Victor Hugo - Quatre-vingt-treize - 1874

Victor Hugo - Quatre-vingt-treize - Michel Lévy Frères - 1874

Very rare original edition of the author's final novel, published in three volumes here gathered into a single book.

Victor Hugo (1802-1885) is one of the central figures of French literature and the leading figure of Romanticism, whose political and literary influence marked the entire 19th century. A poet, playwright and novelist, he spent nearly twenty years in exile for opposing the regime of Napoleon III, a period during which he conceived his most monumental works. He wrote "Quatrevingt-treize" upon his return from exile, between 1872 and 1873, in a context marked by the recent traumas of the 1870 defeat and the Paris Commune, seeking, through the lens of history, to question revolutionary morality.

The book relates the ruthless confrontation, in 1793, between the Republican revolutionary forces and the royalist insurgents during the War in the Vendée, illustrating the dilemma between political justice and human pity.

The binding is a brown half-calf with corner pieces, the spine with raised bands and the gilt title.

First volume: original edition with no edition statement. 313 pages

Second volume: original edition with no edition statement. 287 pages

Third volume: fourth edition dated May 1874. 313 pages

913 pages in total