Les Cahiers d 'André Walter, Inscribed Presentation Copy with Four ALSs bound-in

Paris: Librairie de l'Art Independant, 1891. Very Good+. Deluxe second edition, 12mo (6¼ x 4¼ in); number 180 of 125 copies on tinted paper numbered 66 to 190 and initialed "AW" by Gide in ink. Additionally signed and inscribed by the author to French writer and literary critic Edmond Jaloux (1878-19489), "en cordiale souvenir, Marseille fin Avril 1896" in ink on the half-title; rebound in yellow floral patterned moire silk, gilt-stamped spine, with the original publisher's wrappers preserved, bound in at front and rear. A wonderful association copy. [With] Four autograph letters signed, most likely to French poet Henri de Régnier, bound in: 1) Two pages opposite p. 24, in which Gide worries about a lack of response from Régnier regarding a future meeting; 2) Single page opposite p. 64, where he confirms a date and meeting place; 3) Single page at rear, discussing the organization of a casual, perhaps, "annual dinner of NRF [Nouvelle Revue Française] loyalists" perhaps planned in celebration of Régnier's appearance in Paris; 4) Single page, also at rear, confirming arrangements to meet a mutual friend, Gide inquiries about the friend's address; sizes vary.

Edmond Jaloux was among the earliest literary critics to champion the works of 20th-century authors like Rilke, Proust, and Woolf. "Jaloux was virtually the first to recognize the importance of André Gide. When merely a lad of lycée age, Jaloux could already presage Gide's importance in the development of twentieth-century letters." (J. Kolbert, "Edmond Jaloux and His Contemporaries." The French Review, Vol. 21, No.4). Gide and Jaloux met in late April 1896, when the writer dropped in unannounced to the young man's Marseille apartment. The young critic described the entrance of Gide as if a meteor had landed in his room, dubbing the writer an "Olympian" figure. According to a letter from Jaloux to Gide dated May 16th, 1896, he received the present lot from Gide on the previous day. Jaloux thanks him profusely in this letter, and praises Les Cahiers to the highest, "I read [it] until dusk; the sky was gloomy and misty, and I was able to harmonize myself infinitely with this precious book […] Ah! dear Sir, how admirable and pure Cahiers d'André Walter is! Few books have moved me to this point, and it contains such revealing sentences that make one shiver as when listening to the loveliest of music." (See Correspondance: André Gide & Edmond Jaloux. Edited by Pierre Lachasse, 2004).