Surrealism

In 1924 Breton published a manifesto defining surrealism as pure psychic automatism, dictated by thought free of any control by reason. The method is to write fast without correcting, to note down dreams, to provoke chance: the group invented collective games and walked Paris waiting for the encounter. Nadja is the account of one such encounter, with photographs of the places instead of descriptions. Born of disgust with the war and of Dada, the movement quarrelled as much as it created, and its formal freedom spread to poetry worldwide.

works 5

• PoetryCapital of PainCapitale de la douleurPaul Eluard · 1926Poems drawn from early plaquettes and unpublished pieces, in which the freest imagery serves a love lyricism that has remained readable.Literature
• NarrativeNadjaAndré Breton · 1928A narrative without a plot, interspersed with images that take the place of descriptions, in which one notes in a city the signs that chance sends.Literature
• PoetryThe Big GameLe Grand JeuBenjamin Péret · 1928Poems in which images arise without apparent logic, as speech is left free to run.Literature
• NovelLast Nights of ParisLes Dernières Nuits de ParisPhilippe Soupault · 1928A night stroller follows through Paris a prostitute who seems to hold the secrets of the city.Literature
• PoetryCorps et biensRobert Desnos · 1930not translated into EnglishA surrealist poet shatters language into puns before returning to the love song.Literature