KESSEL (Joseph). Mary of Cork. Autograph manuscript, unsigned, undated (second half of 1924). 9 recto pages (15 x 20 cm, and 20 x 20 cm for the last page), numbered, folded; in a folded envelope, with the handwritten title. Complete manuscript, first draft, with erasures, corrections, and variants; written in a compact manner and without margins, the text is more widely spaced on the first and last leaves. A poignant true story of the Irish Civil War, this famous novella was first published in the Revue des Deux mondes (tome XXIII, pp. 734-754, late 1924) and then in 1925 by Gallimard (reprinted in the collection Les Coeurs pur, 1929). It was inspired by Kessel's first major report: as a young journalist (aged 23), Kessel had been sent in the autumn of 1920, by the newspaper La Liberté, to witness the Irish revolution against England. In this short novel, he recounts the drama and courage of Mary and Art Beckett, husband and wife, but on opposite sides of the war in Ireland; this story joins the famous one of the Lord Mayor of Cork, who starved himself to death in prison to protest against the English judges. The excellent reviews confirmed the young author of L'Équipage (Gallimard, 1923) as a recognised writer.