The Ten Pleasures of Marriage 2Publisher'S Preface
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Literature · Humor
The Ten Pleasures of Marriage 2
Publisher'S Preface
BehnEnglish
"Of the making of many books there is no end," nor is there an end to the Romance of books, as the little volume here, privately reprinted by the Navarre Society, is surely proof most positive. The original is a small thick volume; it bears the imprint "London, Printed in the year 1683," and but one perfect copy is known; that copy lay unappreciated in the heart of London in an antiquarian bookseller's shop.
Fortunately, however, for our literature and for students of the manners of the commonality of the period it was seen by a colleague, who wondered why he did not know it. After purchasing it he found the reason why--the Bodleian Library alone possessed a copy of the work (imperfect); later a copy of the first part (only) appeared in the last portion of the sale of the great Huth Collection. The present text is taken from the perfect copy mentioned above.
The curious title rather damns the literary interest of the book, which presents pictures of the cit and his wife at work and play which Fielding, had he lived in the seventeenth century, might have written. It is thought that the book was printed in Holland, and if so, it may well be that the ship carrying the printed sheets to England foundered in the North Sea, or was sunk by enemy craft. There can be no doubt that such a work would not have escaped the wits of the time; if it had survived for ordinary circulation, mention would have been made of it, however small an edition had been sold. No other so likely reason for its extreme rarity presents itself.
It is reprinted, as faithfully as the altered manners of our time permit, with a Preface by John Harvey, who attributes the work to the industrious and sometimes brilliant Mrs Aphra Behn, a discovery which the Navarre Society believe to be well grounded. They hope that the issue of the book to their subscribers may help to confirm or refute that lady's responsibility for so graceless an attack upon her sex. Whether she did or did not write it, the fact remains that a work so vividly representative of Restoration life and literature is rescued from the obscurity to which its scarceness has hitherto condemned it and worthily preserved for scholars and amateurs of the future.
