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Folio Society
Folio Society of London
The Folio Society ( Folio Society - wikipedia link )
Publisher of the world's most extensive selection of beautifully illustrated collector-quality, hardcover books

Publishes Herzog by Saul Bellow*

with Jesse Reichek etching from Dessins

 Editions Cahiers D-Art hardcover book - text by Saul Bellow and Christian Zervos

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Folio Society webpage for Saul Bellow's Herzog with quote from Joshua Reichek regarding the Folio Society edition of Herzog.

By selecting a Jesse Reichek etching for the front and rear outside cover of their collector-quality, hardcover edition of Saul Bellow's Herzog, the Folio Society, informed by Saul Bellow's admiration for Jesse Reichek as a man and for his works, acknowledges and pays homage to the 55-year relationship between the two men.  By literally placing Bellow's Herzog, one of the great works of 20th-century literature, between the outer covers of an etching by one of Bellow's most admired friends, Jesse Reichek, both a connection and context are expressed between Reichek's works of Dessins and Bellow's Herzog.  The connections and contexts extend to both the time and the place.  The time--the late 1950's to early 1960's. The place--Upstate-Tivoli, New York.

left to right - Saul Bellow, Gregory Bellow, Jesse Reichek -- Tivoli, New York - Summer 1959
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Where and how Bellow and Reichek met and became friends

The Where: 11 Rue Vaneau Paris. The above pictures of 11 Rue Vaneau were taken by Jesse Reichek with a Kodak camera in 1950. 

The How: The American Painter Charles "Charlie" E. Marks came to Paris in the wave of Americans who went to Paris in after the war.  In 1947, he moved into 11 Rue Vaneau, occupying the one-room, ground-floor apartment that opened onto the yard.  Later that  year Marks met and befriended Jesse Reichek.   In early 1949, Marks met and befriended Saul Bellow within the milieu of the American artist and writers "community" in Paris.  When Marks moved out of 11 Rue Vaneau in 1949 to a larger apartment around the corner on Rue de Chanateilles, he made arrangements for Saul Bellow to move in. Bellow wasn’t there long, however. Needing room for his family, Bellow located a bigger apartment at 33 Rue Vaneau (in a building run by Jenine Lemelle –who only rented to Americans) and spoke to his friend Charlie Marks about his intentions to vacate 11 Rue Vaneau.  Marks, knowing Jesse Reichek had recently met a woman, disliked -in the extreme his current arrangements where the landlady sat on cats to suffocate them, and needed living arrangements, arranged for Reichek and Bellow to meet.  Arrangements were made and Reichek with his soon-to-be wife, Laure Guyot (an 18 years old French actress/chanteuse  who grew up in Chateaumaillant in the Cher in Berry), moved into 11 Rue Vaneau.  There followed between the two men a deepening substantial relationship, including meals together at 11 Rue Vaneau and frequent gatherings/parties around the corner at Charlie Marks’apartment on Rue de Chanateilles, as well as gatherings and parties at other members of the American ex-patriot community.   In the context of these gatherings the friendship between Bellow and Reichek grew to include Mark Rothko, among others. Reichek and Bellow also met regularly, nearly ritualistically for more than a year, each Wednesday afternoon at 4:30 at the cafe/brasserie Le Rouget, at the Corner of Boulevard St. Germain and Rue Des Saints Peres, choosing the Le Rouget because it was away from the famous and "Artsy" atmosphere of the renowned cafes further down the street.  They discussed each other's ideas and work. Besides intellectual conversation, they played (and became good players of) the card game Casino.  if it was warm they drank beer.  If it was cold they drank coco.   Their meeting and card game became a locus for famous and to-become-famous artists and writers. 

*Saul Bellow  ( Saul Bellow - wikipedia link )
Nobel Prize for Literature 1976;  The Adventures of Augie March -  in 1954;  Herzog (1964) and Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970)  awarded the National Book Award for fiction;  Humboldt's Gift (1975)  awarded  the Pulitzer Prize;  awarded The International Literary Prize in 1965 for Herzog, becoming the first American to receive the prize;  January 1968 the Republic of France awarded him the Croix de Chevalier des Arts et Lettres, the highest literary distinction awarded by that nation to non-citizens;