Author: GESSNER (Salomon):
Title: New Idyls by Gessner. Translated by W. Hooper M D. With A Letter to M: Fuslin on Landscape Painting and the Two Friends of Bourbon. A Moral Tale.
Description: London Printed for S. Hooper..., 1776. Large 8vo (in 4s), 270 x 173 mms., pp. [vi], 129 [130 blank], engraved title-page followed by drop-title leaf, 9 full-page enraved plates, 10 engraved tail-pieces, and 2 engraved head-pieces, with later inscription and date,"William Burton/ October 1807" and a transcription of a letter in French by Fuslin to Gessner and Gessner's response on three pages, bound in contemporary calf and expertly rebacked with new red morocco. A very good copy This first translation of Moralische Erzæhlungen und Idyllen (Zurich, 1756) is easily the best-known work of Salomon Gessner (1730 – 1788), the Swiss artist, poet, government official, etc. The plates are indeed rather splendid. The Monthly Review for 1776 commented, "Perhaps there is no object in poetical criticism that requires a more consummate judgment than to work with certainty the dividing line between what is simple and what is silly. The innumerable errors of this kind, that we have met with confirm the truth of this observation, and it has occurred once or twice on the view of the publication before use." Ah. well: enjoy the illustrations. Martin Bircher, et al., Salomon Gessner: Maler und Dichter der Idylle 1730–1788. Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel 1982,

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