Description
AUTOGRAPH MANUSCRIPT SIGNED an alternative, unpublished version of two poems by La Bombarde.
Amusing poem entitled Between two tunes consisting of two parts in verse: L'air de Jean- qui-pleure , L'air de Jean-qui-rit and a prose epigraph Thoughts from Petit-Jean :
"Between Jean-qui-pleure and Jean-qui-rit, the main thing is never to be Jean-Foutre, and to remain Jean-bon, even if it means passing for Jean-Jean, because even then you'll always end up finding yourself Gros-Jean as before."
The two parts were included separately and under different titles in the collection La Bombarde published by Fasquelle in 1899:
- L'air de Jean-qui-pleure, an allegory of human life in the form of three sowers throwing out love, war and death, under the title The three sowers (Part XXIII of the suite Always)
- L'air de Jean-qui-ritwhich depicts a soldier asleep in a ditch, believing in a dream that he is falling in love with the pope's two daughters, under the title The soldier of fortune (part V of the suite Yesterday)
The general title and epigraph were not included in the edition.