À la recherche du temps perdu

Name: À la recherche du temps perdu
SKU: 32025
Author: Marcel Proust

Paris, Éditions de la Nrf, 1918-1927.

13 vols. (165 x 210 mm). Tan morocco, spines decorated with a gilt letter at head (different on each volume for the author's name and title) and five small gilt fleurons composed of gilt fillets and a small central mosaic box-calf lozenge, gilt volume numbers at foot, doublures of chamois velvet goatskin bordered with a beige box-calf fillet, velvet goatskin endleaves, edges gilt on the rough, original wrappers and spines preserved, matching chemises and slipcases (binding signed R. Desmules).

First edition of the complete series published by Éditions de la Nouvelle Revue française. Numbered copies on Lafuma-Navarre laid paper. One of 109 to 129 copies réimposé in quarto format — the only deluxe large-paper copies. The first three volumes bear the number 10, then CII, while the following five, printed nominatively for M. André Lefèvre, all bear the number XXV. The réimposé series was also issued in octavo format, in print runs ranging between 859 and 1,200 copies.

A precious copy, superbly bound by René Desmules, described by Fléty as “one of the most skillful binders of his time.”

Born in 1909, Desmules trained in the illustrious workshop of Noulhac, then continued with Maylander, Legrain, Gruel and Marot-Rodde. In 1941, he opened his first workshop in Paris at 15 rue Carrier-Belleuse, later moving to 29 rue Cambronne, where he worked until 1975. He quickly became one of the finest craftsmen-binders to whom leading designers entrusted the execution of their designs: Rose Adler, Anthoine-Legrain, Paul Bonet, Bonfils, Creuzevault, Madeleine Gras, Georges Leroux and Thérèse Moncey, among others, all called upon him. To this end, he worked closely with the most experienced gilders and finishers of his time, André Jeanne (active 1929–1970), André Maylander (brother of the binder Roger Maylander) and Collet. This experience later gave him complete creative freedom when composing “lettered” designs, as in the mosaic titling of this copy.

Each volume here bears on its spine one element of a title designed with great mastery: the number of letters (36) had to be reconciled with the number of volumes (13). The chemises were titled identically, and the volume numbers at the foot of the spines were also repeated beneath each slipcase. Finally, the arrangement of gilt and mosaic fleurons in a small piece of cream box calf is repeated identically on each chemise.

Desmules executed this design for only two other sets, in gray morocco (Sotheby’s, R. et B. L., October 2014, lot 151, and Sotheby’s, Pierre Leroy, 100 livres, June 2007, lot 88).

A choice copy.

#32025

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