André Gide Autograph Manuscript Leads Final Pierre Bergé Library Auction

Running online until October 28, Sotheby’s Paris is presenting rare books and manuscripts from the library of the late Pierre Bergé, bibliophile, art collector, patron and aesthete. 

Following a series of six auctions held between 2015 and 2022, highlights of this sale include books owned and annotated by writers themselves - Bergé had a particular fondness for works with handwritten dedications -  including two examples by Gustave Flaubert who was one of Bergé’s favorite authors, Salammbô and La Tentation de saint Antoine, both gifted by Flaubert with reverence to Victor Hugo.

Bergé spent decades assembling a collection of around 1,600 books and precious manuscripts spanning the 15th to the 20th century and by authors from around the world. In addition to literature, philosophy, and poetry, Bergé, who once presided over the Paris Opera, amassed an impressive selection of music scores by his favourite composers, Bach, Rameau, Vivaldi, Beethoven, Mozart, and Stravinsky.

One of the highlights of this sale is the complete autograph manuscript of Cahiers d’André Walter, the first book written by the French Nobel prize-winning writer André Gide. Other lots include:

• a first edition of Lettres persanes by Montesquieu, elegantly bound with armorial insignia
• a rare edition of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, hand-printed by Whitman himself and bound at his own direction
• a unique first edition of Considérations sur les principaux événements de la Révolution française by Madame de Staël, copiously annotated by Stendhal
• a copy of Promenades dans Rome by Stendhal, annotated in preparation for a future edition