OVA - LITERATURE • WRITERS AND POETS OF THE 19-20th CENTURIES (AGUTTES)

Expert: Claure Oterelo

The sale features major authors of very different styles and spirits: the witty eloquence of Louis-Ferdinand CÉLINE (1894-1961), the humour of Joris-Karl HUYSMANS (1848-1907), the lucidity of Jean GENET (1910-1986), the subtlety of Marcel PROUST (1871-1922), the provocativeness of Oscar WILDE (1854-1900), the rebellion of Albert CAMUS (1913-1960), the exoticism of Victor SEGALEN (1878-1919), the irony of Boris VIAN (1920-1959) and the charm of Paul ÉLUARD (1895-1952).
 
The manuscript of “Les Diables amoureux” by Guillaume APOLLINAIRE (1880-1918) is presented in a magnificent red and black binding (estimate: €20,000-25,000). This collection includes 134 pages: 40 are entirely in the poet’s hand, and 58 others are in the hand of either “Baron Jean Mollet” (a nickname given to him by his friend Apollinaire) who later became Satrap of the College of Pataphysics in 1953, or the bibliographer, Maurice Tourneux. The manuscript bears remarkable witness to Guillaume Apollinaire’s erudite knowledge of erotic literature.

 

aaa

The autograph manuscript of “Stèles” written between 1910 and 1911 by Victor SEGALEN (1878-1919) leads the sale (€100,000-120,000). The book provides evidence of the early versions of “Stèles”, a famous collection of poems and prose published by the author in Peking in 1912, with major variations. With his friend Gilbert de Voisins, Segalen went on a six-month journey exploring central China. “And it was neither Europe, nor China that I came to seek out here, but a vision of China …,” he wrote to Debussy. Segalen sent the draft of “Stèles” to Gilbert de Voisins in several batches from Peking between 1910 and 1912. The main batch included the preface and 19 steles. Other dispatches prior to that one, perhaps two or three, included 15 steles. This is an extremely rare work by Victor Segalen, as all his literary manuscripts are now in the Bibliothèque Nationale de France. Furthermore, according to his wishes, his correspondence with Gilbert de Voisins was burnt after his death; only the present steles and a piece of letter remain.






Also decked out in a very fine binding by Paul Bonet, a first edition of “À toute épreuve” by Paul ÉLUARD (1895-1952) is estimated at €25,000-30,000. It is one of the only 30 numbered copies on Chinese paper published in 1930 by the Éditions Surréalistes. The binding, consisting of a decoration in calfskin pieces arranged in a mosaic of different shades of green, brown and red, with small additions of white and gold calfskin, is listed in the workbooks of Paul Bonet under number 964, with the comment “one of the bindings I like the most; I managed to achieve an airy and truly Surrealist composition on this surface.”  

---