Yesterday’s post, “Surréalisme of André Breton: “La chute libre dans le subconscient” (“The Free Fall into the Subconscious”)“, introduced a general idea of what “le surréalisme” is, and described the Surrealist call to give carte blanche (or “free rein”) to one’s subconscious, in the manner that was expressed by le chef de file (the leader) of this movement, the Frenchman André Breton, as well as many of his followers, such as the deliberately eccentric Salvador Dalí.

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Salvador Dalí was un adepte de la première heure (an early adept) of Surrealism.  According to his autobiographical “Secret Life”, his now iconic “Persistence of Memory” (picture above) was suggested to him by watching a Camembert cheese slowly melting in the chaleur (heat) of the Summer

Later, Dalí was formally “excommunicated” by Breton and the Surrealists, who accused him, among other charges, of excessive greed, and gave me him the unflattering nickname (based on an anagram of his name) of “Avida Dollars”—To be phonetically interpreted in French as “Avid For Dollar$”!

Another episode, less “colorful” this time, and still largely ignored, pertaining to the “Surrealist experience” of Dalí, is the one related to his alleged “exorcism” in France, shortly after WWII

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Today, you are invited to discover, dans le texte original (in the original text), together with the English translation offered by A.S. Klein, important excerpts of one of the two versions of the “Manifeste du Surréalisme” (“Surrealist Manifesto”), which can offer a better idea of Surrealism as a movement, which first appeared in Switzerland, France, and then spread everywhere else.

With that being said, the critique and avertissement (warning) related to this subject, also included in yesterday’s post, should also be pris en considération (taken into consideration.)

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* Secrets de l’art magique surréaliste (Secrets of the Magical Surrealist Art):

* Composition surréaliste écrite, ou premier et dernier jet (Written surrealist composition, or first and last draft)

– Faites-vous apporter de quoi écrire, après vous être établi en un lieu aussi favorable que possible à la concentration de votre esprit sur lui-même (Have writing materials brought, once you are settled in a place as favourable as possible for focusing the mind on itself.)

– Placez-vous dans l’état le plus passif, ou réceptif, que vous pourrez. Faites abstraction de votre génie, de vos talents et de ceux de tous les autres (Put yourself in the most passive, or receptive, state you can.Forget about your genius, your talents, and those of others.)

– Dites-vous bien que la littérature est un des plus tristes chemins qui mènent à tout. Écrivez vite sans sujet préconçu, assez vite pour ne pas retenir et ne pas être tenté de vous relire (Tell yourself repeatedly that literature is one of the saddest roads leading to everything. Write swiftly with no preconceived subject, swiftly enough that you cannot retain it, and are not tempted to re-read.)

– La première phrase viendra toute seule, tant il est vrai qu’à chaque seconde il est une phrase, étrangère à notre pensée consciente, qui ne demande qu’à s’extérioriser (The first sentence will arise spontaneously, it being the case in truth that each second there is a sentence, unknown to our conscious thought, which only asks to be externalised.)

– Il est assez difficile de se prononcer sur le cas de la phrase suivante ; elle participe sans doute à la fois de notre activité consciente et de l’autre, si l’on admet que le fait d’avoir écrit la première entraîne un minimum de perception (It is quite difficult to make pronouncements about the next sentence; it no doubt participates in both our conscious activity and the other kind, if you agree that the fact of having written the first entails a minimum of perception.)

– Peu doit vous importer, d’ailleurs; c’est en cela que réside, pour la plus grande part, l’intérêt du jeu surréaliste(That should matter little to you, however; and in that resides, to a large extent, the interest of the surrealist game.)

 – Toujours est-il que la ponctuation s’oppose sans doute à la continuité absolue de la coulée qui nous occupe, bien qu’elle paraisse aussi nécessaire que la distribution des nœuds sur une corde vibrante. Continuez autant qu’il vous plaira (It is still the case that punctuation definitely runs counter to the absolute continuity of flow which concerns us, although it may seem as necessary as the distribution of nodes on a vibrating string. Continue for as long as you wish.

 – Si le silence menace de s’établir pour peu que vous ayez commis une faute : une faute, peut-on dire, d’inattention, rompez sans hésiter avec une ligne trop claire (If silence threatens to establish itself, if you have committed an error: an error, let us say, of inattention, break off without hesitation with a more than obvious blank line.)

– À la suite du mot dont l’origine vous semble suspecte, posez une lettre quelconque, la lettre l par exemple, toujours la lettrel, et ramenez l’arbitraire en imposant cette lettre pour initiale au mot qui suivra (Following a word whose origin seems suspect to you, place some letter, the letter ‘l’ for example, the letter ‘l’ every time, and recall the arbitrary by making this letter the initial one of the very next word.)