Cosmos and History: The Myth of the Eternal Return
Eliade, Mircea. Cosmos and History: The Myth of the Eternal Return. Harper Torchbooks, 1959. Softbound. First published in Paris in 1949 by Librairie Gallimard as Le Mythe de l'éternel retour: archétypes et répétition. Translated by Willard R. Trask. 'Among countless stones,' ponders Eliade in this foundational study of comparative religion, 'one stone becomes sacred—and hence instantly becomes saturated with being—because it constitutes a hierophany, or possesses mana, or again because it commemorates a mythical act, and so on.' The book has exerted powerful influence on writers ranging from Cocteau (L'Éternel retour) to Milan Kundera (The Unbearable Lightness of Being), and this Torchbooks edition is notable for being released under Eliade's preferred title, the one he first used as he began drafting the book in Lisbon in 1945, shortly after the death of his wife, Nina, and five years before its eventual publication by Gallimard. A handsome trade paperback featuring matte wraps with chicly chiseled outline capitals and three-color design by Charles Gottlieb, as well as a peculiar instance of a self-blurb—'the most significant of my books,' Eliade writes—to the back cover.