Solal

Gaston Gallimard discovered Albert Cohen’s prose in 1922, in an issue of the Nouvelle Revue Française, which published Après minuit à Genève. The publisher was so taken with it that he sent the review’s editor, Jacques Rivière, to meet the unknown writer. Originally from Corfu, Cohen was practicing law in Geneva. A brief but decisive meeting saw Rivière leave the city with a blank contract, in which Cohen committed to five novels for Gallimard, entering the fictitious title of a nonexistent work: Rapides internationaux. He had no literary project in hand, nor any ambition for the bar, yet he signed.

On Rivière’s recommendation, a position was found for him in the diplomatic division of the International Labour Office in Paris, from where, in 1925, he was able to found and direct a journal with Gallimard’s financial support: La Revue juive. There was nothing his patron would not do once he had “found an author.” But what of the novel, the novels he had promised? The publisher would have to wait eight years before a book finally appeared — not Rapides internationaux, but Solal. The beginning of a memorable epic…

A good copy; wrappers formerly cleaned.