Charles Dickens - Contes de Noël - 1870

DICKENS, CHARLES. — A Christmas Carol (PARIS, HACHETTE, 1870).
Paris: Librairie L. Hachette, 1870.
In-12. Demi-chagrin rouge d'époque, plats de percaline rouge.
Precious and elegant French edition published by Hachette in the year of Charles Dickens's death (1870).

The Christmas Tales represent the pinnacle of Dickensian humanism, popularizing the character Ebenezer Scrooge and Marley’s ghost in A Christmas Carol. The Hachette collection directed by Paul Lorain benefited from the author’s explicit authorization, offering a remarkable quality of language that helped establish Dickens’s work definitively in the French literary landscape during the Second Empire and the early Third Republic.

Good copy preserved in its publisher’s or period binding in full red tone (half leather and matching red percaline). The spine is legible with neat gilding, with minor light wear to the heads and along the joints. Interior with usual era foxing typical for 1870 Hachette paper, binding solid.

Originally published in England at the end of 1843, A Christmas Carol literally reinvented the celebration of Christmas in Europe, renewing the spirit of generosity, home warmth, and fraternity. The note “with the author’s authorization” on the 1870 Hachette title recalls the fierce battle Dickens waged throughout his life against literary piracy and for international copyright. Offered in its charming half-red leather period binding, this copy published in the year of Dickens’s death is a fine homage to the master of Victorian literature.