Foreign Literature

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This department specialises in rare and important works of French, German, Italian, Russian, Spanish and South American literature from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries.

Here you can find first editions and signed or presentation copies of authors as diverse as Akhmatova, Balzac, Borges, Camus, Chekhov, Dostoevsky, Goethe, Goldoni, Hugo, Kafka, Leopardi, Lorca, Manzoni, Pirandello, Pushkin, Schiller, Tolstoy, Zola, and many others. Among the important works which have passed through our hands are the original working manuscript of Turgenev's Fathers and Sons, now in the Pushkin House in St Petersburg, the only known copy of the first edition of Brecht's first play, Baal (1920) with his working notes, and an extraordinary collection of Pushkin first editions.
  1. AZAÏS, Gabriel, and Charles LABOR.

    Illustrated manuscript volume of poetry,...

    Béziers, c. 1836?

    An attractive presentation volume, with...

    £1750

  2. [BAUDELAIRE, Charles.]

    Hommage à C. F. Denecourt. Fontainebleau....

    Paris, Librairie de L. Hachette & Co., 1855.

    First edition of this anthology compiled...

    £750

  3. BAUDELAIRE, Charles.

    Les Fleurs du mal [from Revue des...

    [Paris, Revue des Deux Mondes, 1855.]

    First appearance in print of any of...

    £950

  4. BECQUE, Henry.

    Les Corbeaux, pièce en quatre actes.

    Paris, Tresse, [1882].

    First and second editions of Becque’s...

    £2000

  5. [BERINGTON, Simon, adapted by Jean-Baptiste DUPUY-DEMPORTES.] 

    Memoires de Gaudence de Luques, prisonnier...

    Amsterdam and Leipzig, Arkstée & Merkus,...

    Second edition of this much expanded...

    £500

  6. [COLETTE.] KELLER, Fernand, and André LAUTIER.

    Colette (Colette Willy), son oeuvre.

    Paris, Éditions de La Nouvelle Revue...

    First edition of this critical work...

    £900

  7. [COLETTE.] ‘WILLY’ [pseud. Henri GAUTHIER-VILLARS].

    ...

    Paris, Nilsson, Per Lamm, [1904].

    First edition of these vignettes of...

    £600

  8. DESENFANS, Noel Joseph.

    Les deux Hermites, dédié a mylord Lyttelton...

    A Londres; chez R. Davis … J Ridley...

    First and only edition, uncommon, of an...

    £650

  9. DUMAS, Alexandre.

    Les trois mousquetaires.

    Paris, Michel Lévy, 1846.

    Rare early edition of The Three Musketeers,...

    £950

  10. DUMAS, Alexandre.

    Autograph letter, signed.

    [Paris, not before 1859.]

    A short note by the novelist and playwright...

    £750

  11. DUMAS, Alexandre, père.

    Maître Adam le Calabrais.

    Paris, Dumont, 1840.

    Rare first authorised edition of an...

    £1200

  12. FRICKER, Bernard.

    Autograph working manuscript of a collection...

    Circa 1946-52.

    An extraordinary, unique production,...

    £6500

  13. GARCÍA LORCA, Federico.

    Chant funèbre pour Ignacio Sanchez Mejias...

    [Paris], GLM, 1938.

    Rare first edition in French of Lorca’s...

    £500

  14. GARCÍA LORCA, Federico.

    Ode à Salvador Dalí. Texte espagnol &...

    [Paris], GLM, [1938].

    First separate edition of Lorca’s Ode...

    £600

  15. GARCIA LORCA, Federico.

    Cinq romances gitanes, texte espagnol et...

    [Paris], GLM, [1939].

    First edition, one of 475 numbered copies,...

    £100

  16. GIONO, Jean.

    Colline.

    Paris, Bernard Grasset, Les Cahiers Verts,...

    First edition of Giono’s first book;...

    £450

  17. GIUSTI, Paolo Emilio.

    Magie. Preface de Jean Royère.

    Paris, Albert Messein, 1938.

    First edition of a rare work of verse...

    £350

  18. GOGOL’, Nikolai Vasil’evich, and Louis VIARDOT (translator).

    Tarass Boulba… traduit du russe par Louis...

    Paris, Librairie de L. Hachette et Cie, 1853.

    First separate appearance of Gogol’s...

    £250

  19. GUMILEV, Nikolai Stepanovich, translator. GAUTIER, Théophile.

    Emali i kamei [Émaux et camées].

    [St Petersburg, M. V. Popov, 1914.]

    First edition, very rare: Gumilev’s first...

    £850

  20. [HERISSANT, Louis Théodore].

    Le fablier françois, ou élite des meilleurs...

    Paris, Lottin le jeune, 1771.

    First edition, rare, of what has a claim...

    £650