Angelo
Presentation copy inscribed by Giono to Fernandel's wife: “À Madame Henriette Contandin, avec toute l'affection que j'ai pour son mari. Jean Giono. Juin 1960.”
As early as the 1930s, Giono had embarked on a vast novelistic project centered on Angelo Pardi and his descendants. This project would gradually evolve into what is now known as the Cycle du Hussard. The book appeared in 1958, seven years after Le Hussard sur le toit and one year after Le Bonheur fou. Readers might naturally assume it continues the cycle: in fact, the opposite is true, and Angelo offers a foretaste of the first volume, allowing us to return to the very workshop of the Hussard, as originally conceived in the 1930s around Angelo Pardi and his descendants.
The present copy has a particularly appealing provenance: it was given by Jean Giono to Henriette Manse (1902–1984), wife of Fernandel.
Fernand Contandin had married Henriette on April 4, 1925. Their marriage lasted until the actor’s death in 1971 and produced three children. Henriette remained deliberately discreet throughout her husband’s immense career.
Amusingly, however, she is at the very origin of his stage name. According to tradition, her mother, seeing young Fernand assiduously coming to visit her daughter, took to calling him “le Fernand d’elle” (Henriette’s Fernand): Fernandel.
From the library of Fernandel (Beaussant-Lefèvre, 2020, no. 48).