Assessing Condition

The English Reports – a specific issue

Although I have not seen an example of this in a set of English Reports myself,  I understand that in the early days these were not printed on acid free paper.  The effect of this is that the paper goes a light brown slightly burnt colour and brittle.  As one dealer told me “I have bought a set only for it to arrive as though mice had been eating the lot”.

The way to test for this is to fold back a corner of a page – if the corner snaps off then avoid.

Bindings

Please see the rebinding tab for a description of problems with bindings and their causes.

With a set of law reports spanning any significant length of time the bindings may be variable.  Some may look pristine and others be due a rebind.  Since rebinding is so expensive it behoves a purchaser to assess the condition of the books with some care.

For example when I was buying my English Reports,  I asked the vendor (now a very distinguished judge) to send me four numbered volumes which I picked at random.   It was still a bit of a leap of faith but the four I saw showed me the quality of the pages were fine albeit the whole set needed a rebind to make them really usable.  Since at the time they were not available online they were much in demand by my colleagues.

Another way is to go on Zoom, Teams, Skype or Facetime and look at the books with the vendor – asking the vendor to open books on camera and looking at the bindings.

A real problem if you want to use a set of books is that the bindings may have hardened,  although they may still look pristine.   The effect is that when you try to open the book it feels like forcing apart two tightly bound sheets of wood.   Sometimes the book then opens suddenly wide with a resounding crack (which may be the binding going) or it simply will not open wide enough to be read comfortably – I have seen a stunning set to look at (recently rebound in buckram) with this fault and also with classic leather bound set as well.

Gaps

We hope over time to provide checklists of the books there should be in any particular set of law reports.  You can ask the vendor to tick off the volumes he or she has from the list before buying.

We would welcome contributions of check lists.