Anne of Green Gables first edition sells for $28K

A first edition, first printing of the P.E.I. classic Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery has sold at auction for $21,250 USD, or $28,836 Cdn.

The hardcover was published in Boston by L.C. Page & Company in April 1908, and went under the auctioneer's hammer in New York byBonhamsas part of a fine books and manuscripts auction that also included an 1899 copy ofBramStoker's Dracula and the signatures of George Washington, Virginia Woolf and John Hancock.

There is no word on whom the buyers or sellers were.

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The price exceeds the $27,140 Cdn. fetched by a previous first edition, first printing of Anne in beige by Bonhams back in in 2012, and the $14,400 brought by a brown copy in San Francisco in April of this year.

The online listing included a photo of the book in what appears to be very good condition, and describes it as the original mint green cloth with gilt titles, pictorial label, and custom morocco slipcase.

"An unusually fine copy, in desirable light green cloth, of an enduring classic of juvenile literature," the listing said.

"Montgomery's first novel was an instant success scarcely two weeks after its being registered with the copyright office, Page announced a second printing, and Montgomery later reported that the novel received 66 reviews in the first five months. By 1914, it was into its 38th impression."

It saidthe book has a few pale foxmarks or brown spots on some pages and a bit of wear on the bottom of the spine, but is "overall very fine."

The popular work of fiction was by no means the highest bid in Wednesday's sale. That distinction went to an autographed manuscript by Albert Einstein which sold for nearly half a million Canadian dollars.