Marquis de Sade

Publications of Short Prose in English

The Marquis de Sade’s infamy lies mostly with his four ‘libertine’ novels, Justine, Juliette, Philosophy in the Boudoir and The 120 Days of Sodom; he also wrote some ‘non-libertine’ novels, including Aline and Valcour but his output also included short fiction and plays. Many of the plays have been lost or destroyed but much of his shorter prose has survived. The majority of these stories were originally published in the four-volume collection, Les Crimes de l’amour, which was published in 1800, or from the collection Historiettes, Contes et Fabliaux, which were written around 1787-8, whilst Sade was imprisoned in the Bastille, but were not published until 1926. Many of these short stories and novellas have been translated into English and either published separately or in collections containing a variety of stories from each collection; some also have different titles. In an attempt to make sense of what is available for the English language Sadeian reader I have listed some of the contents of the most readily available collections of stories. Below these I have also listed the original French collections and have matched the original stories to the translated versions. Hopefully this will be of some use to readers who are thinking of tackling Sade’s shorter (and less extreme) works.

The Gothic Tales of the Marquis de Sade [GT]
(1990, Peter Owen, translated by Margaret Crosland)
(Originally published in 1965 as Eugénie de Franval and Other Stories)

1. Eugenie de Franval. A Tragic Story
2. The Horse-Chestnut Flower
3. The Chastised Husband
4. Florville and Courval, or Fatality
5. The Husband who Played Priest. A Provençal Tale
6. Emilie de Tourville, or The Cruel Brothers
7. Room for Two
8. The Self-Made Cuckold, or The Unexpected Reconciliation

 

The Misfortunes of Virtue and Other Early Tales [MOV]
(1992, Oxford University Press, translated by David Coward)

1. The Misfortunes of Virtue
2. Dialogue between a Priest and a Dying Man
3. The Successful Ruse
4. The Pimp Well Served
5. The Windbags of Provence
6. An Inexplicable Affair Vouched for by an Entire Province
7. The Prude, or The Unexpected Encounter
8. Émilie de Tourville, or Brotherly Cruelty
9. Augustine de Villebranche, or Love’s Stratagem
10. The Law of Talion
11. The Self-Made Cuckold, or The Unexpected Reconciliation
12. The Husband Who Said Mass: A Provençal Tale
13. The Lady of the Manor of Longeville, or a Woman’s Revenge
14. The Confidence Men

 

The Crimes of Love [COL]
(2005, Oxford University Press, translated by David Coward)

1. An Essay on Novels
2. Miss Henrietta Stralson, or The Effects of Despair. An English Tale
3. Faxelange, or The Faults of Ambition
4. Florville and Courval, or Fatality
5. Rodrigo, or The Enchanted Tower. An Allegorical Tale
6. Ernestine. A Swedish Tale
7. The Countess of Sancerre, or Her Daughter’s Rival. An Anecdote of the Court of Burgundy
8. Eugénie de Franval. A Tragic Tale
9. Appendix I. Draft of the Author’s Foreword (1788)
10. Appendix II. The Controversy with Villeterque
10.1 Review of The Crimes of Love by Villeterque
10.2 The Author of ‘The Crimes of Love’ to Villeterque, Hack and Scribe
10.3 From Le Journal des Arts, 15 nivôse, An IX (5 January 1801)

 

The Mystified Magistrate and Other Tales [MM]
(2000, Arcade Publishing, translated by Richard Seaver)

1. The Mystified Magistrate
2. Émilie de Tourville, or Fraternal Cruelty
3. Augustine de Villebranche or Loves Strategy
4. The Fortunate Ruse
5. The Properly Punished Pimp
6. The Teacher Philosopher
7. Your Wish Is My Command or As You Like It
8. An Eye for an Eye
9. The Windbags of Provence
10. Room for Two
11. The Husband Who Turned Priest: A Tale of Provence
12. Thieves and Swindlers
13. The Gascon Wit

The Crimes of Love [COLPO]
(2003, Peter Owen, translated by Margaret Crosland)

1. Faxelange, or The Wrongs of Ambition
2. Dorgeville, or The Criminal Through Virtue
3. Rodrigo, or The Enchanted Tower: An Allegorical Tale
4. Lorenzo and Antonio: An Italian Story
5. The Comtesse de Sancerre, or Her Daughter’s Rival: Anecdote from the Court of Burgundy

Incest [I]
(2003, Hesperus Classics, translated by Andrew Brown)

1. Incest. A Tragic Tale

 

 

Betrayal [B]
(2006, Hesperus Classics, translated by Andrew Brown)

1. The Magistrate Mocked
2. Émilie de Tourville, or Brotherly Cruelty

 

Virtue [V]
(2011, Hesperus Classics, translated by David Carter)

1. Ernestine: A Swedish Novella
2. Oxtiern, or The Miseries of Libertinism

 

Publications of Short Prose in French

The source of the French title information is from the Wikipedia page of ‘Marquis de Sade Bibliography’.

  • Dialogue entre un prêtre et un moribond, (w. 1782, pub. 1926) [MOV.2]
  • Les Infortunes de la vertu, (w. 1787, pub. 1930) [MOV.1]
  • Dorci, ou la Bizarrerie du sort (novella, w. 1788, pub. 1881)
  • Historiettes, Contes et Fabliaux (w. 1788, pub. 1926)
    • Historiettes
      • Le Serpent
      • La Saillie Gasconne [MM.13]
      • L’Heureuse Feinte [MOV.3] [MM.4]
      • Le M… puni [MOV.4] [MM.5]
      • L’Évêque embourbé
      • Le Revenant
      • Les Harangueurs Provençaux [MOV.5] [MM.9]
      • Attrapez-moi toujours de même
      • L’Époux complaisant
      • Aventure incomprehensible [MOV.6]
      • La Fleur de châtaignier [GT.2]
    • Contes et Fabliaux
      • L’Instituteur philosophe [MM.6]
      • La Prude, ou la Rencontre imprévue [MOV.7]
      • Émilie de Tourville, ou la Cruauté fraternelle [B.2] [GT.6] [MOV.8] [MM.2]
      • Augustine de Villeblanche, ou le Stratagème de l’amour [MOV.9] [MM.3]
      • Soit fait ainsi qu’il est requis [MM.7]
      • Le Président mystifié [B.1] [MM.1]
      • La Marquise de Thélème, ou les Effets du libertinage
      • Le Talion [MOV.10] [MM.8]
      • Le Cocu de lui-même, ou le Raccommodement imprévu [GT.8] [MOV.11]
      • Il y a place pour deux [GT.7] [MM.10]
      • L’Époux corrigé [GT.3]
      • Le Mari prêtre [GT.5] [MOV.12] [MM.11]
      • La Châtelaine de Longeville, ou la Femme vengée [MOV.13]
      • Les Filous [MOV.14] [MM.12]
    • Appendice
      • Les Dangers de la bienfaisance
  • Les Crimes de l’amour, Nouvelles héroïques et tragiques, (novellas, pub. 1800 in four volumes)
    • Une Idée sur les romans [COL.1]
    • Juliette et Raunai, ou la Conspiration d’Amboise, nouvelle historique
    • La Double Épreuve
    • Miss Henriette Stralson, ou les Effets du désespoir, nouvelle anglaise [COL.2]
    • Faxelange, ou les Torts de l’ambition [COL.3] [COLPO.1]
    • Florville et Courval, ou le Fatalisme [GT.4] [COL.4]
    • Rodrigue, ou la Tour enchantée, conte allegorique [COL.5] [COLPO.3]
    • Laurence et Antonio, nouvelle italienne [COLPO.4]
    • Ernestine, nouvelle suedoise [V.1] [COL.6]
    • Dorgeville, ou le Criminel par vertu [COLPO.2]
    • La Comtesse de Sancerre, ou la Rivale de sa fille, anecdote de la Cour de Bourgogne [COL.7] [COLPO.5]
    • Eugénie de Franval [I.1] [GT.1] [COL.8]