”VN was well-known for refusing to sign copies of his books for people he didn’t have a personal relationship with. For instance, on 3 October 1958 (see Vladimir Nabokov: Selected Letters 1940-1977, p. 265), Véra Nabokov wrote to Anita Loos:

My husband asks me to tell you that he was glad to autograph Lolita for you. What comes now is a little embarrassing: he has been autographing Lolita only for personal friends and the very few writers whose work he admires. He has refused his autograph to so many of his own students and to so many of his acquaintances that it would be impossible for him to make an exception in the case of young MacArthur…

That is why there are relatively few VN-inscribed books on the market. And the few that do make it there are very expensive.

Well, where there’s a want and money can be made by responding to it, you can be sure that someone will come along with the goods. And that is just what has been happening on eBay. In the past five years or so I’ve seen up to a dozen frauds, mostly from Australia.

In fact today (15 April), I see that an eBay seller, “books4charities-2008”, in this case out of Los Angeles, has just listed a signed copy of the 1968 McGraw-Hill King, Queen, Knave. It looks very suspicious for many reasons:

• It is not inscribed to a person. It is just a signature and date (May 1971). VN certainly did that sometimes, but it is unusual, especially later in his life.
• The signature itself looks gnarled and doesn’t have the flow of legitimate VN signatures I’ve seen.
• The seller’s other current auction books are all signed—a sign of a serial forger.
• The starting price is low—$95—and the “Buy It Now” price is much, much too low at $249.99. A legitimate signed VN should be offered on eBay for at least five times that amount.
• The seller offers no provenance for the book. (Since VN usually addressed his inscriptions to specific individuals, the provenance of his inscribed books is relatively easy to trace.)
• The seller hasn’t done his homework: He doesn’t list the printing or describe the condition of the book.
• Though this auction is not marked “private”, each of the previous auctions by this seller was private and I cannot see what he has sold in the past. Sellers of other fakes often try to restrict information.
  
• I check eBay every day and I noticed the listing just this morning. Yet the end time is 5:15pm PDT today. A common listing, especially for what would normally be an expensive book, is a week and gives potential buyers time to think about the item and ask questions and get answers before committing themselves. Here, it’s hit-and-run: List it, grab the money, and run.
• And I don’t believe the philanthropic implication of the seller’s ID.
  

Conclusion: This smells very strongly of fraudulence; it is a knowingly fake VN-inscribed book.

I would like to hear of others’ experiences with inscribed—real and fraudulent—VN books.