Viau, Théophile de - Les œuvres du sieur Théophile, Divisées en trois Parties. De l'immortalité de l’âme - 1662

Rare old edition of Les Œuvres de Théophile de Viau (1590-1626),
published by Georges de Scudéry, who wrote the preface, printed in small print.

Contains "Au lecteur" , " Le tombeau de Theophile, "Le traicté de l'immortalité de l’âme" " Oeuvres poétiques" ...

Nicely printed, text embellished with woodcut decorations.

Period full brown leather binding, spine with raised bands adorned with a rich gilded decoration in the grotesque style.



" Théophile de Viau was the most widely read poet of his time, a poet who adored freedom, eager to live as he saw fit and to write according to his fantasy, driven by his temperament and not restricted by rules (Lagarde and Michard - Hatier)

" His Œuvres poétiques would be so successful during the 17th century that even Malherbe’s paled in comparison. Is the best of Theophilus in the stripped down prose of the Apologie au Roi, in the Latin short story “Larissa,” the Fragments d’une Histoire Comique, or perhaps in the flamboyant lyricism of the tragedies Pasiphaé and Pyrame et Thisbé? More musical than Racan, more robust than Tristan, the Theophilus bird has more happily flown through the centuries that it did in its own time (Dictionnaire des Auteurs, A. Duminaret).

“After a long period in Purgatory and though he was widely read in his own time, Viau was rediscovered by Théophile Gautier who placed him in the Pantheon of poets. In addition to his poetry, his very free translation of Plato’s Phaedo, on the immortality of the soul, in verse and prose is worth noting, as well as the famous tragedy, Pyrame et Thisbé. His licentious collection Le Parnasse Satyrique landed him in prison and forced him to walk barefoot in front of Notre-Dame to be burned but his sentence was commuted and he was exiled in perpetuity instead. His conviction for affront to public decency caused a stir among intellectuals of the time.”

Théophile de Viau

Les œuvres du sieur Théophile, Divisées en trois Parties. La première, Contenant l’Immortalité de l’Ame, Avec plusieurs autres pieces.
La Seconde, les Tragedies.
La Troisieme est, le Recueil de toutes les pieces qu’il a faictes pendant sa prison


Revues, corrigées & mises par ordre en cette dernière édition de plusieurs fautes notables.

Partis, Nicolas Pepingué 1662, 2 parts in one duodecimo volume measuring 14.5 x 8.5 with 239, 250 complete.

Sturdy volume, leather insignificantly rubbed, in good condition as a whole, the spine remains decorative. Interior in good condition in terms of freshness, some signs of handling, several handwritten notes (old) at the beginning: on the back of the title and in the margin of pp of the preface and the “Epître au Lecteur". Bibliographical vignettes on the 1661 edition affixed to the endpaper at the beginning. A scribble on the endpaper at the end.



Weight: 600 g