La femme. Trente-neuf poèmes érotiques inédits avec seize dessins de l’auteur reproduits en fac-similé et un portrait gravé par P.-A. Laurens,
LOUYS (Pierre),
The text consists of 40 sonnets by Louÿs, reproduced in facsimile of his original manuscript.
Published by Mytilène, A l’enseigne de Bilitis 1938,, 1938 in-4, 96 pp., portrait engraved on the frontispiece by Laurens, 16 out-of-text drawings by the author, softcover, wine-red cover, title label on the spine and on the front cover. Total print run of 260 copies, ours 222 numbered on vellum,
Life-size facsimiles in purple ink, so dear to Louÿs. These sonnets were written from 22 March 1890 to 15 May 1891, when Louÿs was between 19 and 21 years old, and had not yet published anything.
These dates correspond in part to those of the mythical Chronological and Descriptive Catalogue of the Women With Whom I Have Slept, a diary kept by Louÿs for three years until February 1892, and illustrated with his own photographs (sold by Christies in 2006).
At the opening, this introductory quatrain which is well in the tone of what follows: “Madame, here is the ex-libris / Of a French author who perhaps / Wet your clitoris / More than once without knowing you.”
This Book
In original card covers with splitting and some loss on spine, contents loose in gatherings, but clean and complete a rare title.
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