Cocteau (Jean) - L'Eternel Retour.

Jean Cocteau. L'Eternel Retour. Royal 4to, 32cm, 152p, Nouvelles Editions Francaises, 1 Rue Saint-Georges, Paris, 1947.

Number II of just XXV (625) copies numbered in roman, printed on Japanese vellum,with a photographic portrait of Jean Cocteau signed by him and Laure Albin Guillot. 21 inserted and mounted photographs from the drama romance of 1943 starring Madeleine Sologne as the blonde, Jean Marais as Patrice, etc. Finely printed in reddish-brown and black with large decorative initials. Full natural pigskin with decorative endpapers, spine titled in gilt, gold top, other edges uncut. Morocco lined slipcase. A near fine copy.

'One can identify a queer monumentality and a queer gaze in L'Eternel Retour, a film based on the Tristan and Iseult legend and made under the aegis of the Vichy government. By placing Patrice (a modern Tristan played by Jean Marais) so firmly in our desiring gaze, Cocteau offers us a study in fascist homoeroticism.' (Katherine Coyne Kelly)