Jacques le Fataliste et son maître
“One never knows what the heavens want or do not want, and perhaps they themselves don’t even know.”
First edition of Jacques the Fatalist.
Attractive copy, untrimmed, preserved in its original waiting wrappers.
2 volumes in-8 of I/ (2) ff., XXII [23-286] pp.; II/ (2) ff., 320 pp.
Blue waiting wrappers, untrimmed copy, some foxing, marginal damp stain.
210 x 135 mm.
Diderot, Denis. Jacques le Fataliste et son maître. Par Diderot.
Paris, Buisson, An cinquième de la République (1796).
First edition of Diderot's famous philosophical tale.
Tchémerzine, II, 965; Adams, Bibliographie des œuvres de Diderot, JF 1; Bibliothèque Royale Albert 1er, Diderot et son temps, no. 146 (for an edition of 1797), p. 227.
A counterfeit sometimes presented as a first issue can be recognized by the title Jacques La Fataliste.
In 1765, Diderot sought to sell his library to provide a dowry for his daughter. Empress Catherine II of Russia bought it but allowed him to keep it for the rest of his life.
Invited to Saint Petersburg, Diderot undertook the journey at the age of 60 in 1773. Barely underway, he began writing this novel; he stayed five months at the Russian court and completed Jacques the Fatalist during this stay in Russia.
Like most of Diderot's works, this novel was not published during his lifetime.
“In ‘Jacques the Fatalist’, Diderot addresses, in a seemingly casual way and through the use of dialogue, the problem of freedom”.
“Like ‘Rameau’s Nephew’, ‘Jacques the Fatalist’ is a long dialogue, but this dialogue contains all kinds of adventures, stories, and extremely varied digressions.
This novel, completely original and strange in its presentation and spirit, is reminiscent of a number of 18th-century novels: from Lesage’s ‘Le Diable boiteux’ to Voltaire’s ‘Candide’ and Sterne’s ‘The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy’. Diderot himself acknowledged that Sterne’s work was his main source. The earthiness of many scenes, the freedom of the language, and the liveliness of the narration also reveal the influence of Rabelais, of whom Diderot was always an ardent admirer. And Jacques, in some respects, resembles Panurge.
Nevertheless, the work remains one of the most original in all French literature, precisely because of its apparent flaws—which are deliberate, carefully planned—through the interweaving of its episodes, the density of subjects, and the variety of digressions, which renew the interest from page to page. It is certainly one of the works where Diderot’s vigorous, paradoxical, generous, and often brilliant temperament is most openly revealed” (Dictionnaire des Œuvres).
“This first edition contains no illustrations. Some copies have them. They were added.”
Attractive copy, large-margined, preserved in its original wrappers.
Provenance: Queruau-Lamerie (ex-libris).
