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[Here is my response to the Peret questionnaire...]

Letter dated Tuesday [1934]

Correspondence

Author

Author René Crevel
People cited Bailby, Maurice Barrès, Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, Vladimir Ilitch Oulianov, dit Lénine, Jean-Paul Marat, Georges Bataille, Salvador Dalí, non identifié, Benjamin Péret
Letter to André Breton

Description

Handwritten letter from René Crevel to André Breton, dated ‘Tuesday’ [January 1934].
The Dalí affair, between the end of January and the beginning of March 1934, involved the painter accused of having made fascist remarks. As he defended himself, as several letters sent to Breton in this file attest, it quickly became apparent that the question went far beyond his individual case. In fact, against a backdrop of social unrest (see the Nice letters from Tzara and Éluard on this point), the surrealists were brought to clarify their position vis-à-vis the Third International. A difficult thing, because the AEAR affair, the previous year, had left some traces, with the Stalinist infiltration of this association’s institutions having resulted in the departure of Breton and his friends. Thus, a subtle distinction emerged between the cultural policy of the Third International, which almost everyone rejected, and its political options, which were better accepted by the members of the group. The Dalí question was thus taken in a context of a more general crisis, inside and outside a movement finding some difficulty, as Crevel wrote, in making ‘the synthesis of the poetic and the political’. Letters, telegrams, meeting reports, official declarations comprise a fascinating file. [Atelier André Breton website, 2005]

Signed letter, Tuesday [January 1934].
- Signed letter from René Crevel to Breton, 2 pages in-8° oblong, handwritten, dated ‘Tuesday’ and signed in black ink:
'Here is the response to Benjamin Péret :...What Dalí is criticized for today can be explained, in my opinion, by intellectual isolation. What Dalí brought us that is strictly surrealist is of such value that to part with it would be disastrous.’ [auction catalogue, 2003, translation by Christina Heflin, 2023]

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