Catalogues

One is not born Aragon, one becomes him. Through the trauma of the first World War, the upheaval of Dadaism and the enthusiasm of Surrealism, through communist conviction, through Resistance to oppression, through love… Before Elsa's gaze, before the Affiches rouges, the comrades, the artistic revolutions (even before the shell that would bury him in the trenches) Aragon is already Aragon, from the very first poem, feverishly written in pencil on a schoolboy's page and given to his friend "Anicet"…

"What my son has written, he has written, I repeat, because I inspired it in him from childhood, because at the same time as he is my son by blood, he is my son in spirit, because he wants to continue his father's legacy".

There is no complicity more powerful, nor more discreet, than that of a gaze cast across the shelves of a library. Presentation inscriptions, bookplates, armorial bindings, provenances: step inside illustrious libraries and share the intellectual intimacy of artists, scholars, writers, and the great figures of history and culture.

Gutenberg's Bible was preceded by several ephemera printed with movable type which the legendary B42 always claimed to be the first to use. No matter. The true origin may in fact be Buddhist, since in 1377 the Jikji was already being printed with a similar method. Can one consider fries to be Belgian? What does pasta owe to the Arab world? Isn't the croissant a descendant of the Austrian kipferl? The very idea of champagne may have been born in the mind of an Englishman, Christopher Merret! "First" is decidedly fiction, but to open this new season, Le Feu Follet is pleased to offer you the very first look at its brand-new selection: "Once Upon a First Time…"

The mischievous Feu Follet invites you to count down the most limited deluxe issues, number by number, from the elusive 30 copies to the impossible unique copy. 30, 29, 28, 27… treat yourself to a private encounter with the rarest treasures in the world of book collecting!

In the library of the celebrated jeweller Alexandre Reza lay a literary diamond: Chien Blanc. Its presentation inscription by Romain Gary evoking the 'precious stones' of their shared youth surely made it the crowning gem of his collection. As a true artist of the stone, Reza then set this sublime jewel with one final emerald: an original drawing of one of his own creations.

Joyful Julyers and august Augustans, globe-trotters or shoreline saunterers – however you travel, so long as you carry your books. Ride the waves of our vast, eloquent pages – peopled with valiant Miserables, excellent Rougons, and castaway Fridays…

Every collector of modern books knows this terrible and delightful phrase. An ominous prelude announcing just how arduous the quest for the most desirable copy will be.

The incredible literary and poetic adventure unwittingly inaugurated by Maran would not be recognised again by the Goncourt jury members or more than seventy years, until Texaco. With Chamoiseau's work, language is no longer defined in terms of submission or rebellion, but of the invention of a reconciled identity through a " memory language invoking all of the world's languages".