Mémoires complets…

The tormented editorial history of this monument of French memoir literature is well known:

– The first fragments were published as early as 1788–1789 by Soulavie, in a heavily altered version;
– A new selection appeared in 1818, purged of its most critical passages;
– It was not until 1829, at the instigation of the publisher A. Sautelet, that this complete edition appeared, carefully established from the autograph manuscript preserved by the Saint-Simon family.

The 21 volumes were published within barely two years. These Mémoires cover the years 1691 to 1723 and plunge into the heart of the Court of Versailles, from the end of the reign of Louis XIV to the Regency, as the duke describes the figures of his time, the workings of absolute monarchy, and the intrigues, pettiness and grandeur of French political and aristocratic life.

Sautelet’s edition introduced Saint-Simon to nineteenth-century readers: Victor Hugo said that Saint-Simon wrote “with cannon blasts,” and Balzac reportedly read him as a bible. Countless writers, historians, sociologists and moralists have seen in this text one of the summits of political intelligence. This edition was reprinted five times before Chéruel’s great critical edition of 1856, enriched with a biography by Sainte-Beuve.

Scattered foxing, otherwise a good copy.

Tchemerzine, V, p. 660: “véritable édition originale”; Carteret, II, p. 284; Vicaire, VII, 101–102; Legay, 108; Guery Alain, Saint-Simon et Montesquieu, in Cahiers Saint Simon, no. 27, 1999, p. 17–28.