LOUŸS, Pierre; EGAN, Beresford (illus.)

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Cyprian Masques. First edition, first impression, in the scarce dust jacket, number 80 of 1,275 copies; the first 75 copies were printed on heavy unbleached handmade paper, with the rest printed on Kelmscott handmade paper.Pierre Louÿs, known for his erotic, lesbian, and classical themes, wrote these decadent sketches under the guise of translating the works of Lucian; Louÿs foreword, in which he outlines the circumstances surrounding his "translation" and Lucian's historical contexts, lends credence to this premise. The Deco artist Beresford Egan was a prolific illustrator of erotic works, and Louÿs's "highly conflicted and ambivalent sexual politics clearly serve[d] as a highly useful framework for understanding Egan's brand of post-Victorian Decadent eroticism" (Mahoney, p. 182).The Fortune Press specialized in gay erotica, and was founded by Reginald Caton in 1924; a decade later, Caton was prosecuted and found guilty for publishing obscene works.

• Printing: first

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