Clair-Obscur
Price: $400.00
Original Wraps. Monaco: Éditions du Rocher, 1954. 1st Edition. Very Good.
First edition, first printing. Signed and inscribed by Cocteau on the half-title page: "à giacomo Antonini / cet hommage amical de Jean Cocteau / 1954." Publisher's white wrappers, printed in red and black. Very good, with light toning to spine, wrapper edges, and page margins, light wear and dampstaining to spine, a few small closed tears to bottom edge of front wrapper, uncut pages. Overall, a very pleasing copy. Clair-Obscur is a long collection of poems, which Cocteau opens with a quote by French composer Jean-Philippe Rameau, "Il est difficile d'avoir l'air facile." Included in the collection are poetic tributes to inspirational artists, like Van Gogh, Goya, Kafka, Pushkin, Rilke, and Lewis Carroll. 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." Giacomo Antonini (1901 - 1983) was an Italian literary critic and spy whose papers are held at Gabinetto Vieusseux in Florence, Italy. Item #JEC005
