Inscribed to one of her Wedding Witnesses
“COLETTE” [i.e. Sidonie-Gabrielle COLETTE]. L’Entrave. Paris: Librairie des Lettres. 1913.
8vo. Original cream wrappers printed in black and red, uncut, preserved in a modern cloth slip-case; pp. [4], 307, [1]; light stains to front wrapper, tear at head of upper hinge (repaired), hinges reinforced; contents uniformly toned, light marginal water-staining, mostly at the beginning, small hole (repaired) and stains to inner margin of front free endpaper and half-title, but overall a remarkably good copy; authorial inscription to half-title in ink: “A Georges Abric en témoignage d’une grande sympathie, Colette de Jouvenel” (see below).
First edition in book form, particularly rare in the original wrappers, inscribed by the author to one of the witnesses at her second wedding.
Originally serialised in La Vie Parisienne, L’Entrave (The Shackle) is the sequel to La Vagabonde (1910). Reflecting Colette’s own life, however, the tone of the two novels differs markedly: if La Vagabonde celebrates independence and self-discovery, L’Entrave turns inward, exploring the ambivalence and quiet disillusion that come with love’s constraints. In the intervening years, Colette had married the journalist and diplomat Henry de Jouvenel (1876-1935) and given birth to their daughter, Colette de Jouvenel (1913-1981). She recalled with characteristic humour, in L’Étoile Vesper, the double strain of childbearing and serial publication: “The child and the novel were racing me, and La Vie Parisienne, which was publishing my unfinished novel in instalments, was gaining ground. The child announced that it would arrive first, and I screwed the cap back onto my pen”.
In later years, Colette was unsparing in her assessment of L’Entrave, criticising its “narrow ending”, “diminished heroes”, and “blessing tone”.
Provenance: From the library of Georges Abric, editor-in-chief of Le Matin and a close friend of Henry de Jouvenel. Together with Léon Hamel and Jean Sapéne, Abric was one of the witnesses (témoins) at the wedding of Colette and Jouvenal on 19 December 1912.
See La Société des amis de Colette, online.
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