Alexandre DUMAS, Jr. Approximately 55 autograph, signed letters to writers,...

Alexandre DUMAS, Jr. Approximately 55 autograph, signed letters to writers, journalists, publishers, and others…
Congratulations and expressions of gratitude. Advice to young authors. Regrets at being unable to write a preface. Responses to questionnaires…
Including: Émile Augier (3) – Alphonse Daudet (1, December 19, 1891, regarding a play he refused to edit, seeing nothing to change “except for a few insignificant details”) – A. Delpit (1) – E. Fournier (1) Jouaust (1) and regrets at being unable to attend the banquet Jouaust (1) – Henry Lapauze (2) – Ernest Lavisse (1, 1893, regarding *Le Grand Frédéric* before the accession) – Alphonse Lebègue (1) – Adrien Marx (1) – Émile Montagne (7) – Henri de Pène (1, undated. He sent her a short story for her journal: “If you have young women among your subscribers, you’ll print a separate edition for them, with an embroidery pattern instead of my prose.”).
– Numerous correspondents (“dear friend,” “my dear colleague…”) who remained anonymous. – To a female novelist: “I haven’t forgotten you, my lovely colleague… I think you sensed the right element by having the young girl succumb rather than the other one. The play is right there…” – “You have a flair for the theater—there’s no doubt about it… the two opening monologues are unnecessary… The denouement isn’t subtle enough… You’re from the school of Becque…” – On women: “I’ve received confessions from women. Do women ever make confessions unless forced by the evidence?...“ – “I’ve been asked to write so many prefaces that I finally told several young colleagues I wouldn’t write any more…” – On a manuscript by Béranger: “I spent hours comparing the handwriting in the notebook with that in my letters… There are contradictions that cannot be the result of chance… I therefore cannot propose this notebook as an autograph by Béranger…” – “I’m no longer quite sure how to write novels. The few ideas I still have always take the form typical of the theater…” – He saw Constantinople 22 or 23 years ago and did not “associate this beautiful city—or rather, this beautiful setting—with any state of mind or any philosophical conclusion…” I have decided to stick to the pleasant or unpleasant impression that a new spectacle of nature makes on me and not to seek how I am involved in it other than through my momentary presence.” In this way, he distinguishes himself from Loti, who contemplates death through a “wholly natural antithesis” in the face of “this explosion of light and color….”
– Autograph manuscript. Beginning of Dumas Fils’s preface to *Pensées de la solitude* by Princess Ghyka. 2 pp. in-8
Enclosed:
- Louis GANDERAX. Autograph letter. November 27, 1908. Regarding Dumas Fils.
- Henri de LAPOMMERAYE. Letter. [1871]. Regarding a lecture he gave on Dumas and a note sent to him by Dumas Fils.
- René MAIZEROY. Letter to Alexandre Dumas Fils.
- Pierre VALDAGNE. Drafts of letters to Alexandre Dumas fils. 9 pp., in 12 and in-8.
- Unsigned handwritten article: “What Caused Dumas fils’s Death?” 3 pp., in-4.