L’Araigne
One of 23 copies on vergé de Hollande paper, this copy hors commerce (no. 6).
At only twenty-seven years old, Henri Troyat (Lev Aslanovitch Tarassov, 1911–2007) achieved sudden and dazzling fame with this psychological novel, whose protagonist, Gérard Fonsèque, morbidly attached to his sisters, descends into madness as they gradually gain their independence. L’Araigne explores the tyranny of family ties, the vertigo of emotional dependence and the distortions of a mind consumed by obsession.
On 7 December 1938, after five rounds of voting, the novel was awarded the Prix Goncourt by five votes to five over Brune by François de Roux, the deciding double vote of the president, J.-H. Rosny aîné, tipping the balance in Troyat’s favor. The award also marked a turning point for Plon, a publisher less frequently represented among the prizewinners than Gallimard, Grasset or Albin Michel, having previously won the prize only once, in 1907. For Troyat, it launched an exceptional career, crowned in 1959 by his election to the Académie française and by an immense body of novels and biographies.
From the “Prix Goncourt” library of Gérard Pouguet, with bookplate.