MONNIER, Adrienne. Souvenirs de Londres. Petite suite anglaise.

MONNIER, Adrienne. Souvenirs de Londres. Petite suite anglaise.It Was Because of Debussy That I Went to London MONNIER, Adrienne. Souvenirs de Londres. Petite suite anglaise. Paris: Mercure de France. [8 July] 1957. 8vo. Publisher's wrappers printed in red and black, pp. 105, [4], [3 (blank)], first leaf blank; uncut and largely unopened; spine lightly toned; a few leaves opened roughly resulting in short closed tear to first blank, uniform light browning; a very good copy. First edition of influential

‘It Was Because of Debussy That I Went to London’

MONNIER, Adrienne. Souvenirs de Londres. Petite suite anglaise. Paris: Mercure de France. [8 July] 1957.

8vo. Publisher's wrappers printed in red and black, pp. 105, [4], [3 (blank)], first leaf blank; uncut and largely unopened; spine lightly toned; a few leaves opened roughly resulting in short closed tear to first blank, uniform light browning; a very good copy.

First edition of influential bookseller, writer, and publisher Adrienne Monnier’s (1892–1955) reflections on her past trips to London, including a lengthy account of her meeting with T.S. Eliot.

One of the first women in France to found her own bookstore, La Maison des Ami des Livres, she was also the lover of Sylvia Beach, owner of Shakespeare and Company and responsible for the publication of Joyce’s Ulysses in 1922. Souvenirs de Londres details Monnier's experiences in England and includes an eight-page account of Monnier's meeting with T.S. Eliot, whose poetry she published in her French language review, Le Navire d'Argent (The Silver Ship). A translation (prepared by both Monnier and Beach) of ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ appeared in the review's first issue in May 1925. She also describes visits to the National Gallery and the Wallace Collection; her first trip to London, aged seventeen, spurred by her early fascination with the Pre-Raphaelites; stopping in front of the Savoy in memory of Oscar Wilde; the streets of London festooned for the coronation of Elizabeth II in 1953; and much else.

There follows Monnier’s preface to Bryher’s 1948 edition of Beowulf (the work was dedicated to Beach and Monnier), as well as a letter from the Surrealist writer and ethnographer Michel Leiris praising Souvenirs de Londres and providing additional insights into the mythology and iconography of the figure of Aurora in relation to his 1946 surreal novel of the same name.

SKU: 2121231