Deep Cuts is your monthly digest tracking the hottest and most high-value collectibles entering the market—from rare cultural artifacts to headline-grabbing sales. 

After decades hidden away in a book, a sheet of typed lyrics by Bob Dylan has reemerged on the block at the U.K.-based Omega Auctions. It is expected to bring in £20,000–£40,000 ($27,000–$54,000) when it sells on April 21. 

The lined document, with a torn bottom edge, holds the draft lyrics for Dylan’s “I’m Not There,” written in 1956 and recorded with The Band around 1967. An elusive track, it was only released in 2007, as part of the soundtrack for the Todd Haynes biopic I’m Not There, and later on the 2014 compilation The Bootleg Series Vol. 11: The Basement Tapes Complete. 

Bob Dylan’s typewritten working lyrics for “I’m Not There” (1956). Photo courtesy of Omega Auctions.

The lyric sheet has also taken its time resurfacing. It has spent nearly 60 years tucked away in a first-edition paperback of Allen Ginsberg’s 1968 poem Ankor Wat. The book was gifted by the poet to Sally Grossman, wife of Dylan’s one-time manager Albert Grossman (that’s her on the cover of Dylan’s Bringing It All Back Home from 1965). 

After Grossman’s death in 2021, the volume, as well as others in her estate, wound up with a book dealer. This said consignor was leafing through the paperback one day when Dylan’s typed lyrics fell out, according to the auction house.

“After discussions with notable Dylan collectors,” the lot’s description reads, “it is believed that this is an extremely rare working lyric draft of what is regarded as one of Dylan’s greatest pieces of songwriting.”

Detail of Bob Dylan’s typewritten working lyrics for “I’m Not There” (1956). Photo courtesy of Omega Auctions.

The document might indeed thrill Dylanophiles who have spent years deciphering the words to “I’m Not There,” relying only on a scanned version of original typescript, which was printed in the Dylan fan magazine The Telegraph in 1990. According to an editor’s note in the publication, the image, which does reproduce the lyric sheet, was provided by “an anonymous correspondent.”

Dylan’s lyrical corpus has logged a stunning track record on the market. Just last year saw his typewritten drafts for “Mr. Tambourine Man” (1965) sell for more than $500,000 via Julien’s Auctions. His handwritten lyrics have fetched far higher sums—from the $2 million forked out for the only known draft of his 1965 hit “Like a Rolling Stone” at Sotheby’s in 2014, to the $2.5 million paid for the pencil-scrawled words to his 1964 folk anthem “The Times They Are A-Changin’,” which sold at Christie’s in March.

Also on the Market

Stephen Curry. Photo courtesy of Sotheby’s.

– Memorabilia: Stephen Curry is putting more than 70 pairs of his game-worn sneakers up for sale to benefit the Eat. Learn. Play. Foundation. Through April 28, Sotheby’s is auctioning off these kicks, mostly by Nike and Adidas, hailing from the point guard’s period of free agency in 2025, when he donned a different pair of sneakers in nearly every game. Bidding is now up to $65,000 for a pair of 2010 Nike Hyperdunks.

– Memorabilia: Happy Star Wars Day to all who celebrate. This May 4, Heritage Auctions is hosting its third themed auction celebrating the beloved franchise, featuring art, props, and comics related to the films. The star lot? A large-scale replica of the Millennium Falcon, hand-crafted with period-authentic techniques used by Industrial Light & Magic, that is now bidding from $110,000.

– Rare Autographs: It’s no ordinary Hermann Struck etching that RR Auction is currently selling. The German artist’s ca. 1920 portrait of Albert Einstein has actually been signed by the celebrated physicist with the phrase “Per aspera ad astra,” Latin for “through hardships to the stars.” Bidding for the lot, now at $3,803, closes on April 23.

Elvis Presley’s Hagstrom Electric Guitar, 1968. Photo courtesy of Sotheby’s.

– Memorabilia: On the heels of Christie’s blockbuster guitar jackpot, Sotheby’s is offering two legendary axes. Up for grabs at the house’s inaugural Rock & Pop sale is Noel Gallagher’s Epiphone EJ-200 acoustic guitar, on which he composed songs for Oasis’s 1995 album (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? (estimate: $60,000–$80,000); and Elvis Presley’s Hagstrom Viking II electric guitar, which he wielded at his 1968 comeback special ($1 million–$2 million). The auction runs April 9–23.

– Memorabilia: Just because the adventures of Carrie Bradshaw and crew have concluded, that doesn’t mean you can’t still live with (or as?) these beloved characters. Through May 1, Julien’s Auctions is bringing more than 500 artifacts from the set of And Just Like That… to the block, where you can snag fashions, furnishings, and even the replica Rolex Carrie gifted to Mr. Big.

Billy The Kid (Henry McCarty) original photograph. Photo courtesy of Lee Fox Auctions.

– Rare Photographs: Two rare, original photographs of American outlaw Billy the Kid are up for sale at Lee Fox Auctions on April 25. The images, depicting Billy as a boy and a young adult, were taken between 1863–1867 in Philadelphia, where his mother Catherine McCarty resided, according to the New Jersey-based auctioneer. Fox has high hopes that the lots could soar past the $2.3 million that William I. Koch paid for an authenticated photo of Billy in 2011.

The Top Lot

Letter fragment signed by Mary Anning. Photo courtesy of Bonhams.

Letters written by paleontologist Mary Anning rarely come to market. So, when one surfaced at Bonhams in March, the Lyme Regis Museum in Dorset, the U.K., was eager to acquire this rare window into the life of its local hero. Following a crowdfunding campaign, the museum raised £12,000 ($16,200) to secure the lot, which will go on view in its Geology Gallery in June.

The 19th-century document is actually a fragment containing six lines and her signature, its recipient unknown. Still, its contents are revealing and surprising, with Anning, then-known for her fossil hunting practice, protesting that she is “worn out” and “the name of fossils makes me sick with its concominants [sic]…” 

Portrait of Mary Anning by unknown artist, before 1842. Photo: public domain.

While Anning is known for her game-changing discoveries of Jurassic-era remains along the Lyme Regis coast (she sold them in her small shop, Anning’s Fossil Depot), she often found herself rejected and slighted by a male-dominated field, according to the auction listing. This frustration possibly manifested in the letter, as it did in Charles Dickens’s 1865 article on Anning, in which he noted: “She says the world has used me so unkindly, I fear it has made me suspicious of everyone.”

The artifact, then, represents a tantalizing glimpse into Anning’s private musings, about which little is known. “The letter provides a unique and personal insight into Mary’s life,” the Lyme Regis Museum director Bridget Houseago said in a statement, “and it is vital that such rare and fragile items are cared for within a public collection, where they can be accessible to all.”