American writer and illustrator (1898-1962). [Original mock-up copy of Parsley]. [New York. Oblong folio (325 x 270 mm). (2 blank), (46) pp., unpaginated. Text and illustrations pasted in, as a guideline for later publication. Red cloth boards and original dust jacket.
$ 8,730 / 7.500 €
(99773/BN66182)
The pre-publication artist's design copy, predating the first edition and unique. Written and illustrated by the Austrian-American creator of the internationally beloved "Madeline" children's series, this copy of "Parsley" shows the final stages of the book design process. Each piece of text and each illustration has been cut and pasted into place on a blank full-sized model of the first printed edition, dictating the final layout of the work. The artist himself was likely involved in the creation of this pre-publication design copy, as it was gifted by Bemelmans personally to the fellow émigré Felix Guggenheim (1904-76), the German-born literary agent and publisher who set up the "Pazifische Presse" (Pacific Press) in Los Angeles.
- Ludwig Bemelmans emigrated to the United States as a child, and eventually took up work at hotels, alongside a stint in the U.S. Army during WWI. In his spare time, however, he worked as a cartoonist, and finally as a children's book illustrator. His first great success came with "Madeline" in 1939, but he also published novels and further children's books, such as "Parsley", a picture book about a pine tree and an elderly stag who team up to defeat a hunter..