SALOMÉ

Paris: Printed at Dehon et Cie for the Limited Editions Club, 1938; London: Printed at the Fanfare Press for the Limited Editions Club, 1938. No. 827 of 1,500 copies (English) and no. 21 of 1,500 copies (French). 279 x 203 mm. (11 x 8"). 105, [1] pp., [1] leaf. Two separately published companion volumes. French volume designed by René Ben Sussan; English translation by Lord Alfred Douglas, with an introduction by Holbrook Jackson.
French edition with printed black paper wrapper and original mylar jacket; English edition in publisher's terra cotta cloth, upper cover with gilt lettering and decoration designed by Beardsley, flat spine with gilt titling. French version with 10 gouache illustrations by Derain printed in pochoir by Saudé on black paper; English book with pictorial frames to title page and list of pictures, and 14 full-page illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley. French volume SIGNED BY DERAIN in the colophon. Quarto-Millenary 104. ◆Paper wrapper of French version slightly chipped at head and tail of spine (mylar rather chipped on the front cover, though mostly intact on back cover and spine); English edition with small brown spot to upper cover, three faint scratches to spine, but both volumes immaculate internally.

This appealing pair of volumes combines a stylish modern re-creation of the original 1891 French edition with an attractive re-creation of the 1894 first edition in English, while adding four additional Beardsley illustrations that had to be omitted in the original because of their licentious nature. Wilde's most notorious play, "Salomé" was based on the story in Luke's gospel featuring Herodias, the haughty wife of Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee, who is so incensed by the preaching of John the Baptist against her sins that she determines to be revenged. After her daughter Salomé dances seductively before her stepfather Herod, Herodias persuades Salomé to ask for John's head as a reward. Wilde's fertile imagination converts this story into a tale of juvenile infatuation scorned and turned into twisted hate. Written in French and first published in 1893, "Salomé" was to have been staged in London with Sarah Bernhardt in the title role, but this was prevented by the Lord Chamberlain, the theatre censor. When Lord Alfred Douglas' English translation was published in 1894, it shocked the public less for Wilde's text than for Beardsley's bold Decadent illustrations. Holbrook Jackson notes in the introduction here that, while Wilde sought to shock the bourgeois classes "for the good of their souls," Beardsley did it "because he disliked their tastes and habits." His frankly erotic illustrations greatly increased the controversy surrounding the play, which prevented it from being publicly performed in England before 1932. Our French volume marks the first use in a book of the distinctive Peignot typeface, and its illustrations by the Fauvist artist André Derain were praised by "Vanity Fair" editor Frank Crowninshield as "the gayest and most delightful illustrations ever made for a book" (quoted in Quarto-Millenary). Derain (1880-1954) co-founded the Fauvism movement with Henri Matisse, and his gouaches here boast the brilliant colors that characterize that school..