An anthology containing poems by about 25 poets (Picasso, Dali, etc). The introduction says
- "Of all modern movements in the combined visual and verbal arts, [surrealism's] heritage is proving to be the most powerful and the most lasting" (p.11)
- "Surrealist love picks up on the tradition of courtly love, with all its inbred contraries: to possess is no longer to love, so the truest love is in the pursuit itself" (p.14), though in surrealism, as Breton wrote, love can be "Always for the first time".
Here are some extracts that I liked -
My love whose sex is gladiolus
Is placer and platypus
Algae and sweets of yore
Is mirror
(Breton)She is absorbed in my shadow,
Like a stone upon the sky
(Eluard)beautiful as the uprising of the poor
...
your armpits are night but your breasts are day
your words are stone but your tongue is rain
(Paz)my tomb burst open my red grasshopper rain
(Péret)
Other reviews
- Jeffery Beam (the addition of a number of women poets eases the heavy chauvinism one sometimes feels when reading or viewing surrealist works. ... These poems remind us how flaccid, self-absorbed, and derivative so many contemporary surrealist inspired poems are.)
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