Poésie d'aujourd'hui...

Jean Epstein. La poésie d'aujourd'hui, un nouvel état d'intelligence. Lettre de Blaise Cendrars. Paris: Éditions de la sirène, 1921. First edition, Kraft Roux issue, limited to fifty numbered copies, of which this is lucky number thirteen. Octavo (7.5 x 5.625 inches; 190 x 143 mm; bulk of the text measures .75 inches, compared to .375 inches in the trade issue). [2, half-title (limitation on verso)], [2, title-leaf (copyright on verso)], [2, dedication (note to the rear on verso)], [2, contents], 215, [1, blank] pages. A few in-text illustrations by Claude Dalbanne, including the title-page decoration also printed on the front wrapper. Publisher's binding in the original illustrated wrappers, printed in orangish-red and black; top edge rough-trimmed, others untrimmed; no endpapers. Backstrip and margins very faintly tanned; spine with a couple minor vertical creases; spine ends very gently worn with a short (about one-quarter inch) closed tear at the base of the front panel fold; covers lightly rubbed, more so on the rear; a couple trivial soil spots. Text block browned, but the pages still feel strong and supple; infrequent and insignificant imperfections in the text (tiny soil spots); half-title with two faint blemishes from rubbing and old bookseller notes in pencil. Near fine. Text in French.

Epstein's first book, "focusing mainly on aesthetic and literary concerns... it also sketches out several of the issues Epstein would develop over the course of his writings." Contains the "Les cinéma et les lettres modernes" ["Cinema and Modern Literature"], a chapter that "demonstrate[s] the affinities of poetic strategies and cinematic ones." (Sarah Keller, Jean Epstein, Amsterdam: 2012. p. 271).

Fouché p. 113. (#10052).