‘LORRAIN, Jean’, pseud . [ i.e. Paul DUVAL]. Contes pour lire à la Chandelle.

£750 · Offered by Henry Sotheran Ltd

Presented by Proust's Duellist ‘LORRAIN, Jean’, pseud . [ i.e. Paul DUVAL]. Contes pour lire à la Chandelle. Paris: [C. Renaudie for] Mercure de France. [30 April] 1897. 12mo. Publisher's drab printed wrappers, Mercure de France device to upper wrapper and spine, uncut and partly unopened; pp. [175], [4], [1 (blank)]; slight creasing to spine, small chip to upper joint, spine ends lightly bumped; uniform light toning, slight dampstaining to upper corner; a very good copy; presentation inscription to front free endpaper 'à René Maizeroy, son ami Jean Lorrain' ( see below ). Uncommon first edition of these short stories 'to be read by candlelight' by the openly gay Symbolist poet and novelist Jean Lorrain, notorious for duelling Proust (after Lorrain had subtly outed him in print) only two months before the publication of the present work. Lorrain (born Paul Duval, 1855–1906) came to Paris in 1881, where he became colloquially known as ‘Sodom’s ambassador to Paris’. A friend of Sarah Bernhardt, Colette, and Samuel Pozzi, he was known for his long-standing addiction to ether (it is said that his grave reeked of it decades after his death), his pugnacity, and his ‘great fondness for hoodlums, fairground wrestlers, butcher-boys and assorted pimps’, as he wrote to a friend in an 1890 letter ( trans. Sibalis, GLBTQ Archive, online ). Lorrain narrowly avoided a duel with his childhood friend Maupassant, offended at recognising himself in one of Lorrain’s fictional characters, in 1886

• Binding: Hardcover

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