564 lots

Sotheby’s Paris

2016

12 3/8″ x 9 3/4″

The auction is set to take place November 8th and 9th and features 376 lots broken into four sections:

Precursors, containing pre-romantic material, noir fiction, and material by the Marquis de Sade.
Romanticism.
Material by Gustave Flaubert.
Modern material by realists and dreamers.
Highlights of the sale are numerous. The item with the single highest estimate is an autograph manuscript by Flaubert of Par les Champs et les Grves (Voyage en Bretagne), an account of his travels in Britain with Maxime du Camp. The manuscript is heavily annotated and revised throughout, serving as Flauberts working copy, and carries an estimate of 400.000-600.000.

The collection of Berg was amassed over fifty years, with an eye and a passion for the material that few, if any, possess. This fact, combined with a financial situation conducive to collecting allowed him to acquire the best of the best for subjects he focused on. The following items are but a few indicators of the quality of his collection:

A first edition copy of Victor Hugos La Lgende des Sicles and the only copy printed on vellum. Est. 60.000-80.000.
Another copy of Baudelaires Les Fleurs du Mal, this one a better copy than the lot offered in the first sale. It was bound by Lortic, Baudelaires favorite binder and contains an inscription to Alcide-Pierre Grandguillot, chief editor of the Constitutionnel du Pays. Est. 100.000-150.000.
A first edition of Arthur Schopenhauers Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, and the only known copy in private hands of the rare larger paper printing. Est. 40.000-60.000.
A first edition of Walt Whitmans Leaves of Grass, one of 795 copies printed at the authors expense and one of 599 bound in green cloth. Est. 40.000-50.000.
A first edition of Oscar Wildes The Ballad of Reading Gaol, one of 30 large paper copies on Japan paper and contains a four-page signed autograph letter by Wilde to his editor Leonard Smythers.
A rare first trade edition of Fyodor Dostoyevskys Crime and Punishment [in Russian] in its original first Russian binding. Est. 30.000-40.000.
A first edition set of Leo Tolstoys War and Peace [in Russian], containing all six volumes. Est. 20.000-30.000.