A moving love letter from Juliette DROUET to Victor HUGO.

Juliette DROUET (1806-1883).

Autographed letter signed to Victor Hugo.

Four pages in-8°.

October 27 [1844]. Sunday evening.

" As soon as you're gone, I cease to live, I cease to think, I cease to hope. "

A beautiful love letter from Juliette Drouet, desperate to find herself alone after her trip with the great man.

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" Here I am back to doodling, my Toto, a sad pleasure indeed, especially after the two months of love and intimacy that have just passed. Here I am again with my ink, my paper, my spelling mistakes, my stupidity, and my love. When I was traveling, I didn't need all this paraphernalia to be happy. It was enough for me to love you, and God knows I did that well. Here, I love you no less, on the contrary, if the opposite were possible, but I live far from you, but I desire you, but I worry, but I suffer and I am unhappy, that's all ."

However, I am neither ungrateful nor forgetful. I know you just gave me almost two months of happiness. I still have the sweet kisses of every day and every night on my lips , and I can still feel the pressure of your hand. But all this past happiness only serves to highlight the emptiness your absence leaves in my life more painfully. As soon as you are gone, I no longer live, I no longer think, I no longer hope. I desire you, and I suffer.

"So I dread our return to this hideous Paris as much as death, a Paris where there is nothing for lovers who love each other as we do. Nothing. No sun, no confidence—that sun of love. Nothing but rain, suspicion, and jealousy—that is to say, the three blackest, saddest, and coldest scourges that afflict body and heart. Oh! I suffer, my Toto, as much as I love you, it's quite true, my poor beloved, and it's always like this when you're not with me. Juliette. "