André BRETON. Preparatory file for the Anthologie de l'humou - Lot 63

André BRETON. Preparatory file for the Anthologie de l'humour noir. No place or date [1935-1937]. Strap folder containing 199 typescript leaves with autograph corrections or additions, 14 autograph leaves, 12 printed sheets with some autograph corrections, 31 autograph bristol cards, 1 blue paper folder bearing the title Humour Noir. Precious hitherto unknown collection of André Breton's autograph and typescript notes in preparation for the first edition of the Anthologie de l'Humour Noir. It includes 38 folders dedicated to the authors featured in the work, 31 autograph bristol-cut sheets containing bibliographical references for 29 of these authors, and a list of portraits planned for illustration in the volume. Not only is the choice of texts the fruit of a long and rigorous preparation, striving to leave no field unexplored, but the work itself is the product of the same concern for completeness and precision. The folder, classified by author and made up of typescripts with autograph additions and corrections, contains the introductory notes and selected extracts. Some folders, however, include only the notice or extract quoted - Forneret, Nietzsche, Brisset, Picasso, Duchamp, Savinio, Prassinos. Two authors - Roussel and Kafka - appear only by name on a sheet with a simple autograph note: having been pre-published in Minotaure, Breton refers to the latter. Most of the folders and pages are numbered. The number of pages required for the edition is also indicated. Autograph additions and corrections consist of copies of texts to be reproduced or typographical remarks. For example, the list of planned reproductions mentions Eugène Montfort, who died in 1936, among the people to contact for Jarry. At the same time, some documents refer to the pre-publication in Minotaure in 1937 of a few notices under the title: Têtes d'orage. The Anthology's publication "spanned an unusual number of years. Envisaged at least from the beginning of 1935, the first edition of the work, barely out of the Sagittaire presses in 1940 after a series of complicated editorial twists and turns, was banned from all distribution by the Vichy government's Censorship, and had to wait until 1945 before finally reaching its first public, albeit in a muted way" (Étienne-Alain Hubert, in Breton, OEuvres complètes III, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 1992, p. 1746). A second edition appeared in 1950, with a number of additions and deletions: five new authors were included: Charles Fourier, Benjamin Péret, Jean Ferry, Léonora Carrington and Jean-Pierre Duprey. The definitive edition was published in 1966 by Jean-Jacques Pauvert.