Les Liaisons Dangereuses (Dangerous Acquaintances)

Published in 1782, this epistolary novel is conducted through letters among the Vicomte de Valmont, the Marquise de Merteuil, their targets, and a few confidants in late-ancien-regime France. The two aristocrats treat seduction as a campaign: Valmont pursues the devout Mme de Tourvel while, at Merteuil's urging, he also ruins a young girl just out of her convent. Pride, boredom, and a former attachment between the plotters drive the correspondence. The book is a novel of manners and sexual politics told entirely in letters, not a memoir of the court.

12 two-colour. Patterned endleaves. There were numerous variant bindings including dark red shadow-striped silk, dark green shadow-stripe artificial silk. Light green shadow-stripe artificial silk, full plain green artificial silk and in red cloth. Grey slipcase.