Père Ubu by VOLLARD, AMBROISE

Paris: Georges Crès Fine copies in original pictorial wrappers preserved in handsome custom clamshell case of black cloth with gilt-lettered spine and front cover in red leather. Vollard has adopted his friend Alfred Jarry's satirical figure, Père Ubu, in these short plays, mocking the absurdity of World War I. Jarry, dead at the age of 34 in 1907, was a link between the 19th century and the early 20th century avant-garde, influencing the Theater of the Absurd, Duchamp, the Surrealists, Rouault, Max Ernst, and William Kentridge. He coined the term and concept of pataphysics: the science and philosophy of the absurd, using irony and whimsey to examine imaginary phenomena and symbolic truths. LE PÈRE UBU À L'HOPITAL. Two copies: Paris: "Cette Petite Tragédie N'est Pas Mise dans le Commerce", 1917, and Paris: Éditions Georges Crès, 1918. Both with cover, frontispiece, and title page vignette (black in 1917 and red in 1918) by Pierre Bonnard. LE PÉRE UBU À L'AVIATION. Paris: Georges Crès. 1918. Cover illustration repeated on title page and vignette on first page of text by Pierre Bonnard. INSCRIBED BY VOLLARD: AHOMMAGE À L'AUTEUR. LE POLITIQUE COLONIALE DU PÈRE UBU. Paris: Georges Crès. 1919. Cover illustrated by Georges Rouault repeated on title page. LE PÈRE UBU À LA GUERRE. Paris: Georges Crès, 1920. One of 500 copies on holland paper, out-of-series and unnumbered. Uncut and unopened. Shadow of wrappers on endpapers. Cover illustration, title page, and full-page plate by Jean Puy. A GROUP OF FIVE PLAYS WRITTEN BY ONE OF THE GREATEST CONTEMPORARY ART DEALERS OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY. Wrappers. Fine. Illus. by Alfred Jarry. 8vo.