CREVEL RENÉ (1900-1935)

Lot 43
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Estimation :
30000 - 50000 EUR
Result with fees
Result : 35 586EUR
CREVEL RENÉ (1900-1935)
The Hard Death, autograph manuscript signed. "September 29, 1925", 88 pages in folio in black or violet ink on various vellum papers, lined or not, numbered from 1 to 71, tabbed and bound in one volume in a folio full-colour burgundy grief cloth, lining and endpapers printed in gold with heart motifs, burgundy half-chagrin box with gold title (Alain Lobstein). (A few small ink stains; slight yellowing). Precious, complete and probably unique autograph manuscript of one of Crevel's most beautiful and tragic novels published in Paris, by Simon Kra, in 1926, for which he invented a new form of "poetic novel" close to surrealism and whose main character, Pierre Dumont, is the double of its author, caught in the eternal malaise of his homosexuality, the family fatality and premonitory as to his tragic end by suicide. Autograph title in blue ink on strong laid paper: "Manuscrit complett/La Mort difficile/Roman/par René Crevel/1926". Chapter IV entitled "Night, Cold, Freedom, Death" presents Crevel's loving and painful relationship with the American painter Eugene Mac Cown, portrayed here as Arthur Bruggle. This manuscript, the only known manuscript of the novel, contains nearly 550 autograph corrections, including 22 lines that have been entirely crossed out. The text is very close to the final version with however many variants (the first and last chapters have different subtitles: "The Mothers" instead of "One thing leading to another" for the first one and "Knowing nor daring to love anything" instead of "Help again" for the last one). Only the very last chapter (occupying barely three pages in the printed edition and barely three-quarters of the pages in the folio in the manuscript - very corrected page) presents a version quite different from the final printed version. This manuscript has apparently never been studied. In a letter from Crevel addressed to Jouhandeau and kept at the Fonds littéraire Doucet, this manuscript is described as a "working man
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