Paris, Imprimerie de Didot Jeune chez Didot, Née de La Rochelle et de Senne, 1792.
5 volumes 20mo of: I/ (2) ll., 1 frontispiece, xxxvi pp., 1 folding plate, 648 pp.; II/ (2) ll., 3 folding plates, 652 pp. misnumbered 625; III/ (2) ll., 595 pp.; IV/ (2) ll., lxxxviii pp., 532 pp.; V/ (2) ll., xxxiv pp., (1) l., 411 pp.; and lvi pp., 72 pp., (1) l. for La Chaumière indienne. Red morocco, frame of fillets, pearled, dotted, wavy lines, flat spines decorated with lozenge-shaped compartments and large fleurons, decorated edges, blue tabis endpapers and liners. Contemporary binding.
168 x 98 mm.
Revised and corrected edition by Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, partly original, including Paul et Virginie in volume IV, les Vœux d’un solitaire, and the philosophical tales du Café de Surate and de La Chaumière indienne in volume V.
Volume 5 is here in its original edition.
It is adorned with a frontispiece, drawn by Moreau and engraved by Simonet, a folding map of the Atlantic hemisphere and 3 botanical engravings.
The success of the Études, which saw many re-editions, brought the author—after twenty years of poverty and wandering—material comfort, social recognition, and even a reputation as a scholar which, rightly or wrongly, posterity has scarcely upheld. The title should not be misleading: more than a didactic treatise, the work is closer to an essay, even a form of personal literature: “Descriptions, conjectures, insights, views, objections, doubts, and even my ignorances, I have gathered everything: and I gave these ruins the name of Études, like a painter to the studies for a great painting he could not complete.”
Surpassing the descriptive science of their time, the Études thus foreshadow new disciplines such as ethology or ecology. But their interest is also literary. One finds analyses of great acuity on the sensual feeling of melancholy and the slightly morbid pleasure dispensed by ruins and tombs, as well as splendid landscape descriptions—among the first in French literature—at once precise, colorful, and imbued with a panicked sense of the power of nature, which, while aligning with the vogue of the “descriptive genre” of the late century, also anticipates Chateaubriand.
Bernardin delivers his Avis on this edition:
“The first edition of this work, which appeared in December 1784, was almost sold out by December 1785. Since its publication, I have only had reason to be grateful for the honorable tokens of friendship I have received from people of all ranks and of both sexes, most of whom are unknown to me. Some have come to see me, and others have written the most touching letters to thank me for my book; as if, by offering it to the public, I had rendered them some personal service. Several among them invited me to their châteaux, to live in the countryside where, they told me, I would love to be. Yes, no doubt I would love the countryside—but my own countryside, not that of others. I responded as best I could to such pleasant offers of service, of which I accepted only the goodwill. Goodwill is the flower of friendship; and its perfume lasts forever, when one leaves it on the stem without plucking it.”
As for the edition, he rightly considers it the best:
“For a long time, lovers of Letters and Bibliographers have desired an edition of the ‘Études de la Nature’ in a convenient, portable format, and at the same time pleasing for a library; the one we offer today combines all these advantages. It has been very carefully revised by the author; special care has been given to proofreading and to the typographic quality.”
Fine copy.
Provenance: Russian library stamp on the half-titles, same provenance punch mark on the plates.
