CÉLINE. Mort à crédit. Paris, Denoël et Steel, 1936. ln-8, 1 - Lot 112

CÉLINE. Mort à crédit. Paris, Denoël et Steel, 1936. ln-8, 15 x 22 cm, 698 pp. paperback, uncut, entirely untrimmed, publisher's gray paper folder and slipcase, modern box, signed Atelier Laurenchet, in black jansenist morocco with ribbed spine. First edition. Off-market edition, the only one containing the complete text, which was not republished until 1982 in La Pléiade. Denoël felt that certain passages were too crude, and asked Céline to remove the most explicit. "Sex, in Mort à crédit, is aggressively present... In 1936, the deletion, at the publisher's request, of the most scandalous words or passages had somewhat displaced the sense of provocation" (introduction to the 1982 edition in La Pléiade). One of 22 first copies on japon (n° XI). Signed autograph letter from Céline "A Bécart l'homme de sang et l'excellent ami. LF. Céline. To Suresnes! A la guerre!" to his friend Dr. Auguste Bécart (1896-1954), who appears under his name in the trilogy D'un château l'autre, Nord and Rigodon. Céline had met him in Val-de-Grâce in 1914. They remained close friends, frequenting Montmartre evenings with Gen-Paul, and taking part together in the visit of French doctors to Germany in March 1942, a time when they met in a number of Parisian collaborationist circles. An exceptional copy, as issued, perfectly preserved with its publisher's slipcase and chemise (slightly split at the spines), from major European collections (Christie's, Paris, May 21, 2003; no. 432 & Bergé, Paris, April 23, 2008; no. 122).