The Dedication Copy, Inscribed to Founding Surrealist Benjamin Peret

[Tanguy, Yves] Mayoux, Jehan
Ma tête à couper
(Paris): GLM, 1939. First and limited edition, #2/25 numbered copies on Arches paper (from a total edition of 305). 8vo. 52, (2) pp. Dedication copy, humorously inscribed by Jehan Mayoux on half-title to his close friend and founding member of Surrealism, Benjamin Peret: "À Benjamin Péret, Le plus bruyant et le plus secret des hommes En affectueux témoignage d’admiration. Jehan Mayoux" (To Benjamin Peret, the noisiest and most secretive of men affectively sending my regards. Jehan Mayoux) Illustrated with an engraved frontispiece by Yves Tanguy, and signed, numbered, and dated by him below image. Original limp grey wrappers, printed in black, in original glassine, toned with scattered wear; in grey cloth box.

The dedication copy of French Surrealist poet, teacher, and pacifist Jehan Mayoux's (1904-75) third collection of poetry, inscribed by him to his close friend and founding member of the Surrealist movement, the French poet Benjamin Peret (1899-1955). Peret was early involved in avant garde circles in Paris following World War I, first with the Dadaists, and then with Andre Breton in the emerging Surrealist movement. Along with Pierre Naville he was an early editor of the Surrealist journal and mouthpiece, La Révolution surréaliste, and published and collaborated on numerous volumes of poetry. In 1929, he and his first wife, singer Elise Houston, moved to her homeland of Brazil, but by 1931 were back in Paris after being deported by Brazilian authorities due to their radical politics.

Mayoux first came into contact with Breton and poet Paul Eluard in 1933, when they published his work in the fifth issue of Le surréalisme au service de la revolution. During the 1930s Mayoux frequently published in Surrealist reviews, and signed the group's anti-Stalinist pamphlet, Du temps que les surréalistes avaient raison (1935). The work marked a break between French Surrealism and the Communist Party, but the beginning of a close relationship between Mayoux, Peret, and Surrealist artist Yves Tanguy, who illustrated the above work. Both Mayoux and Peret shared similar radical political sympathies, with Mayoux involved in trade union activity during the 1930s, and Peret fighting alongside anarchists in the Spanish Civil War. At the outbreak of World War II both were imprisoned by the French, Mayoux for being a conscientious objector, and Peret for subversive activities.

A fine copy and association between two of Surrealism's leading literary figures.

Provenance
Collection of Tonian Genstein Volk, Pennsylvania

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Lot 40

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