Description:

FRENCH ANTI-HITLER MANUSCRIPT, 1939
An intriguing A.M. signed ‘Candide', 3pp. 8vo. [n.p.], September 20, 1939. Headlined: ‘One must expect the most cynical acrobatics of Nazi propaganda…' and titled ‘Candide' and again signed as such on the verso. Possibly an editorial printed for the newspaper ‘Candide', it reads, in part: ‘…The tribulations of truth. Among the innumerable progresses that humanity prides itself on with generous naivety, there are already many that give it doubts. Material civilization has invented as many devices that spread death as machines intended to make life easier. But it has perfected beyond all prediction the means of spreading lies.…Last August, Hitler warned the world that the Nuremberg Congress on September 4 would deserve the name of the peace congress. A few days later, he brutally attacked Poland. More recently, a Berlin telegram to the United States announced that the Polish government had left Warsaw and that the Marshal of Poland had resigned a week after the German aggression. It was to proclaim simultaneously the defeat, the collapse of a plan, the infamous betrayal of a cause and of a people. The entire future of comments was contained in a dispatch mentioning a new falsehood. Once re-established the reality of facts, it is the morality of a lying system that collapses. One must expect the most cynical acrobatics of Nazi propaganda. From the beginning of 1914, Germanism had quickly acquired an unequaled reputation for bad faith. The vocabulary of lies has now, under Hitler's regime, reached its peak. Brainwashing through words is complete…This is the baseness to which we are reduced in Europe, and all America has no competitors except Moscow. One of these days, we will learn that Germany, which attacked Poland and treated it with cruelty, proposes to lay down its arms out of love for peace. [Gustav von] Stresemann merely assured that he ‘would finish.' Today's Germanism mocks reason shamelessly. If these tragic hours evoked memories of frivolous authority, one might think of this game that the old Parisians, friends of the Nouveau-Cirque, still fondly remember. The famous [George] Footit [who] humorously caricatured tyranny, proclaiming: ‘When I say we start, we start. When I say we finish, we finish'...But applied by a barbaric state, the game today costs blood and tears...'. ‘Candide' was an anti-parliamentarian, anti-republican, anti-communist, and anti-democratic newspaper, making this commentary quite at odds with its usual tone, and worthy of further research! A few major authors such as Rebatet and Brasillach wrote for the paper, also begging further inquiry into the writer of this superb manuscript. Gustav von Stresemann (1878-1929) served as chancellor and foreign minister during the Weimar Republic, and was widely responsible for restoring Germany's international status after World War I. The author's mention of ‘Footit' no doubt refers to George Footit (1864-1921), an English-born clown in the Paris circus scene who won fame as one half of the slapstick duo Footit & Chocolat, whose circus acts capitalized on the philosophy and conquests of French colonialism. The pair's routine pitted an authoritarian white clown against a ‘stupid' ‘Negro', Augustus, who at the end of each skit receives a correction: ‘Mr. Chocolate, I'm going to have to hit you…'. Ironically, and a most clear representation of latent and pervasive French racism and irredentism, the duo was very popular with intellectuals and artists as well as the public. Rusted paper clip impression at the top left, otherwise very good. Offered with a printed copy of the manuscript in newspaper article form.

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August 14, 2024 10:00 AM EDT
Elkton, MD, US

Alexander Historical Auctions LLC

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