Racine et Shakspeare

A Paris: Chez Bossange, Delaunay, Mongie & Les Marchands de Nouveautés, 1823. M. de. [Beyle, Henri]. Racine et Shakspeare. [and] No. II. À Paris: Chez Bossange père, DeLaunay, Mongie, [and] Les Marchands De Nouveautes, 1823, 1825.

Very scarce first edition of both volumes. Two octavo volumes in one (8 3/16 x 5 inches; 209 x 127 mm). [1]-55, [1, blank]; [4], [3, advertisements], [1]-103, [1, errata] pp. Half-titles for both volumes.

Bound together in twentieth-century half brown levant morocco over marbled paper boards by Stroobants. Spine decoratively tooled and lettered in gilt. Marbled endpapers. Top-edge gilt, others partially uncut. Red silk page-marker. A few pages trimmed shorter at the fore-edge, but with no loss of text. Some minor marking to back board. A bit of very light foxing. Overall an excellent, near fine copy.

Marie-Henri Beyle, known under his pseudonym, de Stendhal, was born in Grenoble, France in 1783 and died in Paris in 1842. Although employed at various military and government posts throughout his life, his underlying passion for art and literature is expressed in his writings, penned between 1812 and 1839. His peers and contemporaries included Honoré de Balzac, Victor Hugo, and George Sand. Perhaps most famous for his novel, Le Rouge et le Noir (1831), his earlier essays and short works reveal his artistic and literary development. This polemic treatise signaled Stendhal's entry into the struggle between classicism and romanticism. A second essay on Racine and Shakespeare (referred to as 'Shakespeare II') was published in 1825 (of which is also present here).

Ebisch & Schüking, A Shakespeare Bibliography, p. 151; Lalanne, Dictionnaire Historique de la France, p. 284-5; Lanson, Gustave, Manuel Bibliographique de la Litterature Française Moderne, 19078. Not in OCLC, Bibliotheque Nationale de France, or Brunet.

HBS 66771.

$3,500.