Exercises in Style [Exercices de Style]. Translated by Barbara Wright.

Queneau (Raymond)

Published by Gaberbocchus, 1958

FIRST EDITION IN ENGLISH, title-page printed in black and red, ta manipulated photograph of the author done by Stefan Themerson preceding the text, line-drawn initial letters by the same, pp. 198, [1], crown 8vo, original yellow cloth, backstrip lettered in red, edges and free endpapers faintly spotted, the latter with faint browning to inner margin, flyleaf with light abrasion at top corner, dustjacket with a manipulated photograph of the author done by Stefan Themerson, this slightly nicked at head of faintly sunned backstrip panel, small mark to front panel, very good. Queneau's book tells the same story 99 times, feeding a simple encounter on a bus through various poetic forms, types of speech, styles of writing, etc. Wright's translation, in which she was required to create English equivalents for elements that could not be translated from the French idiom directly, came about at the prompting of the author - though in her Preface she admits that she at one time considered this work 'as untranslatable as the smell of garlic in the Paris metro', before its difficulty began to feel like a sort of freedom. Wright was a founding director at Gaberbocchus, the publishing house run by Stefan and Franciszka Themerson, which had, at the beginning of the decade published her first translation - of Alfred Jarry's 'Ubu Roi'. Seller Inventory # 81996

Bibliographic Details

Title: Exercises in Style [Exercices de Style]. ...
Publisher: Gaberbocchus
Publication Date: 1958