Octave MIRBEAU et Thadée NATANSON.

[Le Foyer]. No place or date [Paris, ca. 1906]. Autograph manuscript of 4 titles and 121 pages in-4 (234 x 178 mm), mounted on tabs: red jansenist morocco, four-ribbed spine, gold filleted edges, green morocco lining, framed in red morocco and gilt fillet, silk endpapers, case (Marius Michel). Complete autograph manuscript of Octave's third major play Mirbeau, a violent attack on Catholic charity. Cleaned up, it contains about thirty erasures, corrections and small additions. The play was co-signed by Thadée Natanson on a proposal from Mirbeau, who wanted to help his ruined friend by sharing the royalties with him. Le Foyer was performed at the Comédie Française after a long legal and political battle. The manuscript offers a first version of the play, as presented on July 17, 1906, to the administrator of the Comédie Française Jules Claretie. Denouncing without concessions the fate of young orphans placed in institutions, it was initially rejected. Deprived of a stage, Mirbeau complied, taking into account some of Claretie's dramaturgical remarks: the second act was deleted and the last one reworked. Thus he achieved his goal in December 1906. The rehearsals gave rise to a violent confrontation, with Claretie trying by all means to remove any subversive charge from the play. The author chose to take the matter to the public. The government Clemenceau, divided into two camps, was unable to make up its mind, so Mirbeau took the matter to court - and won the case in May 1908, then a triumph the following December 8: "We have finally heard it, this Foyer, the knowledge of which seemed until now to be reserved for ministers, lawyers and judges. We have heard it, and the case first decided by the Tribunal de la Seine has been definitively won before the public", Léon Blum was to enthuse in Comoedia, ranking the play "among the richest, most original and strongest works that have appeared on the stage for a long time". The same enthusiasm greeted the play in Berlin, where it was immediately staged. Octave Mirbeau had all his manuscripts bound by Marius-Michel, with the exception of his last novel, Dingo, which he was unable to complete: the one for Le Foyer is bound in morocco. From the library of Louis Barthou, with bookplate (catalogue II, 1935, no. 1082: "Important manuscript containing the act suppressed at the performance"). The provenance of this great notable of the Third Republic, Minister of Public Works at the time of the scandal provoked by Mirbeau's play, is very interesting. A first draft of 15 pages was in the collection of Colonel Sickles (cat. XVII, 1994, n° 7509).