1900 Scarce French First Edition - Emile Nelligan, Soirees du Chateau de Ramezay
A scarce and important first edition of Les Soirées du Château de Ramezay (1900), a landmark of Quebec literary history featuring the first appearance in book form of poetry by Émile Nelligan, preserved in an attractive contemporary binding and bearing the historic ownership stamps of the Oblate Fathers of Montreal.
Author: L'École littéraire de Montréal, including Émile Nelligan, Louis Fréchette, Wilfrid Larose, Charles Gill, Albert Lozeau, Hector Demers, and other contributors.
Title: Les Soirées du Château de Ramezay.
Publisher: Montréal: Eusèbe Sénécal & Cie, Imprimeurs-Éditeurs, 20 rue Saint-Vincent, 1900.
Edition: First Edition.
Language: French.
Pages: xv, 402 pages.
Size: 8 x 5 inches.
Binding: Very good contemporary quarter brown cloth binding over striking red, black, and grey marbled paper boards. Spine with a dark title label and gilt lettering. Light rubbing and minor wear to the boards and extremities, particularly at the corners, as shown. The binding remains firm, attractive, and well preserved. Protected in a removable mylar cover.
Content: Very good, with clean and well-preserved pages showing light, even age toning and occasional minor marks. From the private library of the Oblate Fathers of Saint-Pierre Church in Montreal, with their historic oval ink ownership stamp on the title page and blind-embossed stamp on the preliminary leaf, as shown. An additional early handwritten inscription and small identification label appear on the front pastedown. A particularly interesting copy with documented Montreal ecclesiastical provenance.
Estimate: USD $350–400.
The book: Published in Montreal in 1900, Les Soirées du Château de Ramezay is one of the foundational publications of modern French Canadian literature and an important first edition associated with the École littéraire de Montréal. The volume brings together literary contributions by some of Quebec's most influential writers at the turn of the twentieth century, including Louis Fréchette, Charles Gill, Albert Lozeau, and Émile Nelligan. It takes its title from the literary gatherings held at the historic Château de Ramezay in Old Montreal, where members of the École came together to read, discuss, and cultivate a new literary identity.
Of particular importance is the substantial section devoted to Émile Nelligan, representing the first publication of his poetry in book form, three years before the appearance of his celebrated posthumously assembled collection in 1903. Among the poems reproduced here are Un rêve de Watteau, La Bénédictine, Sainte Cécile, Les Camélias, Bohème blanche, La Passante, Devant deux portraits de ma mère, Rêve d'artiste, and La Romance du Vin. These early printed texts offer a remarkable opportunity to encounter Nelligan's poetry in the literary context in which it first reached a wider readership. The present copy is further distinguished by its provenance from the Oblate Fathers of Saint-Pierre Church in Montreal, providing a tangible connection to the city's religious and cultural history.
The authors: Founded in 1895, the École littéraire de Montréal played a decisive role in the development of French Canadian literature. Its members sought to encourage original literary expression, refine the art of poetry and prose, and introduce new aesthetic influences into Quebec's cultural landscape. Their gatherings at the Château de Ramezay became emblematic of a generation of writers seeking to establish a distinctive modern literary voice. This collective volume preserves their work at a formative moment in the history of Canadian literature.
Émile Nelligan: Émile Nelligan (1879–1941) is among the most celebrated poets in Quebec literary history. Deeply influenced by French Symbolism, his poetry is renowned for its musical language, haunting imagery, and themes of beauty, melancholy, memory, and artistic longing. His remarkably intense creative period ended while he was still a teenager, yet the poems he produced secured his enduring reputation. His appearance in Les Soirées du Château de Ramezay makes this first edition especially desirable to collectors of Nelligan, Canadian poetry, and important literary first appearances.