MALLARME (Stéphane). The poems of Edgar Poe. Prose translati - Lot 134

MALLARME (Stéphane). The poems of Edgar Poe. Prose translation by Stéphane Mallarmé, with portrait and fleuron by Ed. Manet. Bruxelles, Deman, 1888. Gr. in-8, garnet half-chagr., corners, n. r., cons. cover (contemporary binding). FIRST EDITION of Stéphane Mallarmé's admirable translation. It is dedicated "To the memory of Edouard Manet, these leaves we read together". Edition of 850 copies: ONE OF 50 HEAD COPS ON NUMEROTES IMPERIAL JAPON. The illustration includes two drawings after Manet: the raven's head on the cover and a pen-and-ink portrait of Edgar Poe. The collection comprises thirty-seven pieces. In a letter to Verlaine dated November 16, 1885, Mallarmé says he learned English "simply to read Poe better...". (Mallarmé, OEuvres complètes, Pléiade, 1989 [1945], p. 662). However, exegetes see it more as an interpretation than a translation. It opens with the famous sonnet dedicated to Poe: "Tel qu'en lui-même enfin l'éternité le change...", first published in the United States, in 1877, in the memorial volume dedicated to the writer. Mallarmé, who had been thinking about this translation since the early 1860s, had published eight of the pieces in Emile Blémont's La Renaissance littéraire et artistique in 1872, and another eight in Catulle Mendès' La République des lettres in 1876-1877. A FINE COPY. Bibliothèque du Docteur Lucien-Graux (ex-libris)