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Object Timeline

1950

  • Work on this object began.

2001

  • We acquired this object.

2011

2015

2024

  • You found it!

Book Cover, mallarme: poems

This is a Book cover. It was graphic design by Alvin Lustig. It is dated 1950 and we acquired it in 2001. Its medium is lithograph on thin glossy paper. It is a part of the Drawings, Prints, and Graphic Design department.

It is credited Gift of Susan Lustig Peck.

Its dimensions are

18.4 x 27.0 cm (7 1/4 x 10 5/8 in. )

It is signed

Signature printed, upper right center: lustig.

It is inscribed

Printed in black ink, front cover center left: mallarme: poems. Printed vertically in black ink, side cover: MALLARME: POEMS; printed horizontally in black ink, side cover: NC 28. Printed in black ink, inside flap of front cover: THE POEMS OF MALLARME/With the Translations/of Roger Fry/& Commentaries/by Charles Mauron/The work of great French Symbolist/poet Stephane Mallarme (1842-1898)/has often been considered the best ex-/ample of “pure poetry.” Mallarme/dealt in metaphorical ambiguities and/attempted to practice alchemy with/words – to create a kind of poetry/where the world as symbol would have/a new mobility and would achieve new/intensities and refinements of meaning./With his introduction, Roger Fry wrote of/Mallarme that “certainly no poet has/set words with greater art in their sur-/roundings, or given them by their set-/ting, a more sudden and unexpected/evocative power” and that “for him/it was essential to bring out all the cross-/correspondences and interpenetrations/of the verbal images.”/Mallarme’s influence on modern po-/etry, in English as well as in French, has/been great and pervasive. Such a poet/as Wallace Stevens owes much to Mal-/larme, and it is Mallarme whom T.S./Eliot paraphrases in Little Gidding of/ his Four Quartets. Mallarme’s influence/is visible in James Joyce’s Finnegans/continued on back flap.

Cite this object as

Book Cover, mallarme: poems; Graphic design by Alvin Lustig (American, 1915–1955); USA; lithograph on thin glossy paper; 18.4 x 27.0 cm (7 1/4 x 10 5/8 in. ); Gift of Susan Lustig Peck; 2001-29-24

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<ref name=CH>{{cite web |url=https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18694797/ |title=Book Cover, mallarme: poems |author=Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |accessdate=24 April 2024 |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}</ref>