The Golden Thread
Surrealism was founded in Paris during 1924 and the First Surrealist Manifesto was published that year. The manifesto was essentially written by André Breton. The founders of Surrealism were André Breton, Louis Aragon , Paul Éluard and Phillipe Soupault. All four of them had been among the first members of the Paris Dada group. All four of them were writers.
Before reading the History of Surrealism by Maurice Nadeau, I'd thought Surrealism was Salvador Dali and it didn't interest me much. I came across this book in Luton public Library in 1989 and for some unknown reason I took it out. I'm not sure if I trembled as I read the pages – if I didn't that would have been extraordinary as I spent most of my time trembling – but I did read it in one long 36 hour session. This was before the internet so I had to content myself with scouring second hand book shops looking for texts like Nadja by Breton or Paris Peasant by Aragon and the Manifestos themselves (See, I can just link to these books now – I didn't get hold of Nadja for at least five years and PP later than that.)
You see, reading the History of Surrealism had made me realise I was a Surrealist. I didn't have to paint pictures of melting baboons or grow an inquisitive moustache. Surrealism was a belief. Dada had been rebellion, an Anti-movement. The Dadaists were against things – mainly the things which made up the society which had led to war. They didn't want another war so they were against nationhood, against church, against the concept of family, against art. Breton realised that you then have to define what you are for. Tear down the fabric of society and then… then build it back up but in a different form. This should be a new world - the world of Lennon's Imagine, without country, without religion. This would be a world where we understood our own thoughts and actions, our motivations and our desires (Freud had recently been translated into French and the Surrealist devoured his writings – although he wasn't so keen on the Surrealists).
"To speak of God, to think of God, is in every respect to show what one is made of. I have always wagered against God and I regard the little that I have won in this world as simply the outcome of this bet. However paltry may have been the stake (my life) I am conscious of having won to the full. Everything that is doddering, squint-eyed, vile, polluted and grotesque is summoned up for me in that one word: God!" André Breton, Surrealism and Paintings
Breton's aims were defined more succinctly later, long after Surrealism had gone out of fashion and a second World War had dropped bombs on their idea of a world without war: the aims of surrealism were to give back to man what man had given to God. I'd been an atheist for a long time before I'd even heard of surrealism. So it's godlessness appealed to me. I'd always been irritated by people who want to attach a supernatural origin to mundane constructions, like the idea that the pyramids had been built by an advance extra-terrestrial race. They were built by Earth-bound people. They built them with slaves, mathematics and vision. They did it because we, the human race, are capable of achieving what we dream to achieve – be those dreams good or bad.
Breton also said that he'd been searching for the golden thread which runs through time. I liked this concept, that there was something which linked me to us and to all the us that had gone before. That me, as a man living in the twentieth century (yes, I'm old), was linked to the people who lived a hundred, two hundred, a thousand years ago. We are people with the same set of motivations and desires no matter what period of time we appear in. I was already keen on history and that same thread led to the writing of Salazar – a man in 1930 who could just as easily be a man in 2030. Salazar lives his life trying to find the truth about himself while also tracking down thieves, murderers, rapists, blackmailers, whoever he's paid to track down. You'll notice that list of criminal types could have been produced today or at any other time in the history of mankind.
NadjaParis PeasantThe History of SurrealismSalazar
Before reading the History of Surrealism by Maurice Nadeau, I'd thought Surrealism was Salvador Dali and it didn't interest me much. I came across this book in Luton public Library in 1989 and for some unknown reason I took it out. I'm not sure if I trembled as I read the pages – if I didn't that would have been extraordinary as I spent most of my time trembling – but I did read it in one long 36 hour session. This was before the internet so I had to content myself with scouring second hand book shops looking for texts like Nadja by Breton or Paris Peasant by Aragon and the Manifestos themselves (See, I can just link to these books now – I didn't get hold of Nadja for at least five years and PP later than that.)
You see, reading the History of Surrealism had made me realise I was a Surrealist. I didn't have to paint pictures of melting baboons or grow an inquisitive moustache. Surrealism was a belief. Dada had been rebellion, an Anti-movement. The Dadaists were against things – mainly the things which made up the society which had led to war. They didn't want another war so they were against nationhood, against church, against the concept of family, against art. Breton realised that you then have to define what you are for. Tear down the fabric of society and then… then build it back up but in a different form. This should be a new world - the world of Lennon's Imagine, without country, without religion. This would be a world where we understood our own thoughts and actions, our motivations and our desires (Freud had recently been translated into French and the Surrealist devoured his writings – although he wasn't so keen on the Surrealists).
"To speak of God, to think of God, is in every respect to show what one is made of. I have always wagered against God and I regard the little that I have won in this world as simply the outcome of this bet. However paltry may have been the stake (my life) I am conscious of having won to the full. Everything that is doddering, squint-eyed, vile, polluted and grotesque is summoned up for me in that one word: God!" André Breton, Surrealism and Paintings
Breton's aims were defined more succinctly later, long after Surrealism had gone out of fashion and a second World War had dropped bombs on their idea of a world without war: the aims of surrealism were to give back to man what man had given to God. I'd been an atheist for a long time before I'd even heard of surrealism. So it's godlessness appealed to me. I'd always been irritated by people who want to attach a supernatural origin to mundane constructions, like the idea that the pyramids had been built by an advance extra-terrestrial race. They were built by Earth-bound people. They built them with slaves, mathematics and vision. They did it because we, the human race, are capable of achieving what we dream to achieve – be those dreams good or bad.
Breton also said that he'd been searching for the golden thread which runs through time. I liked this concept, that there was something which linked me to us and to all the us that had gone before. That me, as a man living in the twentieth century (yes, I'm old), was linked to the people who lived a hundred, two hundred, a thousand years ago. We are people with the same set of motivations and desires no matter what period of time we appear in. I was already keen on history and that same thread led to the writing of Salazar – a man in 1930 who could just as easily be a man in 2030. Salazar lives his life trying to find the truth about himself while also tracking down thieves, murderers, rapists, blackmailers, whoever he's paid to track down. You'll notice that list of criminal types could have been produced today or at any other time in the history of mankind.
NadjaParis PeasantThe History of SurrealismSalazar
No comments have been added yet.
