LARBAUD, Valery. A. O. Barnabooth, His Diary. Trans. from the French by Gilbert Cannan. New York: George H. Doran. 1924. 8vo. First American edition. Publisher’s green cloth with salmon paper labels to spine and upper board, in the dust jacket. A near fine copy, the cloth clean and bright, the binding tight and square, the contents clean and fine throughout. The dust jacket priced $2.50 net to spine, all four corners neatly cut. Spine a touch faded, with some small nicks and associated tape repairs showing, else a sharp example.
Larbaud’s third book and second novel, a somewhat autobiographical work told through diary of Barnabooth, a leisurely dandy who enjoys supreme luxury across much of Italy, Denmark, and later London. The life told was similar to the author’s life led, with thanks to his father’s water business. He became close friends with many of the prominent French authors as well as those international authors and artists residing in Europe. As such, he built a very respectable library, and his mastery of six languages allowed him to translate works into French—he oversaw Auguste Morel’s translation of Joyce’s Ulysses. Indeed, his translation work ranged from 17th century work to contemporary, from French, Italian, and especially Spanish works. His erudite cosmopolitan lifestyle was cut short by a debilitating paralysis, and he remains outside of France yet another lost modernist.
LARBAUD, Valery. A. O. Barnabooth, His Diary. Trans. from the French by Gilbert Cannan. New York: George H. Doran. 1924. 8vo. First American edition. Publisher’s green cloth with salmon paper labels to spine and upper board, in the dust jacket. A near fine copy, the cloth clean and bright, the binding tight and square, the contents clean and fine throughout. The dust jacket priced $2.50 net to spine, all four corners neatly cut. Spine a touch faded, with some small nicks and associated tape repairs showing, else a sharp example.
Larbaud’s third book and second novel, a somewhat autobiographical work told through diary of Barnabooth, a leisurely dandy who enjoys supreme luxury across much of Italy, Denmark, and later London. The life told was similar to the author’s life led, with thanks to his father’s water business. He became close friends with many of the prominent French authors as well as those international authors and artists residing in Europe. As such, he built a very respectable library, and his mastery of six languages allowed him to translate works into French—he oversaw Auguste Morel’s translation of Joyce’s Ulysses. Indeed, his translation work ranged from 17th century work to contemporary, from French, Italian, and especially Spanish works. His erudite cosmopolitan lifestyle was cut short by a debilitating paralysis, and he remains outside of France yet another lost modernist.
