LES CONFESSIONS

3 volumes. The Edition Intégrale Publiée sur le Texte Autographie Conservé a La Bibliothèque de Genève, avec une Introduction et Suivie de Notes et d'un Index par Ad. Van Bever 8vo, bound in French decorated cloth, the spines with maroon morocco labels gilt lettered. 310; 369; 268 [1] pp. A very nice set, handsome and very well preserved and with little evidence of age or use, a pleasing and quite fine set.

Edizione: a pleasing french edition of rousseau's great autobiography. 'covering the first fifty-three years of rousseau's life, up to 1765, it was completed in 1769, but not published until 1782, four years after rousseau's death, even though rousseau did read excerpts of his manuscript publicly at various salons and other meeting places. <br> rousseau's work is notable as one of the first major autobiographies. prior to the confessions, the two great autobiographies were augustine's own confessions and saint teresa's life of herself. however, both of these works focused on the religious experiences of their authors; the confessions was one of the first autobiographies in which an individual wrote of his own life mainly in terms of his worldly experiences and personal feelings. rousseau recognized the unique nature of his work; it opens with the famous words: "i have resolved on an enterprise which has no precedent and which, once complete, will have no imitator. my purpose is to display to my kind a portrait in every way true to nature, and the man i shall portray will be myself." his example was soon followed: not long after publication, many other writers (such as goethe, wordsworth, stendhal, de quincey, casanova and alfieri) wrote their own autobiographies in a similar fashion.' wiki