The Bourbon de Rouvre copy with armorial ex-libris and Henri Beraldi (III-1934, n°9)
described as: “Rare and beautiful copy in its period binding”.
Paris, 1830.
Balzac, Honoré de. Physiologie du mariage ou méditations de philosophie éclectique, sur le bonheur et le malheur conjugal. Publiées par un jeune célibataire.
Paris, Levavasseur – Urbain Canel, 1830.
2 volumes in-8° de: (2) ff., pp. (vij)-xxxv, (2) ff., 328 pp. incorrectly paginated 332; 352 pp. Dark green half-calf with corners, ribbed spine adorned with gilt and blind-tooled motifs, marbled edges. Period binding.
203 x 126 mm.
Original edition “rare and sought after” (M. Clouzot) of this insightful and cruel book which can be considered as Balzac’s first personal work.
Carteret, I, p.58 ; Destailleur, 1363.
First printing copy with the pagination error in volume I (p. 332 instead of 328).
Original edition, published anonymously, with an introduction signed H. B … c. It bears on the title page this phrase: Happiness is the end that all societies must aim for.
Starting from some reflections that Napoleon confided to the Council of State during the discussion of the Civil Code, Balzac sees marriage as a carnal adventure, necessarily disappointing, a matter of financial interests, with the main issue being adultery. Close, with its anecdotes, to vaudeville, the work appears as one of the keys to the Human Comedy, where the morality of marriage is the subject of social and political observation not without feminism. Among the numerous anecdotes about the ingenuity and artifices of lovers, Balzac reports, as his own, that of the meditation XXIV of Point de lendemain by Vivant Denon, of which he recalls, on page 204, the account printed in twenty-five copies by Pierre Didot. It is on copy no. 24 that the author took elements for this narration which has the merit of presenting both high instructions to husbands; and to bachelors the depiction of last century’s customs.
At the head of the errata of the second volume, Balzac mocks: To truly understand the meaning of these pages, an honest reader must reread the main passages several times; because the author has put all his thought into it. Remembering his printer’s practice, the writer amused himself by filling pages (207)-210 with a mishmash of letters mostly upside down, forming no intelligible sentence or word and abundantly blotted out with meaningless signs; they are arranged under a chapter title Religions and Confession Considered in Their Relation to Marriage ; followed by La Bruyère’s quip: It is too much against a husband that devotion and gallantry : a woman should choose.
This edition has the particularity of having 4 largely unreadable pages, namely chapter I of the 15th meditation, dealing with “Religions and Confession Considered in Their Relation to Marriage” (pages 207 to 210 of volume 2), made of letters right and upside down, blocks, dashes, parentheses, etc.
“In volume II, Meditation XXV, chapter 1, at the fifth line, pages 207 to 210, there is an incoherent, enigmatic typographic composition, a kind of fantasy in the style of Sterne, which Balzac gives an explanation for on volume II, page 347, full of humor.” (Carteret, I, p.58)
Beautiful copy in period binding, from the prestigious Bourbon de Rouvre and Henri Beraldi libraries. It was bound without the warning leaflet to Readers.
At the Beraldi sale (III – 1934, n°9) its binding was reproduced out of text and it was soberly described: “Rare and beautiful copy in its period binding“.
