Showing posts with label book-lists. Show all posts
Showing posts with label book-lists. Show all posts

Monday, March 30, 2020

Top Ten Pandemic Classics



It's just very hard to think about anything else at the moment. New Zealand went into full COVID-19 lockdown on Wednesday night (25th March 2020, for the history books), and everyone immediately started broadcasting their impressions of the event, starting new blogs to record their daily thoughts, and (so we're reliably informed) working on their long-deferred novels.

There's nothing very original about this list, then, but it does include the main 'plague' books I've read and been impressed by over the last few years. It's bound to be a burgeoning genre over the next wee while, and it's generally a good idea to go back to your roots before launching your own raid on the inarticulate.

The fact is, epidemics are generally quite boring to read about. Once you've got past detailing the symptoms and totting up the ever-mounting grim statistics of dead and dying, you really have to do something quite original with your narrative to make it at all memorable. Each of the books below have succeeded in doing that, I think.

  1. Giovanni Boccaccio: Il Decameron (1353)
  2. Albert Camus: La Peste (1947)
  3. Daniel Defoe: A Journal of the Plague Year (1722)
  4. Horton Foote: 1918 (1985)
  5. Stephen King: The Stand (1978 / 1990)
  6. William Rosen: Justinian's Flea: Plague, Empire, and the Birth of Europe (2006)
  7. Randy Shilts: And the Band Played On: Politics, People and the AIDS Epidemic (1987)
  8. Thucydides: The Peloponnesian War - Book 2: The Plague of Athens (430-426 BCE)
  9. Barbara Tuchman: A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century (1978)
  10. Philip Ziegler: The Black Death (1969)

Of course it's rather difficult to define just what precisely a pandemic classic is. If it were simply a matter of writing about confinement and hardship - as in a siege (often accompanied by disease, after all) - I would go immediately to Lidiya Ginzburg's magisterial account of the 1,000-day siege of Leningrad during the Second World War:



Lidiya Ginzburg: Blockade Diary (1984)
Lidiya Ginzburg. Blockade Diary. 1984. Trans. Alan Myers. Introduction by Aleksandr Kushner. London: The Harvill Press, 1995.

I have, in any case, written about this book before. A long time ago I put together a couple of imaginary online courses intended to serve as background for a novella in my 2010 collection Kingdom of Alt. The second of these was called "Crisis Diaries," and still subsists on the internet somewhere. It includes a range of diaries kept under the stress of various crises, including siege, plague, civil war, addiction and other forms of personal and political turmoil.

I suppose, then, that I define a pandemic text by virtue of its focus on the nature and progress of a disease of some sort. Otherwise, I should certainly have included Cecil Woodham-Smith's terrifying book on the Irish potato famine of the 1840s:



Cecil Woodham-Smith: The Great Hunger: Ireland 1845-1849 (1962)
Cecil Woodham-Smith. The Great Hunger: Ireland 1845-9. 1962. London: Readers Union Ltd. (Hamish Hamilton), 1962.

The potato blight was a disease, mind you - just not one that affected humans directly. Perhaps another way of saying it, then, would be to link the texts to one of the great pandemics of history:



World Economic Forum: A Visual History of Pandemics


That's what I've tried to do, then - though of course the result remains very subjective and undoubtedly excludes large numbers of excellent texts which I happen not to have come across or read as yet.





Giovanni Boccaccio: The Decameron (1353)
Giovanni Boccaccio. Il Decameron. 1350-53. Ed. Carlo Salinari. 1963. 2 vols. Universale Laterza, 26-27. 1966. Torino: Editori Laterza, 1975.

This seems like an excellent place to start. It's often forgotten that the motivation for the ten days of collective storytelling that constitute Boccaccio's Decameron is the need for various noblemen and women to isolate themselves from the Black Death, at that point rampaging through Florence.

Seen this way, there's a certain cruel frivolity about these stories of love, lust, cuckoldry and other subjects dear to the human heart. Pasolini's 1971 film does a good job of bringing out these ironies, and subverting their apparent 'joyousness' with some sense of the unpleasant realities their tellers are working so hard to conceal.



Pier Paolo Pasolini, dir.: The Decameron (1971)






Albert Camus: La peste (1947)
Albert Camus. La Peste. 1947. Ed. W. J. Strachan. 1959. Methuen’s Twentieth Century Texts. London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1965.

This is the great-grandaddy of all 'Plague' narratives. I reread it recently - last year, in fact - before any of the COVID-19 events were even in prospect. It was a little more ponderous than I remembered it, though of course my command of French may have deteriorated since then.

In any case, it remains as telling now as it ever was. I have to confess that I didn't realise, when I first read it as a teenager, how closely it was based on real events. Now I see that as a strength - its allegory of moral degradation and human torpor when faced by genuinely challenging events remains as true as ever. And it's no longer necessary to read it solely as an allegory of the Second World War.

The plague seems as present to us now as the war was for its first readers in 1947.



Albert Camus: La Peste (1947)






Daniel Defoe: A Journal of the Plague Year (1722)
Daniel Defoe. A Journal of the Plague Year: Being Observations or Memorials of the Most Remarkable Occurrences, as well Public as Private, which Happened in London during the Last Great Visitation in 1665. Written by a Citizen who Continued all the while in London. Never made Public Before. 1722. Ed. Anthony Burgess & Christopher Bristow. Introduction by Anthony Burgess. 1966. Penguin English Library. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1978.

But then again, perhaps I'm wrong. Maybe this is the quintessential plague narrative against all others must be measured. It was, apparently, Elizabeth Bishop's favourite book, and there's something about the cool precision of her own writing which does remind one of Defoe's marvellously offhand and deadpan account of the horrors of one of London's many plague years - which seems to have been literally burned out of the city by the Great Fire of London.

Things are rarely that simple, though. It came back, as plagues are wont to do, but never with quite the same virulence as during this first major outbreak.

For a long time it was thought to be a genuine eye-witness account, but - while Defoe definitely collected a large number of such stories from his older contemporaries - he was five at the time, so is unlikely to have had many experiences of his own to contribute.



Daniel Defoe: A Journal of the Plague Year (1722)


Horton Foote: Three Plays from the Orphans' Home Cycle: Courtship / Valentine's Day / 1918. 1987. New York: Grove Press, 1994.

It's hard to find good accounts of the 1918 influenza epidemic. This rather subdued play chronicling the progress of the epidemic in a small town in the USA started life as a 1985 film, but can now be read in its proper place as part of Horton Foote's immense chronicle of Southern life in the early twentieth century.

Foote, probably best known for his original screenplay Tender Mercies (1983) and the teleplay The Trip to Bountiful (1953), has a tendency to stress the uneventful. It could be argued that this is the best tone to take when writing about this cruellest of epidemics, spreading like wildfire both among returning servicemen and the families that awaited them.

There's a story that Guillaume Apollinaire, lying sick of the 'flu in a Paris hospital in 1918, heard the crowds outside chanting "À bas Guillaume" [Down with William]. They were of course referring to Kaiser Wilhelm, who'd just been forced to abdicate, but the poet took it personally. He died shortly afterwards, so this rather mordant bon mot is one of the last things recorded about him and his extraordinary life.



Horton Foote: 1918 (1985)






Stephen King: The Stand (1990)
Stephen King. The Stand: The Complete and Uncut Edition. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1990.

Did Stephen King predict it all? Well, it's true that his 1978 novel The Stand (reissued in a revised and greatly expanded form in 1990) does imagine most of the population of the earth being wiped out by an aberrant strain of the 'flu to which only a very few turn out to be immune.

After that, however, things become distinctly more apocalyptic - which may be disappointing to genuine epidemophiles (if that's a real word ...) It's certainly among his most memorable works, and might arguably be the finest of all.

We're promised a new filmed version soon to replace the rather disappointing 1994 TV miniseries. Whether it can be adequately filmed remains to be seen, especially given the recent debacle of the intensely disappointing Dark Tower movie.



Stephen King: The Stand (1978)


William Rosen. Justinian’s Flea: Plague, Empire and The Birth of Europe. 2006. London: Pimlico, 2008.

This is a truly fascinating book, which attempts to plot the progress of the Byzantine emperor Justinian's Mediterranean campaigns alongside the parallel conquests of the Bubonic plague bacillus.

That might sound a little gimmicky, but the author's decision to try to compare epidemiology with social and military history results in a intriguing mixture of the familiar and the arcane which is guaranteed to inform virtually any reader, no matter how specialised he or she may be.

The accounts of the plague itself are horrific beyond measure, and give considerable backing to the author's contention that it may have been vitally instrumental both in the spread of Islam and the subsequent growth of the nation states of Europe.







Randy Shilts: And the Band Played On (1987)
Randy Shilts. And the Band Played On: Politics, People and the AIDS Epidemic. 1987. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1988.

If you've seen the film, you know the story - how the inertia of governments, societal prejudice against homosexual lifestyles, and jealousy among scientists combined to delay any concerted response against the AIDS virus until it was far too late to prevent its spread.

It's very much worth reading the book, though, even if you think you know what happened. It's too early to say as yet, but there are some indications - as in the article here - that some of the same processes may be playing a part this time round, again.



Roger Spottiswoode, dir.: And the Band Played On (1993)






Robert B. Strassler, ed.: The Landmark Thucydides (1996)
Robert B. Strassler, ed. The Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide to The Peloponnesian War. Trans. Richard Crawley. 1874. Introduction by Victor Davis Hanson. 1996. Free Press. New York: Simon & Schuster, Inc., 2008.

Thucydides' account, in Book II of his grim history of the follies and hubris of Athens in its twenty-year war with Sparta, of the plague that afflicted his native city in the second year of the conflict, remains an indispensable source on the effects of such outbreaks in the pre-scientific era.

Thucydides employs his customary understatement when chronicling the effects of the illness, which unfortunately means that he failed to provide enough detail for a final identification of the pathogen to be confirmed.

It was generally regarded, until recently, to have been the earliest recorded outbreak of bubonic plague, but more recent suggestions include typhus, smallpox, measles, and toxic shock syndrome.



Thucydides (c.460-400 BCE)






Barbara W. Tuchman: A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century (1978)
Barbara W. Tuchman. A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century. 1978. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1980.

JFK's favourite historian, Barbara Tuchman, developed a huge reputation as a sage due to the fact that the former is reliably claimed to have used the latter's Pulitzer-prize winning book about 1914, The Guns of August, as a guide to his conduct during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Some of her later titles - such as The March of Folly (1984), a study of political and military incompetence throughout history - may have suffered from an excess of ideology and editorialising, but A Distant Mirror (1978) still has its fans, myself among them.

Certainly it's an ambitious project - to parallel the tumultuous events of the twentieth century with those of the distant fourteenth - but the result is certainly intriguing. I wouldn't say that it succeeds in convincing me of the validity of the comparison, but it does give a very interesting picture of those times, dominated - in Western Europe at least - by the twin scourges of the Black Death and the Hundred Years War.

With these few provisos, it's a book I would highly recommend. Mind you, the title 'popular' or 'narrative' historian to me seems more of a badge of honour than a pretext for academic sneering - other, more professional readers may be less convinced.



Barbara Tuchman (1912-1989)






Philip Ziegler: The Black Death (1969)
Philip Ziegler. The Black Death. 1969. A Pelican Book. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1970.

I'm sure that many histories of the Black Death have been published since this one by Philip Ziegler. He displays a touching faith in the medical science of his time, and its decoding of the basic facts of the epidemic. The more recent Benedict Gummer book pictured at the top of this post calls that and many other aspects of his narrative into question.

Despite all that, there's a certain directness and lack of pretension about Ziegler's writing which makes it still well worth reading after 50 years.

Mind you, any real study of the epidemic would have to take into account the large amount of revisionist scholarship which has appeared since then, but you have to start somewhere, and Ziegler seems a very good place to begin.



United Agents: Philip Ziegler





So there you go. Those are the main exhibits in my list, anyway. Feel free, if you wish, to add any suggestions of your own. I'd rather think of this post as a pretext for conversation than as any kind of last word on the subject.



World Economic Forum: A Visual History of Pandemics


Saturday, June 08, 2019

Bruxelles & la Bibliothèque de la Pléiade



A long time ago in a country far, far away - called Belgium - I lived a life in what now seems to me almost an alternate universe.

I don't know how convinced you are by the physics of the multiverse: the infinite branching paths radiating out from each moment in each of our lives (or, for that matter, in the life of the cosmos), but certainly in my own life I can see certain moments of decision - certain choices which determined one chain of events or another.



One of them was in Palmerston North, where I taught for a year at Massey University, and was offered at the end of it a new, improved half-time contract rather than the full-time one I'd been on.

On that occasion, a counter-offer of full-time work at Auckland was decisive. I returned to my home town, not without certain regrets, but forced by economic necessity.



My brief life as potential citizen of Europe (or Eurotrash, if you prefer) built up over several years from the late eighties to the mid-nineties. It was all involved with my first marriage, to a London-born, Paris-educated, French, German and Flemish speaking girl whose quite wealthy family lived in one of the nicer suburbs of Brussels.

The only one of those languages I could really speak was French, but no doubt the others would have come in time (I have a reading knowledge of German, though no Flemish at all).

The moment of our break-up put paid to that life. Nearly a quarter of a century later, I can't say I'm sorry. There's a certain comfort, as well as a certain complexity, in making your life in the place you originally came from. I do miss speaking French every day, but returning to New Zealand with the determination to try and get to know it properly for the first time has been as absorbing as any life task could be.

Some of the reliquaries of that vanished life include a large library of French books. One or two of them I should probably have returned to Jackie-Anne when we split up our few sticks of property, but I guess I hung on to them because they would be so much easier for her to replace than for me to reacquire (this was long before the days of Amazon.com and such digital gateways to virtually all the books in existence).



I did send back a whole lot of things, but some I overlooked at the time. Since she kept everything we had in the other country, I imagine it worked out pretty equally. If not, it's all a long time ago now. I hope I learned some things about avoiding pettiness on such occasions as a result, though. It certainly confirmed my agreement with that old Shakespearean tag: 'He jests at scars who never felt a wound.'

Marriage break-ups, like any other emotional upheaval, are not to be taken lightly - and it's been a help to me many times since to remember my own feelings at the time. I don't feel judgemental about excesses of behaviour which might otherwise seem inexplicable.

Some people are able to stay on civil terms with their ex's. I wish that were true of me, too, but it isn't. I envy their maturity, but - again - it's helped me to understand why people will change countries, let alone cities, to avoid any casual encounters.



These are some of the thoughts I have when I examine the following maniacal-seeming list of books belonging to the magisterial French collection of classics, the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade. If you notice obvious gaps, that's probably because I have a lot of other French books in less impressive forms.

And if you've got sick of these long lists of books-in-particular-series I've been putting up on this blog, all I can say is that I suspect this will be the last of them for a while. So far my lists-of-lists have included:

  1. La Bibliothèque de la Pléiade (1931- ) [41]
  2. The Folio Society (1947- ) [95]
  3. The Landmark Ancient Histories (1996- ) [5]
  4. The Library of America (1979- ) [92]
  5. The Loeb Classics (1912- ) [59]
  6. Longman Annotated English Poets (1965- ) [12]
  7. The Nonesuch Library (1927-77) [16]
  8. Norton Annotated Editions (2000- ) [20]
  9. Oxford Myths and Legends (1954- ) [19]
  10. Penguin Modern Poets (1962-83) [28]
  11. Penguin Modern European Poets (1958-84) [40]
  12. Penguin Poets in Translation (1996-2005) [12]
  13. The Reynard Library (1950-71) [7]
  14. Russian Foreign Languages Publishing House (1946-64) [40]


It's the Pléiade which has the most tender, still smarting associations, however.

I'll never regret that other life I almost started to live, but the life I live now is so much more satisfactory in every way, that I have to say that my main feeling about the whole thing now is gratitude both for the amazing opportunity, and also for the fact that I ended up taking another road - the road home, the one less travelled by.

Maybe I'll write more about it someday.







La Pléiade (1931- )

Ma bibliothèque

MES LIVRES

41 ouvrages / 26 auteurs


  1. Anonyme




  2. Les Mille et Une Nuits: Tome I (2005)


    • Bencheikh, Jamel Eddine, and André Miquel, trans. Les Mille et Une Nuits. Tome 1: Nuits 1 à 327. 3 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 515. Paris: Gallimard, 2005.
    • Parution le 13 Mai 2005, 1312 pages, 68.00 €



      Les Mille et Une Nuits: Tome II (2006)


    • Bencheikh, Jamel Eddine, and André Miquel, trans. Les Mille et Une Nuits. Tome 2: Nuits 327 à 719. 3 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 526. Paris: Gallimard, 2006.
    • Parution le 12 Octobre 2006, 1104 pages, 61.00 €



      Les Mille et Une Nuits: Tome III (2006)


    • Bencheikh, Jamel Eddine, and André Miquel, trans. Les Mille et Une Nuits. Tome 3: Nuits 719 à 1001. 3 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 527. Paris: Gallimard, 2006.
    • Parution le 12 Octobre 2006 1088 pages, 61.00 €



    • Album Mille et Une Nuits : Iconographie. Choisie et commentée par Margaret Sironval. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade. Albums de la Pléiade, n° 44. Paris: Gallimard, 2005.
    • Parution le 13 Mai 2005, 272 pages, 248 ill.


  3. Wilhelm Albert Włodzimierz Apolinary Kostrowicki [Guillaume Apollinaire] (1880-1918)




  4. Guillaume Apollinaire : Œuvres poétiques complètes (1956)


    • Apollinaire, Guillaume. Œuvres poétiques : Le Bestiaire - Alcools - Vitam impendere amori - Calligrammes - Il y a - Poèmes à Lou - Le Guetteur mélancolique - Poèmes à Madeleine - Poèmes à la marraine - Poèmes retrouvés - Poèmes épistolaires - Poèmes inédits. Théâtre : Les Mamelles de Tirésias - Couleur du temps - Casanova. Ed. Marcel Adéma & Michel Décaudin. Préface d'André Billy. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 121. 1956. Paris: Gallimard, 1990.
    • Parution en Décembre 1956, 1344 pages, 59.00 €



      Guillaume Apollinaire : Œuvres en prose complètes: Tome I (1977)


    • Apollinaire, Guillaume. Œuvres en prose complètes I : Contes et récits : L'Enchanteur pourrissant - L'Hérésiarque et Cie - Le Poète assassiné - Contes écartés du «Poète assassiné» - La Femme assise - Contes retrouvés - La Fin de Babylone - Les Trois Don Juan - La Femme blanche des Hohenzollern. Théâtre : La Température - Le marchand d'anchois - Jean-Jacques - La colombelle - Fragments divers. Cinéma : La Bréhatine - C'est un oiseau qui vient de France. Ed. Michel Décaudin. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 267. 1977. Paris: Gallimard, 1988.
    • Parution le 14 Mai 1977, 1584 pages, 60.00 €



      Guillaume Apollinaire : Œuvres en prose complètes: Tome II (1991)


    • Apollinaire, Guillaume. Œuvres en prose complètes II : Écrits sur l'art : Méditations esthétiques - Les Peintres cubistes - Fragonard et l'Amérique - Chroniques et paroles sur l'art. Critique littéraire : La Phalange nouvelle - Les Poèmes de l'année - Les Poètes d'aujourd'hui - [Sur la littérature féminine] - L'Antitradition futuriste - L'Esprit nouveau et les Poètes. Chroniques et articles : Théories et polémiques - Portraits et silhouettes - Critique - Variétés. Échos sur les lettres et les arts. Ed. Pierre Caizergues & Michel Décaudin. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 382. Paris: Gallimard, 1991.
    • Parution le 20 Novembre 1991, 1872 pages, 74.50 €



      Guillaume Apollinaire : Œuvres en prose complètes: Tome III (1993)


    • Apollinaire, Guillaume. Œuvres en prose complètes III : Le Flâneur des deux rives - La Vie anecdotique - Chroniques et échos - Les Diables amoureux. Appendices : Essai sur la littérature sotadique au XIXe siècle - L'Arétin et son temps - [Les Fleurs du Mal] - Lettre à Louis Chadourne. Textes érotiques : Les Onze Mille Verges - Les Exploits d'un jeune don Juan. Compléments : théâtre : Un buveau d'absinthe qui a lu Victor Hugo - À la cloche de bois. Pièce en un acte - Revue de l'année : la Vérité sur la vie et le théâtre. Compléments : contes : [Projet de contes] - Un vol à la cour de Prusse - Le Roi Lune - Héloïse ou Dieu même. Chroniques et échos. Ed. Pierre Caizergues & Michel Décaudin. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 399. Paris: Gallimard, 1993.
    • Parution le 13 Mai 1993, 1632 pages, 76.00 €


  5. Georges Bataille (1897-1962)




  6. Georges Bataille : Romans et récits (2004)


    • Bataille, Georges. Romans et récits : Histoire de l'œil - Le Bleu du ciel - Madame Edwarda - Le Petit - Le Mort - Julie - L'Impossible - La Scissiparité - L'Abbé C - Ma mère - Charlotte d'Ingerville - Archives du projet «Divinus Deus». Appendices : Récits retrouvés - La Maison brûlée - Ébauches. Ed. Jean-François Louette. Preface by Denis Hollier. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 511. Paris: Gallimard, 2004.
    • Parution le 18 Novembre 2004, 1552 pages, ill., 66.00 €


  7. Charles Pierre Baudelaire (1821-1867)




  8. Charles Baudelaire : Œuvres complètes: Tome I (1931)


    • Baudelaire, Charles. Œuvres. Tome 1 : Les Fleurs du Mal - Le Spleen de Paris - Les Paradis artificiels - Essais et nouvelles - Théâtre - Critique littéraire - Critique artistique - Richard Wagner - Journaux intimes - Pauvre Belgique - Amœnitates Belgicæ - Traductions de l'anglais. Ed. Y.-G. Le Dantec. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 1. 1931. Paris: Gallimard, 1944.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution le 2 Octobre 1931, 666 pages


  9. Albert Camus (1913-1960)




  10. Albert Camus : Théâtre – Récits et nouvelles (1962)


    • Camus, Albert. Théâtre – Récits et nouvelles : Théâtre : Caligula - Le Malentendu - L'État de siège - Les Justes - Révolte dans les Asturies. Adaptations : Les Esprits - La Dévotion à la croix - Un Cas intéressant - Le Chevalier d'Olmedo - Requiem pour une nonne - Les Possédés. Récits et nouvelles : L'Étranger - La Peste - La Chute - L'Exil et le royaume : La Femme adultère. Le Renégat. Les Muets. L'Hôte. Jonas. La Pierre qui pousse. Ed. Roger Quilliot. Préface de Jean Grenier. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 161. 1962. Paris: Gallimard, 2005.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution le 13 Décembre 1962, 2128 pages



      Albert Camus : Essais (1965)


    • Camus, Albert. Essais : L'Envers et l'Endroit - Noces - Le Mythe de Sisyphe - Lettres à un ami allemand (1943-1944) - Actuelles I, chroniques 1944-1948 - L'Homme révolté - Actuelles II, chroniques 1948-1953 - L'Été - Actuelles III, chroniques algériennes 1939-1958 - Réflexions sur la guillotine - Discours de Suède (1957). Essais critiques : Introduction aux « Maximes » de Chamfort - Avant-propos à « La Maison du peuple », de Louis Guilloux - Rencontres avec André Gide - L'Artiste en prison - Roger Martin du Gard - Sur « Les Îles », de Jean Grenier - René Char. Appendices : Métaphysique chrétienne et néoplatonisme - Articles, préfaces, interviews, inédits. Ed. Roger Quilliot & Louis Faucon. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 183. 1965. Paris: Gallimard, 1981.
    • Épuisé, Parution le 8 Décembre 1965, 2000 pages


  11. Paul Claudel (1868-1955)




  12. Paul Claudel : Théâtre: Tome I (1948)


    • Claudel, Paul. Théâtre. Tome 1 : L'Endormie - Fragment d'un drame - Tête d'or (1re et 2e versions) - La Ville (1re et 2e versions) - La Jeune fille Violaine (1re et 2e versions) - L'Échange (1re et 2e versions) - Le Repos du septième jour - Partage de midi (1re version et version pour la scène). Traductions d'Eschyle : Agamemnon - Les Choéphores - Les Euménides. Ed. Jacques Madaule & Jacques Petit. 2 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 72. 1947. Paris: Gallimard, 1991.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution en Avril 1948, 1440 pages



      Paul Claudel : Théâtre: Tome II (1948)


    • Claudel, Paul. Théâtre. Tome 2 : L'Annonce faite à Marie (1re version et version pour la scène) - L'Otage - Protée (1re et 2e versions) - Le Pain dur - Le Père humilié - La Nuit de Noël 1914 - L'Ours et la Lune - L'Homme et son désir - La Femme et son ombre (1re et 2e versions) - Le Peuple des hommes cassés - Le Soulier de satin (version intégrale et version pour la scène) - Sous le rempart d'Athènes - Le Livre de Christophe Colomb - La Parabole du festin - La Sagesse ou La Parabole du Festin - Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher - Le Jet de pierre - La Danse des morts - L'Histoire de Tobie et de Sara - La Lune à la recherche d'elle-même - Le Ravissement de Scapin. Ed. Jacques Madaule & Jacques Petit. 2 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 73. 1948. Paris: Gallimard, 1965.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution le 23 Mars 1948, 1568 pages


  13. Denis Diderot (1713-1784)




  14. Denis Diderot : Œuvres (1946)


    • Diderot, Denis. Œuvres : Les Bijoux indiscrets - La Religieuse - Le Neveu de Rameau - Jacques le fataliste et son maître - Lui et moi - Les Deux amis de Bourbonne - Entretien d'un père avec ses enfants - Ceci n'est pas un conte - Sur l'inconséquence du jugement publique de nos actions particulières - Mon père et moi - Lettre à mon frère - Lettre sur les aveugles à l'usage de ceux qui voient - Entretien avec d'Alembert - Le rêve de d'Alembert - Regrets sur ma vieille robe de chambre - Sur les femmes - Sur l'estampe de Cochin - Supplément au Voyage de Bougainville - Paradoxe sur le comédien - Éloge de Richardson - Traité du Beau - Essai sur la peinture - Entretien d'un philosophe avec la Maréchale de *** - Satire I sur les caractères et les mots de caractère, de profession, etc. - Entretiens sur «Le fils naturel» - Des auteurs et des critiques - Lettres de Madame Riccoboni. Ed. André Billy. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 25. 1946. Paris: Gallimard, 1969.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution le 25 Septembre 1946, 1478 pages


  15. Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie [Alexandre Dumas, père] (1802-1870)




  16. Alexandre Dumas : Le Comte de Monte-Cristo (1981)


    • Dumas, Alexandre. Le Comte de Monte-Cristo. 1845-46. Ed. Gilbert Sigaux. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 290. Paris: Gallimard, 1981.
    • Parution le 6 Mai 1981, 1504 pages, 60.00 €


  17. André Paul Guillaume Gide (1869-1951)




    • Gide, André. Romans; Récits et Soties; Œuvres lyriques : Le Traité du Narcisse - Le Voyage d'Urien - La Tentative amoureuse - Paludes - Les Nourritures terrestres - Les Nouvelles Nourritures - Le Prométhée mal enchaîné - El Hadj ou Le Traité du faux prophète - L'Immoraliste - Le Retour de l'Enfant Prodigue - La Porte Étroite - Isabelle - Les Caves du Vatican - La Symphonie pastorale - Les Faux-Monnayeurs - L'École des femmes - Robert - Geneviève ou La confidence inachevée - Thésée. Introduction by Maurice Nadeau. Ed. Yvonne Davet & Jean-Jacques Thierry. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 139. 1958. Paris: Gallimard, 1980.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution le 13 Novembre 1958, 1664 pages


  18. Louis Poirier ['Julien Gracq'] (1910-2007)




  19. Julien Gracq : Œuvres complètes: Tome I (1989)


    • Gracq, Julien. Œuvres complètes. Tome 1 : Au château d'Argol - Un beau ténébreux - Liberté grande - Le Roi pêcheur - André Breton. Quelques aspects de l'écrivain - La Littérature à l'estomac - Le Rivage des Syrtes - Préférences. Appendices : Éclosion de la pierre - Un cauchemar - Le Surréalisme et la Littérature contemporaine - Prose pour l'étrangère - Enquête sur la diction poétique - Kleist : «Penthésilée» - Entretien sur «Penthésilée» de H. von Kleist. Ed. Bernhild Boie. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 354. Paris: Gallimard, 1989.
    • Parution le 4 Avril 1989, 1536 pages, 74.50 €


  20. Pierre Ambroise François Choderlos de Laclos (1741-1803)




  21. Choderlos de Laclos : Œuvres complètes (1944)


    • Choderlos de Laclos. Œuvres complètes : Les Liaisons dangereuses - De l'éducation des femmes - Poésies - Critique littéraire - Sur l'éloge de Vauban - Œuvres politiques - Appendices. Ed. Maurice Allem. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 6. 1944. Paris: Gallimard, 1959.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution le 16 Mars 1944, 942 pages


  22. Stéphane [Étienne] Mallarmé (1842-1898)




  23. Stéphane Mallarmé : Œuvres complètes (1945)


    • Mallarmé, Stéphane. Œuvres complètes : Poëmes d'enfance et de jeunesse - Poésies - Vers de circonstance - Les Poëmes d'Edgar Poe - Proses de jeunesse - Poèmes en prose - Crayonné au théâtre - Variations sur un sujet - Un Coup de dés - Quelques médaillons et portraits en pied - Richard Wagner - Préface à «Wathek» - Le «Ten o'clock» de M. Whistler - Contes indiens - La Musique et les Lettres - Proses diverses - Les Mots anglais - Thèmes anglais - Les Dieux antiques - L'Étoile des fées. Ed. Henri Mondor & G. Jean-Aubry. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 65. 1945. Paris: Gallimard, 1992.
    • Épuisé, Parution le 12 Juin 1945, 1696 pages


  24. André Malraux (1901-1976)




  25. André Malraux : Romans (1947)


    • Malraux, André. Romans : Les Conquérants - La Voie royale - La Condition humaine - L'Espoir. 1928, 1930, 1946, 1937. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 70. 1947. Paris: Gallimard, 1978.
    • Épuisé, Parution en Juin 1947, 864 pages


  26. Prosper Mérimée (1803-1870)




  27. Prosper Mérimée : Romans et nouvelles (1934)


    • Mérimée, Prosper. Romans et nouvelles : Chronique du règne de Charles IX - Mosaïque - La Double méprise - Les Âmes du purgatoire - La Vénus d'Ille - Colomba - Arsène Guillot - Carmen - L'Abbé Aubain - Il Viccolo di Madame Lucrezia - La Chambre bleue - Lokis - Djoûmane. Appendice : Histoire de Rondino. Ed. Henri Martineau. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 21. Paris: Gallimard, 1934.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution le 30 Novembre 1934, 864 pages


  28. Jean-Baptiste Poquelin ['Molière'] (1622-1673)




  29. Molière : Œuvres complètes: Tome I (1972)


    • Molière. Œuvres complètes. Tome 1 : La Jalousie du Barbouillé - Le Médecin volant - L'Étourdi ou Les Contretemps - Le Dépit amoureux - Les Précieuses ridicules - Sganarelle ou Le Cocu imaginaire - Dom Garcie de Navarre ou le Prince jaloux - L'École des Maris - Les Fâcheux - L'École des Femmes - Remerciement au Roi - La Critique de l'École des Femmes - L'Impromptu de Versailles - Le Mariage forcé - Les Plaisirs de l'Île enchantée - La Princesse d'Élide - Le Tartuffe ou L'Imposteur - Appendices. Ed. Georges Couton. 2 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 8. 1972. Paris: Gallimard, 1981.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution le 23 Février 1972, 1488 pages



      Molière : Œuvres complètes: Tome II (1972)


    • Molière. Œuvres complètes. Tome 2 : Dom Juan ou Le Festin de Pierre - L'Amour médecin - Le Misanthrope - Le Médecin malgré lui - Le Bal des Muses - Pastorale comique - Mélicerte - Le Sicilien ou L'amour peintre - Amphitryon - Le Grand divertissement royal de Versailles - George Dandin ou Le Mari confondu - L'Avare - Monsieur de Pourceaugnac - Les Amants magnifiques - Le Bourgeois gentilhomme - Psyché - Les Fourberies de Scapin - La Comtesse d'Escarbagnas - Les Femmes savantes - Le Malade imaginaire - Œuvres diverses - Appendices. Ed. Georges Couton. 2 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 9. 1972. Paris: Gallimard, 1981.
    • Ancienne édition, Parution le 23 Février 1972, 1584 pages


  30. Georges Perec (1936-1982)




  31. Georges Perec : Œuvres: Tome I (2017)


    • Perec, Georges. Œuvres I : Les Choses - Quel petit vélo à guidon chromé au fond de la cour? - Un homme qui dort - La Disparition - Les revenentes - Espèces d'espaces - W ou Le souvenir d'enfance - Je me souviens. Ed. Christelle Reggiani, with Dominique Bertelli, Claude Burgelin, Florence de Chalonge, Maxime Decout & Yannick Séité. 2 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 623. Paris: Gallimard, 2017.
    • Parution le 11 Mai 2017, 1184 pages, 61.50 €



      Georges Perec : Œuvres: Tome II (2017)


    • Perec, Georges. Œuvres II : La Vie mode d'emploi - Un cabinet d'amateur - La Clôture et autres poèmes - L'Éternité. Appendice : Tentative d'épuisement d'un lieu parisien - Le Voyage d'hiver - Ellis Island - L'art et la manière d'aborder son chef de service pour lui demander une augmentation - L'Augmentation. Ed. Christelle Reggiani, with Claude Burgelin, Maxime Decout, Maryline Heck et Jean-Luc Joly. 2 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 624. Paris: Gallimard, 2017.
    • Parution le 11 Mai 2017, 1280 pages, 63.50 €



      Claude Burgelin : Album Georges Perec (2017)


    • Burgelin, Claude. Album Georges Perec : Iconographie commentée. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade. Albums de la Pléiade, n° 56. Paris: Gallimard, 2017.
    • Parution le 11 Mai 2017, 256 pages, 202 ill.


  32. Fernando António Nogueira de Seabra Pessoa (1888-1935)




  33. Fernando Pessoa : Œuvres poétiques (2001)


    • Pessoa, Fernando. Œuvres poétiques : Alberto Caeiro : Le Gardeur de troupeaux - Le Berger amoureux - Poèmes non assemblés. Ricardo Reis : Odes. Livre premier - Odes publiées dans la revue «Presença» - Odes éparses. Álvaro de Campos : Premiers poèmes - Les Grandes odes - Autour des grandes odes - Derniers poèmes. Fernando Pessoa : Poèmes paülistes, sensationnistes et intersectionnistes - Pour un «Cancioneiro» - Sonnets - Quatrains - Rubayat - Poèmes politiques - Poèmes ésotériques et métaphysiques - Message - En marge de «Message» - Praça da Figueira - Un Soir à Lima - Poésie humoristique et vers de circonstance. Poésie anglaise : Poèmes d'Alexander Search - Épithalame - Antinoüs - Trente-cinq sonnets - Inscriptions - Le Violoneux fou - Poèmes anglais épars. Appendices : Poèmes de jeunesse - Aux frontières de la littérature : les poèmes français. Ed. Patrick Quillier. Trans. Olivier Amiel, Maria Antónia Câmara Manuel, Michel Chandeigne, Pierre Léglise-Costa et Patrick Quillier. Préface de Robert Bréchon. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 482. Paris: Gallimard, 2001.
    • Parution le 14 Novembre 2001, 2176 pages, 76.00 €


  34. Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust (1871-1922)




  35. Marcel Proust : À la recherche du temps perdu: Tome I (1954)


    • Proust, Marcel. À la recherche du temps perdu. Tome 1 : Du Côté de chez Swann - À l’Ombre des jeunes filles en fleur. Preface by André Maurois. Ed. Pierre Clarac & André Ferré. 3 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 100. 1954. Paris: Gallimard, 1964.
    • Épuisé, Parution le 30 Novembre 1954, 1056 pages



      Marcel Proust : À la recherche du temps perdu: Tome II (1954)


    • Proust, Marcel. À la recherche du temps perdu. Tome 2 : Le Côté de Guermantes - Sodome et Gomorrhe. Ed. Pierre Clarac & André Ferré. 3 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 101. 1954. Paris: Gallimard, 1973.
    • Épuisé, Parution le 30 Novembre 1954, 1232 pages



      Marcel Proust : À la recherche du temps perdu: Tome III (1954)


    • Proust, Marcel. À la recherche du temps perdu. Tome 3 : La Prisonnière - La Fugitive - Le Temps retrouvé. Ed. Pierre Clarac & André Ferré. 3 vols. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 102. Paris: Gallimard, 1954.
    • Épuisé, Parution le 30 Novembre 1954, 1344 pages



    • Proust, Marcel. Jean Santeuil précédé de Les Plaisirs et les Jours. Ed. Pierre Clarac & Yves Sandre. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 228. Paris: Gallimard, 1971.
    • Release on 29 Septembre 1971, 1136 pages, 49.00 €



    • Proust, Marcel. Contre Sainte-Beuve précédé de Pastiches et mélanges et suivi de Essais et articles. Ed. Pierre Clarac & Yves Sandre. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 229. Paris: Gallimard, 1971.
    • Release on 29 Septembre 1971, 1040 pages, 49.70 €


  36. Jean Racine (1639-1699)




  37. Jean Racine : Œuvres complètes: Tome I (1931)


    • Racine. Oeuvres complètes I : Théâtre : La Thébaïde ou les frères ennemis - Alexandre Le Grand - Andromaque - Les Plaideurs - Britannicus - Bérénice - Bajazet - Mithridate - Iphigénie - Phèdre - Esther - Athalie. Poésies : Épigrammes - Cantiques spirituels - Paysage ou les promenades de Port-Royal-Des-Champs - Poésies latines. Ed. Raymond Picard. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 50. 1931. Paris: Gallimard, 1964.
    • Épuisé, Parution en Décembre 1931, 1216 pages


  38. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900-1944)




  39. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry : Œuvres (1953)


    • Saint-Exupéry, Antoine de. Œuvres : Courrier Sud - Vol de nuit - Terre des hommes - Pilote de guerre - Lettre à un otage - Le Petit Prince - Citadelle. Preface de Roger Callois. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 98. 1953. Paris: Gallimard, 1959.
    • Épuisé, Parution en Novembre 1953, 1056 pages, ill.


  40. Alexis Leger [Saint-John Perse] (1887-1975)




  41. Saint-John Perse : Œuvres complètes (1972)


    • Saint-John Perse. Œuvres complètes : Œuvre poétique : Éloges - La Gloire des rois - Anabase - Exil - Vents - Amers - Chronique - Oiseaux - Chanté par celle qui fut là - Chant pour un équinoxe. Prose : Discours - Hommages - Témoignages. Correspondance : Lettres de jeunesse - Lettres d'Asie - Lettres d'exil. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 240. 1972. Paris: Gallimard, 2004.
    • Parution le 27 Novembre 1972, 1472 pages, 56.00 €


  42. Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (1905-1980)




  43. Jean-Paul Sartre : Œuvres romanesques (1982)


    • Sartre, Jean-Paul. Œuvres Romanesque : La Nausée - Le Mur. Les Chemins de la liberté : L'Âge de raison - Le Sursis - La Mort dans l'âme - Drôle d'amitié. Appendices : Dépaysement - La Mort dans l'âme [Fragments de journal] - La Dernière chance [Fragments]. Ed. Michel Contat & Michel Rybalka, with Geneviève Idt & George H. Bauer. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 295. Paris: Gallimard, 1981.
    • Parution le 13 Janvier 1982, 2304 pages, 73.50 €


  44. Somadeva (c.11th century)




    • Somadeva. Océan des rivières de contes. Ed. Nalini Balbir, with Mildrède Besnard, Lucien Billoux, Sylvain Brocquet, Colette Caillat, Christine Chojnacki, Jean Fezas & Jean-Pierre Osier. Traduction des ‘Contes du Vampire’ par Louis & Marie-Simone Renou, 1963. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 438. Paris: Gallimard, 1997.
    • Parution le 5 Septembre 1997, 1792 pages, ill., 76.00 €


  45. Marie-Henri Beyle ['Stendhal'] (1783-1842)




  46. Stendhal : Voyages en Italie (1973)


    • Stendhal. Voyages en Italie : Rome, Naples et Florence en 1817 - L'Italie en 1818 - Rome, Naples et Florence (1826) - Promenades dans Rome. Suppléments : Les Marionnettes - Lettres de Rome à Romain Colomb - Les Ambassadeurs, etc. Ed. V. Del Litto. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 249. Paris: Gallimard, 1973.
    • Parution le 26 Octobre 1973, 1920 pages, 60.00 €


  47. Paul-Marie Verlaine (1844-1896)




  48. Paul Verlaine : Œuvres poétiques complètes (1938)


    • Verlaine, Paul. Œuvres poétiques complètes : Premiers vers - Poèmes saturniens - Fêtes galantes - Poèmes contemporains des «Poèmes saturniens» et des «Fêtes galantes» - La Bonne chanson - Contribution à l'«Album zutique» - Romances sans paroles - Poèmes contemporains de «La bonne chanson» et des «Romances sans paroles» - Sagesse - Reliquat de «Cellulairement» et poèmes contemporains de «Sagesse» - Jadis et naguère - Amour - Parallèlement - Poèmes contemporains de «Parallèlement» - Dédicaces - Bonheur - Chansons pour elle - Liturgies intimes - Odes en son honneur - Élégies - Le Livre posthume - Dans les limbes - Épigrammes - Chair - Invectives - Biblio-sonnets - Poèmes divers. Œuvres libres : Femmes - Hombres. Ed. Y.-G. Le Dantec. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 47. 1938. Paris: Gallimard, 1954.
    • Parution en Juillet 1938, 1600 pages, 61.00 €


  49. Blessed Jacobus de Varagine / Voragine [Giacomo da Varazze / Jacopo da Varazze] (c.1230–1298)




  50. Jacques de Voragine : La Légende dorée (2004)


    • Voragine, Jacques de. La Légende dorée. Preface by Jacques Le Goff. Ed. Alain Bouveau, Monique Goullet, Pascal Colomb, Laurence Moulinier, & Stefano Mula. ‘La Legende dorée et ses images’, by Dominique Donadieu-Rigaut. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 504. Paris: Gallimard, 2004.
    • Parution le 11 Mars 2004, 1664 pages, 197 ill., 69.00 €