Vol de nuit [Night Flight]
Paris, Gallimard, (May 30) 1931.
1 vol. (120 x 185 mm) of 181 p., [1] and 1 f. Paperback.
First edition. Preface by André Gide.
One of 647 copies on “pur-fil” paper (No. 100).
Presentation copy, inscribed: “For my uncle Emmanuel de Fonscolombe and my aunt Yvonne. With all the respectful affection of their nephew, Antoine”.
Dos habilement restauré.
We apologize for the imperfect translation generated by Deepl for the purposes of the show.
A precious and touching copy, offered to his uncle and aunt Emmanuel and Yvonne de Fonscolombe. His uncle, Baron de la Môle and owner of the château of the same name, would become mayor of this small village, located some thirty kilometers from Saint-Tropez, between Bormes-les-Mimosas and Cogolin. It was in these lands that Saint-Exupéry’s mother grew up, like all her ancestors, and where she would live for half the year from 1904, after Saint-Exupéry’s father, Jean, died there on March 14, 1904: “After Jean’s death, the family divided their time between the Château de La Mole […], which belonged to Fonscolombe’s grandmother, in winter, and the property of the great-aunt, the Countess of Tricaud, in Saint-Maurice de Rémens […] in the Ain department, in summer. Travel between the Var and the Ain would form an integral part of the magical world of Saint-Exupéry […] until the age of 9”. (Bernard Marck ‘Saint-Exupéry, le grand prince’).
It was at the Château des Fonscolombre that the writer continued the family tradition of music: his great-grandfather Emmanuel (the first) de Fonscolombe had been a choirmaster and composer in Aix-en-Provence; his grandfather, Charles, introduced his children to music theory and singing, and his mother continued the tradition by inviting Anne-Marie Poncet, the daughter of the director of the Lyon opera house, to the château once a week to teach the children music: his sisters studied piano and singing, and Antoine chose the violin. When he arrived in Paris to prepare for the Naval Academy entrance exam, he did not give up music, and he and his cousin Yvonne de Lestrange played several pieces by Chopin together in the 1920s.
Rare and major family provenance.
