ALEMÁN (Mateo). Lot n° 38

Le Gueux, ou la Vie de Guzman d'Alfarache, image de la vie humaine, en laquelle toutes les fourbes et meschancetez qui se pratiquent dans le monde sont plaisamment et utilement descouvertes. Paris, Denis Houssaye, 1638-1639. 2 parts in one volume in-8, jansenist red morocco, interior lace, gilt edges (Darlaud). Rare Parisian edition of the French translation of Jean Chapelain (1595-1674), the author of La Pucelle, originally published in 1619-1620 in Paris and reprinted in 1630 in Lyon, in 1632 in Paris and in 1633 in Rouen. The second part is, as always, entitled The Thief, or the Life of Guzman d'Alfarache, with, in this case, the name of the author but not of the publisher and the mention Last edition. A masterpiece of the Spanish picaresque novel, Guzmán de Alfarache by Mateo Alemán (1547-1614) was published in two parts, in Madrid in 1599 and in Lisbon in 1604. Only the publication of Don Quixote by Cervantes, Alemán's exact contemporary, in 1605, was to block the way to the immense literary fortune of this picaresque novel, of which there were no less than twenty-six editions in five years. A very fine copy in red jansenist morocco established by Darlaud. Insignificant rubbing to the spines. Palau, n°6746 - Collas, Jean Chapelain, 1912, pp. 501-502.