MUSSET (Alfred de). Lot n° 19

The adventures of the marriage of Pauline Garcia with Louis Viardot. 1840. Suite of 17 humorous drawings in graphite, captioned, 20.2 x 30.5 cm, mounted under a mat, presented in a black half-maroquin case. Famous suite of humorous drawings by Alfred de Musset and in part by his friend the sculptor Auguste Barre. It is presented in the form of a comic strip with 2 or 3 episodes per sheet, i.e. a total of 45 drawings. According to Paul de Musset's testimony, the series originally included 51 drawings, of which only 45 have been preserved. A gap in the story is indeed perceptible between the eleventh and twelfth plates. This creation of the poet is not surprising, as many writers of this period left traces of their drawing talent; Hugo, of course, the very first, to whom one recognizes a real genius as a painter, but also, in a minor mode, Mérimée, Balzac, Corbière, Paul de Musset, Nerval, George Sand, Alfred de Vigny and many others. An exhibition at the Maison de Balzac, in which this set was included, gave an eloquent overview. These episodic drawings, each bearing a few lines of caption, are a kind of prototype of the comic strip, invented by the Swiss Rodophe Töpffer around 1830, with his albums whose success continued until the beginning of the 20th century, M. Cryptogame, M. Vieux Bois, M. Jabot. But the great interest for us is that this series of satirical sketches is autobiographical and tells the story of the poet's disappointment in love with the singer Pauline Garcia. It features all the protagonists of the wedding: the future spouses ("Mlle G. and "M. V."), Musset (Alfred de M.), Paul de Musset ("monsieur son frère"), Pauline's mother and their bellboy, the sculptor Barre ("M. B."), Caroline Jaubert ("Mme la conseillère de la Verdrillette"), George Sand ("Indiana", after the title of her first novel), admirers of the singer such as Baron Deniez ("M. le baron D."), sister Marceline, a giant Figaro who appears in one of Viardot's nightmares, and his three sisters. Madame Mireille Dottin-Orsini has devoted an important study to this comic strip, from which we quote large excerpts here: "Pauline, from a Spanish family devoted to music, was the younger sister of the beautiful Malibran, a singer whose premature death at the height of her fame inspired Musset's famous "Stances". The poet met Pauline in 1838 in the salon of his former mistress and confidante Caroline Jaubert, whom he called his "godmother", at a time when she was already appreciated in Europe and about to conquer the Parisian stage. Initially launched as the double of her deceased sister, whose roles she was made to sing and whose costumes she was made to wear, she wished to impose her own personal voice and style. Pauline, whom Alfred called "Paolita", "Paulette" or "Paulinette", was extremely gifted, but closely watched by her family, who had been scalded by the calamitous marriage of the Malibran, who had married an adventurer to escape the family's strictness. The father, Manuel Garcia, a renowned tenor, created in 1816 the role of Count Almaviva in The Barber of Seville... Musset drew a portrait of "?Paulinette" which he always kept, and in which stands out a particularity of the singer's eyes, large, slightly drooping eyes, sad and serious, whose narrow iris seems to swim in white. Her voice was of exceptional range; an excellent pianist (a pupil of Liszt), she played with Clara Schumann. She also composed, put into songs poems by Tourgueniev, wrote operettas and an opera. Fluent in four languages, a good horsewoman and fencer, she made her own stage costumes. She was a good draughtswoman, and Delacroix asked her, during a joint stay in Nohant, to sketch for him the costumes of peasant women in Berry, which he used for his painting Sainte Anne. George Sand, who met Pauline as early as 1836, had taken her in friendship and under her wing; she made her the model for Consuelo. She intervened to facilitate her marriage, thus opposing Musset's hopes. He immediately fell in love with her, along with the young tragedienne Rachel, another rising star, who was the same age as Pauline, except for one year. The two young girls embodied for him a youth endowed with exceptional talent; he dreamed of actively participating in their future glory, of becoming younger through their contact, of finding inspiration, as if genius were contagious. He published a laudatory article in the Revue des Deux Mondes "Sur les débuts de Mesdemoiselles Rachel et Pauline Garcia" (1 January 1839). Rachel soon gave in to the poet, but Pauline, ... repulsed him by mocking his inveterate alcoholism. All that remained was for Musset to ask her to marry him. But he was not the ideal son-in-law, and Pauline's family is alarmed by the young singer's virtue. Ell