SEVIGNE: Lettres de Madame de Sévigné à sa fille et à ses am - Lot 29

SEVIGNE: Lettres de Madame de Sévigné à sa fille et à ses amis. Nouvelle édition, mise dans un meilleur ordre ; enrichie d'éclaircissements et de notes historiques ; augmentée de lettres, fragments, notices sur Madame de Sévigné et sur ses amis ; éloges et autres morceaux inédits ou peu connus, tant en prose qu'en vers. By Ph.-A. Grouvelle. Paris, Bossange, Masson et Besson, 1806. 8 volumes in-8 in contemporary shagreened calf, smooth ornate spine, gilt roulette on covers, gilt edges (epidermis on spine of volume 7). Two engraved portraits and a facsimile. Largely an original edition, and the first in chronological order." The most complete and best editions of Mme de Sévigné are those of the 19th century". Tchemerzine, V, 829.to the letters printed in the previous editions, Grouvelle has added others: those of Madame de Grignan and the Marquis de Sévigné. Those of Bussy-Rabutin, de Coulanges and Corbinelli form, through the differences in their style, piquant contrasts and a pleasant variety.The idea of classifying all the Lettres indistinctly in the order of the dates on which they were written, which until then had formed as many separate collections as there were individual correspondences, is a very happy one; it removes the gaps where, during the reunion of mother and daughter, they were totally lost to view; but by this means, from the age of 22 to the moment of her death (for we have collected her last, which the editor ingeniously calls the swan song), we follow every moment of this interesting woman, and the collection of her Letters becomes almost the story of her life. A fine copy, despite spotting on the spine of volume 7.