Two Lovers in Rome-Being Extracts from The Journal and Letters of Etienne-Jean Delecluze

Dust jacket small amount of loss to edges, marks, unclipped. Brown cloth boards with bright gilt titling on spine. Book plate on f. paste down. 222 pages clean and tight. Translated from the French by Gerard Hopkins. Illustrated with portrait frontispiece. In 1823 the painter Delecluze was in Rome: a staid man, who enjoyed discussing with his friends problems connected with the arts and philosophy and who regarded society with the mild, observant gaze of one who belonged by nature to a more sober milieu. One day he received an unexpected call from his friend Jean-Jacques Ampere. Jean-Jacques had just arrived from Paris in the train of Madame Recamier, for whom he nursed a hopeless passion. He pressed Delecluze to visit them at once. This Dele'cluze did, and though he disapproved of his friend's romantic thraldom, he himself instantly fell victim to the atmosphere of easy charm with which Madame Re'camier could surround herself. Worse still, mellowed by this delightful atmosphere, he fell no less instantly and most unsuitably in love with Madame Re'camier's niece, Ame'lie Cyvoct. Here was a pretty state of affairs for a man who prided himself on his strict common sense and believed himself enemy of the newfangled romanticism. The story of this love, linked with Ampere's for Madame Re'camier, is told through Dele'cluze's journal and letters to the other people involved. It is certainly a rather comic story, but it is also endearing. One suspects that Amelie and her aunt must have often laughed about poor Delecluze behind his back, but they would certainly have agreed afterwards that it was a shame to be unkind about anyone so very nice. And they would have thought so yet more emphatically if they could have known what a delightful and intimate picture of their circle he was to leave for posterity. Size: 8vo.…