The Saints invading Mount Olympus

Parny, Évariste-Desiré de Forges, chevalier de. La guerre des dieux, poème en dix chants.

€ 7,500.00

A notorious erotic epos about a war between the Olympian gods and the Christian Trinity, first published, without illustrations, in 1798 (Goethe owned a copy). This new, finely illustrated edition with its plates printed in two colours forms a complement to the four-volume edition of the author's works issued by Debray in the same year.

Inspired by Voltaire's "Pucelle d'Orleans", though much more aggressive, Parny's book is a characteristic product of the immediate post-Revolutionary years: a violent satire of the clergy and especially the dogmas of the Trinity and the Virginity of Mary. Gay and Lemonnyer consider all early editions "rares et recherchées", because they were all subject to suppression. Indeed, according to l'Enfer de la Bibliothèque Nationale, this work is "le plus fréquemment frappée pas la justice". "Napoleon prosecuted the book vigorously and thus temporarily put an end to its unchecked distribution. However, it was reprinted surreptitiously all the more often. To prevent further reissues, the government of the Restoration era finally decided to purchase the manuscript and have it destroyed" (cf. Englisch, p. 396).