BOUILHET (Louis) - FLAUBERT (Gustave). - Lot 61

BOUILHET (Louis) - FLAUBERT (Gustave). Dernières chansons. Posthumous poems by Louis Bouilhet with a preface by Gustave Flaubert. Paris: Michel Lévy frères, 1872. - In-8, 232 x 150: portrait, (2 ff.), 337 pp. printed cover. Dark blue half-maroquin à la Bradel and corners, smooth spine, untrimmed, cover and spine preserved (early 20th century binding). Posthumous first edition illustrated with a frontispiece portrait of the author, etched by Léopold Flameng from a photograph by Georges Mathurin Legé. The edition is prefaced by Gustave Flaubert, a close friend of the author who dedicated his Madame Bovary to him. Bouilhet himself had dedicated his first work, Melaenis, conte romain, to Gustave Flaubert in 1857. It was Bouilhet who inspired Flaubert to write Madame Bovary, based on the story of Delphine Delamare. One of 25 copies on Hollande paper, the only large paper edition, with a second state of the portrait on chine glued before the letter. EDMOND DE GONCOURT'S COPY, BEARING THIS AUTOGRAPH JUSTIFICATION SIGNED BY GUSTAVE FLAUBERT ON THE FALSE TITLE: one of 25 copies on Hollande paper // GFlaubert // to Edmond de Goncourt The latter also added his famous bookplate glued to a sheet of laid paper, on which he wrote in red ink: "exemplaire sur papier de hollande // avec portrait avant la lettre // de Goncourt". A fine, later-bound copy. It was bound in "cartonnage de cuir japonais" when the Goncourt library was sold in 1897. Some minor wear. Cover lined. Provenance: Edmond de Goncourt, with bookplate and autograph note (1897, no. 173). - Raymond Claude-Lafontaine, with bookplate (1923, I, no. 207). - Ronald Davis, with bookplate.