TRANSLATION Alexandre - Don Sébastien de Portugal. Drame historique en prose en trois actes et cinq tableaux....

PRZEZDZIECKI Alexandre - Don Sébastien de Portugal. Drame historique en prose en trois actes et cinq tableaux. Saint-Petersbourg 1836. by Charles Kray. 8, pp. LIV, [2], 134, [1]. broch.
Yellowing of the paper in places (including the covers), folding of the corners of the first pages. Bibliot. doublet. (stamp erased), bookseller's stamp. Drama depicting the tragic fate of Sebastian I, King of Portugal and its dependence on Spain by Sebastian's successor, Philip II. Przezdziecki sees clear parallels here with the history of Poland after the third partition. "How could tui in St. Petersburg raise national issues under the watchful eye of Nicholas I, just four years after the capture of Warsaw by Paskevich? Portuguese history thus provided a theme for the young author, who was able to find in the adventures and drama of King Sebastian an analogy to the fate of the homeland [...]. It would become a success when the play was staged during the Carnival of 1936, by a French troupe [...] at St. Petersburg's Théatre Imperial Français [...]. Soon 'Don Sébastien de Portugal' appeared in print, published by one of the St. Petersburg bookstores, in a few valuable pieces, which today constitute a certain bibliophilic rarity" (R. Przezdziecki "Aleksander Przezdziecki, literary historian of the 19th century", Torun 1999, pp. 40-42).