" The dream of flight accustoms us / The child flies over a memory / This flight awakens a memory / The child dreams of a statue / That beckons him to come / Near a fallen fence / He dreams in vague memories / Always the same: a statue / It is evening… a statue / Waving him to come"
6.000€
Jean Cocteau (1889.1963)
Autograph manuscript, signed with a star – The Child Thieves.
One page, quarto. Minor marginal defects. No place or date. [1926]
Manuscript adorned with seven original full-page drawings.
A remarkable poetic manuscript – a first draft – containing some thirty lines written in various directions, extensively corrected and crossed out, and signed with an asterisk. These lines present five variants – previously unpublished – of the last quatrain of the poem " Les Voleurs d'enfants" (The Child Thieves), published in his collection "Opéra " in 1927 by Stock.
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Cocteau composes, corrects and shapes his poetry endlessly:
The dream of flight accustoms us
The child hovers over a memory
This flight brings back a memory
The child dreams of a statue
Who is beckoning him to come?
Near a fallen fence
He dreams in vague memories
Always the same: a statue
It's evening… a statue
He beckons him over
…
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The manuscript is enhanced with seven original drawings.
At the top of the page: a group of six male figures (three full silhouettes and three faces) seemingly playing pétanque. The face of Cocteau's musician and friend, Georges Auric, can be discerned.
At the bottom of the page: a caricature of the painter and decorator Christian Bérard, depicted here, rather unflatteringly, as a nude dancer. A pencil note reads: "Christian Bérard before the beard." It's worth noting that Bérard illustrated the cover of the collection Opéra .