Personalised First Editions rake in £440,000

Fifty-one first editions, one each from an impressive line-up of award-winning authors, were donated to the 'First Editions, Second Thoughts' charity auction this month at Sotheby's in aid of English Pen. Titles included Bridget Jones by Helen Fielding, Northern Lights by Philip Pullman, The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood, War Horse by Michael Morpurgo, Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel and the list keeps going. Let your jaw drop (or draw job as I just typed...) by taking a look at all 51 lots on English Pen's website.

Each title is thoroughly annotated or illustrated by the writer and together raised £440,000 for the literary association when the auction was held on 21st May.

To give you an idea of what went for what, Roald Dahl's Matilda, which included a number of new drawings by illustrious illustrator Quentin Blake, went for £30,000. Alan Bennett's The Uncommon Reader fetched £11,000 and an annotated edition of Kazuo Ishiguro's novel The Remains of the Day sold for £18,000.

Unsurprisingly, the book everyone is talking about is JK Rowling's Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Rowling had herself made notes on 43 pages of the bestselling novel and provided 22 illustrations. Philip Errington, the Director of Printed Books at Sotheby's, described it as 'the definitive copy of any Harry Potter book' where, Rowling's personality 'leaps from [the] pages and we are treated to a remarkable insight into her creative genius.' Sadly, I do not have £150,000 to my name let alone to bid on such a book, which is what it eventually went for at auction last week.

Minor jealousy ensues but generally, cheesy as it may sound, it's nice to see that books can still touch people enough to part with such large amounts of money, and all for a literary cause. Heart feels warmed.