Inscribed by the author to the poet Frances Cornford: “à Mme Frances Cornford, pour la remercier du mal que je lui donne. Aragon”. In 1945 Arthur Koestler republished an intemperate article, ‘Le Catarrhe français’, attacking Aragon, his communist co-surrealists, and their English supporters. He specifically contrasted their politics of the salon with the commitment (to the point of death) shown by John Cornford in the Spanish Civil War. Aragon must have assumed that Frances Cornford (John’s mother) was equally hostile. In fact she was a great enthusiast for his work and that year published a translation of one of his poems and this contrite inscription is probably his acknowledgment. An excellent copy, spine slightly faded and marked.
