PBA Galleries

503 pp. (8vo), finely bound by Semet and Plumelle, in three quarter red morocco and marbled boards, gilt spine with raised bands, marbled endpapers, top edge gilt. Original wrappers bound in. No. 746 of 1200 copies. First Edition.

A true first edition, beautifully bound by famous Parisian bookbinders Semet and Plumelle, with their signature on the verso of the front free endpaper. Gide considered this his first true novel, and his preceding texts being only stories. The multiplicity of points of view make this book a precursor to what will be called much later the "new novel, " and one of the major works of its author. Initially received coldly on its appearance, perhaps because of its homosexual themes and its unusual composition, Les Faux-Monnayeurs (in English, "The Counterfeiters") has gained reputation in the intervening years and is now generally counted among the Western Canon of literature.