La 628-E8

Second edition on ordinary paper.

Bradel binding in half orange cloth, smooth spine very slightly faded decorated with gilt floral motif, double gilt fillet at foot, chocolate shagreen title label, marbled paper boards, original wrappers preserved, contemporary binding.

Precious presentation copy, inscribed by Octave Mirbeau to Jean Ajalbert.

Provenance: Jean Ajalbert’s Japanesque bookplate, in the style of the Nabis, woodcut printed in a very small number of copies and signed with a monogram, probably that of Félicien Rops. “"His bookplate bears all the character of his literature: it is an idealised synthesis of his native Auvergne and of Mount Fuji Japanese horizons,” commented the Archives de la Société des collectionneurs d'exlibris et de reliures artistiques in 1932.

Rops, a major printmaker who was strongly influenced by Japonisme, signed his work with numerous different sets of initials. He used this same “M. B.” monogram for at least one other engraving: the frontispiece to L’Art priapique, published by Poulet-Malassis in 1864. His catalogues raisonnés record very few examples of his bookplates; only one, for Dr Escoube, was included by Exteens in L’Œuvre de Rops, no. 1097.