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Das Dekameron, by Giovanni Baccaccio, illustrated by F. v. Bayros. With a foreword by Hanns Heinz Ewers (Wilhelm Borngräber Verlag, Berlin., 1913) 5.25"x7.5", 612pp + 4 pages of ads, hardcover, half buckram with gilt title and decorations, very good condition. German language of Boccaccio's Decameron with 6 illustrations by Franz von Bayros. The Decameron, (subtitled Prencipe Galeotto or Prince Galehaut), is a collection of novellas by the 14th-century Italian author Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375). The book is structured as a frame story containing 100 tales told by a group of seven young women and three young men sheltering in a secluded villa just outside Florence to escape the Black Death, which was afflicting the city. To make their exile more pleasant each of the ten tells the others one story every day. The Decameron records the narratives of ten days -- 100 stories. Boccaccio probably conceived of The Decameron after the epidemic of 1348, and completed it by 1353. These tales run the entire range of human emotion: grief, love, humor, anger, revenge. Many are based on oral folklore. Boccaccio's ten narrators thus retell already familiar stories about errant priests, rascally husbands, and mischievous wives. Variants of these stories are known in many cultures, but no one formulates them more cleverly or relates them more eloquently than does Boccaccio. In addition to its literary value and widespread influence, it provides a document of life at the time. Written in the vernacular of the Florentine language, it is considered a masterpiece of classical early Italian prose. -
Die Abenteuer der Fanny Hill, John Cleland (np, München, 1919) 7.25" x 5", 2 vol., 178pp, 179-370pp, hardbound, marbled paper boards with cloth spine. Paper label on spine. Good condition for age, showing wear at hinges, both slightly cocked, pages yellowing. Boards worn at edges and corners Written while the author was in debtor's prison in London and first published in 1749, Fanny Hill is considered the first original English prose pornography, and the first pornography to use the form of the novel. One of the most prosecuted and banned books in history, it has become a synonym for obscenity. This German version of Fanny Hill is without mention of publisher. This was German "Bückware" or an item that was kept under the counter only for customers who asked for it. A nice 2 volume set in German. -
Die Abenteuer des Chevalier Faublas | Erzählt von Louvet de Couvray [[The adventures of the Chevalier Faublas | Told by Louvet de Couvray], etchings by Karl Walser (Georg Müller, Munich, 1910, #1411/1500) 8.25"x5.5", 4 volumes, x+216pp, 279pp, 295pp, 344pp, half calf over decorated silk (from a drawing by Karl Walser), black title and vol. label with gilt lettering and decorations on spine, 4 etched title vignettes and 12 toned etchings by Karl Walser on 12 panels with green tissue guard, ribbons present in all volumes, good+ condition. Karl Walser (1877-1943) was a Swiss painter, set designer and illustrator. His artwork, although very popular during his lifetime, has mostly been forgotten by the art world, unlike his brother, author Robert Walser, who was never able to support himself through writing which gained notoriety after his death. Jean-Baptiste Louvet de Couvrai (1760 - 1797) was born in Paris as the son of a stationer, he became a bookseller's clerk, and first attracted attention with the first part of his novel "Les Amours du chevalier de Faublas" (5 parts) in 1787; it was followed in 1788 by "Six semaines de la vie du chevalier de Faublas" (8 parts) and in 1790 by "La Fin des amours du chevalier de Faublas" (6 parts). The heroine, Lodoiska, was modeled on the wife of a jeweler in the Palais Royal, with whom he had an affair. She divorced her husband in 1792 and married Louvet in 1793. This is considered a so-called "libertine" novel. It dwells mainly on the sexual escapades of its hero, a sort of amiable young libertine, and on the corrupted morals of eighteenth-century France. At the start of this novel the young Chevalier de Faublas attends a party dressed as a woman and is knowingly seduced by the lady of the house ('. I receive with equal astonishment and pleasure a charming lesson, which I repeated more than once .') Oxford Comp. to French Literature says it is "typical of many frivolous, licentious novels of its time, and still mentioned. Faublas, the amiable hero, is the victim of his own charms. His amorous adventures, recounted with a certain lively force, begin with his entry into society at the age of sixteen. He loves several women by the way and three in particular. A jealous husband and a despairing suicide reduce the three to one. The novel ends on a moral note: Faublas , who had happened to settle down with his remaining love, is haunted by the avenging phantoms of the other two and goes mad." -
Die Weiberherrschaft in der Geschichte der Menschheit [The Rule of Women in the History of Mankind], Eduard Fuchs, Alfred Kind (Albert Langen, München, 1913) 8.75″ X 11″, complete set, 2 volumes plus supplementary volume, x+1-348pp, 349-711pp, ix+319pp, decorated green cloth boards, decorated cloth endpapers, binding loose by design and very much intact on all volumes (binding is often a problem with this edition), Vol. 1&2 contain 665 illustrations and 90 tipped in illustrations. The supplemental volume contains 317 illustrations and 34 tipped in illustrations. Minor bumping on covers, in excellent condition for age. Compiling 665+317 reproductions of drawings, prints and paintings from the collection of Eduard Fuchs, this edition shows how the image of female domination and male submission was widespread in Europe from the Renaissance to the early 20th century. Edward Fuchs (1870-1940). Fuchs' father was a shopkeeper. Early in his life, the younger Fuchs developed socialist and Marxist political convictions. In 1886, he joined the outlawed political party Sozialistische Arbeiterpartei (the precursor of the modern SPD, Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands). Fuchs received a doctor of law degree and practiced as an attorney. In 1892, he became editor-in-chief of the satiric weekly Süddeutscher Postillon and later co-editor of the Leipziger Volkszeitung. His inflammatory articles in newspapers—one accusing the Kaiser of being a mass murderer—resulted in periodic jail sentences. During his periods of confinement, Fuchs wrote various social histories utilizing images as one of his primary sources. The first of these was his Karikatur der europäischen Völker (Caricatures of European Peoples), 1902. He moved to Berlin that same year where he edited the socialist newspaper Vorwärts. The following year he began his magnum opus, an examination of moral practice, Sittengeschichte, eventually running to six volumes by 1912. While engaged in this series, he followed up his interest in caricatures with one devoted to the representation of women, Die Frau in der Karikatur, 1905 (3 vols). Another book documenting the stereotypical representations of Jews appeared in 1912. Fuchs traveled with the artist Max Slevogt to Egypt in 1914, shortly before the outbreak of World War I. He was a pacifist during the War. Lenin's government put him in charge of prisoner exchange with Germany after the war; he was among the leaders of the German Comintern in Berlin in 1919. His interest in societal concerns in caricature led to a research interest in Daumier. Beginning in 1920, Fuchs published a catalogue raisonné on the artist in three volumes. He resigned from the party in 1929, following the expulsion of several stalwarts. At Hitler's ascension to power in Germany in 1933, Fuchs moved to France.
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Fanny Hill (Erlebnisse eines Bordellmädchens.), John Cleland (Dieses Buch wird als Privatdruck für die Mitglieder des Clubs 'Carpe Diem' herausgegeben und darf nicht öffentlich verkauft oder weitergegeben werden. John Freer's Druglin, Rotterdam, 1949) 6.5" x 5.25", 78pp, hardbound tan paper over boards, faux leather spine. Good condition, slight foxing around edges of front cover. "This book is privately printed, published for the members of the 'Carpe Diem' club and must not be passed on or sold to the public." This was German "Bückware" or an item that was kept under the counter only for customers who asked for it. The book is labeled "Erstes Buch" (First Book). It is unknown whether this is a complete book. With only 79 pages, it might be a loosely translated edition or just the first volume. I have not found any similar books labeled anything but "Erste Buch" -
Galante Lieder und Gedichte, Concordia Ball 25. Jänner 1926 [Galante songs and poems with images after originals by Franz von Bayros selected by Johannes Pilz and Viktor Wögerer, Concordia Ball, January 25, 1926] (Der Presseclub Concordia, Strache, Vienna 1926) 6.5"x4.75", very good condition, boards slightly rubbed and stained, interior fine, with carrying strap intact. Press Club Concordia, an organization of Austrian journalists and writers, has been holding a traditional Viennese ball at the Vienna City Hall each June for over 150 years. In 1926 their program book featured art by Franz von Bayros. The illustrations feature both erotic and musical themes. This is a great piece of European/Austrian interbellum history, a rare find in this condition with the carrying strap still intact. -
Novellen und Cymbalum Mundi: Die neuen Schwänke und lustigen Unterhaltungen gefolgt von der Weltbimmel (VOL 2 only), by Bonaventure Des Periers. "For the first time translated from French and introduced by Hanns Floerke with 10 illustrations by Franz von Bayros" (Georg Müller, München und Leipzig 1910) 5.25"x7", 404pp, vol 2 of 2, top edge gilt, other edges deckled, 3/4 vellum on green boards, 5 illustrations by Bayros tipped in, ribbon present but detached, good+ condition. German translation of Des Periers short stories and Cymbalum Mundi, Four Very Ancient Joyous and Facetious Dialogues. Bonaventure des Périers (c. 1500 – 1544) was a French storyteller and humanist who attained notoriety as a freethinker. Margaret of Angoulême, queen of Navarre, made him her valet de chambre in 1536. He acted as her secretary and transcribed her Heptaméron; some maintain that he in fact wrote the work. The free discussions permitted at Margaret’s court encouraged a license of thought as displeasing to the Calvinists as to the Roman Catholics; it became skepticism in Des Périers’s Cymbalum Mundi, a brilliant and violent attack upon Christianity. The allegorical form of its four dialogues in imitation of the Greek rhetorician Lucian did not conceal its real meaning. It was suppressed (c. 1538), but it was reprinted in Paris in the same year. His book made many bitter enemies for Des Périers, who prudently left Paris and settled at Lyon. Tradition has it that he killed himself in 1544, but this is questionable. Franz von Bayros (1866–1924) was an Austrian commercial artist, illustrator, and painter, best known for his controversial Tales at the Dressing Table portfolio, a book considered so dangerous to the morality of the time that Von Bayros was arrested and forced into exile. He was obliged to move from one European capital to another as each outrageous new work was banned by the authorities.