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Extraordinary signed and extensively hand-corrected carbon typescript by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry for the revised final chapter of Terre des Hommes [Wind, Sand and Stars], comprising 43 pages in French, 8.25 x 10.5, circa 1941. The typescript contains numerous deletions, additions, and emendations in Saint-Exupéry’s hand, with the author also repaginating the manuscript in red pencil and signing in full, “Antoine de Saint-Exupery,” at the conclusion of the final page. The cover sheet carries Saint-Exupéry’s remarkable one-page autograph transmittal note in red pencil, headed “Nouvelle fin du livre [New ending of the book],” in part (translated): "Page 1 is the last page of the chapter on Spain, but the last paragraph of which is changed to tie it into what follows. Page 39 is the link with the old last chapter of the book, but this page 39 is also changed out of the need to tie it into what follows. Finally, page 43 (end) contains an added final line (which might be set off sufficiently from what precedes and printed in italics?)."
Saint-Exupery makes his handwritten corrections to fourteen pages of the manuscript, totaling well over 100 words. Includes an ALS by his translator, Lewis Galantière, April 9, 1941, providing an English translation of Saint-Exupéry’s note and further explaining the relationship between the revised French text and the American edition. Galantière writes in part: “I have not compared the material with W.S.&S. but I believe our ‘end of the book’ is bigger than this, i.e. that I retained matter which Saint Ex discarded for Terre des Hommes.”
In fine condition, with the ink stamp of the A.F.G. Literary Agency of New York on the first page, and some marginal fraying and soiling. In very good condition, with expected handling wear, scattered soiling, and some marginal fraying.
A superb working manuscript documenting Saint-Exupéry’s substantial revision of the concluding chapter of one of his greatest books. First published in 1939, Terre des Hommes—issued in English as Wind, Sand and Stars—drew heavily upon Saint-Exupéry’s experiences as a pioneering airmail pilot, including his near-fatal 1935 crash in the Sahara during an attempted Paris-to-Saigon record flight. Blending autobiography, aviation adventure, and philosophical meditation, the book examines courage, friendship, mortality, and humanity’s place in the world.
This revised conclusion was prepared for the subsequent edition published by Reynal & Hitchcock in the United States and Gallimard in France. Galantière’s accompanying letter is particularly significant, not only providing a contemporary translation of Saint-Exupéry’s transmittal note, but also recording differences between the French text and the version prepared for American readers.
Saint-Exupéry manuscript material relating to his major literary works is exceptionally scarce, and this extensive, signed working typescript—preserving dozens of the author’s direct revisions to the ending of Wind, Sand and Stars—represents an important literary manuscript from the author of The Little Prince.
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