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The CAT19 database (‘CAT’ for ‘catalog’ and ‘19’ for ‘19^th century’) is a Digital Humanities project that seeks to present comprehensive data concerning multiple aspects of the French-language novel for the period 1801-1820: formal and thematic trends, authorial identities and publishing practices, materiality and critical reception. The database is intended to be the ‘connected’ continuation of the Bibliographie du genre romanesque 1751-1800 (1977), by Angus Martin, Vivienne G. Mylne et Richard Frautschi. Forty-three years passed before a follow‑up project to the Bibliographie du genre romesque 1751-1800 was undertaken, and until now, the production of novels in the first decades of the 19^th century has been marked by the absence of such an exhaustive catalogue.

1. Defining the data to be collected

The Bibliographie du genre romanesque 1751-1800 (henceforth referred to as ‘MMF’), an essential work of reference in bibliographical and 18^th-century studies, was our first model to define the criteria for the data to be collected.

MMF’s definition of the novel genre is a broad one, and includes ‘tout ce qui a été publié en langue française en matière de roman, de conte, de nouvelle, de récit fictif en prose sous toutes les formes’ [everything that has been published in the French language and in prose, novel, tale, short story, fictitious story in prose whateveer its form] (MMF, Préface, p. ix). We adopted these unrestricted criteria. However, we have only focused on the productions from the conventional publishing, excluding chapbooks and fiction published in periodicals. Has been included in our database ‘tout ouvrage où nous arriverions à décerner un récit – autrement dit un enchaînement d’incidents, une progression dans le temps, dans l’espace, dans l’existence des personnages mis en scène […], [tout] ouvrage où il y aurait des acteurs, des protagonistes humains ou autres, qui motiveraient ou supporteraient la trame de l’action, si minime soit-elle’ [any work which contains a story – in other words a chain of incidents, a progression in time, in space, in the existence of the characters […], [any] work in which there are actors, human protagonists or others, who help the progression of the plot, however small it may be] (MMF, Introduction, p. xiv).

These criteria include ‘marginal’ works, defined by MMF as being ‘close to the fictional genre, but which one hesitates to qualify as a novel or a tale’ (MMF, Sigles et Abréviations, p. liii). Similar selection criteria were used for CAT19. Thus, prose translations of certain verse poems, as well as fictional journeys, pseudo-memoirs and pseudo-letters feature in our database. Likewise, a work that does not belong to the fictional genre in itself, but which contains one or several pieces of prose fiction, will be listed in the database. For example, Auguste Leblanc’s Voyage sans bouger de place (1809), which consists of prose interspersed with verse, features in the database. The same goes for Dialogues d'une mère avec sa fille (1802), by Claudine Coeurderoy, which consists of moral dialogues interspersed with tales, as in the Magasin des enfants (1756) by Marie Leprince de Beaumont.

 As we have consulted a large number of sources, we have chosen to list all the reprints and reeditions encountered during our research, hoping that even such an approximate and incomplete list will provide useful information.

In accordance with the MMF model, each record provides general information on the featured work (publication date, status, author/translator, title, editor, publisher etc.), elements of material description (format, number of volumes and pages, etc.), the critical reception of the works (references of contemporary reviews), a non-exhaustive overview of the other editions of the same title, as well as, where possible, a brief description of the content (literary genre, narrative form, plot summary, name of the characters, etc.). Each record also mentions at least one library holding a physical copy of the work, as well as a hyperlink, in the case of digitised editions, providing direct access to the document. This constitutes an advantage in comparison to the MMF, which, to date, only exists in paper edition.

In order to provide researchers with the most complete and relevant data possible on the book as an object, we considered it necessary to include a series of additional elements relating to the production and marketing of the works (publisher’s and printer’s addresses, price of the book), and potential paratext (epigraphs, prefaces, dedications, illustrations and sheet music).

2. Data collection and processing

Data collection was carried out for the period starting from January 1801 and ending in December 1820. This work was broken down into three stages.

First, we listed all the novels published during the selected period, thanks to the examination of general and specialised bibliographies (Cf. ‘Sources, bibliographical references and abbreviations’). These bibliographies provide a first set of general and material information. We then cross-referenced the data collected using general bibliographies and library catalogues.

Significant associated research work was then carried out to complete the data. Such research was necessary to proceed, for example, to the identification of author(s)/translator(s), in the case of anonymous or pseudonymous novels. Then, the status of the works was established, first edition (and, if not, the date of first publication was provided), and/or translation (in which case we indicated, when possible, the name of translator, the author, title and publication date of the source text). We also identified and listed other existing editions of the same title. Finally, we located copies of each edition in libraries and searched within periodicals of the time to collect literary reviews relating to the editions listed in the database.

The fundamental principles of the database and its search criteria are further developed in the ‘Adopted norms’ section.

Finally, once all the entries were in place, the last task to be carried out was to consult, when possible, one copy of each of the works listed in the database, in order to complete the material data and provide content description. COVID-19 lockdown, which prevented travels, affected this part of the project, and we were unable to consult as many physical copies as we would have hoped to. Fortunately, the libraries’ massive digitisation undertaking has made it possible to consult some of the digitised copies of the works listed in the database.

The realisation of a project such as CAT19 would have been impossible without significant financial support. We would like to thank the Fondation Wiener-Anspach, the University of Oxford and the Université Libre de Bruxelles for their support. Thank you, also, to the SwingTree team for their expertise, flexibility and interest in the project.