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several pieces of yellow paper are stacked on top of each otheran open book with a handwritten poem on it sitting on a tablea piece of paper with writing on it sitting on top of a tablean open book with a handwritten letter and a pen on ittwo pages of handwritten paper with writing on theman open book with a drawing of a kite on itan image of a piece of paper with writing on itan image of a piece of paper with writing on ita letter written in black ink on a piece of yellow paperseveral open books are lined up on a white surface
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166 - [AUTOGRAPH]. RASPAIL (Jean). LES YEUX D'IRÈNE.
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Estimate €3,000 - €4,000
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Description
[AUTOGRAPH]. RASPAIL (Jean). LES YEUX D'IRÈNE. 387 folios on straw-yellow laid Conquéror paper, A4 size (approx. 30 × 21 cm), numbered from 1 to 356, written on the front (pages 3 and 4 are also handwritten on the reverse): Folio 46 is missing – a folio 83 between ff. 57/58 – 2 ff. ‘60’ – 2 ff. ‘66’ – 1 f. ‘69 bis’ – 1 f. ‘70 bis’ – 2 ff. ‘81’ – ff. 124/125 on the same page – ff. 128/129 on the same page – 2 ff. ‘138’ – 3 ff. ‘149’, of which the middle one is unnumbered – ff. 151/152 on the same page – f. 168 cut in two with no text missing – 1 f. ‘177 bis’ – 2 ff. ‘184’ – 1 f. ‘187 bis’ – 1 f. ‘201 bis’ – following f. ‘206’ Raspail has grouped the folios numbered ‘201/203/203 bis/204/205/206/207’ into three sub-folders, with the handwritten note ‘Is there some confusion in the numbering?... !!’, the sheets ‘209 to 217 bis’ with the handwritten note ‘209/217 bis? ’ and the pages ‘214? 215? as well as f. 208’, with the handwritten note ‘2 pages not placed / filed’ – 2 ff. ‘223’ – 1 f. ‘226 bis’ – 1 f. ‘249 bis’ – 1 f. ‘254 bis’ – 1 f. ‘265 bis’ – 2 ff. ‘266’ – 1 f. ‘274 bis’ – 1 f. ‘276 bis’ – 2 ff. ‘294’ – ff. 301/302 on the same page – following f. ‘331’, a sub-folder containing 5 ff. and the handwritten note ‘Duplicate page numbers: 332 to 336’, then repeated again at no. 332 – a fragment of half a page on white paper numbered ‘341 bis’. The reverse of the sheets mostly contains a typewritten text (a full page or just a few lines), sometimes with typewritten or handwritten corrections. On the reverse of sheets nos. 9 and 10, the following identical note appears: ‘JEAN RASPAIL / “SEPT CAVALIERS sortirent de la ville au crépuscule…” / novel’: both pages are numbered ‘1’ in the top left-hand corner. EXTENSIVELY CORRECTED AUTOGRAPH MANUSCRIPT of the novel *Les Yeux d’Irène* by Jean Raspail (1925–2020), published by Albin Michel in March 1984. A genuine working manuscript, written in black ink, probably a first draft, it features a great many interlinear additions, deletions, corrections, crossings-out, substitutions and marginal annotations, providing a particularly detailed account of the work’s genesis. Page 46 is missing, but it corresponds to a long passage deleted from the final text: indeed, a large part of handwritten page 45 (from ‘I had decided to set off […] ’) up to and including the first third of folio no. 47 has been deleted (‘I said that it had gone badly’, which corresponds to the beginning of the fourth chapter, page 52 of the text printed in 1984 by Albin Michel). In a handwritten note in pencil at the bottom of folio 45, Raspail also appears to question the veracity of his account, which would explain its omission from the final text. ATTACHED: A blank A4 sheet with a coloured coat-of-arms header reading ‘Cavalerie Margravine / Colonel-Major Silve de Pikkendorff’s Squadron ’ [Colonel-Major Silve de Pikkendorff is the hero of the novel *Sept cavaliers* published by Raspail in 1993], containing the following handwritten text: ‘Note: the pages of the MS [manuscript] of *Les Yeux d’Irène* are identical to pages 1 to 4 of the MS [manuscript] of *SEPT CAVALIERS*. J.[ean] R.[aspail] December 2009’. At the top of the first folio of the manuscript is the following HANDWRITTEN DEDICATION: “Dear Alain de Chantérac, it is a source of great joy and pleasure to me to know that my *Sept Cavaliers* [sic, instead of *Les Yeux d’Irène*], after so much hesitation, will now be published by your press. Thank you on their behalf. Best regards / Jean Raspail / 25 October 2015”. The lunch following which the writer wrote the dedication had, according to the recipient’s recollection, involved a fair amount of drinking: which is why Jean Raspail confused the two novels, writing ‘Sept cavaliers’ instead of ‘Les Yeux d’Irène’… However, the autograph note from December 2009 nevertheless shows just how aware the author remained of the physical and textual connection between the two manuscripts. A UNIQUE NOVEL within Jean Raspail’s oeuvre, *Les Yeux d’Irène* pits two female figures, Irène and Aude, against one another, each associated with opposing principles: water and fire, day and night, God and the Devil. The manuscript, in perfect condition, constitutes—by its scope, its completeness and the density of its corrections—A LITERARY DOCUMENT OF THE HIGHEST ORDER ON THE WRITER’S WORKING METHOD.
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About the sale Sale of Antique and Modern Books
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Auction time 11/12/2026 at 2:00 PM
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