Les Racines du ciel

The first novel to take the protection of nature as its explicit central subject, Les Racines du ciel is also, once again, a novel of resistance: “resistance to everything that oppresses man, wherever and however it occurs.” This is why Gary wrote, in December 1956, after Russian tanks entered Budapest: “The Hungarian elephants must be saved. One day they will resume their triumphant march.” (Larat, Romain Gary, Une trajectoire dans le siècle, II, p. 48) African elephants, for their part, would return to prominence ten years later, in the celebrated “Dear Elephant, Sir” published in Life Magazine on December 22, 1967. There Gary again developed the theme of this animal as the bearer of human freedom: “If the world can no longer afford the luxury of natural beauty, then it will soon be overcome and destroyed by its own ugliness.”

A very fine copy, in a perfect box matching the decoration of the “collection blanche,” by Julie Nadot.