Details
SAINT-JOHN PERSE (pseudonym of Alexis Léger, 1887-1975). Six autograph letters signed ('Alexis Léger') to André Rousseaux, Giens (Var), 20 August 1959-11 July 1961, 18 pages, mostly large 4to.
On Rousseaux's forthcoming special issue [of Cahiers du Sud] to be devoted to Saint-John Perse, 'La qualifier de "magistrale" serait trop banal' (31 August 1959). Saint-John Perse was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature the following year. The later letters praise Rousseaux's work as critic -- 'votre magnifique indépendance' -- and congratulate him on a literary award. Saint-John Perse also sends commiseration and advice after an accident, and a sensitive and warm letter of sympathy to Rousseaux and his wife on a tragic event [the death of their two children in a car accident].
A succesful diplomat Saint-John Perse was forced into exile in the US in 1940; much of his poetry was written during his exile. André Rousseaux (1896-1960), the literary critic of Le Figaro, championed the work of many 20th-century writers, and the perceptiveness and objectivity of his comments on their work won him their gratitude and friendship. (15)
On Rousseaux's forthcoming special issue [of Cahiers du Sud] to be devoted to Saint-John Perse, 'La qualifier de "magistrale" serait trop banal' (31 August 1959). Saint-John Perse was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature the following year. The later letters praise Rousseaux's work as critic -- 'votre magnifique indépendance' -- and congratulate him on a literary award. Saint-John Perse also sends commiseration and advice after an accident, and a sensitive and warm letter of sympathy to Rousseaux and his wife on a tragic event [the death of their two children in a car accident].
A succesful diplomat Saint-John Perse was forced into exile in the US in 1940; much of his poetry was written during his exile. André Rousseaux (1896-1960), the literary critic of Le Figaro, championed the work of many 20th-century writers, and the perceptiveness and objectivity of his comments on their work won him their gratitude and friendship. (15)
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