Discours de Réception de M. Jean Cocteau a L'Académie Française et Réponse de M. André Maurois
Price: $500.00
Original Wraps. Paris: Gallimard, 1955, 1955. 1st Edition. Near Fine.
First edition, review copy, with "S P" (Service de Presse) punched into rear wrapper. Signed and inscribed by Cocteau in the year of publication (1955) on half-title page. Additionally signed by Maurois. Publisher's white wrappers, printed in black and red. Near fine, with light toning to spine and edges of wrappers. With a yellow Gallimard promotional slip for the book laid in. Overall, a tight and clean copy. This volume contains speeches by Cocteau and Maurois regarding Cocteau's election to the French Academy. The Academy was founded by Cardinal Richelieu in 1634 to preserve and protect the French language. It is highly prestigious, with only 40 members, who are called "les immortales" and often hold their titles for life. Cocteau succeeded French writer Jérôme Tharaud, who died in 1953. A particularly lyrical New York Times article announcing Cocteau's election reads: "M. Cocteau, poet and film producer, will be clad in a green-faced uniform, with a two-corner hat hiding his famous halo of thick, whitening hair. As his urbane voice sprinkles witticisms on the 'immortals,' his hand will be resting on a sword made by Cartier and decorated with an emerald, a gift." Jean Cocteau (1889 - 1963) was a French author, artist, and filmmaker, whose most famous works include the novel Les Enfants Terrible (1929), the play La Machine Infernale (1934), and the ballet Parade (1917), for which Cocteau collaborated with Picasso, Erik Satie, and other notable artists. A writer for the National Observer declared that, "of the artistic generation whose daring gave birth to Twentieth Century Art, Cocteau came closest to being a Renaissance man." André Maurois (1885 - 1967) was a French novelist and biographer, who wrote acclaimed biographies on Percy Bysshe Shelley, Lord Byron, Victor Hugo, Marcel Proust, and others. In his biographies, he "combined documentary, erudition, and imagination, to unfold the psychological development of his subjects" (Jewish Virtual Library). Item #JCAM001
