Jabès, Edmond.

[EGYPTIAN SURREALISM – DECONSTRUCTION AND JEWISH HERMENEUTICS] Paul Eluard. – Signed and inscribed to Georges Bataille.

Cairo: La Part du Sable, 1953. Small octavo (18 × 13 cm). Original printed wrappers; 18, [1] pp. Signed and inscribed by the author: "à Georges Bataille, avec la vive sympathie et l'admiration d'Edmond Jabès, Fev. 1953." Very good, uncut and unopened copy in original translucent calque; discoloration to first leaf due to laid-in paper slip. Item #55092

Only edition, rare and not for commercial distribution, of this homage to Paul Eluard consisting of notes and two poems. Edmond Jabès submitted it to Georges Henein for printing a few days after the French surrealist's death. This collaboration, which did not attract much attention from a wide audience, was no coincidence, as Jabés was one of Henein's early companions and supporters in the founding of the Egyptian Surrealist group. Not least due to the reception by Jacques Derrida in his essay “Edmond Jabès and the Question of the Book”, Edmond Jabès is also known to a wider audience today. Jabès was influenced by Eluard from the very beginning. Growing up as the child of Jewish parents in Cairo, his first lyrical texts were influenced by him. However, this homage was published some time before his literary success in France. Jabès fled across the Mediterranean in 1956 during the Suez Crisis and it was not until 1959 that his first volume of poetry was published in Paris. He achieved fame with his often-translated work “Book of Questions”, which was strongly influenced by the Jewish scriptural tradition. (Cf. Felix Philipp Ingold, in: NZZ, >https://w ww.n zz.c h/innere-echos-ld.637175<, April 9th, 2025)

What is largely unknown, however, is Edmond Jabè's long-standing collaboration with Georges Henein. Due to his origins, Henein was predestined to establish and organize the exchange between Egyptian and European avant-gardists. As the son of a Coptic diplomat, he was familiar with moving between different cultures. He learned French in Rome. English, French, and Italian were spoken fluently in his family. He began his law studies in Paris, which he eventually completed in Cairo. After visiting Breton in Paris, he devoted himself entirely to surrealism and the task of making it known in Egypt. In 1937, he organized a conference broadcast on the radio as part of "Les Essayistes", which made him Breton's ambassador in Cairo. The first supporters of Surrealism in Egypt gathered around him: Edmond Jabès as well as the journalist Émile Simon and the painters Kamel Telmisany, Angelo de Riz and Ramses Younan. In 1938, the group gave itself the name "Art and Freedom", in reference to the manifesto "Pour un art révolutionnaire indépendant", which Breton had written in Mexico in collaboration with Trotsky. This was followed by a series of exhibitions and individual publications. The war interrupted personal contact with Breton, whom Heinen did not visit again until 1947 in Paris. After his return to Cairo, he published the first issue of "La part du sable" (The part of the sand). Shortly after the first issue was published in 1947, Henein visited Breton again in Paris. Soon after, he declared his renunciation of Breton. (Mona Khazindar, Georges Henein. A Surrealist in Egypt or the Wanderer between Two Worlds?, in: Nka. Journal of Contemporary African Art, Vol. 2021, Issue 49, pp. 64-81)

One of 100 numbered copies (all published).

As of April 2025, KVK, OCLC show three copies, two in France and one in North America.