Notes sur la poésie - Exemplaire de René Char

First edition, one of 100 numbered copies on vellum, ours unnumbered, the only deluxe papers after 15 copies on Japon.
Illustrated with a frontispiece drawing by Salvador Dalí.
Precious signed autograph presentation from Paul Eluard to René Char : « Exemplaire de mon ami René Char. Paul Eluard. »

It was in 1929 that René Char first discovered the verse of Paul Eluard. Captivated, the young twenty-two-year-old poet from L'Isle decided to send him a copy of his collection Arsenal, inscribing it with the following dedication:

« à Paul éluard enfin. L'Isle, 17 septembre 1929. »

His elder responded kindly a few weeks later:

« Cher Monsieur, n'est-il pas possible que nous nous connaissions mieux ? Ne pensez-vous pas venir à Paris ? Je serais heureux de vous dire combien j'aime vos poèmes – tout ce si beau livre. »

The young Char, elated, set off for the first time to meet his « substitute brother » (Laurent Greilsamer, René Char, Perrin, 2012), and soon decided to move to Paris to join his new companions Aragon, Breton, and Eluard, placing himself under the Surrealist banner.

Eluard, abandoned by Gala who left him for Dalí, offered Char to live in his apartment on rue Becquerel. The two bachelors soon engaged Odette, a young maid who was more than agreeable:

« Char enjoyed this refined service but was nevertheless surprised by the marked kindness of this pretty brunette. One day, he took her in his arms. The young beauty smiled, yielded, and proved herself expert. That evening, René recounted his adventure to Eluard, who the next morning had his breakfast served in bed and invited Odette to join him. A temporary trio was thus formed. » (op. cit.)

Char and Eluard, now inseparable, shared a taste for revelry and frenetic seduction, roaming the Parisian boulevards in search of adventure. Thus, on the evening of 21 May 1930, they met a destitute actress and trapeze artist: Nusch.

« Eluard decided to take her back, like a precious parcel, to rue Becquerel. But it would take all the friendship of Char and his powers of persuasion to convince the young woman to stay, giving Eluard the time—all the time—to fall in love. » (op. cit.)

Char thus played the role of mediator, enabling Eluard to win the great love of his life, who died prematurely in 1946 of a cerebral haemorrhage. Despite several passing quarrels—never over women but always over ideas—the two poets maintained a strong bond of friendship and intellect until the end of Eluard's life.

« Je suis vieux, René, par instants – à force de ne plus aimer la vie. Je vis par devoir. Mais je t'aime profondément, comme je t'ai toujours aimé : ne te choque de rien ; venant de moi, tout est pour moi affection et admiration. [...] Quelle preuve de plus peux-tu en avoir que je te dise que tu es le seul homme à qui je pourrais avouer ce grand vide que je porte en moi et devant qui je pourrais pleurer autant que j'en ai toujours envie. »