BEAUMARCHAIS, Pierre-Augustin Caron de (1732-99). La Folle Journée, ou Le Mariage de Figaro, Paris, 1785, large 8vo, 5 engraved plates, 19th-century red half morocco gilt. FIRST EDITION, later issue with illustrations.

BEAUMARCHAIS, Pierre-Augustin Caron de (1732-99).  La Folle Journée, ou Le Mariage de Figaro, Comédie en Cinq Actes, en Prose. Paris: Chez Ruault, 1785. Large 8vo (258 x 165mm). Half title with list of 12 booksellers and "Avis de l' Editeur" regarding a pirated Amsterdam edition on the verso, engraved frontispiece and 4 plates by Claude Nicolas Malapeau after Jacques Philippe Joseph de Saint-Quentin (frontispiece spotted and stained, other plates spotted mainly at margins, some light spotting to text mainly at margins, without the errata leaf). 19th-century French red half morocco gilt by Charles-François Capé [binder's stamp on front free endpaper], spine elaborately decorated in gilt, top edges gilt, others uncut (extremities quite heavily rubbed, boards scuffed, inner hinges weak). Provenance: DUFF COOPER (armorial bookplate); "Ex P. G. Libros. Skinos" (modern label); [?]Augustine [?]Brohay (old signature on front free endpaper); Maud Russell (later signature beneath, probably that of the British socialite, collector of French art and diarist); pencil note on front free endpaper stating "with aut. letter inserted", although, sadly, this is no longer present. FIRST EDITION, the later issue with illustrations, by a renowned French polymath who was, by turns (according to a certain on-line encyclopaedia), "a watchmaker, inventor, playwright, musician, diplomat, spy, publisher, horticulturist, arms dealer, satirist, financier and revolutionary (both French and American)." But Beaumarchais is perhaps best remembered today as the author of "The Marriage of Figaro", the comic play on which Mozart's operatic masterpiece was based. Cohen - de Ricci 125; PMM 230: "Public interest was whetted by [the play's] satirical references to the aristocracy, and it was this that first won its fame. Although greeted with enthusiasm by French society, it in fact contributed largely to its destruction. It is, however, the music of Mozart which has immortalised it as the perfect type of comedy. To Beaumarchais, a controversial figure, whose other principal achievement was his edition of the complete works of Voltaire, its transformation would probably be surprising, but no one can doubt its immortality"; Tchemerzine II, pp.14-15: "The first edition was published without illustrations. Very soon after 5 illustrations were added by Saint-Quentin."