Nouveaux Contes des Fées. Par Madame D * *

The Hague: Chez Meindert Uytwerf, 1700. Early Edition. Hardcover (Vellum). Near Fine Condition. Modern full decorated parchment, page edges decorated in green, white and gold - a charming rebinding. Occasional browning and wear to page edges, slight foxing in spots, but bright and clean overall. Two volumes bound in one each with a title page and frontis (the same frontis of a woman storyteller dressed as Minerva reading to a Salon group). Aulnoy's first collections were published in 1698 in Paris, Les Contes de Fées and then Noiveaux Contes des Fées (quickly pirated with a Trevoux imprint) and then in The Hague in 1698 and again in 1700 by Uytwerf. This edition, confusingly, collects the latter two volumes of the original Les Contes de Fées. All the early editions are represented by just a few copies in libraries and auction records. Included here are Le Nain Jaune and Le Mouton both collected in Lang's Blue Fairy Book, and Finette cendron, a Cinderella/Wonderful Birch type tale. (4), 244, (4), 210pp.

Married to a 40+ gambler when she was only 13, she tried to have him killed, failed, did a short stint in prison, and then traveled widely through England and Spain while working as a spy. She returned to Paris in 1690, opened a Salon, and wrote a series of extremely successful fairy tales in a conversational Salon style. Folktale historian Jack Zipes describes her as "more notable" than Perrault. Like madame de Villeneuve who followed in her footsteps, Aulnoy empowers women in her stories and critiques the French upper class society hat sought to oppress and belittle independent women. She coined the term fairy tale and wrote a number of tales that are read today - though many filtered through Andrew Lang. A new collection of her stories, The Island of Happiness, is scheduled to be published by Princeton in April 2021 and includes The Green Serpent from this collection. Size: Octavo (8vo). Quantity Available: 1. Shipped Weight: Under 1 kilo. Category: Literature & Literary; Inventory No: 047112.