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a handwritten letter from a man who is writing a poem
Ader

355 - [Victor HUGO]. Juliette DROUET (1806–1883).
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Estimate €1,000 - €1,200
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Description
[Victor HUGO]. Juliette DROUET (1806–1883). Autograph letter signed ‘Juliette’, 12 August [1838], Sunday afternoon, 1.25 pm, to Victor Hugo; 6 pages, in-4. A lovely letter concerning *Ruy Blas*. [Victor Hugo had finished writing *Ruy Blas* the day before, and had reserved its first reading for Juliette.] ‘It has been a fortnight, my beloved, since you last came to have lunch with me – God knows how much I’ve been longing for you. I would have swallowed you whole like a cherry if you hadn’t had a stem. That’s when little Toto’s caution proved wise: ‘I don’t know if there’s a stem, but I don’t like the way it’s cut.’ I realise I’ve turned my paper the wrong way round. Thank goodness my love is the right way up and you’ll still be able to make sense of it. My handwriting is dreadful. I’d just as soon write with a poppy head—I’d manage it better […] I’m going to write to Mrs Krafft to ask if she can lend me an old hat; that’ll save us a little money and perhaps bring us one more day of happiness? What a miracle your play is, my poor beloved, and how kind of you to let me be the first to admire it. I have never heard anything so magnificent. I do not even exclude your other masterpieces from this. It is a richness, a magnificence, a dazzling splendour that one cannot begin to imagine until one has heard it. It is miraculous. Unfortunately, my mind is even more clouded by it, just as when one’s eyes have gazed at the sun for too long, black spots remain before one’s eyes [drawing of two black spots] like this. That is what is happening to me; I can see less than ever. I am as daft as a goose, and were it not for my love, which serves as my candles and my light, I would see nothing at all. Oh! My beautiful sun, you have blinded me for a long time. I see nothing now but your rays that burn me: inside and outside me, everything that is not you is black’... Former ‘Femmes’ collection by Claude de Flers (18–19 November 2014, lot 517).
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About the sale Letters and Autograph Manuscripts – Part II
Auction location
Auction time 10/14/2026 at 2:00 PM
Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House
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