(1786). [GORSAS (Antoine Joseph)]. L'ANE PROMENEUR, OU CRITE - Lot 83

(1786). [GORSAS (Antoine Joseph)]. L'ANE PROMENEUR, OU CRITES PROMENE PAR SON ANE. Masterpiece to serve as an Apology to the Taste, Morals, Spirit and Discoveries of the Century. Pamplona, (Paris), chez Démocrite, au grelot de la folie, 1786. In-8, [2]-302-[2] (catalog) pages, fawn half-calf with corners, ribbed spine, red tr. (slightly later binding). Gorsas, originally destined for the priesthood, founded a house of education in Versailles. In 1788, he was imprisoned in Bicêtre, accused of corrupting the morals of his pupils. After his release, and when the King was forced to leave Versailles, he founded a revolutionary newspaper, Le Courrier de Versailles. Appointed a member of the Convention, he gradually switched from the Montagne to the Gironde, and was arrested and guillotined on October 7, 1793. "L'Ane Promeneur" is a pretext for the author to take to the stage with his donkey, and to mock the literary news of the day through spicy chronicles. Page 278, entitled le meilleur du livre, is blank, and the engraving, numbered 277, suggests that the donkey is the reader... A fine copy (Barbier I, 177) (Quérard III, 411).