Max JACOB / Autographed letter signed / Occupation / Jew / Gestapo / Poetry

  
Autographed letter signed "Max Jacob" to his friend graphologist Raymond Trillat [St Benoît-sur-Loire], September 12 [1942], 2 p. A long unpublished letter from the poet alluding to visits from the gendarmerie to verify the wearing of the yellow star during the second census of Jews in the Loiret. Max Jacob ends his letter by quoting six amusing holorhymes. Rewriting history with graphology and astrology - including literary history. Get a well-versed historian, a well-educated type - yes - that’s a project if you had the time.

Proceed in pieces: explain Joan of Arc by Capricorn since she couldn't write. I would love to hear your lecture.

Proceed coolly without preconceived ideas; astrology serving the astrologer's passions is doomed. Here daily visits to the point that a report (denunciation) was made to the police. My Parisian protector is having a hard time getting me out of this. I expect the worst - and I await the worst. Without believing it because of my trust in my protector and in God.

I have sold so much painting that I must get back to it to build up stock. I would like to marry, says my famous landlady, preferably to an ENT specialist.

Well, her interlocutor says, you should put an ad in Le Chasseur français! Did she mistake ENT for the name of game? Gal, lover of the queen, went, noble tower. Gallantly from the arena to the Tour Magne in Nîmes [Marc Monnier (wrongly attributed to Victor Hugo)] In his lacquered furniture, somber curtains and canopies Dance, love, blue lacquer, dare to utter rosy words [Charles Cros, Le Coffret de santal, 1873] Through the Djinn wood, where fear piles up, Speak and Drink gin or a hundred cups of cold milk.

One must specialize at all costs, prune, cut, concentrate. There must be some sign of madness (mental alienation) or eye disease in my handwriting. It is difficult to identify Max Jacob's protector.

The latter never revealed any names; however, several of his friends can be considered "protectors" in the sense that they provide Max Jacob with crucial information as they hold strategic positions. In this instance, Max Jacob was accused of "Jewish conspiracy" because he received many people in the summer of 1942; he confides in Conrad Moricand, then private secretary to Georges Oltramare. Until Moricand's resignation in mid-1943, it is indeed possible to consider Moricand as a "protector." Max Jacob was ultimately arrested on February 24, 1944, by three members of the Orléans Gestapo. He died in the Drancy camp on March 5 following. Raymond Trillat is a reference graphologist for Max Jacob, whom he consulted in addition to his official graphologist, Jean Tuset.

It should be noted that regarding Trillat's graphological analyses, the poet saw in them an input from astrology, "I do not believe that it is through manuals that Trillat has achieved a science where he seems innovative. There is rather a gift of mediumship here, but above all observation and attention.

Belaval, "La rencontre avec Max Jacob," Vrin, p. An invitation card with Jacob's careful handwriting "Dinners of Vouillemont": "Max Jacob will speak during dinner on Thursday, June 8 at 8:30 PM." Artcurial, June 15, 2010, sale 1677, no. Patricia Sustrac for the elements she kindly shared with us.