PREVERT, Jacques. Paroles. San Francisco: City Lights Books. 1958.
Small 4to. Stiff white paper wrapper printed in black; white border across top, down foreedge and across bottom around a square black box; specificaiton "Number Nine"; black border across top, down foreedge and across bottom around a square white box on back wrapper; inside rear and front wrappers blank; pp 3-71, [1]; signs of foxing on front wrapper, title page, back wrapper and final page; significant fading on front and back wrappers, tear on head of spine and rubbing on bottom; spine detached from title page; otherwise very good condition.
First English edition of Jacques Prevert's first collection of poetry, originally published in 1946.
Jacques Prevert was an enthusiastic participant in the Surrealist movement, alongside names like Ryamond Queneau. He was also a pioneer of the left-wing cause and built a cinematic collective supporting the plight of the Popular Front, an important alliance of left-wing movements in France. One of France's most popular poets of the 20th Century, his poems have been countlessly transposed to music in renditions by french vocalists incuding Édith Piaf, as well as by the later American singer Nat King Cole to name only as few.
As translator Lawrence Ferlinghetti would write in this editions introduction; "Many of the poems of Paroles grew out of the Occupation, out of the war years in France, and it is plain that 'paroles' could mean both words and passwords. Prevert spoke partiuclarly to the French youth immediately after the war, and if ever there was a generation that was Beat, this was it".
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