ORIGINAL ETCHINGS & LITHOGRAPHS. Contes Pour les Bibliophiles by Uzanne, Octave and Robida, Albert - 1895

Paris: Ancienne Maison Quantin, Librairies-Imprimeries Reunis, 1895. First printing.

LIMITED FRENCH EDITION SUMPTUOUS COLLECTION OF STORIES ILLUSTRATED WITH ORIGINAL ETCHINGS, LITHOGRAPHS, AND PHOTOGRAVURES INCLUDES "THE END OF BOOKS"--PREDICTING TODAY'S eBOOKS AND AUDIOBOOKS.

12 inches tall hardcover, 3/4 green pebbled leather binding, gilt rules, marbled paper covered boards, decorative gilt title to spine, marbled endpapers, 2x2.5 inch photographic bookplate to front free endpaper, "Ex. Lib. E. C. 1895," original art deco color lithographed paper covers by Auriol bound in, title page with hand colored vignette by Robida and facing limitation notice (volume 467 of 1000 printed on Japanese vellum), iv, 230 pp, colophon (printed on presses of the former Quantin, Paris, November 27, 1894). 17 plates (comprising 2 original etchings by Robida and 15 photogravures or lithographs including 4 handcolored), 170 figures in text. Wear to cover edges and corners, binding tight, light browning to pages, text and plates unmarked, bright and clean with tissue guards intact. Very good in custom archival mylar cover. CONTENTS: Un Almanach des Muses de 1789; L'Heritage Sigismond; Le Bibliothecaire van der Boecken, de Rotterdam; Un Roman de chevalerie franco-japonais; Les Romantiques inconnus; Le Carnet de notes de Napoleon 1er; La Fin des Livres; Poudriere et bibliotheque; L'Enfer du chevalier de Kerhany; Les Estrennes du poete Scarron; Histoires de Momies (recits authentiques).

OCTAVE UZANNE (181-1931) was a 19th-century French bibliophile, writer, publisher, and journalist. He founded the Société des Bibliophiles Contemporaines, of which he was president. In the early 1890s, Uzanne was considered to be "... the best authority that book lovers know on subjects specially interesting to book lovers". In contrast to most bibliophiles of his time, Uzanne was chiefly interested in the creation of new, luxurious bibliophile works, collaborating closely with printers, binders, typographers and artists (especially the Symbolists and early Art Nouveau artists). Among them were such painters as James McNeill Whistler, Adolphe Lalauze and Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly. Uzanne's bibliophile activity in the early 1880s coincided with the gradual abandonment of manual methods of printing illustrations kin favour of photomechanized methods. As a journalist, sometimes employing the pseudonym "la Cagoule", Uzanne wrote for L'Écho de Paris, Le Gaulois and other newspapers. In addition, for other French and foreign magazines like The Studio, Magazine of Art, and Scribner's Magazine, for which he wrote in 1894 an article, "The End of Books", which he thought would come because of the rise of phonography, where he predicted the rise of radio and television. The original illustrated La fin des Livres is included in Contes des Bibliophiles offered here. Uzanne was fascinated by modern technology and the possibilities it offered for the reproduction and dissemination of words, sounds, and images, which was evidenced not only in that article or in his groundbreaking work in book publishing, but also in an article he wrote in 1893 for the French newspaper Le Figaro, about a visit he made to US President Grover Cleveland and the inventor Thomas Edison during the EXPO Chicago 1893, where he witnessed the Kinetograph shortly before it went public. Contes Pour les Bibliophiles (offered here) was translated into English as Tales for bibliophiles, Chicago, The Caxton Club, 1929.

ALBERT ROBIDA (1848-1926) was a French illustrator, etcher, lithographer, caricaturist, and novelist. He edited and published La Caricature magazine for 12 years. Through the 1880s, he wrote an acclaimed trilogy of futuristic novels. These works drew comparison with Jules Verne. Unlike Verne, he proposed inventions integrated into everyday life, not creations of mad scientists, and he imagined the social developments that arose from them, often with accuracy: social advancement of women, mass tourism, pollution, etc. His La Guerre au vingtième siècle describes modern warfare, with robotic missiles and poison gas. His Téléphonoscope was a flat screen television display that delivered the latest news 24-hours a day, the latest plays, courses, and teleconferences.

GEORGE AURIOL (1863-1938) was a French poet, songwriter, graphic designer, type designer, and Art Nouveau artist. He worked in many media and created illustrations for the covers of magazines, books, and sheet music.