François MAURIAC / Autographed letter signed / Sartre / Theater / Critique / 1937

  

Autographed letter signed "François Mauriac" to Thierry Maulnier S. [Paris, probably late 1938], 2 pp. In-8° Letterhead at his address of 38, avenue Théophile Gautier in Paris Watermark: "Crown Liner" with crown Two words censored and two others underlined by Mauriac Central fold inherent in the period's envelope. Mauriac reacts with emotion to Maulnier's critique of his first play, then takes the opportunity to criticize Sartre in passing. "Nothing could touch me, reassure me, or comfort me like your article in Combat did.

Between us, I was very worried, very troubled by the half-praises of [Jacques] Lemarchand, 'in command service' or by the flattery that [Jean-Jacques] Gautier dreamed of throwing in my face while he praised me with a false voice, yes! Very troubled by the laborious duties of [Francis] Ambrière and his nonsense. But here you are, saying plainly why you find this play good [...] but this friendship based on literary esteem, on common work, on secret thoughts, on memories that we never evoke, is very precious to me, and I tell you this morning, to you, whom I consider the best 'head' of your generation - the only one, on our side, who can stand up to Sartre. I have flaws, but I am not ungrateful, and if I am capable of resentment to a point that surprises even me!

- I have a courtly fever that my true friends know. Here are some confidences, dear Thierry! But it is for lack of being able to embrace you! François Mauriac [Then he adds in the margin, vertically:] Please present my respectful (and affectionate) regards to your wife.

" Distrust between Sartre and Mauriac. Having become a leading literary critic within the NRF with his short story collection The Wall, published in the spring of 1938, Sartre asserts his literary and intellectual positioning. The realization of this recruitment of Sartre will also be Mauriac's critique that he publishes in the magazine in February 1939. This letter likely dates from late 1938.

Mauriac's play was still on the bill at the Comédie Française, which celebrated its hundredth performance on December 17. Furthermore, Sartre finds himself publicly in opposition to Mauriac following the interview he gave to Claudine Chonez in Marianne on November 23, 1938. The five-act play Asmodée, created in November 1937 at the Comédie-Française, is linked to Mauriac's discovery of Mozart's Don Giovanni conducted by Bruno Walter at the Salzburg festival in August 1934.

Subsequently, conversations with Édouard Bourdet, the administrator of the Comédie-Française, inclined the novelist to embark on playwriting. Mauriac would write three other plays, the last of which, The Fire on Earth, would be created in 1950.