Les jeunes Filles. Roman. by LYDIS, Mariette. MONTHERLANT, Henri de.

Folio (316 × 230 mm), pp. [8], 187, [5]. 12 lithographed plates, coloured. Loose as issued in original wrappers.

First edition with the illustrations by Lydis, one of 350 copies on Rives (total edition 382).

The novel first appeared in 1936. Montherlant is remembered partly through the lens of Simone de Beauvoir, who chastised his misogyny and anti-feminism in The Second Sex. The disdain for adult homosexuality he expressed in public took on disturbing dimensions when viewed in the context of his private paedophilia, fully revealed only after his death. He was, however, an important connection for Mariette Lydis and was one of her first acquaintances on her arrival in Paris; he later wrote several appreciations of her work.