Europa
Paris, Gallimard, (March 23) 1972.
1 vol. (140 x 205 mm) of 372 p. and [3] f. In wrappers, uncut.
First edition.
One of 45 copies on vélin pur fil (no. 33).
One of 45 copies on vélin pur fil (no. 33).
Against a backdrop of identity crisis, Gary explores intimate wounds, questioning by implication the very identity of this fledgling communal space for which he foretells the end of culture, “soluble in the market economy”: Europe, “insofar as it means anything at all, is above all apartheid: culture on one side, social reality on the other […]. It has never managed to become what might have given it life: a lived realization of its own imagination.”
A fascinating novel, savaged by critics on publication. Some suggest that this reception led Gary to later adopt the pseudonym Ajar. Questioning by implication the very identity of Europe, Gary denounces, prophet-like, the dissolution of its culture into the market economy.
#30065
Back