THE SURREALISTS
llya
Ehrenbourg
I
N AN OLD CHARLIE CHAPLIN FILM there is a picturesque if somewhat
unappetizing incident. The hero enters a restaurant and orders fowl.
He is no ordinary glutton, but the daintiest of epicures, and he likes his
bird only when it is decidedly "high." He accordingly goes out into the
lcitclien to see to it that the pheasant is sufficiently tainted. For connois–
seurs of his sort, it is customary to hang the fowl up by the neck. When
the neclr rots off and the bird drops to the floor, the pheasant is ready
to be put into the oven. The chef and his assistants are forced to hold
their noses; even their sense of professional duty is not strong enough to
enable them to overcome their repugnance. Not so the delighted gourmet;
he inhales the spoiled meat odor as greedily as if it came from a cluster
of lilies of the valley.
I am not quite sure as to whether the Parisian "Surrealists" are to
be compared to the pheasant strung up .by the neclr or to the wily chef.
I am not sure as to whether they are mentally sick or merely very clever,
these young fellows who make a trade of insanity. One thing is certain,
they have a following of connoisseurs, and well to do ones at that: a copy
of a poem by Rene Crevel* on "Imperial Japan" paper sells for three hun–
dred francs, while the worlr of another poet, Peret, brings five hundred
francs the copy.
The Surrealist magazine is provided with a phosphorescent wrapper
that glows in the dark. It would be hard, certainly, to explain just why
the publication must appear in this format, just as it would be to demon–
strate that a rotten pheasant is any more savory than a fresh one. It may
be a matter of taste, but it is at the same time material for the psychiatrist.
These young fellows call themselves Surrealists, that is to say, the devotees
• TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.-In justice to Creve!, a justice which Ehrenbourg himself
would be the first to want to see done, it must by all means be pointed out that
this article was written in 1933. The author of
Mon corps et moi
afterward came
through beautifully, to take his manly stand beside Aragon and Malraux as a prole–
tarian revolutionist in the true sense of the word. At the recent Paris Congress, he
made an admirable address, and on the preceding May 1, he had spoken before an
audience of workers who had been deeply stirred by his words. His death shortly
after the Congress came as a great shock to his comrades and is still fresh in mind.
Knowing that he was doomed by cancer, he had worked feverishly to the very last
for the cause. Poems on "Imperial Japan" were a thing of the past with him.
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