Lot 93
93
COHEN, Leonard (1934-2016). Let Us Compare Mythologies. Toronto: Contact Press for the McGill Poetry Series, 1956.
No VAT on hammer price or buyer's premium. 'I went to Greece and I stayed there for the next eight years. I’d never been in a sunny place and I’d never known what the sun was; so I fell in love with the sun, and a blonde girl, and a white house.'Leonard Cohen, poet, singer-songwriter, philosopher and novelist, met Marianne Ihlen on the Greek island of Hydra in 1960. She would become one of his greatest sources of inspiration, immortalised in songs like 'So Long, Marianne' and 'Bird on a Wire'. The two lived an idyllic, simple existence together in Greece, before finally moving to New York as Cohen's music career began to take off. They separated in 1970, but Cohen would always praise their 'mysterious enduring love'. On hearing, in 2016, that his former lover lay dying, he wrote to her: 'Well Marianne it's come to this time when we are really so old and our bodies are falling apart and I think I will follow you very soon. Know that I am so close behind you that if you stretch out your hand, I think you can reach mine [...]. But now, I just want to wish you a very good journey. Goodbye old friend.' Cohen died in November 2016, only 3 months after Marianne.
COHEN, Leonard (1934-2016). Let Us Compare Mythologies. Toronto: Contact Press for the McGill Poetry Series, 1956.

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COHEN, Leonard (1934-2016). Let Us Compare Mythologies. Toronto: Contact Press for the McGill Poetry Series, 1956.

First edition of Leonard Cohen’s first book of poems, written in 1956, and presented to Marianne Ihlen in November 1960. Cohen had bought a house in Hydra in September 1960 and had only just met Marianne, who would become one his greatest muses. Let Us Compare Mythologies is a young poet experimenting with styles and beginning to explore themes ? Judeo-Christian imagery, philosophy, sexuality, death, a world of violent contrasts ? that would define his future literary and musical careers.

Octavo (203 x 135mm). 5 illustrated plates by Canadian artist Freda Guttman (tiny marginal stain in two leaves). Original black cloth, lettered in silver on spine (without the dustjacket). Autograph inscription in blue ink: 'For Marianne / with my love / Leonard / November 1960'. Provenance: by descent from Marianne Ihlen.
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