Bibliofemme News
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03/11/2004
J.K. Rowling Book Fetches Auction High
A small leather-bound volume in which Muhammad Ali drew pictures of himself fighting archrival Joe Frazier has sold for $30,000, Sotheby's auctioneers said yesterday.
It was the most expensive item sold at an auction on Monday organised by Tatler magazine that raised a total of $225,000 for a south London charity for the homeless.
Tatler sent two dozen 1-inch-high books bound in leather to celebrities from the worlds of arts, sport and politics and asked them to fill the pages with whatever they liked.
South African casino tycoon Sol Kerzner bought the Ali volume which was a bit bigger than the others as the fighter has Parkinson's disease. Kerzner paid another $17,000 for British artist David Hockney's effort - nine sketches of his native Yorkshire.
Ali fought Frazier in three brutal fights - losing the first but outlasting Frazier in the others.
The second most expensive lot $23,000, was Paul McCartney's book, which contained the handwritten lyrics to Hey Jude. Tatler provided an acrylic-bound volume for the vegetarian former Beatle.
Third was JK Rowling's offering - which included pictures of young wizard Harry Potter's broomstick and wire-rimmed spectacles - at $20,000.
The book by former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, in which she wrote one of her most famous lines: "You turn if you want to; the lady's not for turning" - went for $10,000 to Zac Goldsmith, son of the late businessman Jimmy Goldsmith.
Madonna's US flag and lyrics to the song American Life raised $15,000.
Soccer star David Beckham's effort - a stick drawing of himself kicking the goal against Greece which secured England's qualification for the 2002 World Cup - fetched $5,400, the same as poet Seamus Heaney's.
Other contributions included one from acclaimed scientist Stephen Hawking, who asked a student to write down the formulae for the entropy of black holes, and a short story from John Le Carre featuring his legendary spy George Smiley. Poet TS Eliot's widow Valerie wrote the opening lines of his poem The Wasteland.
