VOLTAIRE.

£12,000 · Offered by Peter Harrington · No longer available

Oeuvres Complete. The first complete collection, known as the "Kehl" edition for the small German town in which it was printed to avoid French censorship. After his death, the Société Littéraire Typographique was founded there dedicated to the monumental effort of disseminating Voltaire's work through a definitive, and typographically magnificent, edition.The group of Enlightenment intellectuals ready to champion the author were led by Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, who financed the operation, and the Marquis de Condorcet, who acted as chief editor. For the first time Voltaire's correspondence was published, and commentary and a biography by Cordorcet was added. For the type, Beaumarchais bought John Baskerville's apparatus from his widow. This, coupled with the unprecedented price he paid for the rights, the paper mills he purchased, and the cost of setting up in Kehl bankrupted Beaumarchais. Nevertheless he concluded "Europe will be satisfied".

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