Lot n° 217
Estimation :
20000 - 25000
EUR
Result with fees
Result
: 18 452EUR
SAND George (1804-1876). - Lot 217
SAND George (1804-1876).
MANUSCRIT autograph signed " G. Sand", Malgrétout, 1869; 979 pages in-8 (21 x 13 cm), bound in 2 volumes in-8, red morocco, with double gilt filleting in the center of the boards between a triple filleting, smooth spines decorated with five vertical gilt fillets, punctuated with a decoration of fleurons in a double gilt framing ; author, title and tomaison in gold within a limited compartment of curved double-fillets; interior roulette, combed paper lining and endpapers, double fillet on the edges.
Complete working manuscript of the novel Malgrétout, which takes place in the Ardennes, and which caused a scandal.
Published in the Revue des Deux Mondes from January 1 to March 15, 1870, then in bookshops by Michel Lévy, the novel was written between October 27 and the end of December 1869: Sand started the correction on December 30; on January 10, 1870, she announced to Buloz that the novel was finished. The writing was preceded by two trips to the Ardennes to discover the places where Sand would set her story: from September 17 to 22, then from September 28 to October 1, in the company of Edmond Plauchut, to whom the novel was dedicated: Verdun, Charleville, Givet, the banks of the Meuse and the "Dames de la Meuse" in Laifour and Revin, the caves of Han, the valley of the Féron between Anthée and Hastière, all places in which she will set episodes of the novel.
Malgrétout consists of two long letters where the heroine Sarah Owen tells her story to a friend. Retired to her house in Malgrétout, this Protestant Englishwoman lives wisely with her father, and her capricious sister Adda, who has married the frivolous M. de Rémonville, a debauched and debt-ridden man. After Rémonville's death, Sarah devotes herself to safeguarding the family's financial situation and to raising her niece, little Sarah. This quiet and wise life is turned upside down by the appearance of Abel, a brilliant and whimsical violinist, and his love for Sarah; everything opposes these two beings, but Sarah, despite her moral reluctance, will end up loving Abel too. Many obstacles will come to thwart this love, starting with the seduction that the musician exerts on Adda, and the maneuvers of an audacious adventurer, Carmen d'Ortosa. The two lovers end up finding each other, falling in love and getting married. The novel caused a scandal when it was published, because of the character of Carmen d'Ortosa: one wanted to recognize in this scheming Eugenie de Montijo; the resemblance is striking, and the empress felt targeted; Sand protested that it was only a character of invention. The character of Adda is also reminiscent of the difficult and capricious character of Sand's daughter Solange, and her husband Clésinger in the character of Rémonville. The musician Abel evokes both Chopin and Liszt. One will especially remember the psychological analysis, the pages on the love of music and the questioning of the place of the artist in society, and the admirable art of George Sand as a landscape artist, in the description of the banks of the Meuse where she has set her action.
The manuscript opens, as does the book, with a long dedication, dated "Nohant, December 69", "to my friend Edmond Plauchut", one of Nohant's acquaintances, who introduced Sand to the places where the novel takes place. "We traveled together through the curious and charming country where we were trying to find the traces of Abel and Miss Owen, modest heroes of the true story I dedicate to you. We found only a beautiful river, rocks, flowers and trees. Are we to believe that Sarah Owen wanted to give her readers a change of scenery by setting her story in this region? It seems certain to me at least that she has seen it, for her descriptions are quite faithful. I have altered very little the contained and down-to-earth style of the narrator, a logical expression of her character and situation...
The manuscript has four parts bound in 2 volumes. Volume I: dedication (p. 1-6); 1st part (p. 7-244); 2nd part (245-503, and at the top an unpaginated title sheet); Volume II: 3rd part (504-758); 4th part (759-979). The manuscript was used for printing, as indicated by the typographers' names and marks. Each of the 979 pages has about twenty lines of Sand's beautiful, round, regular handwriting in black ink on the fronts of sheets of wove paper. It is paginated from 1-919 in black pencil. On the back of some leaves, there is also a numbering in pencil 1-102, corresponding to the notebooks; at that time, Sand wrote on notebooks made of two sheets. One can find traces of reworkings through reworked sheets inserted in the notebooks; thus for the first sheet of the 3rd part, where one will note that the introductory mention: "to Mrs Mary Clymer. In spite of all May 1865" has disappeared in the edition. The manuscript has been extensively reworked and corrected; there are more than 2000 corrections,
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