DE MONTHERLANT, Henry (1895-1972). La Petite Infante de Castille. Illustrations Originales en Couleurs de Grau Sala. Paris: Editions Rombaldi, 1929. Octavo. (8 x 6 inches). 180pp. 5 full-page color illustrations by Grau Sala. Publisher's decorative wrappings. An excellent-condition copy of de Montherlant's classic novel. Number 2665 of 3500 copies. Henry Marie Joseph Frédéric Expedite Millon de Montherlant was a French essayist, novelist, and dramatist. He was elected to the Académie française in 1960. From the age of seven or eight, Henry was enthusiastic about literature and began writing. After the deaths of his father and mother in 1914 and 1915, he went to live with his doting grandmother and eccentric uncles. Mobilised in 1916, he was wounded and decorated. Marked by his experience of war, he wrote Songe ('Dream'), an autobiographic novel, as well as his Chant funèbre pour les morts de Verdun (Funeral Chant for the Dead at Verdun), both exaltations of heroism during the Great War. His work was part of the literature event in the art competition at the 1924 Summer Olympics. A closeted pederast, Montherlant treated pederastic themes in his work, including in his play La Ville dont le prince est un enfant (1952) and novel Les Garçons (The Boys). The present work is another example of the author's pederastic inclinations.Emilio Grau-Sala is a Spanish artist who studied in Paris and the US.