Les Enfants Terribles
Paris: Bernard Grasset (1929). 228pp.
Item #9203
First edition of the author's most famous novel, written while he was undergoing disintoxication for his opium addiction.
Cocteau reputedly based the story of incest and adolescence on his lover Jean Bourgoint and his sister Jeanne. The convoluted relationships between the siblings and several misfits conjures a hermetic world of powerful conflicting emotions. A classic of modern French literature, adapted into a movie by Cocteau in 1950 and subsequently in a Philip Glass opera.
Very good in original wrappers, bound in a full morocco Art Deco binding signed by the renowned binder, Madeleine Gras, dramatic endpapers evoking the novel, top edge gilt. Inscribed by the author in the year of publication, along with an ink drawing by Cocteau of a hand.
Price: $2,500.00