An auction featuring items once belonging to the late Leonard Cohen has been announced to take place next month.
Entitled “Leonard Cohen: The Collections of Aviva Layton, Anjani Thomas & More,” the auction is set to take place on February 28 in Los Angeles via Julien’s Auction. The lot is comprised of 164 items, with the majority of them coming from the collections of Cohen’s longtime friend Aviva Layton and romantic and creative partner Anjani Thomas.
Among the items in the collection set to go under the hammer are various typed and handwritten works by Cohen including lyrics, letters, poems, postcards and manuscripts. Those items are expected to be bought for prices within the low thousands. One of the more impressive pieces that is included in the lot is one of the legendary musician’s personal notebooks from 2007 which features 76 pages of notes, poems, and drafts of lyrics. The notebook is expected to sell within the $10,000 – $15,000 (£8,000-12,000).
“Perhaps the most unusual item is the notebook we shared containing snippets of Leonard’s verses in the works, a poem for me, and a list of our bets and debts,” Thomas said (via Billboard).
She continued: “We used to bet on any number of things and the stakes were ridiculously high but I never collected on them. We’d bet on things like whether or not Phil Spector would go to jail, and I said he would. This is the only notebook of Leonard’s in private hands outside of the Cohen Family Trust Archives, and I imagine those will never be available for purchase.”
Other pieces in the lot include the ‘Hallelujah’ hitmaker’s Greek Fisherman’s “magic writing” cap which he would sport during his time spent in Greece back in the 60s. Another peculiar piece featured in the collection is a tiny locket which contains a piece of Cohen’s hair inside. The locket’s bit will start at $25 (£20) and is estimated to sell for $400 – $600 (£322-£483).
Speaking to Rolling Stone, Layton opened up about the Fisherman’s cap and said: “Leonard was wearing his cap and Irving [Layton, her ex-husband] said, ‘I write poetry, but I’d like to write songs and make tons of money like you. And Leonard said, ‘I’ve got this cap, it’s a magic cap. I’ve written all my early songs wearing this cap. I’m going to give it to you and you’ll be able to write songs and make a lot of money too.’ Unfortunately, it only seemed to work for Leonard.”
Speaking about the locket with a piece of Cohen’s hair in it, Thomas said: “We were cutting his [Leonard’s] hair one day, and he had just given me this locket for my birthday, and I thought it was a traditional thing to put a snippet of hair in a locket. It’s a very olden-times custom.”
You can browse the items in the auction and register to bid here. Thomas has urged any Cohen fans to act quickly and explained to the publication that “The [official Cohen] archives vacuumed up anything that came in the market rather quickly. So there isn’t a lot available, nor will there be. So this is one of those once-in-a-lifetime opportunities.”
In other news, fans have been sharing Marianne Faithfull’s final live performance which featured a cover of Cohen’s track ‘Tower Of Song’.
The post Leonard Cohen’s notes, hats and even his hair are going up for auction appeared first on NME.