Paris

First edition.
Bradel bindings in full apple-green boards, smooth spines slightly browned and decorated with gilt fillets, traces of rubbing to headcaps, corners slightly bumped, some tears to leading edges, contemporary bindings.
Some foxing.

First edition on current paper.

Illustrated book of 6 vignettes by André Derain.
Very discreet restorations on the back and the boards of covers, tiny angular gaps in heads of the very first leaflets.
Precious autograph dedication signed by Antonin Artaud: "To my dear friend André Lhote the only living writer who knows how to speak about painting in a poetic and superior sense."

First edition of Album d’un pessimiste, here in its exceptionally rare earliest state. In this copy, both the title-page and half-title still bear the heading Œuvres posthumes.

Three states of the edition are known. The first, represented by the present copy, retains Œuvres posthumes on both title-page and half-title. In the second state, a new title-page reads Album d’un pessimiste, while the half-title remains unchanged; this is the state most commonly...

New édition, illustrated with 4 folding plates (tree of consanguinity, tree of affinities, genealogy of Charles Le Bel and Blanche de Bourgogne, of Louis XII and Jeanne de France)

Contemporary full marbled brown sheep binding. Spine with raised bands decorated. Beige morocco title label. Rubbing to headcaps, joints, edges and corners; handsome copy, fresh.

Bookplate: Library of the Grand Seminary of Versailles, and stamp on title page.

First edition, one of 40 numbered copies on vélin pur fil paper, the tirage de tête (deluxe copies).

Full morocco, covers and spine preserved, slipcase, elegant binding signed by Semet & Plumelle.

Provenances: mostly from Robert Desprechins' library with his ex-libris drawn by Jean Cocteau, and by Louis de Sadeleer with his engraved ex-libris.

A very nice copy beautifully bound morocco signed by Semet & Plumelle.

Rare and highly sought-after first edition (...) of which only a portion of the copies contains a preface (cf. Clouzot). The important account of the lawsuit concerning The Lily of the Valley that precedes the novel was not retained in subsequent editions and is often lacking in a number of the copies published by Werdet.

Copy complete with both the preface and the account of the lawsuit that opposed Balzac to the publisher François Buloz. Contemporary half green sheepskin bindings, smooth spines decorated with gilt romantic typographical motifs, gilt fillets at heads and tails, marbled paper boards, paste paper endpapers and pastedowns, marbled edges...