APOLLINAIRE Guillaume (1880-1918). Lot n° 1

Case d'Armons (Aux armées de la République, 1915); booklet in-8 (21,5 x 14 cm) : 1 title page (13,4 x 10,3 cm) and 20 ff. of squared paper (21,2 x 12,7 and 21,2 x 14,2 cm); contemporary (or slightly later) binding in black half-chagrin à la Bradel, grey marbled paper boards, spine titled vertically, combed paper endpapers; in black half-maroquin slipcase (Loutrel). First edition of Guillaume Apollinaire's rarest book, published on the Front in June 1915. One of the 25 copies of the unique edition, not sold, numbered and signed in red ink "N° 23 G. A." on the justification. While he was at the front in May 1915, Guillaume Apollinaire had the idea of collecting his most recent poems in a small booklet, calligraphed and polygraphed "at the firing battery, in front of the enemy", helped by "the marshals Bodard and Berthier, on June 17, 1915" on the army's stencil duplicator. The print run was to be 112, then 60 copies (including 5 on large paper), and the proceeds of the sale were to be given to the gunners of his battery. In the end, the edition was limited to 25 copies, all of them different. Guillaume Apollinaire took back in black ink some letters that were not well printed: 8 pages present words or letters ironed in black ink by Apollinaire himself. A very rare copy, in good condition, of the collection in which Apollinaire used for the first time the form of the calligram, an essential date of poetic modernity. Case d'Armons will be used almost entirely in a section of Calligrammes (1918). A superb, complete, untrimmed copy, bound at the time (or shortly thereafter), in very good condition, despite the usual paleness of some pages due to the conditions of manufacture. Slight foxing and marginal browning on the first few leaves. As the order of the poems may change from one edition to another, here is the order of our copy: illustrated cover label, mounted on a plain paper sheet; [the suite on squared paper:] f. title with the justification of the edition on the back; blank f. (silhouette of a character on the reverse); [then the 21 polygraph poems:] Loin du Pigeonnier, on the v°: S.P.; Reconnaissance, on the v°: Visée; [p. virgin], on the v°: Fête; [p. virgin], on the v°: Saillant; [p. blank], in the v°: War; Mutation, in the v°: Madeleine; Oracles, in the v°: 14 Juin 1915; Venu de Dieuze [v° blank]; De la Batterie de Tir [v° blank]; Échelon [v° blank]; Postcard in manuscript [corner of the postcard appearing in a window], in the v°: 1915 [stenciled on a glued postcard]; [p. blank], on the v°: The Seasons; [1 p. blank], on the v°: Towards the South; [p. blank], on the v°: The Dakar Servant [on 2 p, the v° of the 2nd p. blank]; Toujours [v° blank]; La nuit d'Avril 1915 [v° blank]; justificatif du tirage [v° blank]. Attached is the mimeographed subscription form, and a blank military postcard. Autograph retouching of the poet on 8 pages, to the poems Loin du Pigeonnier, Reconnaissance, Visée, Mutation, Vers le Sud, Toujours (autograph dedication added: "To L. Faure Favier"), La nuit d'Avril 1915 (in the 18th line, autograph addition in the interlining: "It's raining, my soul, it's raining, but...). Confidential edition of 25 copies: "25 copies, one for me, one for you, remain 23 throughout the universe", Apollinaire wrote to Madeleine Pagès. We have listed those addressed to Ardengo Soffici [no. 1], Ambroise Vollard [no. 2], Alberto Magnelli [no. 3], Madeleine Pagès [no. 6], Guillaume Apollinaire himself [no. 7], Lou [no. 14], René Berthier [no. 18], Gabrielle and Francis Picabia [n° 19], André Level [n° 24], Lucien Bodard [n° 25], as well as 3 other copies for which the dedication is missing (one in the BnF [n° 21], this one which must have been from the printer Danel [n° 23] and one in another private collection [n° 15]).