Les Misérables

- A. Lacroix, Verboeckhoven & Cie, Bruxelles 1862, 14,5x22cm, 10 volumes reliés. - Victor HUGO Les Misérables A. Lacroix & Verboeckhoven & Cie, Bruxelles 1862, 14,5x22cm, 10 bound volumes. First edition without statement published concomitantly with the Pagnerre's Paris edition. Bound in half blue sheepskin, spine in four compartments decorated with double gilt fillets, blue paper plates, marbled paste-down and endpapers, mottled edges, English bindings of the time. Scattered foxings, title page of the third volume slightly and marginally soiled, paper plates a little rubbed and a few tears on some edges, some joints repaired. The first edition of Les Misérables was legally created by three different publishers, Pagnerre in France, Lacroix in Belgium and Steinacker in Germany, under the aegis of the official publisher A. Lacroix, Verboeckhoven & Cie. The question of the prevalence of one edition over the other has long stirred the bibliophilic world and bibliographers remain divided on this thorny issue. Carteret and Vicaire, for example, ensured that the Paris edition should be preferred, whereas Vanderem and Clouzot placed the Belgian edition first. More than just a matter of chronology, this bibliographical dispute reveals the complexity of the concept of the first edition and the symbolic importance its holds for literary history and, in particular, for this masterful work which is among the most important in world literature. Strangely, without this question really being settled, the Brussels edition is commonly described as pre-Paris, whereas the Leipzig edition is simply ignored. Les Misérables would, therefore, be published on 30 or 31 March with Lacroix and 3 April with Pagnerre. The arguments of this Belgian precedence are, however, all refutable, and from 1936, Georges Blaizot had demonstrated its fragility. The first argument is based on a letter by Victor Hugo addressed to Lacroix from 1865 and in which the poet himself called the Belgian edition "princeps" "first": "Typographiquement, il faut se régler en tout sur l'édition belge princeps des Misérables, en dilatant plutôt qu'en resserrant" "Typographically, it is necessary to be totally attuned with the first Belgian edition of Les Misérables, expanding rather than tightening" he wrote on the subject of the Travailleurs de la mer which will be published in 1866. Yet, Hugo's designation is by no means a bibliographical indication, as Georges Blaizot explains, denouncing the abusive interpretation of P. de Lacretelle and Dr Michaux: "?Le poète précise un point, un seul, très simple, très clair, très précis?: l'édition belge princeps (c'est-à-dire la première parue des éditions belges) doit servir de type aux éditions futures. Il dit cela, il dit bien cela, il ne dit que cela." "The poet specifies one point, one, very simple, very clear, very precise: the first Belgian edition (i.e. the first published of the Belgian editions) must serve as a type for future editions. He says that, he says that clearly, he says only that." (Georges Blaizot in Le Bulletin du bibliophile et du bibliothécaire, 1936). Indeed, a more modern in-12 edition will follow the famous in-8 edition in October of the same year. The second argument is more significant. It is based on a letter by Adèle Hugo to her husband recounting the extraordinary affair of the French publication four days before the scheduled date. This letter will be partially reproduced in 1904 in the complete works published by Meurice and Simon, with the supposed date of "[31 March 1862]". In it, Adèle recounts the reasons for the French publishing haste: "Auguste [Vacquerie] nous apprend que Les Misérables paraissent sous trois jours. Étonnement mêlé de satisfaction. Auguste me raconte qu'ils comptaient faire paraître Les Misérables le 7 avril?; que le matin [Noël] Parfait était accouru effaré chez [Paul] Meurice lui dire qu'il sortait de voir aux mains de [Paul] Siraudin, un exemplaire des Misérables qu'il avait achet