Études de Mœurs au XIXe siècle
First edition of the first essay of La Comédie Humaine in uniform binding of the period.
The famous copy bound for the Duchess of Berry, of great purity, with the bookplate of her château de Brunsee.
Eugénie Grandet and Les Illusions perdues appear here for the first time.
Set of 12 octavo volumes, half Havana calf with corners, spines with raised bands decorated, title and volume labels in blue morocco, mottled edges. Period binding made for the Duchess of Berry.
192 x 124 mm.
Balzac, Honoré de. Studies of Manners in the 19thth Century.
Scenes from Private Life, with an introduction… by Félix Davin.
Paris, Madame Charles Déchet, 1834-1835, 4 volumes in octavo.
I/ (2) leaves, 401 pp., (1) table leaf; II/ 361 pp., (3) leaves; III/ (2) leaves, 386 pp., (1) table leaf; IV/ 398 pp., (1) table leaf.
Scenes from Provincial Life.
Paris, Madame Ch. Béchet, 1834-1837, 4 volumes in octavo.
I/ containing Eugénie Grandet: 384 pp., (1) table leaf and (1) blank leaf; II/ (2) leaves, 387 pp., (1) table leaf; III/ (2) leaves, 359 pp.; IV/ (2) leaves, 357 pp., (1) table leaf.
Scenes from Parisian Life.
Paris, Madame Ch. Béchet, 1834-1835, 4 volumes in octavo.
I/ 339 pp.; II/ (2) leaves, 366 pp., (1) table leaf; III/ (2) leaves, 349 pp., (1) table leaf; IV/ 390 pp. (1) table leaf unknown to bibliographers.
First edition of the initial essay of La Comédie Humaine.
Carteret, I, 68-69; Vicaire, I, 196-199; Clouzot, 21.
“This series of 12 volumes of the Studies of manners is very rare today [… ] It is exceedingly rare in fine period bindings” (Carteret).
“The grouping of these 12 volumes forms the first essay of La Comédie Humaine. Increasingly sought after. Even rarer in uniform period bindings than in modern bindings with covers” (Clouzot).
Many novels by Balzac thus appear here in first edition, some under a title different from their final title: notably Eugénie Grandet and the first part of Lost Illusions, but also The Marriage Contract, The Quest of the Absolute, The Abandoned Woman, The Grenadière, The Illustrious Gaudissart, The Old Maid, The Marana Family, Ferragus, The Duchess of Langeais, The Girl with the Golden Eyes.
Precious copy, preserved in its period binding made especially for the private reading cabinet of the Duchess of Berryat Brunsee Castle,of great purity (some minor foxing on volumes 5 and 6, and on 4 or 5 leaves of the remaining ten volumes).
Marie-Caroline-Ferdinande-Louise of Bourbon-Sicily (1798-1870) married on June 17, 1816, the Duke of Berry, second son of the future Charles X, who was assassinated on February 13, 1820. The Duchess of Berry, widowed at 22, attempted in 1832 to incite a legitimist uprising in Vendée which failed; she was imprisoned in the citadel of Blaye; she died on April 17, 1870 at Brunsee Castle in Styria. This princess, with highly developed artistic tastes, had assembled in her château of Rosny a luxurious library remarkable both for the choice of editions and for the richness of the bindings. She later gathered a select reading cabinet of the leading contemporary novels she especially favored in her Austrian retreat at Brunsee: Balzac, Dumas, Sue, etc.
