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several old papers and a book sitting on top of a tablea close up of a piece of paper with writing on ita piece of paper with writing on it sitting on a tablean old photo of a woman and her dogthree old handwritten letters sitting on top of a tablea group of four old papers sitting on top of a tablea close up of a piece of paper with writing on itan old book sitting on top of a table covered in moss
Daguerre Savoie

6 - Anonymous (Octave Mirbeau, ghostwriter for Forsan, pen name …
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Estimate €250 - €400
Description
Anonymous (Octave Mirbeau, ghostwriter for Forsan, pen name of Dora Melagari) – *Expiation* (with accompanying handwritten letters) – Calmann Lévy, 1882, Paris, second edition. In small 8vo format comprising 162 pages, in period half-shagreen binding, ribbed spine, gilt head. A copy on laid paper, enriched with five multi-page letters received by Dora Melegari, some of which contain comments on her work, and a photographic postcard. For information: Dora Melegari, an Italian writer and a feminist ahead of her time, commissioned Octave Mirbeau to ghostwrite three works, which were published under the pseudonym Forsan (‘Expiation’, a slim volume as stripped down as a sketch, published without an author’s name in 1881, ‘Marthe de Thiennes’ in 1882 and ‘Les Incertitudes de Livia’ in 1883). The novels she commissioned from Mirbeau centre on ‘female characters, victims of the bourgeois society of the so-called Belle Époque, where patriarchy, Christianity and commercialism join forces to better crush women’. In 1881 (the year the first edition was published, and certainly Mirbeau’s first novel), Octave Mirbeau was not yet well known; he was a journalist, or rather a paid contributor. This enabled him not only to earn a decent living, but also, and above all, to cut his teeth and prove himself before becoming the great writer we know today. Octave Mirbeau (1848–1917) was a French writer, art critic and anarchist journalist, and a member of the Académie Goncourt.
See original version (French)
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About the sale AUTOGRAPHS & BOOKS
Auction location
Auction time 09/06/2026 at 8:00 PM
ID: 88412382
Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House
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