Paul Scarron. Oeuvres de Monsieur Scarron. Amsterdam, 1752.

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"I conquered pain through laughter and playfulness". Scarron in 7 volumes

Original price

€ 500,00

Sale price

€ 250,00

Rare and best Amsterdam edition of Paul Scarron’s Oeuvres, with seven engraved frontispieces including a striking portrait of the author, the most important proponent of burlesque literature in 17th-century France.

Though crippled by illness and chronic pain, Paul Scarron (1610–1660) produced a dazzling body of plays, burlesque verse, satire, and fiction, most famously Le Roman comique. His biting lampoon of Cardinal Mazarin during the Fronde, La Mazarinade, even gave its name to a whole genre.

Scarron’s narrative virtuosity influenced writers from Diderot to Stendhal, and his legacy was celebrated in a posthumous medal with the fitting motto: “I conquered pain through laughter and playfulness.”

This edition is the work of Antoine-Augustin Bruzen de la Martinière (signing as “Eutrapelophile”) and is considered superior to Wetstein’s 1737 ten-volume set. As Magne notes: “La meilleure et la complète des éditions anciennes de ce poète burlesque.”

This set comes from the library of F.L. Fred. Chavannes (1803–1893), a pastor of the Wallonian Church in Amsterdam. A desirable illustrated set, praised as the finest early edition of Scarron’s works.

Title

Paul Scarron.

Oeuvres de Monsieur Scarron. Nouvelle édition. Revue, corrigée, & augmentée de l'Histoire de sa Vie & de ses Ouvrages, d'un Discours sur le Style Burlesque, & de quantité de Piéces omises dans les Editions précédentes.

Amsterdam, Jacobus Wetstein, 1752.

Physical Description

12mo (13 x 7,5 cm). 7 volumes. Title-pages in red and black, each with an engraved vignette, 7 engraved frontispieces, including a portrait, by Folkema after De Bourg and one signed “Paett”, woodcut tailpieces, head- and tailpieces beautifully built up from cast fleurons.

Contemporary half calf, red sprinkled edges. All volumes with name in manuscript on first free endpaper (“F.L. Fred. Chavannes”), volumes one, four and six with longer annotations on first and last blanks. Bindings worn, corners bumped, spines of second, third and fourth volumes damaged, a double leaf in volume two nearly detached. Still an attractive set in good condition.

References

Cohen/De Ricci, col. 945; Magne, Bibliographie générale des œuvres de Scarron, 403; STCN (5 copies only, of which 2 in the Netherlands); cf. Paul Scarron, The comic romance. Translated [and with an afterword] by Jacques Houis. Surrey, Alma classics, 2012.