The Sofa

First published in 1742 as Le Sopha, this libertine Oriental tale frames a soul condemned by Brahma to inhabit sofas until two virgins consummate their love upon him. The narrator, now restored, tells the sultan what he saw: a sequence of Parisian-style intrigues transplanted to a vaguely Eastern court, in which desire, vanity, and hypocrisy play out on the furniture that holds him. The episodes are erotic and satirical rather than romantic. The book is a comic novel of observation, not a manual and not a straight moral fable.

Bound in pink cloth. White dust-jacket printed in pink and black. Variant binding of quarter pale blue cloth with pink cloth boards.