THE FOURTH VOLUME OF LETTERS WRIT BY A TURKISH SPY, who lived five and forty years undiscover'd, at Paris: giving an impartial account to the Divan of Constantinople, of the most remarkable transactions of Europe. Fifth edition,

MARANA, Giovanni Paolo.

Edité par London: printed for H. Rhodes. and Rich. Sare, 1703

A propos de cet article

12mo, (155x93mm), [22],288p, slightly browned throughout. Contemporary calf, worn and with some loss from the surface of leather in part. Several sources attribute editorship of the English translation to Robert Midgley although his role, or that of William Bradshaw (who may have provided the translation and who was described by Dunton in his Life and errors as 'the best accomplished hackney-writer I have ever met with) in the publishing history and authorship of The Turkish Spy have never been fully established. Giovanni Paolo Marana, a Genoese refugee at the court of Louis XIV, published the first volume in Italian in 1683. A French version, L'espion du grand seigneur (1684-6), in three volumes and 102 letters, attributed to Marana, reached nine volumes in various editions by 1756. The expanded English version, eventually in eight volumes and containing some 600 letters, was first published in the years 1687 to 1694. A footnote in Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, concerning the authorship of The Turkish spy, reads: 'the following memorandum was taken from a copy of the original conveyance in the hands of the late Mr. Charles Bathurst, bookseller in London, in May 1767: Dr. Robert Midgely, of the parish of St. Michael Bassishaw, London, conveys 27th Dec. 1693, to Jos. Hindmarsh, Rd. Sare, and Henry Rhodes [a subsequent publisher of some of the volumes], all the copy-right in the Turkish Spy in 8 volumes. . translated, written, and composed, by himself. Afterwards: written originally in Arabick, translated into Italian, and from thence into English. Last of all, he calls himself the sole author of these copies or books. He sold the copy for £209. 11s. 9d.' As DNB notes, All this is very detailed, but not definite proof of Midgley's authorship. The Turkish spy is, however, of greater importance than the problem of its authorship, as it is the first example of a literary genre: the description of a country and its customs, people, and institutions laid bare in a series of letters by a foreigner, and won great contemporary popularity by thrilling and satisfying the new bourgeois reading public with its pseudo-secret revelations of the intrigues of a foreign observer in the capital of one of the most powerful monarchies of western Europe. Estc locates only 5 copies of this volume and edition. Please note that the advised postage is based on an average book, if necessary the postage will be reduced to the correct amount and you will be notified by email.

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Détails bibliographiques

• Titre: THE FOURTH VOLUME OF LETTERS WRIT BY A TURKISH SPY, who lived five and forty years undiscover'd, at Paris: giving an impartial account to the Divan of Constantinople, of the most remarkable transactions of Europe. Fifth edition,
• Éditeur: London: printed for H. Rhodes. and Rich. Sare
• Date de parution: 1703
• Reliure: Couverture souple