All Products

Les mamelles de Tirésias is one of the most charged theatrical works from Apollinaire’s final years. Published in 1918 by Éditions SIC, it emerged from the circle of Pierre Albert-Birot, where literary experiment, typography, music and visual art converged. Its subtitle, ‘drame surréaliste’, gives the book a singular place before Surrealism was codified as a movement by Breton. Serge Férat supplied seven drawings, making the volume both a literary text and an early modernist artist’s book. The music by Germaine Albert-Birot further emphasizes its hybrid nature, poised between stage, image, sound and manifesto. This unnumbered copy, on browned paper, preserves the fragile material character of the original issue. For the bibliophile, it is a tangible witness to the moment when the French avant-garde began to name its own future.

Mes caravanes is a poetic publication from Aragon’s post-war period, issued in 1954 by Seghers. The collection no longer stands at the centre of historical Surrealism, yet it bears the name of one of the major figures who helped shape that adventure. Here Aragon is the poet of engagement, memory and political conviction rather than the young Surrealist provocateur of the 1920s. For The Hidden Page, the appeal lies in the combination of a major avant-garde author with an extremely small deluxe limitation. This copy, number 15 of only 40 on Hollande, belongs to the sole large-paper issue. A post-war poetry booklet thus acquires particular bibliophilic sharpness and collector interest.

L’Herbe rouge is one of Boris Vian’s most singular novels, born of the nervous imagination of post-war Saint-Germain-des-Prés. The first edition appeared in 1950 with Toutain and belongs to the group of Vian publications that often met with limited success during his lifetime before acquiring cult status. The book combines science-fiction-like invention, existential anxiety, absurdist humour and emotional disarray. That mixture makes it especially relevant to The Hidden Page: it is not part of a strict historical avant-garde, but it breathes the pataphysical and experimental spirit of post-war literature. This copy is materially weak, with a reglued spine, pasted-down first leaf and lacking final blank. It nevertheless remains bibliographically and literarily meaningful as the original edition of a central Vian text.

Grains et issues is a key publication in Tristan Tzara’s passage from Dadaist disruption to Surrealist and revolutionary reflection. The book appeared in 1935 with Denoël et Steele, at a moment when poetry, politics and theory were becoming increasingly intertwined within the avant-garde. Tzara, once the voice and organizer of Dada in Zurich and Paris, no longer seeks only the explosion of meaning, but also a dialectic between dream, matter, history and liberation. This original edition is bibliophilically notable as a large-paper copy: one of the copies on vergé d’Arches, signed by the author. Its unopened state preserves the tension between the book as an instrument of reading and the book as an untouched object. For The Hidden Page, it is an exceptionally strong match: a major historical avant-garde author, a key text and a scarce signed deluxe variant.

Les pénitents en maillots roses belongs to Max Jacob’s subtle, agile poetry of the years following his conversion and his partial withdrawal from the Parisian scene. The book was published in 1925 by Aux Éditions du Sagittaire, chez Simon Kra, as no. 17 in the series Les Cahiers nouveaux. In this compact volume, burlesque observation, religious unease and verbal lightness meet in a characteristically Jacobian manner. This copy is enriched with a witty, slightly self-mocking inscription in brown ink. The recipient Fouquet is probably Gaëtan Fouquet (1903–1973), a well-known figure within the broader Parisian modernist circle.. For the bibliophile, its appeal lies in the conjunction of first edition, numbered issue and personal envoi.

L’Orestie is one of Georges Bataille’s most concentrated and unsettling poetic books. Its title invokes Orestes and the tragic inheritance of guilt, blood and madness, yet Bataille offers no classical retelling. The book is instead a brief, severe cycle in which poetry places itself under pressure and almost turns against its own possibility. Published shortly after the war by Les Éditions des Quatre Vents, it retains the tension of the years in which it was written: hunger, fear, desire, religious emptiness and bodily dread. The edition is austere, but bibliographically precise in its limited printing on tinted nacreous paper. This copy belongs to the 175 copies issued for commerce and bears the very early number 7. Its uncut state heightens the sense of an intact, still-closed object from Bataille’s rare poetic production.

Far Rockaway is a rare first edition by Pierre Alechinsky published by Fata Morgana, a press especially attuned to the meeting of literature, image and bibliophile restraint. The title refers to Far Rockaway, a place-name both concrete and almost dreamlike, as though a geographical point had become a mental edge-zone. Alechinsky, shaped by Cobra yet always independent in his writing of line and sign, brings together here his world of travel, memory, margin and graphic rhythm. The 1977 edition belongs to Fata Morgana’s refined small-scale objects, where paper choice and typographic restraint heighten the relation between text and image. This copy is especially desirable because it belongs to the tirage de tête: one of only 30 numbered copies on Ingres d’Arches. Number 26 therefore stands clearly above the ordinary issue. For a collector of Alechinsky, it is a small but important bibliophile object from his mature period.

*Nouvelles Hébrides, Nouvelle Guinée* is a very rare first PAB edition by René Char, printed in Alès in 1962. As often with Pierre-André Benoît, the book’s intensity lies in its sobriety, small format, and extremely limited edition. The text would later be included in the second edition of *Recherche de la base et du sommet*, giving this first edition a special place in Char’s textual history. This copy is one of 44 on Arches, signed by both author and publisher. The inscription to Edmée Maus and her bookplate make it a meaningful association copy.

*Lettre contre la cabbale adressée à Jacques Prevel* belongs to Artaud’s late, incandescent texts, where letter, accusation, and conjuration converge. Its addressee, Jacques Prevel, was one of the intimate witnesses of Artaud’s final years and recorded his words and gestures at close range. This 1949 edition appeared shortly after Artaud’s death and carries the tension of a text at once personal, polemical, and visionary. The edition on white vellum makes the text less inaccessible than manuscript material or deluxe issues, while preserving the force of an autonomous Artaud publication. This copy is number 420 of 1,800.

*L’An 1964* is an exceptionally intimate PAB publication by René Char, printed in Alès on 2 January 1964. The text is a new edition of *Pages d’ascendants* and appears here for the first time under this title. As often with Pierre-André Benoît, the book is small in format but intense in bibliophile presence. This copy is one of seven on Chine, signed by PAB. The bound-in autograph card by PAB, announcing misprints and the reprinting of a leaf, gives the copy exceptional documentary value. Since both the faulty and corrected states of the leaf are preserved, the book reveals its own making at close range.