Romain Rolland (1866-1944)
11 autograph letters signed (‘Romain Rolland’) to various correspondents, Villeneuve, Switzerland, and n.p., 13 February 1913 - 27 December 1938
In French, 22½ pages, various sizes (135 x 103mm to 206 x 134mm), bifolia, 7 in card covers with 5 tipped in. Provenance: Stargardt, 20 February 1979, lot 260; Sotheby's, 28 May 1986, lot 224; Christie’s, 29 November 1995, lot 185.

A view from a high vantage point over the literary and intellectual landscape of Belle-Époque France. In 1913 Rolland responds to his correspondent’s questions about Upton Sinclair, writing that he does not have to hand his current address but remembers that he used to live at ‘Edge Moor, Delaware’. He refers to an article by Paul Dupin, and writes that he is due to meet the same day with Stefan Zweig and Rainer Maria Rilke – ‘Connaissez-vous celui-ci?’. In the letter of 1914, Rolland gives his thoughts on Roger Martin du Gard’s Jean Barois (1913), which he describes as ‘un des plus beaux livres publiés a Paris depuis plusieurs années’ and ‘un des évènements littéraires de cet hiver’. The book will be remembered above all as a precious document on the religious conscience of the French intellectual elite over the last 20 years. He praises the work further for its ‘richesse d’observation et d’émotion admirable’: du Gard’s characters are ‘tous vrais et vivants’.