Edmond de Goncourt. [Texte de Paul Verlaine. Dessin de Coll-Toc, pseud.]

Paris: Librairie Vanier, 1886   ¶ FIRST EDITION, and in fact the only separate edition, of Verlaine's sketch of the elder Goncourt, novelist, diarist, and legendary testator whose famous will established the Prix Goncourt and gave heart to auctioneers everywhere: It is my wish, he wrote, that my drawings, my prints, my curiosities, my books--in short, these works of art which have been the delight of my life--shall not be consigned to the cold tomb of a museum and subjected to the stupid glance of the careless passerby. Instead I require that they should be dispersed under the auctioneer's hammer, so that the pleasure I have had in acquiring every one of them shall be given again, in every case, to some inheritor of my tastes.   ¶ Verlaine's essay is enlivened here by a striking full-page caricature of Goncourt in his library, listing his novels while six fat volumes of "Souvenirs" are strewn behind him: The bust over his shoulder represents his late brother and collaborator Jules de Goncourt (1830-1870). (Series: Les hommes d'aujourd'hui, no. 274.)   ||| Collation: 291 x 199 mm: Two leaves, paginated [1-4] (ie, not paginated).  Illustration: Wood-engraved caricature 198 x 153 mm after "Coll-Toc" (ie, Collignon and Tocqueville) by Rougeron-Vignerot, signed in the block lower left and by Rougeron-Vignerot lower right, printed in black and HAND-COLORED au pochoir, AS ISSUED.  Binding: (A bifolium loose as issued, never bound.)  Condition: Slightly foxed, withal A FINE COPY of a scarce and fragile pamphlet.  References: Vicaire vii 1002; Carteret ii 425; Montel 127; Van Bever 32, 116; Verlaine/Borel (1992-93) ii 1344-46, 1503; Fischer/Galantaris 63n.   ||| For further details please contact Jay Dillon  Rare Books + Manuscripts, as below. .