From Paris to Tlön: Surrealism as World Literature

Description

Surrealism began as a movement in poetry and visual art, but it turned out to have its widest impact worldwide in fiction—including in major world writers who denied any connection to surrealism at all. At the heart of this book are discoveries Delia Ungureanu has made in the archives of Harvard’s Widener and Houghton libraries, where she has found that Jorge Luis Borges and Vladimir Nabokov were greatly indebted to surrealism for the creation of the pivotal characters who brought them world fame: Pierre Menard and Lolita. In From Paris to Tlön: Surrealism as World Literature, Ungureanu explores the networks of transmission and transformation that turned an avant-garde Parisian movement into a global literary phenomenon. From Paris to Tlön gives a fresh account of surrealism’s surprising success, exploring the process of artistic transfer by which the surrealist object rapidly evolved from a purely poetic conception to a mainstay of surrealist visual art and then a key element in late modernist and postmodern fiction, from Borges and Nabokov to such disparate writers as Gabriel García Márquez, Haruki Murakami, and Orhan Pamuk in the 21st century. Cover page Halftitle page Series page Title page Copyright page Dedication Contents List of Illustrations Introduction 1 Intellectual Networks and Surrealist Objects Gaming the system The world comes to Paris From automatic writing to the surrealist object 2 On the Road to Establishment: Surrealism in the 1930s The second manifesto Who is Salvador Dalí? Surrealism conquers the world (1933–1939) 3 Pierre Menard the Sur-realist Lautréamont and plagiarism in Littérature, Minotaure, Mesures, and Sur Littérature is the birthplace of Pierre Menard From Lautréamont’s plagiarism to Breton’s surrealist object Lautréamont as a model for Pierre Menard Les Chants de Maldoror: from anonymity to pen name Lautréamont’s Poésies, plagiarism, and surrealism Menard’s surreal bibliography The common denominator A retrospective prophecy 4 Surrealism on the New York Market Introducing surrealism: Levy and Barr Barr’s fantastic art exhibit and Levy’s Surrealism Dalí at Levy’s gallery and at the New York World’s Fair 5 The Battle Over the New World VVV versus Vogue Where is surrealism? The surrealist object: try it on with Breton and Dalí 6 From Dulita to Lolita The spectral beauty of language Lolita’s surrealist sister: Dalí’s Dulita Dullita—Galuchka—Lolita A scent of surrealism: Lolita’s Soleil Vert perfume Humbert’s Amour fou 7 The Ghosts of Surrealism in the World Novel Strategies for going global: Orhan Pamuk and Mircea Cărtărescu Surrealist noir: Aragon’s Cahier noir and Pamuk’s Black Book Louis Aragon and La Défense de l’infini: a novel for posterity From transparent objects to innocent objects Beyond Tlön: Cărtărescu’s Bucharest Being-objects in “Gemini”: books and playing cards 2 Messages hidden in maps: the cryptogram world of Blinding The paradise of crimson traps: Solenoid Bibliography Index Plates