Alcools. Poèmes 1898-1913

The first edition, first printing, numbered in the press, with only 23 large paper copies on Hollande paper.
With a frontispiece portrait of Apollinaire by Picasso.
Discreet restorations to spine.

With a chemise of half red morocco over paper boards by Boichot, spine in six compartments, date to foot of spine, identical paper slipcase with red morocco edging.

 
Rare autograph inscription signed by Guillaume Apollinaire: “for Henri Ghéon whose poetry I am fond of, Guillaume Apollinaire”.
This copy also with five manuscript corrections by Apollinaire on pages 71, 77, 92, 110 and 189.
A good copy with a rare autograph inscription by the poet.

An autograph quatrain in black ink has been mounted on the verso of the frontispiece.

Apollinaire inscribed this copy to the literary critic of La Nouvelle Revue Française, Henri Ghéon. The poet was careful to correct the misprints still present here in the very first edition. We also find the same handwritten corrections in other advance copies or the few gifted by the author. After receiving his copy, Ghéon wrote an article on Alcools (“Alcools, par Guillaume Apollinaire”, Nouvelle Revue Française, no. LVI, 1 July 1913), calling the collection an “adventurous endeavour”.

Inscriptions by Apollinaire on this text are rare and sought-after.

Apollinaire's short satirical four-verse poem is written in his own hand on the back of the frontispiece and was originally composed two years earlier. Although it does not have the poetic pretensions of Alcools. However, it shares with this famous collection a few details shedding light on the composition of Apollinaire's greatest work. Published under the pseudonym “Montade” (Mercure de France, April 1911) with five commas, the present manuscript of the poem is written here without any punctuation, like those of the avant-garde Alcools. The very form of this short poem reveals Apollinaire's curiosity and his constant search for renewal in the poetic genre. He even demonstrated this interest in his own poem's introduction in the Mercure (the passage in bold being the transcription of the present manuscript):

“Chantecler has been an opportunity for French poets to revive a neglected genre, the epigram. (...) Mr. Fauchois' 'Rivoli' has also inspired epigrams. Here are two that are well turned. One was inserted in L'Intransigeant:

Après Beethoven, Amen ! Après Rivoli, au lit !La seconde, parce qu'il y a plus de ruelles, court les brasseries :

Le grand Napoléon, au jour de Rivoli,
Avait fait, par ma foi, une belle trouvaille,
Inutile vraiment puisque partout on lit
Qu'à l'Odéon Fauchois a perdu la bataille »

Note the poet's appreciation of his own work and his desire for poetry that wanders freely, unshackled by the constraints of print, through the streets and bistros, unhindered by punctuation or correctness, like the calligraphy of these handwritten verses - nine years before Calligrammes.