Description

Second handwritten and drawn sleeping fit by Robert Desnos dated 30 September, 1922 and annotated in part by André Breton. "Ah, what a horror!” Who has just entered? "Péret." In an hypnotic sleep, Desnos’ jealousies are confessed and exacerbated, in the complete innocence of someone speaking without any censorship. His obsession with death returns here in full force, whether it be dreaming of his own death or predicting that of his friends. Examined in the way one would scan an unknown country, the future takes on a strange allure under the dreamer's pen - "I shall see with my own eyes". "In five years, alas, my absolute desire.” And abruptly breaking off, betraying the desire of others, refusing to say more. If the seer shies away from the expectations of his comrades, the poet speaks, writing and uttering formulas that under Breton's pen will become a poetics - "there are never any accidents" – in anticipation of Hegelian objective chance, so often invoked in the 1930s. And what is there, if there are no accidents? "The Marvellous." In anticipation of the first Manifesto... Desnos, switching at times from the written to the spoken word, also tells stories of houses with ebony caretakers, shouts "poor fools" on several occasions, and in the end describes his experience as a "negative state". But the formula didn’t endure… First period of hypnotic sleeping fits. 30 September 1922. - 41 pages in-4° on Congrès de Paris letterheaded paper, folioed 1 to 41, of handwritten responses by Desnos in blue pencil, with Breton questioning Desnos about his past, his destiny and their own; the whole is enclosed in an identical sheet folded in two and titled by Breton in blue pencil: ‘Saturday 30 September, Desnos, 2nd sleeping fit': "What will Péret do in two years’ time? – At night the street lamps he doesn’t know the light. "When will he die? How will he die? – Within 15 years the wheels. "How? What wheels? – 1,000 wheels. "From which vehicle? – A train at 3 o'clock. "Will there be an accident? – There are no, there are never any accidents."

Creation date	30-sept.-22
Date of publication	1922
Languages	French
Physical description	Ds et Ms - crayon noir
Library	Bibliothèque littéraire Jacques Doucet, Paris : BRT 161
Method of acquisition and collection	Bibliothèque littéraire Jacques Doucet, Paris, don Aube et Oona Elléouët
Reference	41000
Breton Auction, 2003	Lot 2026
Keywords	Dream, Automatic Writing
Categories	Manuscripts, Surrealists Manuscripts
Set	[Manuscripts] Sommeils
Permanent link	https://cms.andrebreton.fr/en/work/56600100019630