The Story of King Kabul the First & Gawain the Kitchen-Boy: Histoire Du Roi Kaboul Ier Et Du Marmiton Gauwain ; Followed by Vulcan's Crown

by Max Jacob, Moishe Black (Translator), Maria Green (Translator)

Beloved for his whimsy as much as his genius, Max Jacob wrote works for every age and taste. In the two stories contained in this volume, 'The Story of King Kabul the First and Gawain the Kitchen-Boy' and 'Vulcan's Crown,' he writes for the young at heart. The stories appear with the original drawings by Roger Blachon from the French edition of 1971.
The hero of 'King Kabul' is Gawain the kitchen-boy, who dreams of marrying Julia, daughter of Kabul the First, King of the Balibridgians. To earn Julia's favor, Gawain becomes the best cook in the world. King Kabul enjoys Gawain's cooking but refuses to let his daughter marry a mere cook. In order to win Julia's hand, Gawain sees that he must do something more heroic than cooking.
'Vulcan's Crown' is a tale of fantastic adventure involving Toulic, a humpbacked tailor and blacksmith in small-town Brittany. One day as Toulic peels onions for his soup, the Lord Jesus Christ appears and tells Toulic that he will soon be rich. But first he must earn his wealth. Toulic goes off to sea with a drunken admiral, flies through the air on a fish's back, listens to unlikely but evocative poetry, and is mockingly crowned by the King of the Cheeses before returning home.

78 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 1994

About the author

After spending his childhood in Quimper, Brittany, France, he enrolled in the Paris Colonial School, which he left in 1897 for an artistic career. He was one of the first friends Pablo Picasso made in Paris. They met in the summer of 1901, and it was Jacob who helped the young artist learn French. Later, on the Boulevard Voltaire, he shared a room with Picasso, who remained a lifelong friend (and was included in his artwork Three Musicians). Jacob introduced him to Guillaume Apollinaire, who in turn introduced Picasso to Georges Braque. He would become close friends with Jean Cocteau, Jean Hugo, Christopher Wood and Amedeo Modigliani, who painted his portrait in 1916. He also befriended and encouraged the artist Romanin, otherwise known as French politician and future Resistance leader Jean Moulin. Moulin's famous nom de guerre Max is presumed to be selected in honor of Jacob.
Having moved outside of Paris in May, 1936, to settle in Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire, Loiret, Max Jacob was arrested on 24 February 1944 by the Gestapo, and interned at Orléans prison, (prisoner #15872). Jewish by birth, Jacob's brother Gaston had been previously arrested in January, 1944, deported to Auschwitz concentration camp, and gassed upon arrival with his sister Myrthe-Lea; her husband also deported and murdered by the Nazis. Following his incarceration at Orléans, Max was then transferred to Drancy internment camp from where he was to be transported in the next convoy to Auschwitz in Germany. However, said to be suffering from bronchial pneumonia, Max Jacob died in the infirmary of Le Cité de la Muette, a former housing block which served as the internment camp known as Drancy on 5 March.

Reviews

[Ronald Morton · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this up on a whim because it's a part of the University of Nebraska "French Modernist Library" series, which has some interesting stuff in it, including some good out of print surrealist stuff. And, the Publishers Weekly description of it included: "Widely considered a founder of French surrealism, Jacob (1876-1944) liked to combine seriousness with verbal clowning in his poetry. In the two children's tales contained in this volume, written in 1904 and 1923 but first published in 1971 in France, the emphasis is on the clowning." Which sounded good (and it was cheap).

I've looked, and the best I can find is that Jacob was more of a link between the Symbolists and the Surrealists, and I can find nothing to support the claim that he would be considered a "founder of French surrealism". I likely would have still bought it as I like the series, but that's a bit disappointing.

The book contains a couple fairly basic, but amusing, stories, which are big on whimsy, and would mostly fit into a decent children's story collection that no one would publish any more because of the drinking and smoking and slightly odd appearance of Jesus in a pot of soup. Nothing really sets it apart though, and is really more of a curiosity due to the author and the company he kept, than any real important text or link.

It's a handsome little hard cover though (with reproductions of all the original illustrations), and will look nice on the shelf, so I'm good with it.

[Caterina · Rating 3 out of 5]

grazie CV pt.30
Assomiglia a una fiaba classica, scritta e illustrata da due artisti.