[HUGO (Victor)] - Lot 282

[HUGO (Victor)] Autograph working manuscript of L'Elégie des fléaux, excerpt from La Légende des siècles In French, autograph manuscript sheet on paper, brown ink S.l. [Paris (?) Victor Hugo returned to Paris in 1870], s.d. [circa 1875 (?)] Two small ink corrosion holes; text scratched with vertical and horizontal lines Size: 310 x 165 mm. This fragment belongs to the group of Victor Hugo's works sometimes referred to as "Copeaux", so named by the author himself. Once transferred and used, the author crossed them out and either archived or destroyed them. See: "J.-M. Hovasse, "Les copeaux de Victor Hugo", in Genesis: Manuscrits, Recherche, Innovation, no. 45 (2017), pp. 17-35: "For most of them were 'used', either in a more developed fragment or in a published work, and were then crossed out. Those that, for various reasons, in which chance plays a major role, have been saved, appeal to collectors and scholars alike, as they allow us to witness the birth of constituted ensembles, to get as close as possible to the origin of the creative work, and to sometimes allow a confrontation between a first draft and its final version". On the recto is an autograph fragment of the Légende des siècles (XXII, L'Elégie des fléaux, Nouvelle Série [Seconde série], Paris, Hetzel, 1877, pp. 297-299). Incipit: "Sous qui rampe la foule aux confuses rumeurs..." and explicit, "[...] D'où vient cette coloère odieuse des fleuves? So many crimes committed by the shadow! So many widows! How many orphans! Infamous massacre of innocents! La Légende des siècles is a collection of poems by Victor Hugo, written intermittently between 1855 and 1876, and published in three series (1859, 1877, 1883). A collective edition of the three series appeared in 1883. Verso: various autograph notes, less legible. Names of historical figures appear in La Légendes des siècles: Cambyses, Cyrus, Alexander, Annibal, Attila, Genghis...Caiaphas, Pico, Borgia, Torquemada....