Fables of La Fontaine.

First Grandville Illustrated Edition in English
Extra-Illustrated With Fifty-Three Engravings,
Thirty-Six in Color

LA FONTAINE, [Jean de]. GRANDVILLE, J.J. Fables of La Fontaine. Illustrated by J.J. Grandville. Translated From the French, by Elizur Wright, Jr. Boston: Elizur Wright, Jr. and Tappan and Dennet; New York: William A. Coleman; London: Edward Moxon: 1841.

First Grandville-illustrated edition in English. Two octavo volumes (9 3/8 x 5 3/4 in; 238 x 147 mm). xlvii, [1, blank], 244, [1, blank]; [4], 339, [1,, blank] pp. Illustrated with sixty Grandville plates from the Fournier first Grandville edition of 1839, fifteen of which have been hand colored especially for this copy, and including Grandville's head- tailpieces, and text vignettes. Extra-illustrated with thirty-six hand colored and seventeen black and white engravings by Massard, Collyer, Schroeder, and others.

Bound in full red crushed Levant morocco by an unknown hand. Double gilt fillets. Five gilt ruled raised bands. Six double gilt bordered compartments. Gilt tooled edge corners. Top edges gilt. Occasional foxing to plate margins. A most attractive, unique and fine copy.

"In these designs, the most popular he ever drew, Grandville presents La Fontaine's beasts acting like men and sometimes costumed like them. Since La Fontaine's poems are a veiled commentary on human behaviour, this formula works to admiration. Even Oudry's drawings [for La Fontaine's Fables] do not always match Grandville"s in psychological penetration, however superior they may be in other respects. Grandville is effective as well with uncostumed animals�" (Gordon Ray, Art of the French illustrated Book, no. 191, p. 270).

Cf. Ray 191. Cf. Carteret II, 357-358.

Price: $0

   (To order this item, or for more information, please call 818-222-4103)