Je Ne Sçais Quoi Par Je Ne Sçais Qui. Prix. Je ne sçais combien. Imprimé, je ne sçais quand; Se Vend, Je ne sçais où. Chez Je ne sçais qui est-ce.
s.l., s.n. 1780.
12mo (116 x 74 mm.. 124p.
Contemporary mottled sheep (rubbed, slightly stained), flat spine and label gilt, red edges.
Only Edition. His first book is as amusing as its title. This mix of prose and verse scalds current literary fashion — fluffy theatrical pastorals, labored sonnets and odes, grossly flattering dedications (and grossly flattered dedicatees), rigid prosody, chic vocabulary (gilgalins, s’enmistoufleront, etc.), failed imitations of classical writers (he challenges Horace to a poetry duel), frothy love poems and letters…. In addition to his fellow writers, he skewers publishers, reviewers and members of the Académie Française. The ninety-three footnotes serve as running satirical commentary on his own compositions as well as on those he openly mocks, and the index gives the number of each piece’s footnotes. A hoot which I read much with pleasure. Two institutional copies in the U.S. Modest, trimmed close with loss of some page numbers, two pages with minor stain, lower margin of the final two leaves folded up to preserve the footnotes.
¶Gay, Bibliographie des ouvrages relatifs à l’amour II: 701 (not seen, “1783”); Barbier, Dictionnaire des ouvrages anonymes II: 983 (“1783”); Conlon, Le Siècle des Lumières 80: 1372; Cioranescu 42234.
Price: $1,350.00