[PALLAVICINI, Andrea.]

Lettres d'un petit fils à sa grand' mère.

[Northern Italy?, privately printed, c. 1844]. 8vo, pp. [vii], 152; half-title lightly browned, butan excellent copy in contemporary dark blue blindstamped calf, gilt, gilt edges; lightly rubbed; bookplate of Cesare di Saluzzo (see below). First edition, the justification de tirage states that this is no. 3 of only twenty copies printed, a presentation copy from Therèse Pallavicini Lomellini (presumably the ‘grand-mère’ of the title) to Cesare di Saluzzo, inscribed on the back of the front free endpaper ‘À S.E. Mr le Chevalier Cesar Saluzzo de la part de la marquise Therèse Pallavicini Lomellini’. The Pallavicinis and the Lomellinis were noble Genoese families.The work takes the form of eighteen letters from Pallavicini to his grandmother (who had them published) and is a lively account of a sojourn in St Petersburg in the spring and summer of 1843. After travelling north through Germany (stopping at Erlangen, Leipzig and Hamburg), the author boarded the Nicolas bound for St Petersburg, arriving there on 7 May. The great majority of the letters are written from St Petersburg or its environs (Peterhof and Krasnoe Selo) and describe the grand dinners and court functions the author attended and the prominent royal and society figures he met at them. At one soirée, hosted by the Count and Countess of Laval, Pallavicini encountered Natalya Pushkin: ‘Mad. Pouschin la veuve du poète tué en duel, est magnifique, courbée sous les poids de tous ses malheurs, sa physionomie melancolique, a quelque chose d’indefinissable’ (p. 93).Cesare di Saluzzo (1778–1853), to whom this copy was presented, was a Piedmontese nobleman and poet and an important figure at the court of Savoy.Not found in any of the usual bibliographies or online databases.

• GBP 1,200.00 > otras divisas
• nº de pedido: F1219

• librero: Bernard Quaritch Ltd. (GREAT BRITAIN)