Abel Gance. Napoleon vu par Abel Gance. Épopée cinégraphique en cinq époques. Première époque--Bonaparte. Paris: Librairie Plon, 1927. First edition, ordinary paper issue, early printing (2e mille). Association copy, inscribed by the author to his father-in-law (guessing here): "À mon beau père / pour m'il retrouve / dans ... l'echo / de ce qu'il a vu à / l'ecran / Avec l'affection / de / Abel Gance / Janvier 1928." Octavo (7.75 x 5 inches; 195 x 125 mm.). [1, blank], [1, justification], [2, half-title (deposit notice on verso)], [2, title-leaf (copyright on verso)], [2, homage (verso blank)], 408, [1, printing note], [3 blank] pages. Frontispiece and eight additional plates, featuring a total of thirty-four photographic illustrations, inserted throughout. Publisher's binding in the original illustrated wrappers, printed in black and light grayish blue, priced 16 francs on the spine; edges of the text block untrimmed; no endpapers. Front joint split at both ends, front wrapper barely holding on; wrappers a little tatty with tears, chips and creases; backstrip; spine askew and creased; backstrip and edges darkened. Text block slightly tanned; fore-edge of the text softened with trivial wear. Good. Text in French.
"Napoleon is a masterpiece in the original sense of the word; containing every conceivable technique of cinema, it has served as a masterwork for the motion picture in Europe ever since" (Kevin Brownlow, The Parade's Gone By..., Berkeley: 1968. p. 518).
Viejo, 12.2 ("one of the longest, most expensive, and most innovative works of the silent era"). (#10065).
