Xavier Marmier - Lettres sur l'Islande [Edition originale] - 1837

Original edition of this important travel account in Iceland by the writer Xavier Marmier (1808-1892). Rare.

Conserved in an antique binding of deep green half-morocco, with a richly decorated round spine featuring small gilded tools, a piece of brown leather bearing the letter G, fleuron ornaments, and a title in gilded initials. Mottled edges.

In 1836, the corvette La Recherche set sail for Iceland with a scientific mission aimed at studying the country from various perspectives. It was led by Mr. Gaimard, who was the first to conceive the idea of this expedition, and included Mr. Robert, a geologist; Mr. Lottin, responsible for magnetic needle observations; Mr. Anglès, a meteorologist; Mr. Meyer, a Marine painter; and Xavier Marmier (1808-1892), a young travel writer attracted to the Scandinavian world and the Far North, who was granted a literary mandate.

However, it is indeed true, adds Marmier, that I could have found, in Paris, at the King's Library, a large part of the poetic treasures I was seeking so far away. It is also true that all Icelandic literature has been transported to Copenhagen, that Danish scholars have examined it down to its last folds, and that, when a stranger goes from village to village, from house to house, seeking manuscripts, he would not find a single unfortunate stanza, not a single poor saga, that had not already been collected by Magnussen, commented on by Rafn, analyzed by Müller. But, the author adds, it is an important matter to see the country whose history one studies, to live among the people whose language one wishes to learn. There is an intimate alliance between a people's poetry and the land they inhabit, the nature surrounding them, and the sky under which they live—a bond that few books reveal, and that must be observed on the very spot to be truly felt. Thus, I set out with joy (...)

Not only the author of travel stories but also of translations, poems, and novels, Xavier Marmier primarily contributed to promoting Scandinavian and German literature in France.

Condition: Tear at the head of the spine (start of a split and a piece of leather slightly detached), rubbing, corners worn. One leaf detached, page margins slightly browned, with some scattered foxing. A good copy.

Xavier Marmier
Letters about Iceland
Paris, Félix Bonnaire, 1837
in-8 (20.5 x 13cm); xxxviii + 361pp

Subject: Xavier Marmier's Journey to Scandinavia and Iceland, First Edition 1837, Beautiful Binding