“There is nothing like looking, if you want to find something. You certainly usually find something, if you look, but it is not always quite the something you were after.” – J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit

PHILADELPHIA — Literary enthusiasts and avid collectors of first editions need not look hard to find items worth seeking in Freeman’s books, maps and manuscripts sale on Thursday, September 28, at 10 am. Leading the literature section of the sale is a first edition, first issue copy of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit, or There and Back, published in London in 1937 by George Allen & Unwin.

With its first state dust jacket (containing the notable misprint “Dodgeson” for “Dodgson”), seven full-page illustrations and map endpapers, this near-fine copy is expected to elicit strong bidder interest.

Complementing Tolkien’s classic is a complete set of A.A. Milne’s Christopher Robin Books with first trade editions of When We Were Very Young (1924), Winnie-The-Pooh (1926), Now We Are Six (1927) and The House at Pooh Corner (1928). Other notable first editions include James Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. (New York: B. W. Huebsch, 1916) and a five-volume set of Charles Dickens’s Christmas Books, which includes a first edition, third issue of Dickens’s beloved classic, A Christmas Carol.

Freeman’s is at 1808 Chestnut Street. Preview continues through Wednesday, September 27, 10 to 5.