Zola (Émile) Édouard Manet, first edition, 48pp., frontispiece portrait of Manet by Bracquemond and etched 'Olympia' plate by Manet, the odd spot but largely very clean, modern boards, light fading on lower board, original wrappers bound in, 8vo, Paris, E. Dentu, 1867.

⁂ First edition of Zola's biographical study of his friend Edouard Manet, first published in the Revue du XIXe siecle on January 1, 1867.

The work was initially sold as a brochure at the retrospective exhibition organized by the artist in the pavilion built at his own expense at the Alma, on the sidelines of the Universal Exhibition and the Salon of 1867, from which he had been excluded.

More than a biography, it is a defence of the work that was first exhibited at the 1865 Salon, depicting the high-class sex worker, Olympia: "It contains all of him, and only him. It will remain as the defining work of his talent, as the highest mark of his power" (p. 34)