[JEAN COCTEAU].

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  4. Lot n° 130 
Lot n° 130
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[JEAN COCTEAU].
Le Livre blanc. Paris, Imprimerie de Ducros et Colas, 1928. Small in-4 : paperback, filled cover. First edition, very rare : unique edition of 31 copies on Montval's white laid paper handmade by Gaspard Maillol. One of the 10 author's copies (nº I). "As far back as I can remember, and even at the age when the mind does not yet influence the senses, I find traces of my love for boys. I have always loved the strong sex, which I find legitimate to call the fair sex." Extraordinary novelistic confession, published anonymously. The copyright is attributed to Maurice Sachs and Jacques Bonjean, in Paris. The text is preceded by a note from the editor: "We are publishing this work because the talents in it go far beyond indecency and a kind of morality emerges from it that prevents an honest man from classifying it among the libertine books. We received it without name or address. A notice on the machine recommended that the sums which such a book is likely to bring in to its author should be divided among the typographers." Enriched copy with a large original drawing by Jean Cocteau. It features a male couple: pencil, ink and ink wash. Also enclosed is an unpublished autograph letter signed by Jean Bourgoint addressed to Jean Cocteau. Before entering the orders and leaving as a missionary in Africa, the model for Paul of Les Enfants terribles, Jean Bourgoint (1905-1966) led a disjointed life and was the lover of Jean Cocteau. From December 1925 to the spring of 1926, he did his military service in Nîmes. His letter to "my beloved Jean" begins with a reproach: Cocteau came to Nîmes, but didn't warn him: "The idea that you came so close without my knowing it gives me a feeling of butterflies (me being the butter)." Life in the barracks is monotonous, and to Cocteau, who had asked him what his pleasures were, he replies that they "consist mainly of duffle fights. In second place comes the Charleston in the canteen (at the phono). I forget the garrison band that plays everything "no no nanette" but it's pretty hellish since it goes on from 7 in the morning until 6 at night. There's the horseback riding on Sunday mornings, a divine pleasure when the weather is nice. There is the pleasure of masturbating my imagination on the pleasures of the return to civilian life. [...]" He rejoices in the spring which consoles him for a sorrow, evokes a film and the actor Jaque Catelain to whom he has written, "to see how a response from these curious animals can be". Finally, he announces his arrival "in about ten days for a fortnight" and begs Cocteau to reply. "My beloved little Jean, I am your bear who begs you to kiss him" - a reference to one of the diminutives used by Cocteau who called him "my little bear". (Autograph letter signed "Jean", undated [ca. April 1926], 2 pages large in-8 on graph paper).
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