MALLARMÉ (Stéphane). L'Après-Midi d'un Faune. With frontispi - Lot 399

MALLARMÉ (Stéphane). L'Après-Midi d'un Faune. With frontispiece, fleuron and cul-de-lampe. Paris, Alphonse Derenne, 1876. In-4, fawn morocco with bands, on the first board along the spine decorated with geometrical black morocco and small palladium coins and calligraphy along the edge, between the two bands large vertical green box and snakeskin coins partly tinted green, spine decorated, on the second plate, large geometric decoration composed of vertical bands of black morocco with small palladium pieces, snakeskin return between them, wide inner frame, green box lining set with black listel or palladium fillet, marron glacé moire endpapers, dark green glacé paper double endpaper, slipcase (Rose Adler - A. Cuzin). First edition of one of Symbolism's masterpieces, illustrated with 4 wood-engraved figures by Édouard Manet, 2 of which printed on papier pelure. Edition of 195 copies, including 20 on japon. Copy no. 70, bearing this dispatch: Pour le faune Stéphane Mallarmé Cover scorched. Small cracks to the leaf on which the bookplate is glued, also browned. Missing black and pink silk cords. Slipped into the volume is a copy of Vanier's 1887 edition (third edition, disowned by the author), in sheets, one of a few copies on japon, and an autograph letter from Édouard Dujardin on Revue indépendante headed paper (one page 1/2 in-8): "Je vous remets deux exemplaires, l'un signé de l'auteur, l'autre pour les découpages possibles, de L'Après-Midi d'un Faune de Stéphane Mallarmé, qu'édite la Revue indépendante". "As the primitive 1876 deluxe edition has become unobtainable, and this is the first current and affordable edition of Mallarmé's work, we have chosen L'Après-Midi d'un Faune, which is his best-known work and one of his most characteristic. A very interesting binding by Rose Adler, gilded by Adolphe Cuzin, the son of the great Francisque Cuzin, and one of the very first of his career. After the bankruptcy of his own workshop in 1902, Adolphe Cuzin became a professor at the École Centrale des Arts Décoratifs from 1920, where he gilded the bindings of Rose Adler, Jeanne Langrand and Geneviève de Léotard. Our binding also shows the influence of Pierre Legrain (see the large inner frame), whom Rose Adler had met while working for Jacques Doucet.