Description
A collection of two seminal works of proletarian literature, both bearing a SIGNED AUTOGRAPH CONSIGNMENT to Marguerite Audoux.
Daily Bread (1934, reference to 4th edition):
A Marguerite Audoux
in heartfelt tribute
a documentary about working-class Paris twenty years ago
H Poulaille
The Damned of the Earth (1935, 6th edition):
A Marguerite Audoux
in sincere homage
this fresco essay on proletarian life 25 years ago, in the heroic days of trade union struggles
H Poulaille
These are the first two volumes in the Magueux trilogy, chronicling the daily life of a working-class family in the early 20th century. Soldier's bread completed this autobiographical cycle in 1937.
A letter dated 10 October 1936 documents the writer's impressions:
My dear Henry Poulaille,
I've received your books and I'd like to thank you for them. Naturally, I've already put my nose in Daily Bread. It's really interesting. And so true!It's not always fun going back to the past, but how can you resist Henry Poulaille, who grabs you by the shoulder, turns you over and forces you to look back. [...]
A leading figure and pioneering theoretician of proletarian literature, Henry Poulaille defended a literature composed of "by and for the people"This is the title of part 3 of his manifesto. New age of literature (1930), in which he devoted several pages to Marguerite Audoux (p. 255-258). The two writers are said to have met in 1936 (Archives Marguerite Audoux).
As well as managing the press department at Bernard Grasset, with whom he published several novels, Poulaille edited the Valois collection of proletarian works "Les romans du Nouvel âge" and the review New literary age, renamed New age. He also contributed to a number of "proletarian pages" magazines, in which he promoted authors from "the people".
In 1935, Poulaille helped set up the Musées du soir, a literary circle, library and exhibition hall for workers and employees in the Paris region.
