When Marcel Schwob published The Book of Monelle in French in 1894, it immediately became the unofficial bible of the French Symbolist movement, admired by such contemporaries as Stéphane Mallarmé, Alfred Jarry and André Gide. A carefully woven assemblage of legends, aphorisms, fairy tales and nihilistic philosophy, it remains a deeply enigmatic and haunting work more than a century later, a gathering of literary and personal ruins written in a style that evokes both the Brothers Grimm and Friedrich Nietzsche. The Book of Monelle was the result of Schwob’s intense emotional suffering over the loss of his love, a “girl of the streets” named Louise, whom he had befriended in 1891 and who succumbed to tuberculosis two years later. Transforming her into the innocent prophet of destruction, Monelle, Schwob tells the stories of her various sisters: girls succumbing to disillusionment, caught between the misleading world of childlike fantasy and the bitter world of reality. This new translation reintroduces a true fin-de-siècle masterpiece into English. A secret influence on generations of writers, from Guillaume Apollinaire and Jorge Luis Borges to Roberto Bolaño, Marcel Schwob (1867–1905) was as versed in the street slang of medieval thieves as he was in the poetry of Walt Whitman (whom he translated into French). Paul Valéry and Alfred Jarry both dedicated their first books to him, and he was the uncle of Surrealist photographer Claude Cahun.
Featured image, of Marcel Schwob, is reproduced from The Book of Monelle.
in stock $12.95
Free Shipping
UPS GROUND IN THE CONTINENTAL U.S. FOR CONSUMER ONLINE ORDERS
EXEMPLARY DEPARTURES By Gabrielle Wittkop. Afterword and translation by Annette David. WAKEFIELD PRESS ISBN: 9781939663139 | US $16.95 Pub Date: 11/24/2015 Active | In stock
MURDER MOST SERENE By Gabrielle Wittkop. Introduction and translation by Louise Rogers Lalaurie. WAKEFIELD PRESS ISBN: 9781939663146 | US $12.95 Pub Date: 11/24/2015 Active | In stock
LESABéNDIO By Paul Scheerbart. WAKEFIELD PRESS ISBN: 9780984115594 | US $16.95 Pub Date: 12/30/2012 Active | In stock
THE BOOK OF MONELLE By Marcel Schwob. WAKEFIELD PRESS ISBN: 9780984115587 | US $12.95 Pub Date: 11/30/2012 Active | In stock
THE HIGH LIFE By Jean-Pierre Martinet. Translated by Henry Vale. WAKEFIELD PRESS ISBN: 9780984115570 | US $11.95 Pub Date: 5/31/2012 Active | In stock
THE LEG OF LAMB By Benjamin Péret. WAKEFIELD PRESS ISBN: 9780984115532 | US $17.95 Pub Date: 4/30/2011 Active | In stock
NEW YORK Showroom by Appointment Only 75 Broad Street, Suite 630 New York NY 10004 Tel 212 627 1999
LOS ANGELES Showroom by Appointment Only
818 S. Broadway, Suite 700 Los Angeles, CA 90014 Tel. 323 969 8985
ARTBOOK LLC D.A.P. | Distributed Art Publishers, Inc.
All site content Copyright C 2000-2017 by Distributed Art Publishers, Inc. and the respective publishers, authors, artists. For reproduction permissions, contact the copyright holders.
The D.A.P. Catalog www.artbook.com
Distributed by D.A.P.
FORMAT: Pbk, 4.5 x 7 in. / 136 pgs / 2 b&w. LIST PRICE: U.S. $12.95 LIST PRICE: CANADA $15 ISBN: 9780984115587 PUBLISHER: Wakefield Press AVAILABLE: 11/30/2012 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Active AVAILABILITY: In stock
When Marcel Schwob published The Book of Monelle in French in 1894, it immediately became the unofficial bible of the French Symbolist movement, admired by such contemporaries as Stéphane Mallarmé, Alfred Jarry and André Gide. A carefully woven assemblage of legends, aphorisms, fairy tales and nihilistic philosophy, it remains a deeply enigmatic and haunting work more than a century later, a gathering of literary and personal ruins written in a style that evokes both the Brothers Grimm and Friedrich Nietzsche. The Book of Monelle was the result of Schwob’s intense emotional suffering over the loss of his love, a “girl of the streets” named Louise, whom he had befriended in 1891 and who succumbed to tuberculosis two years later. Transforming her into the innocent prophet of destruction, Monelle, Schwob tells the stories of her various sisters: girls succumbing to disillusionment, caught between the misleading world of childlike fantasy and the bitter world of reality. This new translation reintroduces a true fin-de-siècle masterpiece into English. A secret influence on generations of writers, from Guillaume Apollinaire and Jorge Luis Borges to Roberto Bolaño, Marcel Schwob (1867–1905) was as versed in the street slang of medieval thieves as he was in the poetry of Walt Whitman (whom he translated into French). Paul Valéry and Alfred Jarry both dedicated their first books to him, and he was the uncle of Surrealist photographer Claude Cahun.
