FLAUBERT, Gustave.

£15,000 · Offered by Peter Harrington · No longer available

Madame Bovary. First edition, first issue, in the original wrappers. Flaubert's debut novel is considered "the principal masterpiece of realism and the work that established the realist movement on the European scene" (Ency. Brit.).Despite La Revue de Paris excising explicit passages upon serializing the work in 1856, they were immediately sued for "outrage aux bonnes moeurs" and Flaubert appeared before the court on 7 February 1857. He was found not guilty, and after publication resumed, the author dedicated the novel to his attorney Maitre Sénard. The scandal assured the book's instant fame. Sainte-Beuve, the most influential critic of the time, famously wrote a lengthy review praising Flaubert's power as a narrator but also criticising the lack of a moral touchstone in the story. Flaubert replied by letter: "This book is for me a matter of pure art and set purpose. Nothing more. It will be a long time before I attempt anything like it again. It was physically painful to write. Henceforth I wish to live... in less nauseating milieus". The first issue has the dedicatee's name misspelt "Senart" and continuous pagination between the volumes.

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