FARRÈRE (Claude). — *Le Pont du Ciel*. Original etchings by - Lot 94

FARRÈRE (Claude). — *Le Pont du Ciel*. Original etchings by Camille Roche. Paris, Éditions Lapina, “Les Panathénées” series, No. IV, 1926. In-8 (approx. 22 × 16.5 cm), 126 pp., paperback, cream-colored cloth-covered binding printed in blue and red, decorated on the front cover with the collection’s emblematic temple designed by J. Pruvost. Untrimmed. FIRST EDITION of this play by Claude Farrère, set in China during the Zhou Dynasty. The book is illustrated with 6 original etchings by Camille Roche, including notably a portrait of Claude Farrère on the frontispiece, three illustrations outside the text, and two within the text. The book also opens with four autograph pages by Claude Farrère reproduced as facsimiles, constituting the author’s preface. This feature is well attested for the first edition. Limited edition of 1,220 numbered copies, printed on various types of paper: 1 unique copy on re-imposed Imperial Japan paper; 19 on old Japan paper; 50 on Imperial Japan paper; 30 on re-pressed Imperial Japan paper; 1,000 on pure-rag Rives B.F.K. laid paper, numbered from 101 to 1,100, in addition to the non-commercial and reserved copies listed in the colophon. One of the 1,000 copies on Rives B.F.K. pure-rag laid paper, this one being No. 895. This is indeed the fourth publication in the “Les Panathénées” collection, following, notably, Paul Reboux’s *Bamboulina*, which you showed me earlier. The Metropolitan Museum of Art itself holds a copy of this edition and lists its dimensions as 22 × 16.5 cm. A paperback copy, in its original filled-in cover, in very good condition: the cover is slightly browned with a few small marks and normal signs of wear, and slight rubbing on the spine; the interior is very fresh on beautiful laid paper, with wide margins and untrimmed. Judging by the photographs, the quires appear to be sound. A beautiful, illustrated first edition, characteristic of Lapina’s bibliophilic publications in the 1920s.