Lydie, ou les Mariages Manqués, conte moral. Par Mme. J. Simons Cand.lle, auteur de Catherine ou la Belle Fermière. by CANDEILLE (Amélie Julie)

Paris, chez Barba, 1809. 2 volumes, 12mo. 2 leaves. 239 pages. 1 leaf. + 2 leaves. 191 pages. (i.e. 195). Half calfskin, smooth spine decorated (period binding). First Edition. First novel by musician, actress and woman of letters Julie Candeille (1767-1834), who was one of the great female celebrities of the performing arts and letters of her time. Produced on stage from an early age by her musician parents, she was quickly put in touch with the fashionable Paris of the Ancien Régime and took her first steps on the stage with mixed success, despite her unanimously celebrated beauty. It was after the advent of the French Revolution, to which she was favourable, that she obtained her greatest successes. A friend of Olympe de Gouges, she played the role of Mirza in the latter's play about the denunciation of slavery. The present book, which is her first novel, describing the "failed marriages" of a young beauty, is interesting in several respects. On the one hand, it paints a particularly interesting picture of manners at the turn of the century, observed from the female perspective with such psychological finesse that it was accused of preciousness and licentiousness. Thus, the 'Revue Encyclopédique' of 1829 concludes its report on the work as follows: "On n'aurait que des éloges à donner à l'ouvrage, si l'auteur ne s'amusait quelquefois à développer les replis les plus imperceptibles du cœur humain; ce qui lui donne un certain air d'afféterie et de marivaudage". On the other hand, this novel could gather autobiographical clues about the eventful love life of the author, who had many lovers, married three times and ended her life with the great painter Anne-Louis Girodet (1767-1824), although the exact nature of their relationship is unknown. The plot of the story thus describes the sentimental adventures of a pretty young woman who, from failure to failure and after having humiliated the man she loves, decides to renounce love and prefers to remain the friend of this man who could no longer marry her and who (was it a coincidence?) happened to be - like Girodet - a famous painter. This first edition is extremely rare. It is only found in French public collections at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France and we have only located one copy abroad (Herzogin Anna Amalia Bibliothek in Weimar). Good copy.