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22. ERNST, Max. Eluard, Paul. Répétitions. Paris. Au Sans Pareil. 1922, 18 Mars.
Large 8vo. (218 x 138 mm). [28 leaves; pp. 51, (iii)]. Half-title with presentation from Eluard (see below), colour collage frontispiece verso, printed title, Eluard’s 28 poems and 9 collage compositions by Ernst, leaf with ‘Table’, leaf with justification and stamped num- ber with advertisement for Eluard’s publications verso; the additional collage for the cover is not repeated in the book. Original pub- lisher’s purple printed wrappers, titles in black and mounted monochrome illustration by Ernst to front cover.
The first collaboration between Max Ernst and Paul Eluard with a presentation from Eluard.
From the edition limited to 350 numbered copies (all on glossy paper), this copy numbered 10 in black ink and signed by Eluard on the justification and with a presentation in black ink on the half-title: à F. S. Flint / cordial hommage / de Paul Eluard.
Paul Eluard’s first collaboration with Max Ernst, and Ernst’s first collage illustrations for a book, a format that he was to use throughout the dada and Surrealist periods in works such as Les Malheurs des Immortels (1922, also with Eluard), the trilogy La Femme 100 Têtes (1929), Rêve dune Petite Fille qui Voulut Entrer au Carmel (1930) and Une Semaine de Bonté, ou, Les Septs Elements Capitaux (1934), Gedichte Weisst du Schwartz du (1930, with Hans Arp) among others.
Eluard had first seen the collages of Max Ernst at the Au Sans Pareil in 1920 where they were exhibited and met Ernst himself shortly afterwards in Cologne. That meeting was inspirational for both and led to both a profound personal friendship and an ongoing spirit of artistic collaboration. The 28 poems of Répétitions, composed by Eluard in 1921 (Eluard described the collection to Jacques Doucet as De tous mes livres, Répétitions est celui qui je préfère. Il réunit tout ce que je ne pouvais écrire ... dans mes autres livers, d’un genre spécial) had a profound effect on Ernst and he imvited Eluard to choose a selection of collages as illustrations; the result was the present work. Later in 1922, Eluard and Ernst published Les Malheurs des Immortels with a further series of Ernst’s collages and a collaborative text.
Frank Stuart Flint (1885 - 1960) was a prolific translator and Imagist poet who published his first verse collection In the Net of the Stars in 1909. He did translate Eluard but appears to have been more concerned for Eluard’s mental health than for his verse.