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Higgledy-piggledy

Manuscript

Author

Author André Breton
People cited Charles Baudelaire, Jacques Brenner, François Coppée, Tristan Corbière, Lucien-Graux, Stéphane Mallarmé, Matarasso, Gérard de Nerval, Arthur Rimbaud, Charles Cros, Valentine Hugo, Alfred Jarry, Germain Nouveau, Jean Paulhan

Description

Autograph manuscript by André Breton written between December 1958 and January 1959, published in BIEF n°4 in February 1959.

Breton’s anger was considerable when he came across the Anthologie des poètes de la N.R.F., published in December 1958 - "for the holidays", as they say in the publishing world. Signing a reading note for BIEF No.4, he toned down its virulence somewhat (for example, erasing the adjective "dreadful" affixed to "amalgam") so as to make his attack more specific, by pointing out some aberrations and inaccuracies. ‘En vrac’ (‘Higgledy-piggledy’) is the title of this article denouncing the heterogeneity of this ‘mishmash’. [Atelier André Breton website, 2005]

Autograph manuscript, undated [December 1958-January 1959].
- 2 handwritten pages in-4°, titled in ink and signed by Breton, with erasures and corrections of a text in which Breton criticizes the Anthologie des poètes de la N.R.F., by Jacques Brenner, already criticized in Médium No.1 for his presentation of Germain Nouveau's poetic works at the Nouvelle Revue Française.

"We regret that we cannot join in the praise with which a hasty critic has thought it necessary to lavish upon the republication of the Anthologie des poètes de la N.R.F. Beyond its weighty and off-putting aspect [...] the book lover is confronted with a mishmash in which the best and the worst have been thrown together.” [Sale Catalogue, 2003].

Bibliography

André Breton, in BIEF, n°4, 15 février 1959, p. 1

Anthologie des poètes de la NRF

See also