QUENEAU Raymond.

QUENEAU Raymond.
2 autograph MANUSCRITS, [Preface for MASSIN's La Lettre et l'Image, February 1970]| 3 pages in-8 on nrf letterhead, and 1 page and a half in-4.
Beautiful text dedicated to the designer of the Cent mille milliards de poèmes .
Draft and corrected editing of his preface for MASSIN's (1925-2020) book, La Lettre et l'Image. La figuration dans l'alphabet latin du
VIII e siècle à nos jours (Gallimard, 1970).
This is written on the back of two typescripts of a letter from Queneau to Pierre Guillon, one of which is on blue paper. "Here is a book of love, a book of love and friendship. Its author is a member of the S.PA., that is to say, of the Société Protectrice de l'Alphabet, a society which is not content to protect, but, like those organizations which feed the running of racecourses, encourages and improves the race of alphabets in whose fate it is interested
- resse. [...] The sum that follows reserves much joy for the lovers of letters, much knowledge for their friends. Queneau cites as an example the games proposed by Massin and the correspondence between the letters of the alphabet, lower case and upper case, and playing cards, with five sketches of cards.
In the draft, Queneau looked for several ways to talk about the "mysterious virtues" of these "little beasts" that are letters, as well as their "mystagogical values".
The corrected typescript is attached.