SALE IN PARIS AT HOTEL DES VENTES DU PALAIS DES CONGRES

SALE IN PARIS AT HOTEL DES VENTES DU PALAIS DES CONGRES
THE LIBRARY OF CHARLES HAYOIT A TREMENDOUS SUCCESS
TOTAL (2 sessions)
26.245.000 FF - ($ 3.408.572)
AN IMPORTANT AUTOGRAPH MANUSCRIPT
BY GUSTAVE FLAUBERT
‘Novembre’
SOLD FOR : 3.488.000 FF - $ 450.000
the highest price ever achieved for a manuscript by Flaubert
‘HISTOIRES OU CONTES DU TEMPS PASSE’ BY CHARLES PERRAULT
FF 2.071.000 - $ 270.510
world record for a first edition of a work of French literature
Paris, 29 June, 2001 : All present people - mainly prominent Paris book dealers - attending the crowded Poulain Le
Fur saleroom at Hotel du Palais in Paris, gave an ovation to the anonymous buyer bidding on the telephone who
purchased the important manuscript ‘Novembre’ by Gustave Flaubert. The gavel of Maître Hervé Poulain knocked it
down, at FF 3.488.000 after a long and exciting bidding battle and well above the pre-sale estimate (from FF
1.500.000 to 2.500.000FF - lot 222).
This important autograph manuscript by Flaubert ‘Novembre, fragments de style quelconque’ is an early work which
announces ‘L’Education Sentimentale’. Flaubert wrote it at the age of twenty, between 1840 and 1842, and reworked the text in the 1860’s. A fragment of Novembre was published for the first time in 1886. It is one of the four
literary manuscripts by Flaubert still in private hands. Charles Hayoit had purchased it in 1957, at the sale of Dr
Lucien-Graux which took place at the Galerie Charpentier. This manuscript was on view at The Bibliothèque
Nationale in 1980, at the Gustave Flaubert exhibition.
For Jean-Baptiste de Proyart, vice-chairman of Sotheby’s France and expert of the sale: ‘The great Belgian book
collector Charles Hayoit assembled during his life masterpieces of French classical and 19th century literature. The
exceptional prices achieved yesterday and today during the first two sessions of the sale of his library, including the
splendid winning bid on the Gustave Flaubert manuscript “Novembre”, crown the great success of the expertise of
Sotheby’s and the excellent auctioneering of Maîtres Poulain et le Fur’.
‘LES PRECIEUSES RIDICULES’ BY MOLIERE
FF 1.635.000 - $ 213.560
‘SGANARELLE OU LE COCU IMAGINAIRE’ BY MOLIERE
FF 708.500 - $ 92.540
LES ‘FABLES CHOISIES’ BY LA FONTAINE
FF 708.500 - $ 92.540
‘LES FACHEUX’ BY MOLIERE
purchased by the Friends of Vaux-le-Vicomte for FF 87.596 - $ 11.495
Sotheby’s France
Marie-Odile Deutsch et Sophie Dufresne
tél. 33 (0)1 53 05 53 66 – fax 33 (0)1 53 05 52 08
[email protected]
Etude Poulain Le Fur
Sophie Peyrache
tél. 33 (0)1 58 05 06 07 – fax. 33 (0)1 45 72 07 77
[email protected]