Marguerite YOURCENAR The Writer Before History signed autograph 1954

  
The Rectors, the Academy Inspectors, and the Directors of Normal Schools. On Friday, February 26, 1954. "Publication of the National Center for Educational Documentation" [1954]. Brochure, large format, 20 pages. Autographed dedication signed: "To Mr. Robert van Elslande, a friendly memory from Marguerite Yourcenar." Between reality and fiction, The Writer Before History is a text in which Marguerite Yourcenar reflects on the place of man before History while referencing the development of the Memoirs of Hadrian.

The writer subsequently amended this text with handwritten corrections and a typewritten list of corrections, but these would not be published until 2015 (Achmy Halley, Marguerite Yourcenar: Archives of a Writer's Life, Ghent, Snoeck Editions) based on the work of a master's thesis completed by Marc Veillet at Laval University (Quebec) in 1990. The text of the conference was intended to be included during her lifetime in Angles of Reflection, a collection of conferences that was never published. Sources of information: Rémy Poignault, Making of "The Writer Before History," in Bulletin of the International Society for Yourcenarian Studies, 2015.