La Batarde.
196421210071964. Paris: Gallimard. 1964. 8vo. Publisher's wrappers printed in red and black; pp. 462 2 first leaf blank; very minimal toning to spine and a few marks to upper wrapper; otherwise near-fine; authorial inscription to half-title 'a Anne Germain avec ma sympa tres attentive apres un bon apres-midi . Violette Leduc' see below.First edition of Leduc's 1907-1972 memoir one of the boldest explorations of sex queer desire and the female experience in twentieth-century French literature this copy intimately inscribed to the singer Anne Germain affectionately thanking her for a pleasant afternoon.'A woman is descending into the most secret part of herself' writes Simone de Beauvoir in her illuminating preface 'and telling us about all she finds there with an unflinching sincerity as though there were no one listening' trans. Leduc was de Beauvoir's protegee and they had met in 1945; through De Beauvoir's efforts Gallimard published Leduc's first novel L'Asphyxie. In the same year De Beauvoir sent a letter to Leduc rejecting her sexual advances describing it as 'strange to find out that you are so precious to someone . there is a mirage effect there which will certainly dissipate quickly' trans. De Beauvoir frequently cited Leduc in her analysis of lesbianism contained within The Second Sex.Leduc sought not provocation but precision: of the lesbian passages suppressed from her earlier novel Ravages she explained that she was 'trying to render as accurately as possible as minutely as possible the sensations felt in physical love . not aiming for scandal but only to describe the woman's experience with precision' trans. After the success of La Batarde Leduc planned to have a rival edition of the suppressed passages of Ravages published at Genet's suggestion by Jean-Jacques Pauvert publisher of the Story of O; Gaston Gallimard forced Leduc to cancel her contract with Pauvert and hastily brought out the work as Therese and Isabelle albeit in a censored edition.An immediate bestseller La Batarde sold 170000 copies within only a few months of publication and narrowly missed the Prix Goncourt.Provenance: the Anne Germain to whom this copy was presented 'apres un bon apres-midi' is likely the French singer 1935-2016 of the same name known for dubbing the singing voice of Catherine Deneuve in Les Demoiselles de Rochefort and Peau d'Ane. After studying under soprano Ninon Vallin she became a member of the original lineup of the vocal jazz group The Swingle Singers in the early 1960s and later worked as a backing vocalist for the likes of Charles Aznavour Francoise Hardy and Sylvie Vartan. unknown
Henry Sotheran Ltd. · Royaume-Uni600,00 £GB≈ 685,08 €
