The Collection
Home Page > Works > [Alphonse Toussenel, in a manner...]
Description
Manuscript signed by André Breton, undated.
This homage to Alphonse Toussenel, intended for Surrealism itself, is one of the few texts by Breton to allude to the death camps. Centred on a comparison between the animal magnetism of the viper and man's carnivorous vocation, it leads to a reflection on the atomic threat, an obsession of the late 1950s. Breton reaffirms the responsibilities of the intellectual world, which is too often absolved of its positions by the ‘old resource’ of separating the work from the author. [Atelier André Breton website, 2005]
Signed autograph manuscript, undated.
1 page in-4°, autograph manuscript (1953) in ink by André Breton, with erasures and corrections, relating to Alphonse Toussenel.
“Alphonse Toussenel, in a manner that could not be more poignant, describes in ‘Trietia’ the fascination exerted by the viper on the frog and the bird. He shows them caught up in an irrevocable process of mortal attraction. The abyss into which the victim is finally thrown - rather than has fallen into - has its answer in man's mind... He must realise that God did not just say to all his creatures: ‘Grow and multiply’. He also said to them, ‘Eat one another’.’’ [Auction Catalogue, 2003]
| Creation date | sd [1953] |
| Bibliographical material | 1 pages in-4° - MS - black ink on blue paper |
| Languages | French |
| Number of pages | 1 p. |
| Reference | 1296000 |
| Breton Auction, 2003 | Lot 2389 |
| Keywords | Criticism, Publication |
| Categories | Manuscripts, Andre Breton's Manuscripts |
| Set | [Archives] Le surréalisme, même |
| Permanent link | https://cms.andrebreton.fr/en/work/56600100549900 |