Manuscrit autographe complet et largement inédit de l'ouvrage "Poèmes de Si Mohand"

Complete and mostly unpublished autograph manuscript by Mouloud Feraoun, dated by the author from “December 1956” to “July 1958”, for his work "Les Poèmes de Si Mohand", published in 1960 by Éditions de Minuit. Numerous erasures, corrections, deleted passages, and additions.

178 manuscript pages in blue and black ink, written in a lined Séyès notebook, with the autograph title “Si Mohand” on the upper cover; a manuscript slip tipped onto page 53 and numbered by the author; also preserved in the notebook: 5 typescript pages with autograph corrections, entitled “Voyage de Si Mohand de Maison Carrée à Michelet (Recueilli par la P. Giacobetti des P. B. à Beni-Yenni, en 1906 peu de temps après la mort du poète)” [Si Mohand's travel from Maison Carrée at Michelet (Transcribed by F[ather] Giacobetti of the B[enedictine] F[athers], in 1906 shortly after the poet's death)]. A few scattered spots, a burn mark on the final pages of the notebook. Dampstains and smudging to the covers.

Together with: two autograph letters addressed to Mouloud Feraoun. The first, from J. Simon, dated 4 September 1956; the second, from Emmanuel Roblès, written between 1957 and 1958. An original photograph of Mouloud Feraoun alongside Emmanuel Roblès.

Exceptional manuscript of the last book published by Algerian writer Mouloud Feraoun before his assassination by the OAS: the first collected edition of the great Berber poet Si Mohand also known as Mhand (ca. 1840-1906), whose poems had been transmitted orally for nearly a century.

Despite the considerable difference between this original manuscript and the much-abridged published version, we have found no record of any other manuscript version of "Les Poèmes de Si Mohand". All other known manuscripts of Feraoun’s works and writings are held at the Fondation Mouloud Feraoun in Algiers.

[Full English translation upon request]