[Louis ARAGON].

Fucking Irene. Sans lieu [Paris, René Bonnel], 1928. In-4, flesh-coloured calf, smooth spine, title in English mosaic letters on the first plate surmounting a set of blond pubic hairs, large vertical band of mosaic red calf in the centre of the second plate, beige suede linings and endpapers, gold edges on witnesses, red paper cover and spine preserved, shirt, case (Leroux, 1988). Original, clandestine and anonymous edition of the erotic masterpiece by Louis Aragon. Edition at 150 copies: one of the 125 on vergé d'Arches à la forme (#34). The illustration includes 5 original etchings without text by André Masson, in the first edition. The story is organized in eleven sequences which are as many prose poems, so as to confront eroticism with writing. "Aragon always disavowed this clandestine volume, at least publicly, when in fact he was delighted with it - "the book is wonderful," he wrote to Pascal Pia. One hundred and fifty copies of this first edition [...] were sold in three months" (Eros au secret, no. 208). The book is, along with Histoire de l'oeil, the most famous of the work of the two companions Pascal Pia and René Bonnel. (Cf. nº 18 of this catalogue.) Singular talking binding by Georges Leroux (Saphir & Cramer, André Masson, catalogue raisonné des livres illustrés, nº 5 - Dutel, Bibliographie des ouvrages érotiques clandestinement publiés en français entre 1920 et 1970, nº 1270 - Pia, Les Livres de l'Enfer, col. 238: "Published in 1928, the work was delivered to subscribers in a case covered with red poster paper").