Paris (AFP)
"It is for you alone that I come".
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry was addressing the American Jane Lawton, who will write for Walt Disney a project to adapt the "Little Prince", and which is unveiled in a series of unpublished books at the Paris Rare Book Fair.
Biographers know extremely little about this romance of the years 1938, 1939 and 1940 between the aviator and "Miss Lawton".
A bookseller specializing in the former, Christophe Champion, has got his hands on seven documents allowing him to be given a first name, but also to make some hypotheses on this relationship, the details of which remain mysterious.
What we learn from these seven pieces on sale is that Saint-Exupéry and Jane Lawton met in New York, in 1938 or 1939, years when he made three stays in the American metropolis.
His marriage to Consuelo, at that time, experienced ups and downs.
"He kept from their first evening together a golden feather that must have come from the hat or the outfit of Jane. And he calls it Angel's feather", tells AFP Christophe Champion, of the Faustroll bookstore in Paris.
Who exactly is this Jane Lawton?
Historians will have to determine this, as the name is widespread in the United States, and the date of birth unknown.
She looks younger than the writer, who is approaching his forties when he meets her.
This is what the bookseller deduces from a dedication on the "Copy specially printed for Miss Jane Lawton" of the New York edition of "Pilot of war" in 1942, because he refers to himself as "old friend. ".
- "For Disney" -
One of the exceptional pieces of the set is an undated two-page letter, but very probably from October 1940. Saint-Exupéry explains: "I will come to NY for my book" (namely "Earth men").
"I don't allow you to laugh if I tell you that it's for you alone that I'm coming - because it's true," he explains.
No one knows what the nature of the relationship was, not even the biographers who tried to shed light on these essential years for his life and his work.
But she was very dear to the novelist.
In a telegram from December 1940, just as he was preparing to cross the Atlantic again after the defeat of France, he warned: "Very happy to see you again, SS Siboney [the American military ship which brings him] arrives, don't say so to no one believe deep friendship ".
"He knows a lot of people in New York, and his words suggest that he wants to spend his first evening with her, without anyone else", according to Christophe Champion.
Saint-Exupéry remained there until 1943, wary of the cause of General du Gaulle, and devoting himself to writing "Pilote de guerre", on the 1940 debacle, then a tale.
He will call it "The Little Prince".
We knew that Orson Welles had bought the rights to adapt it to a film as early as 1943, then turned to Walt Disney to mix in the cartoon.
Disney, without assurance on its artistic leeway in the project, had declined.
The Faustroll bookstore presents, in this Jane Lawton lot, a three-page synopsis faithful to the tale, in English, written by the young American.
His debut: "A lone pilot breaks down in the Sahara. After working hard on his broken engine, he finally falls asleep."
"It is she who is at the initiative, surely with the agreement of those who were to give it", comments the bookseller.
This scenario of a possible classic of the cinema of the 20th century, which unfortunately never saw the light of day, has an addressee added in the hand: "for Disney".
Saint-Exupéry had died for France off Marseille in July 1944.
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