Farouche à quatre feuilles
One of 18 copies on Japanese paper (no. XV).
After the war, Breton renewed ties with the women who had populated his life: Simone, Suzanne, Jacqueline and, above all, Lise Deharme. It was for a series of broadcasts produced by Deharme, under the general title “Les Dormeurs éveillés,” that André Breton wrote Alouette du parloir. He read it himself on 20 October 1953, on Paris Inter, interspersed with music by Schönberg, Stravinsky and Bartók.
Breton also wished to see his text published, and an edition proposed by Bernard Privat at Grasset appeared, bringing together three other texts likewise concerned with creative reverie: La Vraie joie by Lise Deharme, Les Yeux bien ouverts by Julien Gracq (later included in Préférences, 1961) and Madrépores ou l’Architecte imaginaire by Jean Tardieu (later included in the collection Pages d’écriture, 1967).
The volume is illustrated with four etchings by Max Walter Svanberg, Vieira da Silva, Simon Hantaï and Wolfgang Paalen.
The title of the book was coined by Lise Deharme: in the Southwest of France, “farouche” is the name given by local people to clover when it bears a pinkish-red color.
A very fine copy, delicately bound by Monique Mathieu.
From the library of Philippe de Rothschild, with bookplate.