Danish pears: Contes moraux in Copenhagen

A court case from 1775 concerning German reprints made by the Copenhagen publisher Søren Gyldendal points a finger at the culprit: Claude Philibert (1709–76).2 Stevning […] i Sagen imellem […] Gyldendal og Schubothe (Copenhagen, 1796), p. 15. It is noted that Philibert’s reprints were supported (even financially) by the government. His Contes moraux edition is one of two editions specified (along with the bestselling Raynal’s Histoire philosophique (1773–4, s.l.) among ‘numerous other major French works printed in this way in Copenhagen’. See H. Horstbøll, ‘En bogtrykker og boghandler i København’, Fund og forskning, 51 (2012), 311–35, at p. 322. This printer had moved to Copenhagen in 1755 from his native Geneva and the top-of-the-line business he co-owned with the Cramer brothers. They were soon to win fame as Voltaire’s publishers, while Philibert had fallen out with the philosophe over a pirate edition the year before his move. In Denmark, Philibert set up as an upmarket bookseller-printer while retaining a business in Geneva, now co-owned with and run by his brother Antoine. (Some books carry the imprint ‘Copenhague et Genève’.) He mainly produced books and periodicals in French and a few titles in Danish, all high quality and expensive, earning him a good reputation in Denmark and beyond.3 Letters to Voltaire from the Cramer brothers and C. Philibert, both dated 15 April 1754 (Th. Besterman (ed.), Correspondence and Related Documents, vol. XV (Geneva, 1971), pp. 83–5). L. Bobé, ‘Claude Philibert 1709–84. En Foregangsmand paa Boghaandværkets og Bogudbredelsens Omraade’, Nordisk Tidsskrift för Bok- och Bibliotekväsen, vol. VII (1920), 14–18, at p. 16; ‘Philibert, Claude’ in R.I.E.C.H. Inventory of Swiss printers and editors prior to 1850, 2008/2017; J. R. Kleinschmidt, Les imprimeurs et libraires de la république de Genève 1700–1798 (Geneva, 1948), pp. 92–5, 159–62. After Antoine’s death in 1764 Claude Philibert partnered with B. Chirol in Geneva until 1775. In addition, his bookshop offered imports particularly from Paris, Amsterdam, Leipzig and later Neuchatel.4 H. Ilsøe, Bogtrykkerne i København og deres virksomhed ca. 1600–1810 (Copenhagen, 1992), pp. 153–5; L. Bobé, ‘Claude Philibert 1709–84’, pp. 15–17. Contes moraux does not figure on a (short) backlist of titles that Philibert provided the Royal Library with in 1780–1 under the new law on legal deposit (Royal Library, Copenhagen, KBs Arkiv (indtil 1943), Pligtaflevering, Ms E39, 1778–1784).

When the theatre-loving Christian VII opened the Court Theatre in Copenhagen in 1767, where French and Italian ensembles performed, Philibert acquired the privilege to (re)print the staged plays, ‘Avec permission du Roi’ [with the king’s permission] printed on the title page. It often openly acknowledged the original edition, too, for instance ‘Suivant la nouvelle edition de 1768’ [after the new edition of 1768].5 See for instance his collections of dramas, which includes long lists of titles on offer in his bookshop: Theatre royal de Dannemarc (1770–3, 5 vols). Several of these plays were adaptations of Marmontel’s stories. As the defence pointed out in the case against Gyldendal (and as Bassompierre had reminded Marmontel), reprints of foreign books were common and legal, although frowned upon.6 See also R. Darnton, Pirating and Publishing, p. 2. Rather, Philibert took part in an international, flourishing trade in unauthorised reprints and translations, of which the Danish contributions of ‘numerous […] major French works’ remain to be studied in full.7 Stevning […] i Sagen imellem […] Gyldendal og Schubothe (Copenhagen, 1796), p. 15 (cf. n. 18 above); H. Horstbøll, ‘En bogtrykker og boghandler i København’, pp. 322–3. Books forbidden in France, such as Bélisaire, were particularly attractive to reprint. Furthermore, Philibert’s French titles from Copenhagen were potential objects of exchange with books from publishers abroad, as so-called ‘change’ rather than payments in cash was often preferred. For example, his pirate edition of Montesquieu’s works (1759–65) found their way to his shop in Geneva and from there to Neuchatel – and from there, who knows where. Others, like his edition of Raynal’s Histoire philosophique (1773–4), were considered a direct competition by pirate publishers abroad.8 H. Horstbøll, ‘En bogtrykker og boghandler i København’, pp. 319–20; A. Frøland, Dansk boghandels historie 1482 til 1945 (Copenhagen, 1974), pp. 85, 88f, 119. Printing inexpensive books that were attractive abroad for ‘change’ was a difficult but necessary task for Danish booksellers. However, Philibert primarily had to rely on international payments through a financial agent, while his shop in Geneva more easily could engage in ‘change’. S. Burrows’ and M. Curran’s The French Book Trade in Enlightenment Europe Database, 1769–94 (on the book trade to and from Société Typographique Neuchatel) lists Geneva as the top supplier of Montesquieu, but I have not found a list of specific editions (browse author: Montesquieu/supply origins).

Newspaper advertisements confirm that Philibert had offered Contes moraux at least from 1766. However, in May 1768 he announces that an edition of Contes moraux is currently in print, following other works by Marmontel all in octavo and printed 1767–8.9 Kiøbenhavnske Tidender and KA, both 16 May 1768, p. 4. The first volume is finished, a second volume is due in June. The third (with Nouveaux contes moraux) is not mentioned here and no further advertisements are found until 9 November 1768 (KA) when 3 volumes in octavo (1768) are listed under ‘Livres nouveaux chez Cl. Philibert’. The others include Fragmens de Philosophie Morale, the 1767 novel Bélisaire (with the Fragmens) as well as an unattributed ‘conte moral’, ‘L’Heureuse famille’. This confirms an unrecognised Danish 1768 edition. Does it still exist? Bibliographies of Marmontel’s works list a 1768-edition in French (3 vols, octavo) with unknown place of publication. It is found in several Northern European libraries, where place of print is either given as unknown or as Paris due to a misreading of the title page: ‘Suivant l’Edition de Paris, chez Merlin’ (referencing the 1765 Merlin edition).10 M. Freund (Die moralischen Erzählungen Marmontels, p. 84) and A. Martin et al. (Bibliographie, p. 61.12). Copies of this edition are owned by the University Library, Oslo, the library of Oslo Cathedral School, the royal libraries of Copenhagen and Stockholm, Staatsbibliothek Berlin and the British Library (the latter two list ‘[The Hague?]’ as place of origin). R. Dawson (‘Marmontel Made in Britain’, p. 122) describes it as a ‘rare book’ as he is only aware of one or two copies. The provenance of the copy in Copenhagen (along with other works of Marmontel printed by Philibert) is diplomat and counsellor to the Dano-Norwegian king, Count Haxthausen (1733–1802). So far, the wording echoes other reprints of Philibert’s at the time, supported by a predominantly Scandinavian distribution.

The bibliographer Dawson gives a detailed description of the three volumes of this 1768 edition, arguing that certain printing features and paper qualities ‘feels British’. If the edition is compared to Philibert’s other Marmontel editions, however, it rather feels Danish. For instance, the layout and type of the title page of his Bélisaire (1767) is identical to Contes moraux’, as are those of Fragmens de Philosophie Morale (1767), except for each work having different ornaments above the year of print. However, Bélisaire is embellished with the same ornament we find on the last page of Contes moraux (vol. 3). Furthermore, Fragmens’ title page identifies Merlin’s edition as its original with the same phrase as the Contes’. Bound between the copies of these editions in the Royal Library Copenhagen is Philibert’s sales catalogue for August 1767, where Bélisaire is listed among his own publications. The reprint of Bélisaire in 1775, carrying the imprint ‘A Copenhague, Chez Cl. Philibert’, has a vignette of a bunch of pears and leaves on the title page and last page, identical to the vignette on the title page of Contes moraux. Philibert frequently used this vignette in his reprints of French drama 1769–70.11 R. Dawson (‘Marmontel Made in Britain’, p. 111) describes the ornaments as ‘enigmatic to [me]’, but as having a ‘British look’. Again, the fonts, punctuation, the presentation of the author’s name and title, and the use of single and double black lines are still exactly the same. While Philibert reprinted Fragmens and Bélisaire in 1775, he did not reprint the Contes.

Finally, a near mistake by Philibert laid out in his foreword to L’Heureuse famille (1768) confirms that Contes moraux was indeed published by him in 1768. The moral tale had previously been added to the Leipzig edition of Bélisaire (1767) and an Amsterdam edition of the Contes, mistaking the tale for Marmontel’s and not (as was the case) by one of his many imitators, Lezay-Marnézia in Geneva.12 Philibert adds that the story was included in an Amsterdam edition of Contes moraux, too, which I have not found. The original appeared in Geneva in 1766. Evidently Philibert had been made aware of this mistake during printing, so he explains to the reader why the pagination of the story starts on page 49: it was supposed to follow Fragmens and precede Contes moraux.

Indirectly, we here learn that Philibert had consulted an Amsterdam edition of Contes moraux. Apparently, it contradicts the reference to the Merlin edition, but it could be the case that he consulted both. The Amsterdam edition opens with Marmontel’s poem Les Charmes de l’Etude (1760).13 Published by ‘la Compagnie’ (1761/62; several reprints before 1768). So does the 1768 edition, with an added footnote that this text is not found in the Paris edition but in the one from Amsterdam.14 ‘Cette pièce n’est pas dans l’édition de Paris, mais d’Amsterdam’ (Marmontel, Contes moraux ([Copenhagen], 1768), p. [19]). More importantly, the 1768 edition has all the new stories from the Paris edition, although it rearranges their sequence (compared to both the Paris and Amsterdam editions) throughout the three volumes, thus altering the author’s careful organisation and potentially the readers’ reception of them. However, by combining textual and material elements to create a distinctly new edition, Philibert could more easily defend his publication if international trade partners should complain of his competition in the reprint market.15 See H. Horstbøll, ‘En bogtrykker og boghandler i København’, p. 322.

In other words, Nimb and his fellow readers visiting Copenhagen bookshops would have had a range of editions in French to choose from, including one printed locally, for the Danish and Scandinavian markets and beyond. It would have been one of the earliest French editions of the Contes moraux outside France and the capitals of European reprints, preceding a Swedish edition by seventeen years. Furthermore, it would mean that no French edition was published in Britain.16 According to R. Dawson (‘Marmontel Made in Britain’, p. 110), there are three French editions with a London imprint (1771, 1780 and 1795), all of which are fake. Moreover, Philibert’s active production of reprints over two decades in Copenhagen adds to Darnton’s recent mapping of the European pirating industry of French books in this period.17 Darnton focuses on ‘The Fertile Crescent’ of printers in cities along France’s borders while briefly referencing studies of Britain and Germany, but not beyond (Pirating and Publishing, p. 5). However, Marmontel’s tales were to reach far beyond Copenhagen and those fluent in French, or even readers of long volumes. The tales found their early and wide readership in Denmark–Norway by assuming their original form: as pieces in periodicals, only now in translation.