VALÉRY (Paul). - Lot 213

Lot n° 213
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2000 - 3000 EUR
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Result : 3 125EUR
VALÉRY (Paul). - Lot 213
VALÉRY (Paul). La Jeune Parque. Paris : Nouvelle Revue Française, 1917. - In-4, 241 x 190 : (24 ff. first and last blank), illustrated cover. Paperback. First edition of one of the major works of 20th century French poetry. "After twenty years of silence, Paul Valéry published in 1917 a very long poem, La Jeune Parque, which immediately brought him fame. [...] To flesh out his old poems, he thought of adding a piece of about forty Alexandrines. When the war came, to alleviate his anguish, he imposed on himself the most rigorous prosodic constraints. From this gigantic effort - Paul Valéry covered no less than eight hundred pages of drafts to give the five hundred verses of La Jeune Parque their definitive form - was born the work in which 'extreme sensuality, extreme intellectuality, extreme musicality' merge in a rarely equaled harmony" (Paul Valéry, Exposition du centenaire, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale, 1971, page 49). He was responding to the wishes of two of his friends, André Gide, dedicatee of the collection, and Gaston Gallimard. One of 575 copies on Arches laid paper. EXAMPLE OF THE PUBLISHER AND POET ADRIENNE MONNIER (1892-1955), with this very nice autograph letter in verse on the false title: D'autres préfèrent la prairie; // Mais les plus sages vont nier // La rose dans ta librairie // O Mademoiselle Monnier // P. ValéryThe author of La Jeune Parque was a regular and faithful customer of "La Maison des Amis des Livres", a bookshop created by Adrienne Monnier on November 15, 1915 at 7 rue de l'Odéon in Paris . Slight soiling to the cover. Some scattered foxing. Provenance: Adrienne Monnier, with a consignment from the author and a butterfly from the 1926 sale (cat. May 1926, n° 370). - Ex-libris M.D.
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