Beschreibung:

MIRABEAU, Honoré-Gabriel Riqueti de (1749-1791).] Le Libertin de qualité, ou confidences d’un prisonnier au chateau de Vincennes. Ecrites par lui-même. Avec figures . ‘Stamboul’: De l’Imprimerie des Odalisques, 1784.
MIRABEAU, Honoré-Gabriel Riqueti de (1749-1791).] Le Libertin de qualité, ou confidences d’un prisonnier au chateau de Vincennes. Ecrites par lui-même. Avec figures . ‘Stamboul’: De l’Imprimerie des Odalisques, 1784. 8° (183 x 117mm, with deckle edges); [3]ff., 317pp., [1]f. [binder’s instructions]. All the text printed within ornamental borders. Eight engraved plates including the frontispiece. (Frontispiece re-margined, title margins soiled, repaired tear in G8, occasional marginal spotting.) Later boards marbled in blue and orange, flat spine with a leather label lettered in gilt (corners rubbed, endpapers possibly renewed). THE FIRST OBTAINABLE ILLUSTRATED EDITION under this title, first published the previous year as Ma Conversion . That first edition is very rare: RBH and Auction.fr record no copy having been offered at auction. An edition dated 1783 is known, and sometimes described as a second edition, but it was issued without the illustrations. The present edition uses the engravings of the first edition, with the frontispiece corrected to show the new title and date. This edition is also rare; RBH records only two copies: the Nordmann copy, and the copy offered in the Libertine Literature auction in 1971. This classic in the genre is typically attributed to Mirabeau, who is said to have written it around 1780 while imprisoned in the dungeon at Vincennes. It quickly became one of the most reprinted erotic works of its time. Dutel lists another edition with this title also dated 1784 (in Arabic numerals instead of Roman), but that may be a ghost: Dutel does not illustrate it and simply quotes Cohen-de Ricci. Dutel A-640; Pia 801; Nordmann II, 369; Private Case 1199.