1781 Scarce French early Fairy Tales ~ Griselidis, Peau d’Ane and Contes by Perrault. (Copy)

Author: Charles Perrault.
Title: Griselidis, Peau d’Ane et Les Souhaits Ridicules. Contes. Par Perrault, de l'Académie Françoise. Nouvelle Edition.
Publisher: A Paris, Chez LAMY, Libraire, quai des Augustins, 1781.
Language: Text in French.
Size: 6 "X 4 ".
Pages: 149 pages.
Binding: Attractive and very good, contemporary half calf leather binding over marbled covers (hinges fine, overall slightly worn and scuffed - as shown) under a protective removable mylar cover.
Content: Very good content (bright, tight, and clean, rare light foxing -  as shown, ex-libris of Comte François Potocki on the first endpaper - as shown).
Illustrations: Complete with the nice portrait of Perrault and four title heading vignettes illustrations engraved by Martinet

Estimate: (USD 2000 -USD 2500)

The book: Scarce and very “sought-after” 18th-century edition of Perrault's fairy tales including Donkey Skin, in prose and verse, Griselidis and The Ridiculous Wishes”(Brunet, IV, 508).

The author: Charles Perrault (12 January 1628 – 16 May 1703) was a French author and member of the Académie française. He laid the foundations for a new literary genre, the fairy tale, with his works derived from pre-existing folk tales. The best known of his tales include Le Petit Chaperon rouge (Little Red Riding Hood), Cendrillon (Cinderella), Le Chat Botté (Puss in Boots), La Belle au bois dormant (The Sleeping Beauty) and La Barbe bleue (Bluebeard). Some of Perrault's versions of old stories may have influenced the German versions published by the Brothers Grimm 200 years later. The stories continue to be printed and have been adapted to opera, ballet (such as Tchaikovsky's The Sleeping Beauty), theatre, and film. Perrault was an influential figure in the 17th-century French literary scene, and was the leader of the Modern faction during the Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns.