121 - GAUTIER, Théophile and UZELAC, Milivoj. *The Novel of the Mummy*.

GAUTIER, Théophile and UZELAC, Milivoj. *The Novel of the Mummy*. Paris, Eryx, 1947. In-4 (28 x 22 cm), loose-leaf, white cover embossed with an Egyptian motif and the title in relief and filled in, cardboard slipcase, case. 239 pp. Spine of the slipcase sun-faded. A beautiful and luxurious edition of Théophile Gautier’s *The Novel of the Mummy*, illustrated here by Uzelac with 24 compositions stenciled by Jacomet, including 14 insert plates. Beautiful woodcut initials. Printed in an edition of 695 copies plus 86 non-commercial copies. One of the 190 copies on Arches vellum, this one being No. 210, including a set of inset plates and a set of studies printed in a single color (14 + 24 plates in black). Milivoj Uzelac (1897–1977), a Croatian painter born in Mostar, trained in Zagreb and then settled in Prague during World War I. In 1921 he discovered Paris, where he settled in 1923. He enjoyed a successful career and began exhibiting at the Salon d’Automne in 1924. His first solo exhibition took place at the Bibliothèque Marguerite Durand in Paris in 1925. *The Romance of the Mummy* was serialized from March to May 1857 in *Le Moniteur universel*, then published in book form in 1858 by Hachette. Not far from the Nile, in the Biban-el-Molouk Valley, a young English aristocrat, Lord Evandale, and a German Egyptologist, Dr. Rumphius, discover an untouched tomb with the help of a Greek con artist named Argyropoulos. For more than 3,500 years, no one had set foot in the burial chamber where a pharaoh’s sarcophagus lay. But when they open the heavy black basalt lid, the two men are astonished to find the perfectly preserved mummy of a young woman of stunning beauty named Tahoser. Following the discovery of this mummy, the novel tells the story of the mummy and her love affairs. A beautiful copy with sequels.