[Derenne, Paris, 1876].
8vo, leaves mounted on guards, full green long-grain morocco, title in gilt capitals at the center of the upper cover, gilt rules along the edges of the covers and spine, which bears the author’s name lengthwise. Contemporary binding.
210 x 130 mm.
Unique copy in printer’s proofs of the first edition of Mallarmé’s poem. These proofs, pasted back-to-back onto light card stock, present the complete text, the pages being numbered as in the printed edition but without the preliminary leaves for the half-title, title page, and imprint, which do not appear in the proofs.
Instead, they are preceded by a curious first leaf serving at once as title page, notice, and dedication:
Messrs. the Directors of Newspapers and Editors, should they wish to quote from the work, have here the entire text in printer’s proofs, suitable for being cut up and sent to the printer.
To offer these few verses (which pleased them) to three friends named Cladel, Dierx, and Mendès adds distinction to them; yet it is just as well that my dear publisher present them to the select public of amateurs: the illustration by Manet so directs.
On a slip of paper pasted at the top of the first page of the text appear three words in English in purple pencil (“Basil from Houston”) in Mallarmé’s hand, no doubt an address for mailing; small correction on page 11. (Galantaris, Verlaine Rimbaud Mallarmé. Catalogue raisonné d’une collection. See no. 251, p. 347).
“Rare and highly sought after.” (Clouzot).
L’Après-midi d’un faune is the monologue of a faun who evokes the nymphs and the nature surrounding him in a succession of poetic images. The work is dedicated, in its opening lines, to three friends of Mallarmé, namely Léon Cladel, Léon Dierx, and Catulle Mendès.
The poem was adapted into music between 1892 and 1894 by Claude Debussy, who composed Prélude à l’Après-midi d’un faune, to which Vaslav Nijinski created a choreography in 1912.
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