Spectacular Simone de Beauvoir Archive $380,000-$470,000 At Christie's

by Stephen J. Gertz

An outstanding trove of over 350 original and unpublished signed autograph letters and postcards written by French writer, intellectual, existentialist philosopher, political activist, feminist, social theorist, and author of the major work of Feminist theory, The Second Sex (Le Deuxième Sexe, 1949; 1953 in English), Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986), is being offered by Christie's-Paris in it Importants livres anciens,  livers d'artistes & manuscrits sale, April 30, 2014. It is estimated to sell for $380,000-$470,000 (€280,000-€350,000; £250,000-310,000).

Spanning the years 1918-1957, the letters, each 1-10 pages in length and written to her mother, Françoise de Beauvoir (1887-1963), constitute an informal book by de Beauvoir, discussing her childhood and adolescence, life as an independent teacher, her emancipation, etc., and in detail recounts her daily life, travels, her readings (Dumas, Dostoevsky, Saint- Exupery, Faulkner, Celine, Virginia Woolf, D.H. Lawrence, and many detective novels), meetings, and the progress of her literary work.

As the letters progress from youth to adulthood, discussion of her blood family ebbs and the tide flows to the "small family" she was adopted into, whose members, cited many times, included Jean-Paul Sartre, Jacques-Laurent Bost, Olga Zuorro, Bianca Bienenfelds, Nathalie Sorokin Fernand, and Stephan Gerassi, and also Merleau-Ponty, Nizan,  Colette Aubry, the Morels, the Guilles, the Leiris, Raymond Aron,  etc.  

There is much discussion of Jean-Paul Sartre, whom she met in 1929, opening "a new era" in her life. Several letters detail her life with Sartre: a trip together to Spain in 1931; sojourns in Spain, Italy, Germany - where she joined Sartre  in an internship at the French Institute in Berlin in 1939 - in Greece (July-August 1937) and Morocco (summer 1938). She finds Nuremberg "covered with swastikas," and Morocco "horribly lousy, but extremely attractive." 

She discusses her June 1940 exodus from Paris - Sartre was taken prisoner and would not be released until April of the following year; Simone took refuge in La Poueze. She writes of taking a long bicycle trip with Sartre in the free zone to organize a resistance movement. "There is a dearth here," she wrote Sept. 13, 1940 from Cannes, "and twice I had a breakfast of dry bread." The Liberation and her immediate post-war life are covered.

She writes of her 1947 lecture tour in the United States, where she met novelist Nelson Algren, who took her for a walk on the wild side and became her lover. "New York absolutely delights me and life is delicious" (January 28, 1947). She talks about a trip to Sweden with Sartre, and another in the United States and Mexico with Algren in 1948, then Algeria  the following autumn, and with a ferocious appetite for life she describes her discoveries and impressions. Concurrently, she began The Second Sex: "J’ai envie de travailler le plus possible parce que ce livre sera très long à faire et je voudrais quand même bien qu’il soit fni dans un an," she writes in September 1948; the book would be published a year later. 

Additional Sartre, Algren, an important trip to China in 1955, and more through 1957 when the correspondence ends.

The provenance to the archive is rock-solid: from Henriette, Simone's sister, aka Helene de Beauvoir. Her adopted daughter, Mrs. Sylvie Le Bon de Beauvoir, assisted Christie's with the dates to many  letters otherwise dateless.

The significance of this archive cannot be underestimated: it constitutes an epistolary autobiography of one of the towering figures in feminist thought and a major figure in twentieth century French literature.

__________

Images courtesy of Christie's, with our thanks.
__________
__________

Kierkegaard's Silver Quill At Auction

by Stephen J. Gertz

Philosopher Søren Kierkegaard's silver quill, finely wrought as an elegant feather, is being offered by Bruun Rasmussen Auctioneers of Copenhagen in its International Paintings, Antiquities and Modern Art sale on September 18, 2013. It is estimated to sell for €10,000-€13,000 ($13,295 - $17,282).

The quill, 16.3 cm long (just shy of 6 1/2 inches), has passed down through the Høyernielsen family, descendants of Kierkegaard's sister, Nicoline. According to family tradition, it is the only pen he is known to have meticulously and diligently used to set down his thoughts, which flooded out of his head, poured down his arm, ran into his fingers through to pen and burst onto paper.

In 1955, this pen was exhibited at the Royal Library's Memorial Exhibition on Kierkegaard, and it was also depicted in the exhibition's catalog.

Kierkegaard (1813-1855), the father of existentialism who considered himself a Christian poet, was a compulsive, profound and prolific writer with a chronic itch. In 1838, he wrote in his journal, "Ingen dag uden en streg" ("No day without a line"). Later, in 1847, he noted, "Only when I'm writing do I feel well. I forget all unpleasantness and sufferings, I am with my thoughts and happy. If I stop for only a few days I feel immediately sick, overwhelmed, labored, my head heavy and weighed down."

As a youth the prominent Danish literary and cultural critic, Georg Brandes (1842-1927), was witness to Kierkegaard's fervent urge to write. In his memoirs (1880) he recalled walking past Kierkegaard's apartment and catching sight of him through a window:

"The strange Thinker went back and forth during a silence that was only broken by pen scratching on paper [...] in all rooms lay pen, paper and ink [...] Never in all existence has ink played so great a role."

Note that the pen has no nib. By the 1830's, quill pens, which sucked up ink into their hollow via capillary action and required that the feather be often sliced at its point to maintain a sharp nib, had been replaced by dip pens with steel nibs (the pen itself) inserted into pen-holders, as here.  Steel nibs were sturdier, kept their sharpness, lasted longer, and had the added advantage of being a much neater implement, not spilling ink all over paper and fingers. The next step in the evolution of pens was the fountain pen. Had Kierkegaard lived long enough to enjoy their use, the fountain would have required the capacity of Niagara Falls to handle the rush of words that cascaded forth.

His pen in overdrive, Kierkegaard wrote seventy-three works during his lifetime, many under pseudonyms including Johannes Climacus, Nicolas Notabene, Vigilius Haufniensis, Frater Taciturnus, Johannes de Silentio, Constantin Constantius, Victor Eremita, and my personal favorite, Hilarius Bookbinder, who, I imagine, thinks that binding a book in infant-soiled publisher's diaper cloth glued with anti-bacterial zinc oxide paste and dusted with Johnson's Baby Powder is a laff-riot.

Philosophy being a notoriously low-paying gig, one wonders how Kierkegaard could afford such an  extravagant and expensive pen. He was, however, born into wealth and died in it, never held a job, and never, ever had to worry about paying bills, which tends to burn a lot of mental energy that Kierkegaard had the luxury to conserve for that other consuming preoccupation, the anxiety of existence.

__________

Images courtesy of Bruun Rasmussen auctions, with our thanks.
__________
__________

The Story Of Nobody, By Somebody, Illustrated By Someone

By Stephen J. Gertz

The Original Story Of O.

Ex Nihilo Nihil Fit
(From Nothing Comes Nothing).

Since Nothing is with Nothing fraught
Then Nobody must spring from naught.

"Nobody knows the trouble I've seen..."

But Nobody's not talking so we have to depend upon Something Concerning Nobody (1814), a curious satire edited by Somebody, and delightfully illustrated by Someone, for answers. Nobody has nothing to worry about in this testament to his non-existence; Nobody, it turns out, lives. It's Being and Nothingness without the annoying phenomenological ontology, cut-to-the-chase existentialism. Nobody, it turns out, is somebody and nothing to sneeze at.

Nobody's afraid of him.

Somebody, Nobody's biographer,  begins with a Dedication to the object of his essay: "I...content myself with courting Nobody's applause, whose patronage I can at all times command, heedless of public approbation," signing it, "With all due deference, Sir, Your most obsequious And very humble servant, Somebody."

Nobody at the door.

It is Nobody's curse that he has no body,
simply head, arms and legs.

Somebody did his homework.  It's a difficult task to trace the lifetime of "the renowned Mr. Nobody, whose existence was not only anterior to Adam's wearing green incomprehensibles, but even before the sun, moon, or stars  moved in the realms of endless space." With this statement, Somebody moves from existential philosophy into modern theoretical physics and the mind-bending consideration of something out of nothing, somebody out of Nobody, and chaos theory.

Somebody consulted "The Chronicles of Chaos, a volume so vast and intricate that few heads can even think upon the subject without becoming moon-struck; or, to speak more comprehensively, bereft of their wits." The work of Doctor Dennis O'Dunderum, Doctor Brady O'Blunder'em, and the compendium of Doctor Wiggins Wig-all ("published in folio, Basel edition, vol. 192, page 1379, beginning at line 106") was also studied. 

A domestic scene: Nobody at home.

"Ever since we were urchins at school we recollect the mischief that Nobody did. We find, however, by Somebody, that Nobody is more amusing than we suspected; though we fear, if we inquire for Somebody, as the author of Something about Nobody - nobody will own it. This piece, 'a trifle light as air,' will amuse in spite of criticism - not as a literary bagatelle, but as a 'Picture Book.' Nobody perhaps will know so much of the letter-press part as ourselves; nor will any body believe that Nobody goes to Paternoster Row, nor that Nobody travels.

"'On his way from the city towards the west end of the metropolis, our Nobody, instead of passing along St. Paul's Curchyard, though for to be godly, and therefore proceeded by the way of Paternoster Row, the renowned mart of literature, in order to take a peep at the liberal GENTLEMEN booksellers of the present era.'

"Winners will be laughers whether booksellers or authors, for which Nobody will blame them; and if Somebody's book 'goes off' well, buyers will laugh at Nobody" (The Critical Review, or, Annals of Literature, 1814, Article 20, p. 218).

Somebody & Nobody

Who's responsible for this work of mind-warping whimsy? Who is the Somebody behind Nobody?

William Henry Ireland (1775 - 1835)  is the pseudonymous Somebody. He is known as a poet, writer of gothic novels, and histories. But his primary claim to fame is as the Thomas J. Wise of his time.

"Perhaps the most brazen literary forgeries of all were those of William Henry Ireland. William Henry Ireland was born in London in 1777, the son of Samuel Ireland, a self-taught artist who had achieved considerable commercial success with a series of illustrated travel books. Samuel Ireland also fancied himself an antiquarian. He collected books and artwork and had an enthusiasm for William Shakespeare which bordered on idolatry. His devotion was such that he read nightly to his family from the works of Shakespeare and sought memorabilia and artifacts relating to the Bard. During a research trip to Stratford, for what was later published as Picturesque Views on the Upper, or Warwickshire Avon (1795), Samuel Ireland is alleged to have been duped into purchasing such fraudulent artifacts as a purse and chair formerly belonging to Shakespeare. His son William accompanied him on this trip and was able to witness firsthand his father's passion and, perhaps gullibility, towards any and all things relating to Shakespeare.

"William Henry Ireland, like his father, was an avid reader and a collector of books and antiquities. His biographers suggest he was also familiar with James Macpherson's Ossian poems and with the life and work of Thomas Chatterton. At some point, the younger Ireland apparently decided to emulate these two figures in an effort to satisfy his father's desire to obtain a document in Shakespeare's handwriting...

"In December 1794, William Henry Ireland informed his father that he had discovered a cache of old documents in the possession of a wealthy acquaintance. Among them was a deed bearing the signature of William Shakespeare which he accepted as a gift from his friend on the condition that it remain anonymous. William in turn gave it to his father who was beside himself with joy at his son's discovery. William had satisfied his father's lifelong dream to possess an actual specimen of William Shakespeare's signature" (William Henry Ireland and the Shakespeare Fabrications, University of Delaware Special Collections).

Nobody scents it.

And what of the anonymous artist who has so keenly captured the essence of Nobody with nothing to go on? 

George Moutard Woodward (1760?-1809), “caricaturist, son of William Woodward of Stanton Hall, Derbyshire, was born in that county about 1760. He received no artistic training, but, having much original talent, came to London, with an allowance from his father, and became a prolific and popular designer of social caricatures, much in the style of Bunbury, which were etched chiefly by Rowlandson and Isaac Cruikshank. Although their humour was generally of a very coarse and extravagant kind, they display a singular wealth of imagination and insight into character, and some are extremely entertaining. Among the best are ‘Effects of Flattery,’ ‘Effects of Hope,’ ‘Club of Quidnuncs,’ ‘Everybody in Town,’ ‘Everybody out of Town,’ and ‘Specimens of Domestic Phrensy.’ Woodward…was of dissipated and intemperate habits, spending much of his time in taverns, and died in a state of penury at the Brown Bear public-house in Bow Street, Covent Garden, in November 1809” (Oxford DNB).

Nobody arrested in his Minority.A case of arrested development.

.

It is ironic that the man who forged Shakespeare would make much ado about Nobody. 

In the modern world, the subject of something about Nobody was revisited by one of America's  lesser known philosophers, from the Steubenville, Ohio, school of thought.



__________

[IRELAND, William Henry]. [WOODWARD, George Moutard, illustrator].  Something Concerning Nobody. Edited by Somebody. Embellished with Fourteen Characteristic Etchings. London: Printed for Robert Scholey, 1814.

First edition. Octavo (7 3/8 x 4 7/8 in; 188 x 125mm) . xv, 191 pp. Fourteen hand-colored engraved plates.

Regarding authorship, see British Museum N&Q, 4th ser., VII, 474.

__________

Images courtesy of David Brass Rare Books, with our thanks.
__________
__________

Albert Camus in Grave Condition, France Holds Its Breath

The author at rest.

Albert Camus is in the midst of a post-existential crisis.

President Nicolas Sarkozy of France wants to transfer the remains of the writer and Nobel-laureate to the Panthéon, the Paris monument to some of the great men and women of France and one of the nation's most hallowed burial places. Camus is currently residing in the cemetery of Lourmarin, in the Luberon area of Provence, his birthplace.

The gall, says Camus’s son, Jean, who asserts that interring his father’s remains at the Panthéon would be contrary to his father’s wishes and does not want to have his legacy put to work in the service of the state.

Jean Camus’s sister, Catherine Camus, who manages her father’s estate, is prepared to give her approval and has spoken with Mr. Sarkozy on the subject, Le Monde said.

Mr. Sarkozy has said little publicly on the subject, but he noted last week that he had “been in touch with the family members,” adding: “I need their agreement.”
“No decision has been made on the Panthéonization,” a spokeswoman for the Elysée Palace said, declining to comment further.
A reader on the Web site of Le Figaro, a daily that is generally supportive of Mr. Sarkozy, said "Let’s leave Albert where he is while we wait.”

Albert Camus died in a car crash in the town of Villeblevin, in Burgundy, on Jan. 4, 1960, at the age of 46.
Full story at the New York Times.