BATOUALA A Novel

LIMITED edition of only 1500 hand-numbered copies SIGNED BY THE ILLUSTRATOR, Miguel Covarrubias. Illustrated on every page of the novel in line drawings and with 6 brilliantly coloured full-page plates all by noted artist Miguel Covarrubias. Folio, in the publisher's original mottled tan morocco with multiple rules in blind backed in brown crushed morocco blind lettered on the spine. xiv, 118, [2] pp. A fine copy with just a little rubbing from shelving to the bottom board edges and corners.

Edizione: scarce, a very elusive early work for members of the limited editions club. it is also the first work published for the club by a black author and many consider batouala to be one of the earliest novels about africa written by a black author and rené maran became the first black recipient of the prix goncourt for the novel in 1921. this edition includes the 1920 introduction by the author and a glossary of african terms used within the text.<br> batouala centers on the life of the chieftain batouala, and his attempts to stop a younger man from courting one of his nine wives. the preface of the novel contains critiques of french colonial abuses, and due to this it was banned from french colonies in 1928. despite the racial themes in the novel, maran said it was not written to show a battle between black and white, but instead, it was written to tell the story of two men fighting over a woman.<br> a noted ethnologist as well as a painter and illustrator, mexican artist miguel covarrubias was a surprisingly sympathetic choice to illustrate batouala. he belonged to the same circle of harlem renaissance intellectuals that had welcomed rené maran. the ethnographic details, rich use of color, and perceived aesthetic portrayal of "african-ness" within covarrubias' drawings were much appreciated by those within the circle as well as the public at large.