Description

FIRST EDITIONS of the two novels forming the diptych Water from the hills, published by Editions Marcel Pagnol, Cagnes-sur-Mer.
Subsequent print runs will be handled by Editions de Provence in Paris.
One of 1000 deluxe editions on Renage vellum, after 25 copies on pur-fil.

Inscribed and signed by the author on the title page of the second volume:

"For Édouard Corniglion Molinier
with my congratulations
Marcel"

Édouard Corniglion Molinier (1898 - 1963) was a character in a novel.

Before becoming a producer of Funny drama by Marcel Carné (1937), L' Hope by André Malraux (1939), a friend of Jacques Prévert and Marcel Pagnol, Édouard Corniglion Molinier was France's youngest fighter pilot and a hero of the First World War, awarded the Légion d'Honneur and numerous military medals. Mobilised at the start of the Second World War, he joined the Resistance in 1940 and managed to get to New York and then London, before taking charge of the French Air Force in 1943 and then the Atlantic Air Force in 1944. Demobilised with the rank of air division general, he quickly returned to politics, heading several ministries while continuing to fly planes in search of speed records. He died in 1963 after collapsing on board a Sud-Aviation Caravelle. To mark the 60th anniversary of his death, a recent exhibition entitled A knight in shining armour was organised by the Musée de l'Ordre de la Libération.