CORRESPONDENCE
THE
FRENCH
LIST
CORRESPONDENCE Georges Bataille Michel Leiris EDITED WITII NOTES BY LOUIS YVERT
AFfERWORD BY BERNARD NOEL
TRANSLATED BY LIZ HERON
CALCUlTA LONDON NEW YORK
P6( :J(P03
, /1''(5 Z't8~/3 ~ {)oS
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o Editions Gallimard, PAris,2004 English translation 0 Liz Heron 2008 First published in English by Seagull Boob. 2008 ISBN-IS
978 1 905422678
British Library Catalogumg-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British library Typeset by Seagull Boob, Calcutta. India Printed and bound in the United Kingdom by Biddies Ltd, King's Lynn
CONTENTS
Editor's Acknowledgements
vii
Abbreviations
viii
MICHEL LEIRIS On Georges Bataille Georges Bataille as Don Giovanni From Bataille the Impossible to the Impossible Documents From the TIme of Lord Auch GEORGES BATAILLE On Michel Leiris Surrealism from Day to Day
1 3
6 22
39 41
The Publication of 'X Corpse'
63
Racism
70
GEORGES BATAILLE and MICHEL LEIRIS Correspondence 1924-61
77
MICHEL LEIRIS Georges Bataille, As Tune Goes By
225
ROBERT DESNOS, GEORGES B'ATAILLE and MARCEL GRIAULE Eye
243
BERNARD NOEL Afterword: A Way of Looking that is Understood
253
Appendix: A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology
261
Periodicals to which Bataille and Leins both contributed (1925-62)
285
Bibliography
289
Index
293
Editor's Acknowledgements
My warmest thanks to Julie Bataille and Jean Jamin, who gladly gave me authorization to publish the letters and other writings of Georges Bataille and Michel Leiris collected in this work. I am also grateful to Denis Hollier; who authorized me to reproduce his commentaries to the letters that feature in his book Le College de sociologie, 1937-1939, Gallimard, 1995 edition; to Genevieve Firouz-Abadie,Jacques Fraenkel, Jean-Luc Froissart, Marina Galletti, Evelyne Grossman, Delphine Herve, Annie Maillis and Catherine Maubon, whose help and advice have been invaluable; and to the institutions which hold the letters of Bataille and Leiris and which have given me authorization to publish them: the Bibliotheque nationale de France (Department of Manuscripts) and the Bibliotheque litteraire Jacques Doucet.
Louis Yvert
Abbreviations
BLJD
Bibliotheque litteraire ] acques Doucet
BNF~Mss
Bibliotheque nationale de France, manuscript department
f. and ff.
folio and folios
LRS
Leiris (Michel Leiris archive in the BLJD)
NAF
Nouvelles acquisitions francaises (new French acquisitions in the BNF)
NRF
The Nouvelle Revuefranfaise
OC
Georges Bataille's Oeuvres completes (Complete Works), VOLS 1-12, Gallimard, 1970-88
MICHEL LEIRIS
On Georges Bataille
Georges Bataille as Don Giovanni
I've always lilted the fact that Da Ponte and Mozart's Don Giovanni was called a dramma giocoso. I don't believe that greatness ever has anything to gain by styling itself as great. Quite the contrary: those who go furthest and highest are the ones who haven't weighed themselves down with heavy boots for the walk or the climb. Isn't the reason why Georges Bataille has frequently invoked Nietzschean 'vitalism' that he knows greatness to be incapable of self-advertisement without thereby setting itself a standard? That the whole of Georges Bataille's output (or very nearly) falls under the category of eroticism derives certainly from a penchant, one moreover justified by a philosophy (there is no better route than eroticism, that opening among openings, for approaching, in as much as is at all possible, the elusive emptiness of death). But I think too that there is an underlying bias and that this bias is a matter of method. Isn't taking carnal pleasure as an axis of reference, and aligning oneself firmly on the side of libertinage, a way of ruling out any risk of getting stuck in the kind of greatness that is too hidebound to be supreme greatness? Isn't tackling from the very outset the most basic of all prohibitions (the one that regulates and humanizes the animal business of sex), also a way of proclaiming that true morality can only be attained somewhere beyond morality? And that it is only in breaking boundaries that worthwhile progress can be 3
Bataille & Leins
1
made? And, finally, doesn't the provocation inherent in a body of work that is so brazen in its orientation point from the start to the crucial importance of defiance, the means whereby a man irreducibly asserts himself in a vein which finds its extreme expression in the heroism of Don Giovanni as he stubbornly insists on his own evildoing even when faced with the terrible troth of the Commendatore's statue? I have long been persuaded that Georges Bataille, albeit pursuing a path other than that of carefree debauchery, is in his own way a kind of Don Giovanni. I can see no other writer these days whose words-allowing him to be simultaneously masked and revealed-function to this degree as instruments of personal seduction. Like Don Giovanni, he stirs emotions, he uses trickery, frequently shocks and comes out with things of the sort that make Leporello shudder with fear. But whatever register he employs, be' it tragic, humorous, blasphemous or the voice of reason, this seducer, who readily resorts to the pseudonym 1 as mode of disguise and sometimes adopts the Bluebeard persona routinely given to the Don by so many of his operatic interpreters, is a fascinating writer. No one could doubt that he ever plays for anything less than high stakes, after the fashion of the man who receives the stone guest.
1..Up until 1965, three of Bataille's erotic works were published clandestinely under pseudonyms: The St!Y"Y of the Eye u!lder the name Lord Auch (three editions, 1928, 1947 and 1951); Madame Edwarda under the name Pierre Angelique (four editions: 1941, 1945, 1956 and 1965) and Le Petit under the name Louis Trente (one edition, 1943). Moreover, these editions usually came out without the name of the illustrator or the publisher, or else false names and false dates would be given for publication or printing. Because he was ~ librarian at the Bibliotheque nationale and, later, the director of two municipal libraries in the provinces (at Carpentras, then at Orleans), Bataille could scarcelr let himself be prosecuted for 'affronts to public decency by book publication', according to the legal statutes of his day. But, as Leiris remarks, Bataille himself had a fondness for
4
Georges Bataille as Don Giovanni All of human desire, in the forms decreed by traditional morality as the basest or most noble, courses through the words of this mystic of debauchery, who is apt to snare his readers and make them his accomplices, just as the 'one thousand and three' of the Cataloguer aria had been for Don Giovanni. What is particularly irresistible about his writing is the infinite character of this human desire, expressed in a language that shines with 'the ageless touch, the ageless and cosmopolitan style',3 as Baudelaire put it, and which, sooner or later, will be strikingly apparent in this practical joker who teaches us that the only way to truly 'live one's life' is to live it with fervid purity, in the dizzying manner with which death is lived, and, at one and the same time, with unbridled exuberance.
disguises, blasphemies and scandals. A case in point is the name Lord Auch, which is certainly blasphemous, referring to the Lord God of the Scriptures in English and an abbreviation of 'aux chiottes' ('to the shithouse')-see 'The Publication of I'A Corpse" " p. 63 in this volume. However; this pseudonym was not exported across the Channel and the English translation of The Story of tht Eye was published under the name Pierre Angelique (A Tau of Satisfied Desire, trans. Audiart, Paris: The Olympia Press, 1953). Michel Surya devoted a chapter of his book Georges Bataille, la mortal'oeusne, Gallimard, 1992 (trans. Krzysztof Fijalkowski and Michael Richardson as Georges Bataille: An Intellectual Biog;aphy, London: Verso, 2002) to Bataille's use of pseudonyms, a chapter that takes its title from the work: :J'~cris pour effacer mon nom' (I write to erase my own name), Gallimard, pp. 114-19 (English translation, pp. 88-92). On the different editions of The Story of the Eyt, see P: 8 ,
NOTE
7 in this volume.
2. 'Madamina, it catalogo e questo', Leporello's aria in Act I, Scene Five. Don Giovanni's 1,003 conquests are only those in Spain. Along with those in Italy (640), Germany (231) and other countries, the total catalogue exceeds 2,000. 3. Baudelaire, 'Fusees', XII, Oeuvres compUtes, VOL. 1, Gallimard, Bibliotheque de la Pleiade, p.661.
5
From Bataille the Impossible to the Impossible Documents
It was thanks to his colleague at the Bibliotheque nationale, Jacques Lavaud, another former pupil of the Ecole de chartes in Paris and the author of a thesis on Philippe Desportes, that I met Georges Bataille. I had known Lavaud for a long time and he, being a good bit older than me, had been my guide into modem literature. In the course of 1924, which happened to be the year when I became a Surrealist, he introduced us, partly (he told me later) to assume the role of detached observer ,at whatever odd outcome such a meeting might precipitate.s This took place one evening in a very quiet and bourgeois location-the cafe Marigny near the Elysee. I've forgotten what time of year it was, though it was def4. Jacques Lavaud (1894-1975) was six years older than Leiris. The date of their first meeting is not known, but was probably around the start of World War It in"Paris, in the' 16th arrondissement. Leiris mentions it in three of the dossiers 'Souvenirs (1901 ... published as an appendix to La Regie du jeu (Gallimard, Bibliotheque de la Pleiade, 2003): dossiers 27 (p. 1097), 30 (p. 1099) and 35 (p. 1104). These three dossiers concern the years 1916-17, a period when, although already in the army, Jacques Lavaud would mix with the teenage Leiris and his classmates from school or from the baccalaureat crammer. These teenagers got up to all kinds of odd tricks, mainly at the expens~ of their elder, whom they called 'PouicPouic', In April 1917, Jacques Lavaud was seriously wounded at the Chemin des Dames (for the rest of his life he had a shell splinter lodged near his heart). H'e then studied at the Ecole des chartes (the School of Paleography and Librarianship), from which he graduated in
r
6
Bataille the Impossible initely not in-summer since I think Bataille was wearing an overcoat in black-and-white herringbone tweed of the kind worn in town, together with a grey felt hat. I made friends very quickly with Georges Bataille, who was not much older than me. Not only did I admire the greater breadth and variety of his cultural knowledge in comparison with mine, but also his nonconformist way of thinking that was distinguished by what we hadn't yet come to call 'black humour'. Nor was I insensible to the external qualities of his person: he was fairly thin and his physical presence conveyed something of the romantic as well as the twentieth century; he already possessed that elegance (in its younger, less discreet version, of course) that would never leave him, even when it became cumbersome and gave him that slight air of a peasant familiar to most of those who knew him; the elegance was entirely his and it was apparent without any self-important showiness of dress. To match his somewhat deep-set, close-together eyes of a brilliant noorlday blue, he had teeth curiously like those of some woodland creature; these were frequently displayed in the act of laughter that I (perhaps wrongly) considered sarcastic. Paul Valery, regarded by Bataille as a perfect example of academicism, was ranked at the top of his list of enemies, precisely because of this January 1920, and was appointed to the Bibliotheque nationale the following month. He could have got to know Bataille either at the Ecole des chartes (although they were two years apart .there) or, more likely, at the Bibliotheque nationale (where Bataille was appointed in July 1922). In 1924, Leiris mentions him in lJisJourna11922-1989 (ed. Jean Jamin, Gallimard, 1992): 'Jacques Lavaud and social pataphysics: the family replaced by the decimal system' (12 October, ~. 68); tan afternoon project with Jacques Lavaud: to mystify a certain number of people by suggesting the creation of a Jarry museum' (19 November, p. 79). In 1936, Lavaud was awarded his doctorate with the thesis Un POtte de cour au temps des demiets Valois: Philippe Desportes (Droz, 1936; A Court Poet in the Days of;the Last Valois), and in 1937 he was appointed to a teaching post at the arts faculty of Poitiers University; from 1954 until his retirement in 1964 he was faculty dean there. See Edmond-Rene Labande, Jacques Lavaud (1894-1975)', Bihliotheque de ['Ecole des dumes, VOL. 134, Bibliotheque, 1976, pp. 458--61.
7
Bataille & Leins perfection. Nor did the spirit of Dada fmd favour with him; he talked about the chance there would be to launch a Yes movement, involving a perpetual acquiescence to everything and being superior to the No that had been Dada because it would avoid the puerility of provoking through systematic negation. One project that we toyed with for a while, but to no avail, was the founding of a review; in this we were like so many young intellectuals who have just come together and discovered a number of shared outlooks on literature and everything else. The most noteworthy aspect of this project was that we had decided that our periodical would, if possible, have as its base a brothel in the old Saint-Denis quarter, an establishment chanced upon on one of our late.. night wanders, squalid and rundown enough for us to find it irresistible.f We would have tried, of course, to involve the female staff there
in producing our review. On 24 December, with the idea of' publication in mind, I had noted down some of the dreams that two of the girls had told us. From Gaby: 'I had done some embroidery for a slip. I put it to soak in the sink to get it clean and it was washed away. I threw myself in to catch-hold of it but instead of the water I fonnd stairs, stairs that went on and on.' Also from Gaby: f'I buy a revolver to kill my little sister's boyfriend. The more blood I see, the morel want to keep firing.' From-Marinette: 'I was-going for a walk with a pack of little black dogs and a small white cat. I had the dogs on a leash, but not the cat. They turned into a cloud.'6 At this time, Bataille had not yet emerged as a writer, The Story ofthe Eye 7 was still to appear; likewise the article on the Aztecs that he wrote for a very 5. Bataille, gave 'his own account of meeting Leiris and their joint projects with Jacques Lavaud in 'Surreali~m from Day to Day', p. 41 in this volume.
6. Leiris,Journal1922-1989, p. 87. 7. Histou« de l'oeil, by Lord Auch, with eight original lithographs, Paris, 1928_ No name was given for either the illustrator (Andre Masson) or the publisher (Rene Bonnel, with maquettes by Pascal Pia). Still under the name Lord Auch, a new version was published and reprinted:
8
Bataille the Impossible official exhibition of pre-Columbian art,8 the first instance of the hybrid J approach combining passion and objectivity that he .was to develop with such brilliance. All the same, we could not have known one another for very long when he spoke to me about a novel in which he fictionalized himself in 'the guise of the famous murderer Georges Tropmann (his partial namesake)? but which later took the form of a first-person narrative. Could this
1) illustrated by Hans Bellmer, with place and date of publication given as 'Seville, 1940'; in reality, Paris: K. editeur, 1947 (see Georges Bataille, Romans et reeds, ed.
Jean-Francois Louette, Gallimard, Bibliotheque de
la Pleiade, 2004, p. 1026);
2) no illustrations, place and date given as 'Burgos, 1941'; in reality, Paris, J eanJacques Pauvert, 1951. After Bataille's death, this new version was published under his name (for the first time with Jean-] acque~,Pauvert, in 1967). 3) Both these versions appear without any illustrations in DC, VOL. 1. ed. Denis Hollier, 1970, pp. 9--78 (1928 version) and pp. 569-608 (1947 version). They also appear in Romans et recits, with the illustrations in reverse order, pp. 1-45 (1947 version, illustrated by Bellmer) and pp. 51-106 (1928 version, illustrated by Masson). The first two editions were reproduced with the illustrations by Andre Masson and Hans Bellmer in Georges 'Bataille, Histoire de l'oeil, Madame Edwarda, with a study by Magdeleine Lessana titled 'De Borel a Blanchot, une joyseuse chance: Georges Bataille', Pauvert, 2002, boxed set of three volumes. Here, the second and fourth editions of Madame Eduasda are published with the illustrations by Jean Fautrier (1945) and Hans Bellmer (1965). 8. ' l'Amerique disparue', Cahiers de la RJpublique des lettres, des sciences et des arts, NO. 11, 1928, 'l'art precolombien, l'Amerique avant Christophe Colomb', pp. 5-14 (DC, VOL 1, pp. 152-8). The exhibition, Les arts anciens de l'Amerique, was organized by Alfred Metraux and Georges Henri Rivierewith the involvement of Bataille and Andre Schaeffner, among others, and took place at the Musee des
Arts Decoratifs in May-June 1928.
9. Troppmann (1849-70), spelled with two p's. His first name was Jean-Baptiste, and not Georges, and the fact that Leiris has emphatically given him Bataille's first name is a strange lapsus. He was a working man, a mechanic, who killed seven members of;the same family (five of them children) in September 1~?9, at Pantin, near Paris, and was guillotined in]anuary 1870. See Pierre Drachline, Le Crime de lbntin, l'affaire 1Toppmann, Denoel, 1985.
9
Bataille & Leiris have been U:C.IO whose manuscript he eventually destroyed? One episode from this novel survived as the story of Dirty (it would seem that this unclean title was derived from the name Dorothy), which was first published on its own,U topped with an epigraph from Hegel and a brief note but with hardly any revisions, then used again as the introduction to-BlueofNoon. 12 As far as I can remember, this story, set at the Savoy in London, was-in the rudimentary state I knew it in-a first chapter (the one that the two of us called the 'Savoy chapter') followed by a Flemish episode in which the young, rich and beautiful Englishwoman Dirty was to be seen accompanied by the narrator and indulging in an orgy with the female stallholders in a fishmarket, at their very place of work. In what followed these two chapters there. was a certainMylord l'Arsouille'f touch (this was later rut out, when Bataille had rid himself of all outward romanticism, though not without continuing to .burn with it beneath his judicious exterior) where everything unfolds between the extremes of aristocratic luxury and a vulgarity literally in the , fishwife mode. I'm not quite sure, but it was perhaps from this early period of our friendship that Bataille got me to read a work o£which he had the high-
10. 'Ayear before The Story of the Eye, I had written a book titled u(C., a short book and a kind of crazy one. J.f'C. was as funereal as The Story of theEye isjuvenile. The manuscript ofJ.f'C. got burnt, and this is hardly regrettable given my sad state at the time: it was a cry of horror [etc.]' (WC., DC, VOL. 3, p. 59).
11. Dirty was written in 1928 and published by the magazine Fontaine in the LAge d' or series, NO. VOL.
16 (28 pp.). The epigraph taken from Hegel and Bataille's note were reproduced in DC, 1, p. 560.
12. Dated May 1935, Le Bleu du ciel was published in 1957 with Jean-Jacques Pauvert and reprinted in 1971 in DC, VOL. 3, ed. Thadee Klossowski, pp. 377-487. The introduction does indeed correspond to the text of Dirty, but in a slightly different version. 13. Lord Henry Seymour (1805-59); an English dandy who lived in Paris.
10
Bataille the Impossible est opinion: Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground, a book in which (as is well known) the hero and apparent narrator is mesmerizing in his stubbornness to be what is commonly called an 'impossible' individual, someone who is ridiculous and obnoxious to an intolerable degree. Whatever the case, Bataille-then an habitue of lowlife dives and the company of ptostitutes, like so many heroes of Russian literature-set so much store by Dostoevsky that the story of Dirty includes a reference to the great novelist: 'The scene that came before was, in short, worthy of Dostoevsky,'14 he proclaims while relating in flashback the scene of drunkenness and degrading eroticism that takes place in the London mansion. Shortly after I got to know him, I introduced Bataille to the circle that for the previous two years had been my fount of nourishment in art and poetry. The rallying point for this small group was the studio of the painter Andre 'Masson.U at 45 rue Blomet-premises of a very
14. The reference in the introduction to Bleu du ciel is: 'everywhere, the scene preceding this repugnant orgy-after which rats lurked around two bodies spread out on the ground-was worthy of Dostoevsky' (DC, VOL. 3, p. 560). 15. According to Georges Limbour, Masson's studio, vast, but fairly squalid, was located at the end of a series of courtyards overgrown with grass and a few stunted trees on what resembled waste ground. There were other studios of the same kind there, including Mir6's, but also a much bigger one next to Masson's, where some locksmiths worked. The whole time Masson lived there the background noise of their machines accompanied his every thol;lght and action with a constant hum that would stop suddenly at 6 p.m. on the dot. An uncanny stillness then settled over the place. The paintings seemed strangely to awaken, words were heard in a different way' (Georges Limbour; preface to Andre
Masson, EntTetiens avecGeorges Charbonnier, Rene Julliard, 1958, p. 9).
In his text, '45, rue Blomet' (1982), Leiris lists those who frequented the place: Andre Masson, Joan Mir6, Antonin Artaud, Georges Limbour, Armand Salacrou, the American poet Evan Shipman and himself. He adds: It was I who [...Jbrought in Georges Bataille, a numismatist at the time and extremely dissatisfied with his discipline, a man whose elegantly bourgeois exterior quite belied the ideas of this violator of taboos' (Zebrage, Gallimard, 1992, p. 223).
11
Bataille & Leiris Dostoevskian dilapidation. Masson had already produced some wonderful drawings in which sexual abandon evoked a return to. the origins of the world, and he would become Bataille's great illustrator in The St017J of the Eye and other texts where eroticism converged with lyrical cosmogony and philosophy of the sacred. At the time I joined the Surrealist movement, after Masson and a little before his neighbour Joan Mir6 did, Bataille had kept his distance from it. His only contribution to In Revolution surrealiste consisted of a selection of Fatrasies published in Issue 6 with a note by him that was unsigned, not even initialled.J" It was'thanks to the erudition acquired at the Ecole de chartes that he knew these little thirteenth-century French poems, rightly deemed masterpieces of the nonsense genre; he had already talked to me about them.and it was to me that he submitted them.I? Bataille was suspicious at first, then resolutely hostile (at the time he was 'general secretary' of the review Documents, 18 from 1929 to 1930, and
a
Masson and Mir6 had had their studios at rue Blomet since the winter of 1920 oan Mir6, 'Souvenir de la rue Blomet', inJoan Mir6, Ecrits et entretiens, selected, introduced and annotated by Margit Rowell, published by Daniel Lelong editeur, 1995, pp. 112-17). The site of the studios has become the square Blomet, where a sculpture by Mir6 now stands. 16. Bataille had refused permission 'for his name to appear in anything at all [...], because he mistrusted Surrealism' (Leiris to Bernard-Henri Levy in the latter's book, us Aventures de La liberu, Grasset, 1991, p. 178). The Fatrasies published in, La Revolution surrealiste were reprinted in EIre des vents, NOS 3-4, Spring 1981, 'Autour de Michel Leiris', pp. 121-5, where the introductory note and the translations are attributed to Bataille. 17. It was Leiriswho had asked for them, in a letter of 16July 1925 (l..etter3, p. 84 in this volume). 18. Documents. Doctrines, archaeolog'J1 fine arts, ethnography, then Documents. Archaeologyl fine arts, ethnography, variety. There were 15 issues of the magazine, the first dated 'April 1929', the last, -Year2, 1930, No.7', appearing in April or May 1931. Editor: Carl Einstein. General Secretary: Georg~s Bataille. Editorial board: 11 members, including Carl Einstein, Pierre d'Espezel (Bataille's colleague at the Department of Coins), Dr Paul Rivet, Georges Henri
12
Bataille the Impossible a focus of dissidence), when refusing the Surrealists' invitation to attend a large meeting called to debate the 'Trotsky affair'19-he did not beat about the bush: 'too many bloody boring idealists'. Later on, a mutual esteem for Breton and for Eluard brought him into alliance with them and even a collaboration of a literary nature on the review Minotaure 20 and a political one when he initiated the antifascist movement ContreAttaque,21 but for all this he remained no less an outsider to the group. Riviere (respectively director and deputy director of the Ethnography Museum at the Trocadero) and Georges Wildenstein (editor of the Gauue des Beaux-arts). This board ceased ~o be referred to after Issue 5 (October 1929). Documents has been republished in facsimile (jean-Michel Place, 1991, 2 VOlS) with a preface by Denis Hollier titled 'La valeur d'usage de l'impossible' (The Use Value of the Impossible), which is reprinted in his collection us Depossedis (Bataille, Cadlois, Leiris, Malraux, Sartre), published by Minuit, 1993. In his preface, Denis Hollier points out that the idea for Documents came from Bataille and Pierre d'Espezel, See also Surya, Georges Bataille, La mort a l'oeuore, pp. 147-57 (English translation, pp. 116-25). Pierre d'Espezel (1893-1959) was a librarian, numismatist and art historian; with Jean Babelon (1889-1978), he was co-founder and co-editor of Arhhuse, a review of art and archaeology (1923-31) in which Bataille had published numismatic studies in 192.7. and 1928. D'Espezel also contributed to Beaux-arts and to the Gazette des Beaux-arts, but not to Documents. 19. This was the meeting on 11 March 1929 at the Chateau Bar, which on 12 February had been preceded by a letter/questionnaire sent by the Surrealists to more than 70 'intellectuals with revolutionary sympathies', among them Bataille, Leiris and Andre Masson. See Louis Aragon and Andre Breton, 'To follow, short contribution to the dossier by certain intellectuals with revolutionary sympathies, Paris 1929', Varietes, Brussels, special issue, June 1929, 'Le surrealisme en 1929', reprinted in Andre Breton, Oeuvres completes, VOL. I, Gallimard, Bibliotheque de la Pleiade, pp. 951-91 (pp. 953-4 for the letter/questionnaire and P: 962 for the responses of Bataille, Leiris and Masson). 20. Published from June 1933 to May 1939. 21. Contre-Attaque, the Union of Revolutionary Intellectuals in Struggle, whose inaugural manifesto appeared on 7 October 1935, was described by Bataille as 'a small political grouping bringing together some former members of [Boris Souvarine's] Communist Circle and,
13
Bataille & Leiris It was with Documents that Bataille first assumed the role of leader. Although his power there was far from untrammelled, it seems now as if the review had been made in his image: it was a]anus-faced publication with one side turned towards the higher spheres of culture (where Bataille was, for good or ill, in his sanctioned element, both by profession and education) and the other towards a savage domain where travellers ventured with neither map nor passport of any kind. Financed by the art dealer Georges Wildenstein,22 who also published the Gazette des Beaux-arts, Documents was primarily driven by Georges Henri Riviere,23 then deputy director of the Museum of Ethnography at Trocadero, along with Bataille himself and the German poet and cultural critic Carl Einsteins! who specialized in modern. Western art and was the in the wake of a clear-cut reconciliation with Andre Breton, the whole of the surrealist group' (Tragment of an Autobiographical Note', in Laure, Ecrits, fragments, lettres . . . , Societe. nouvelle des editions Pauvert, 1985, p. 311). Leiris refused to join the movement, approving of its aims but considering it puerile in its forms of action (interview with Bernard-Henri Levy, LesAuentures de La liberu, Grasset, 1991, p. 175). As for Bataille himself, see Leiris'sJoumal, 7 January 1936, p. 232 in this volume. The Contre-Attaque manifesto and the various texts published by the movement can be found in DC, VOL. 1, pp. 379-432. 22. Georges Wildenstein (1892-1963), art dealer, art historian, publisher and benefactor of the Ethnography Museum at Trocadero. 23. In 1986-87, Leiris was to say: 'I think Riviere got the idea for Documents and he must have thought that Bataille would make a very good general secretary for it' (interview with Sally Price and Jean ]amin in Michel Leiris, C'est-a-dire, Jean-Michel Place, 1992, p. 32). In fact, Riviere was probably only connected with the project at a later stage and at the request of the Georges Wildenstein, in order to strengthen the 'ethnographic' wing of the publication. 24. Carl Einstein was the titular editor of Documents and Bataille the general secretary. In fact, it was Bataille who ran the magazine (see 'The Publication of 1\ Corpse" " p. 63 in this volume).
Nonetheless, in her Carl Einstein, 1885-1940: itinerarieS d'une pertsee moderne, Presses de l'universite de Paris-Sorbonne, 2002, pp. 232-45,·in the chapter 'Laventure de Documents', Liliane Meffre deems Einstein to have had a decisive role in the project, judging him to have been 'scandalously and partially' forgotten in the introduction to the reprint of the magazine (Denis
14
Bataille the Impossible author of the first study on 'Negro art' .25 The contributors came from an extremely wide range of backgrounds, since writers in the vanguard (most of them renegades from Surrealism who had rallied to Bataille) were side by side with representatives of a host of different disciplines (art history, musicology, archaeology, ethnology, etc.), some of them members of the Institut de France or occupying high-ranking positions in museums or libraries. This was an absolutely 'impossible' mixture, more because of the diversity of the disciplines-and the indisciplines-than for the disparities between the individuals themselves. Some were really conservative in their thinking, or, at any rate, inclined (like Einstein) towards little more than art-historical writing or reviewing, while others (like Bataille, supported by Riviere and I . as his deputyfor some months in the role of sub-editor; then my successor, the poet Georges Limbour, with an ethnographer, Marcel Griaule 26 coming before me) were applying themselves to using the review as a war machine against received ideas. In the statement issued to launch the review.. there are some paragraphs that seem especially to bear Bataille's hallmarkc TIle most provoking works of art, as yet unclassified, and certain assorted artefacts that have been neglected until now, will be the object' of studies as rigorous and scientific as those of the archaeologists [...]. What we
Hollier's preface). In fact, in the course of the magazine's two-year run, Einstein published around a dozen articles and a number of reports and, to our knowledge, no one has denied the interest of these.
25. Negerplastik (Leipzig, 1915). Different translations into French had been published, with the tide La Sculpture negre. 26. Leiris occupied these posts from 3 June 1929 fJournal, 2 June 1929, p. 188) and shared them for some time with Griaule from August of that year; when the two men met on the premises of the magazine, shortly after the ethnologist's return from his first trip to Abyssinia. See Michel Leiris, Miroirde I'A.friqtu, edsJeanJamin and Jacques Mercier; Gallimard, 1995, p. 114, Nan: 15, and pp. 394-5, NOTE 39.
15
Bataille & Leins broadly have in mind are things that are really disturbing, 'whose outcomes are yet to be defined. In these diverse investigations, the sometimes absurd nature of the results or the methods, instead of being concealed, as always happens when the rules of propriety are followed, will be deliberately emphasised, just as much out of hatred for platitudes as from humorous intent. 27
We only need to peruse the nul of Documents in chronological order and we shall see that, after cautious beginnings, greater weight was given to those articles of the programme which at the start had seemed to suggest only the open spirit in,which the periodical would be produced, while essentially keeping it within the bounds ofwhat is ordinarily expected from an art journal. Quickly, under Bataille's guiding hand, it was the provoking and the miscellaneous, if not the, disturbing, that rather than being objects of study became the inherent characteristics of the publication itself, a strange amalgam into whose making there entered many a preposterous element, even if it was by virtue of the juxtaposition with certain texts that continued to reflect the most austere kind ofleaming, or with reproductions of ancient or modern works whose value was hardly debatable. It was with two articles that were seemingly worthy of the official from the Cabinet of Medals and the Ecole de chartes graduate that.Bataille made his entrance in Documents: 'The Academic Horse', about Gaulish coins, arid 'The Apocalypse of Saint-Sever', a description of a medieval manuscript.sf Yet, themes that Bataille was later to develop were already evident in these: hirsute forms (here, those of the Celtic depictions of the
27. The .full text of, this brochure appears in Louis Yvert, Bibliographie des lcrits de Michel Leins, 1924 a 1995, Jean-Michel Place, 1996, pp. 354-5. 28. Articles published in.JNo. 1, April 1929, pp. 27-31, and in No.2, May 1929, pp. 74-84 (DC, VOL~ 1, pp.J59-63 and 164--70).
16
Bataille the Impossible horse) representing 'an answer from the ludicrous and frightft1l night of J humanity, to the platitudes and arrogance of the idealists'; the bracing role of 'filthy or bloody deeds' (such as those that appear in the chansons de geste or in miniatures like those of Saint-Sever). In Issue 3, with 'The Language of Flowers' ,29 its title paradoxically idyllic, Bataille gives a first outline of the aggressively anti-idealist philosophy that was his, in a diversity offorms, up to the point when after lengthy inspection of the idea of the sacred he begins'to elaborate that mystique of the 'impossible' (that is, what overtakes the limits of the possible and whose pursuit is therefore a pure waste of time) and that doctrine-or rather that anti-doctrine-of 'non-knowledge' with which, having reached his full maturity, he went beyond the iconoclastic rage of his youthful revolts. He was then in a position to dispense to those who wished to 'hear it a more effective kind of teaching, in as much as he was enriched by greater experience and knowledge while simultaneously having greater control. This, which might be calledhis inaugural article, gave-him the opportunity to display some reproductions of incongruous vegetable forms (as if incongruity were not a matter ofjudgement but a given in Nature itself) and to wind up by referring to the Marquis de Sade's famous gesture of pulling the petals off roses over a pit of liquid manure. Nonetheless, we have to wait until Issue 4 to see Bataille-a stubborn peasant, who may loo~ quite harmless but for all that digs his heels in-make up his mind to lay his cards squarely on the table. Illustrated with photographs-one was of a most outlandish petit-bourgeois wedding taken in 1905 while the rest were of theatrical types and other figures of the turn-of-the-century at the latest, but with clothes, postures or facial appearance that are antiquated beyond belief-'The Human 29.
NO.
3. June 1929, pp. 160-8 (DC, VOL. 1, pp. 173-8).
17
Bataille & Leiris Figure'30 is a real onslaught by the presenter ofithis farcical gallery of 'madly improbable' creatures (who are none other than men and women who could be our fathers and mothers) against the reassuring idea of any human nature whose continuity would assume 'the permanence of certain distinguished qualities' and against the very idea of 'bringing Nature into the rational order'. Shortlyafter this comes 'The Big Toe',31 with which Bataille literally puts his foot down: full-page reproductions of friends' big toes and a commentary establishing that if the foot is the object of taboos and of fetishization in the sphere of eroticism, it is because it reminds people that life is only a 'movement back.and forth between filth and ideal and ideal and filth' since the feet are in the mud and the head is raised to the sky. This passion for anti-idealism will find its supreme expression in 'base materialism and gnosticism',32 a text of Manichean inspiration in the first instance about gnostic intaglio-work, Wit\! apparent neutrality, he notes: 'God in the abstract (or merely the idea) andabstract matter: the.chief warder and the prison walls'; he sees in the monstrous divinities represented on these stones (among them a headless one, a motif to which he, will later grant great emblematic significance) 'the figuration of forms in which it
i~
possible to
see the image of this base matter, which alone, through its incongruity and an overwhelming lack of regard, enables the intelligence to escape from the constraints of idealism'.
Documents did not renege on its remit as an
art journal.
There was ample
scope for genuine 'documents' (such as those relating to a scandal provoked by the likes of Courbet and Manet33 in their day, or a previously unpublished 30. No.4, September 1929, pp. 194-201 (OC, VOL. 1, pp. 181-5). 31. No.6, November 1929, pp. 297-302 (DC, VOLs 1, pp. 200--04). 32. Year 2, NO.1, [February or March] 1930, pp. 1-8 (DC, VOL. 1, pp. 220--6). 33. Two articles by Marie Elbe (the pseudonym of Marie-Louise Bataille, Georges Bataille's
18
Bataille the Impossible text by the CubistJuan Gris).34 The current output of famous artists or those already on their way to being well known was envisaged under fresh perspectives in relation to those usually adopted by writers on art, and that inexhaustible topic, Picasso, had provided the material for a special issue to which the great sociologist Marcel Mauss had deigned to contribute. ~5 What is more, there is no doubt that Documents must have been the first review, in France at least, to pay tribute to the genius of Antoine Caron36--among several older artists who were practically ignored at the time-as well as taking up unknown newcomers then starting out on their careers, such as Alberto Giacometti''? and Gaston-Louis Roux,38 not to mention Salvador Dah"39 (who, to Bataille's great displeasure, was soon to join the Surrealists). The fact that very marginal things were often brought up as relating in some degree to aesthetics and pertaining to the domain of folklore or ethnography was never at odds-with the-line theoretically envisaged, and, as for Bataille's participation as a writer, whatever were the conclusions he wound up with, in the end he himself ,I
cousin): 'Le scandale Courbet', Year 2, No.4, [1 May] 1930, pp. 227-33. and 'Maner et la critique de son temps'. Year 2, No.2, [March] 1930. pp. 84-91. 34. Juan Gris: "Texte inedit', introduced by Carl Einstein, Year 2. No.5, (June or July] 1930. pp. 267-75. Juan Gris had died in May \927. 35. Special issue 'Hommage a PicassQ' , Year 2. No.3. [April] 1930. 36. Michel Leiris, 'Une peinture d'Antoine Caron'. No.7, December 1929, pp. 348-55. Reprinted in Leiris, Zebrage~ pp. 13-20. . 37. Michel Leiris, 'Alberto Giacometti', No.4. September 1929, ,?p. 209--14. One of the very first articles on Giacometti (who had settled in France in 1925), and which has never been r~printed in any of Leiris's collections. 38. Roger Vitrac, 'Gaston-Louis Roux', No.7, December 1929. pp. 356--63. 39. Reproductions of three paintings by Dalf in No.4, September 1929, pp. 217 and 229, and an article by Bataille, 'Le "[eu lugubre" '; No.7, December 1929, pp. 297-302 (DC, VOL. 1, pp. 210-16).
19
Bataille & Leins played the game by making formal or iconographical analysis the starting point in the majority of his articles. Nonetheless, there is no doubt that the readership of art lovers at whom the magazine was essentially aimed was baffled, not just by the tenor of Bataille's texts and of those by his closest collaborators, but by what was a shocking break with the expected in an art jownal of the late 1920s: the livelyinterest in Afro-American, and even Parisian popular music, in jazz and in talking pictures (still in their babbling infancy), in beautiful Transatlantic film stars, in the reigning singers of the cafe-concert, in popular imagery such as the covers of FantOmas or illustrated news magazines and other outlying subjects (monuments of bygone days in our squares and parks, children's books, carnival masks), together with photographs included by Bataille, not without some degree of mischief, merely because of their unusual, not to say grotesque or frightful, content. Housed on business premises where we stood out as an enclave of eccentricity, badly organized among ourselves and split into -tendencies (which derived from the oddly assorted composition of our team and partly explains the many hued character of a review that was decidedly more incongruous than eclectic), incapable of coming up with brilliant page layouts that would have smoothed the magazine's rough edges, we were finally abandoned by our publisher, a man who was to some extent entertained by the nonconformism of the magazine he financed (perhaps flattered by it as much as frightened) but who nonetheless would have preferred it to bring in more money. In the [mal issue, Bataille wrote a long article on Van Gogh which established a link between the episode where he cut off his ear and the theme of the sun in the painter's work as it appeared both directly and obliquely.w 40. 'La mutilation sacrificielle et l'oreille coupee de Vincent Van Gogh', Year 2, No.8 [April or May 1931], pp. 10-20 (GC, VOL. 1, pp. 258-70).
20
Bataille the Impossible We know how much the whole of Bataille's work was weighed down by the theme of the blinding sun associated with that of sacrifice as a projection outside the self in ecstasy or in death. On certain points he gave way, but things became non-negotiable when he set out to confront the reader with an equivocal reality; it was he who made the running in that bizarre game of loser-takes-all, the story of Documents. With the majority of its core contributors (Bataille and his acolytes, whose writings were baroque and almost always impertinent in one way or another; Einstein too with his laborious and practically untranslatable language) seemingly paid to give it an air of 'impossibility', each by their own lights, the magazine did indeed prove to be impossible in getting no further than its 15th issue. Is this defmition of Georges Bataille's trajectory, during the 30-odd years of a literary life still in gestation when I met him, really just a play on words? After having been the impossible man fascinated by the most unacceptable things he could discover, the man who made Documents by un-making it, he broadened his horizons (in terms of the old idea ofleaving behind the foot-stamping No! of the child in a tantrum) and, knowing that_a man isn't thoroughly a man unless he finds his right measure in such excess, he made himself the man ofImpossibility, avid to attain the point where high and low merge in Dyonisiac vertigo and where distance between all and nothing is abolished. But in Bataille's case, it is probably absurd to want to define an itinerary as if his thinking had been so meagre and linear to contain a starting point and a point of arrival. By making impossibility his governing principle from the start, Bataille created an uncrossable margin around himself, made particularly impossible for the friend here undersigned to transmit anything other than a very pale and unclear reflection of the friend who is no longer with us.
21
From the Time ofLordAuch
Ofall the things that can be contemplated under the arcof the heavens, there is none that more awakens the human spirit, ravishes thesenses, inspires fright, and provokes greater dread or admiration than the monsters, marvels and abominations in which we see nature's works overturned, mutilated and cut down. ~erre Boaistuau, Histoires prodigieuses, Paris, 1561, quoted by Georges Bataille, ~Les ecarts de la nature', Documents, Year 2,
No.2, 1930.41
A beach somewhere with its usual holiday villas for families and its dramatic summer storms, a Spain where foreigners make sure to visit the churches and spend afternoons at the Plaza de torose This is the sequence of settings in which The Story of the Eye unfolds, a fiction which, like .the most notorious of those imagined by Sade, belongs as much to the crime genre as to the erotic, and which, swiftly delineated, illustrates a philosophy which is explicit in Sade (who entrusts the exposition of his ideas to a number of his characters) but remains implicit in this first of Georges Bataille's books. 41. Pierre Boaistuau (c. 1517-66), Breton storyteller, orator and translator. Bataille's article, 'Les ecarts de la nature' was reprinted in OC, VOL. 1, pp. 228--30.
22
From the Time ofLordAuch 1
This fiction is written in the first person, which has its precedents in erotic literature; together with the strangeness of its simultaneously idyllic and frantic character, it has a peculiarity: the 'I' supposed to be the narrator's is openly doubled by a real 'I' since the fiction is accompanied by an autobiographical exegesis that relates events of his youth and childhood that had made an impression on the author to the point where they surface again, transformed but identifiable after the event, in a narrative believed to have no relation to them. In the earliest edition, dated 1928, the second part, indicated as such and following on from the Recit, forms a companion piece, Coincidences, which, by reattaching the fiction, deliberately and without the logic of a solution, to its psychological underpinning, manages to give the weight and emotional quality of lived experience to a story which is nonetheless excessive, at least in so far as the norms of the genre allow. But in the 'Seville 1940' edition and the 'Burgos 1941'42 edition, or with the title Reminiscences, this exegesis is no more than an appendix printed in a smaller typeface; now, set on another level from the narrative and presented simply as a commentary, it appears to be somewhat shortened and even toned down at certain points, either because the author wanted to blur some over-personal revelations about the feelings his father and mother inspired in him when he was a very young child and then a young man, or because he thought he had distorted certain facts through his perhaps mistaken view of them in terms of the Oedipus complex. Suppressed in this last version-as if Bataille had come to regard the statement concerned as fallacious or inopportune-one passage points out that 'this partly imaginary story' was composed in the manner of a novel in which the author lets his mind freewheel beyond any speculative J
42.·- These being the 1947 and 1951 editions, which present the new version. See pp. 7-8, NOTE 7 in this volume.
23
Bataille & Leins or didactic aim: 'I began to write with no specific purpose, urged above all by the wish to forget, for the time being at least, what I personally can be or do. '43 From one version to the next, the chasm that has opened up between the two parts, and thereby between the real 'I' and the 'I' of the narrator, shows that there had been a distinct auto-critique in operation: by now deeply absorbed in strictly philosophical reflection, Bataille appears to be judging his attempt at exegesis more severely as well as denying that his undertaking could have had an essentially gratuitous character, If he thought otherwise, what reason could he have had for not · only shortening the exegesis and reducing the typeface, but also cutting out the phrase in question and, in terms of his overall objective of produeing a tighter version, for expunging from the fiction certain stylistic or invented.details that actually underlined (sometimes ironically) its novelistic character? With these amendments, the work certainly gained in rigour, 'while losing nothing of its corrosive force; but for anyone who had read it first in its original form, it is difficult----even though the overall difference may, in fact, be tiny-to lose one's liking for the first version, the one that is more impulsive and, by correlation, more provocative. Being among those who were bowled over by this first version (illustrated by Andre Masson, then a Surrealist, in a style more lyrical than naturalistic, as with his work for Aragon's Le Con d'Irtne, which carne out with the same publishersj.w I confess that with scarcely any exceptions I would have preferred-it to have been left without revision. I am sorry, moreover, that in
4g. DC, VOL 1, p. 7g. Leiris notes further on that he will quote only from the first version (1928), which has no contemporary edition, only the original edition and in the Complete Works (Oeuvres completes or OC). It is therefore these that will be referenced below. 44. Aragon's book, Le Con d'Irene, was published shortly before The Sto1!J of the Eye, in 1928, without the author's name, nor that of the illustrator or publisher.
24
From the Time of LordAuch the English translation-which was based on the final text and attributed not to Lord Auch but to Pierre Angelique, the pseudonymous author of
Madame Edwardar--the title, A Tale of Satisfied Desire,45 while having the virtue of making the mainspring of the plot starkly obvious, no longer has the word eye' looming over it like some sinister headlight in the dark. Now that I have
c
made my partiality clear, it goes without saying that from here on I shall always refer to the early version, which is perhaps not the best (it being certainly looser) but which for me has something of the charm of revelation. What banality there is in the two sunlit backdrops, one of them utterly bourgeois, the other hardly less so, since its picturesque quality doesn't go beyond the tourist level (tourism in style, you understand, and less run-of-the-mill than trips to Spain have become since then). One would think both of these decors had been chosen for their comfortable blandness, to highlight in even greater contrasting relief the discrepancies, at first merely obscene or scatological, then ultimately bloody, indulged in by the narrator and his girlfriend, adolescents whose frenzy of sensuality is not without playfulness, nor their anxious greed without a certain divine insouciance. In addition to this couple are other characters belonging to the well-heeled classes of society: a very young girl who is not so much an accomplice as a fascinated victim-a blonde as gentle as the other girl is violent and in such a state that she will go mad and hang herself; then, an older Englishman who in the blatantly sadistic parts of the story will act as something ofa master ofceremonies. Two puppet characters, typically the sort of people who are usually treated with great respect and who will be cynically held up to ridicule: the heroine's mother, whom the former takes pleasure in pissing on from her perch in an
45. Pierre Angelique, A Tale of SatisfUd Desire, translated into English by Audiart.
25
Bataille & Leins attic; then, a Seville priest, who will be compelled to take part in a sacrilegious orgy and later killed, his torn-out eye placed by the heroine inside her female opening, a scene that crowns the story like an apotheosis conjugating its three modes ofexcess: sexual delirium, wholesale blasphemy and murderous rage. At the heart of all this is a true story ofwhich the human eye is likewise the pivot and which Bataille took delight (as he says in the first version of the exegesis) in incorporating into a narrative which is otherwise essentialIyfiction: the death of the much-admired matador Manuel Granero,46 gored in the eye by a bull's horn on 7 May 1922 in the bullring at Madrid. In the audience at this all-too-memorable corrida, during a university trip to the Spanish capital, was the young former pupil of the Ecole de chartes who was soon to become the author of these pages. These begin almost innocently with libertine games involving milk-the eat's milk-then eggs, and the episode of the young madwoman whose suicide will not prevent her from remaining present to all intents and pmposes (a modern example of the haunted castle novel, here a sanatorium, that a girl of unstable mind peoples with her phantoms, and where we see her drying a sheet wet with urine that assumes a ghostly appearance) to arrive at that accidental enucleation which shortly precedes the deliberate atrocity whose toy is no longer the shining oval of an egg with its sticky, yellow centre, but an eyeball that only minutes before could see. Achieving this narrative culmination, together with their English partner; are he and she ofwhom the narrator said near the start: 'We were in no sense without shame, not at all, but something imperious compelled us to brave it together as shamelessly as possible.'47
46. Manuel Granero (1902-22). A postcard depicting him, sent by Andre Castel to Jean Paulhan, is reproduced in Andre Castel and Michel Leiris, Correspondance 1938-1958, ed. Annie Maillis, editions Claire Paulhan, 2002, p. 264. 47. OC, VOL. 1, p. 15.
26
From the Time ofLordAuch Egg, eye: solids , not without a certain formal analogy and which, indicated in the plural by words that sound almost the same (muft, yeux), for Bataille-as for his heroine-are connected to that sun which in 1930, in the tide of his contribution to a tribute to Picasso (Documents, Year 2, NO. 3), he will describe as 'rotten',48 noting in the body of his text that 'the horrible crowing sound [of the rooster], which is particularly sun-related, is always close to the sound of a throat being cut', and pointing out that the myth of Icarus shows how 'the highest point reached blurs into a sudden fall, an unparalleled violence'o? There is another sun in 1931, in the subscription prospectus for Solar Anus,50 a cosmology laid out in a vein both prophetic and humorous, which he will describe as 'sickening and pink like a gland, open and urinating like a meatus', at least for anyone who looks at it without fear of being blinded by the dazzle, 'at the height of summer and one's own red face bathed in sweat'A! therefore in the same conditions as the protagonists of The Story of the Eye in which the Spanish light, so intense that it seems liquefied, replaces the summer clarity of a bathing resort whose nights are sometimes rent by lightning. Egg: the candid product of the country henhouse, the luxury of childhood Easters, and a highly symbolic object associated with both new life and the origins of the world. For the 'I' of the exegesis, there is a reminder of the blind, infirm father making eyes when he urinated. For the narrator and his girlfriend, something which they will use (eating it) and misuse
48. The title of Bataille's contribution was' Soleil pourri' (DC, VOL. 1, pp. 231-2). 49. DC, VOL. 1, p. 232.
50. L'Anus solaire, illustrated in drypoint by Andre Masson, published by La Galerie Simon, 1931, text reprinted in OC, VOL. 1, pp. 79-86. The Galerie Simon was the name of DanielHenry Kahnweiler's gallery in the inter-War period. 51. DC, YOLo I, p. 612.
27
Bataille & Leiris with such shamelessness that soon the very sight of it will make them blush and, by tacit accord, they will cease to utter its very name. Eye: a part of the body whose extreme ambiguity Bataille will note in September 1929 (in the 'Dictionary' article 'Eye', Documents, NO. 14).52 Simultaneously a figure of moral consciousness (the eye of conscience, a widely employed commonplace) and an image of repression (wasn't there a long-running crime stories periodical with the title The Eye of thePolice,53 a basically sadistic publication, with an eye as its graphic emblem, and was this not merely 'the expression of a blind bloodthirstiness'?), for Westerners this organ is something that both attracts and disturbs, and in its animal forms is so repugnant as a food that 'we will never eat it'. Yet others have such a different attitude towards it that Robert Louis Stevenson, by virtue of his long experience of the life of the South Sea Islanders, described it as a cannibal delicacy.-s Observing that 'the extreme of seduction probably verges on horror', Bataille points out that in this respect 'the eye could be approached with a sharp instrument whose appearance provokes both acute and contradictory reactions' and he adds that this was doubtless what was obscurely felt by Luis Bufiuel and Salvador Dali, the then almost unknown makers of Un Chien Andalou, that 'extraordinary film' which shows in one of its early sequences 'a razor 52. The section ' Dictionnaire critique', then 'Dictionnaire', of which Bataille and Leiris were the main authors, was included in the 'Chronique' which featured in each issue. We are unable to grasp what Leiris means by his reference to NO. 14. 53. A weekly which, Bataille tells us, was published from 1907 to 1924. Its cover with the eye as graphic emblem illustrates the article, p. 217. 54. 'In historic times, when human oblation was made [...] the eyes of the victim were formally offered to the chief: a delicacy to the leading guest' (Robert Louis Stevenson, In the South Seas, Part I: The Marquesas, Chapter 11, Long Pig-A Cannibal High Place, Penguin, 1988, p. 70).
28
From the Time of LordAuch slicing right into the sparkling eye of a charming young woman'. Moreover, he includes a reproduction of the drawing by Grandville illustrating a nightmare that the artist had had: the story of a murderer pur.. sued into the very depths of the sea by a vengeful eye that assumes the form of a fish, its successively represented metamorphoses turning the single image into another 'story of the eye' where, as in Bataille's novel, the way through the narrative lies with the organ of sight. Finally, he relates an incident that is macabre and comical in equal measure: just as he is about to be guillotined, a condemned man, Crampon, tears out one of his eyes and makes a gift of it to the chaplain who wished to attend him-a moment of high farce, since the priest was unaware that this was a glass eye.55 The theme of the eye was thus so important for Bataille that the article on this word in the 'Critical Dictionary' includes two other texts written at his instigation: one of them, by Robert Desnos, is a philological commentary with the title The Image of the Eye, on some current expressions using either the word or the idea of the eye, sometimes with risque undertones; the other is an ethnographic piece by Marcel Griaule, about belief in the evil eye, and there's also a concluding note observing that the locution 'faire de l'oeil' (to give the glad eye) was deemed too colloquial to be included in the dictionary of the Academic Francaise.t" It was (I think) also around that time, which could be termed the time of The Story of the Eye and Documents, that Bataille's concern with oddities of the natural sciences led to him becoming interested in the pineal gland, a small mass of tissue deep in the brain whose functions are unclear. According to
55. No trace is to be found of this occurrence, nor of Crampon, as its hero is called. 56. The reader will find these texts below, pp. 243-52.
29
Bataille & Leiris the Grand Larousse encyclopidique, Descartes regarded this body as 'a centre receiving and transmitting impressions from outside to the soul'; but Bataille liked to see it-i-unless the close on 40 years since then are making me distort his ideas-as an embryonic eye intended to be directed upwards, in other words towards the sun, a purpose unfulfilled by evolution, so that the pineal gland is in effect a failed eye. 57 Egg, eye: added to these two elided elements are the testicles of the freshly slaughtered bull, resembling pinkish eggs or eyes that the narrator's girlfriend has brought to her terrace on the sol side (the side in the glare of the sun, which she nonetheless preferred to sombra, considered better) by her other companion, not so as to eat them without further ado, after the fashion of certain bygone aficionados, and cooked with this in mind, but to place them under her naked buttocks. 'They are raw balls, says Sir Edmund to Simone with a slight English accent.t 58 After biting into one of tlre two globes, Simone puts the other one into her most intimate part, an action that occurs at the very moment when Granero is gored by- the 'sun monster' with the result that . his eye spurts out, as if the two events were interpellating one another through some obscure correlation and as if (one may think) this was the offering that the dark..h aired Simone was waiting for; a new Salome in love with a surrogate cut-off head, but getting the extravagant toy she so greedily-desires only after the sordid murder which is enacted with a church in Seville as its theatre. Urine, blood: the sun-coloured liquid whose flow Simone compares to 'gunshot seen as a Iight'59and which her young blonde friend cannot-stop
57. See the 'Dossier de l'oeil pineal', DC, VOL. 2, pp. 11-47. and more particularly 'l'oeil pineal'. pp. 14-20. This dossier had not yet been published when Leiris was writing his article. 58. OCt VOL. 1. p. 54. 59. OCt VOL. 1. p. 38.
30
From the Time of LordAuch herself from producing in copious quantities every time she is convulsed by pleasure; the darker liquid which will be shed by that Icarus, Granero, and that pathetic martyr, the priest with his eye torn out. Besides milk (too white not to be profaned), besides the sperm that the narrator compares to the Milky Way, 'strange breach of astral sperm and celestial urine across the cranial vault formed by the circle of the constellations',60 there are no other possible libations, one being ignoble and the other tragic, their potency equivocal-derision and unbridled desire-brought to them by a hero and especially by a heroine whose taste 'for sinister and cruel farce' (as well as the insolently happy manner in which, without ever achieving a calmness of mood, she splashes about in the worst excess) is akin to those Aztec gods, 'sinister nasty jokers, full of malevolent humour'61 to whom Bataille paid tribute in a text impelled by a large exhibition of preColumbian art in which he was involved as a librarian at the National Library,62 in the very year when he published The Story of the Eye under the sardonic pseudonym of Lord Auch. 'Mexico,' he observed, after having described the horror of the cults and the farcical strangeness of certain Aztec myths, 'was not only the most dripping of human slaughterhouses, it was also a rich city, a veritable Venice with canals and walkways, decorated temples and, above all, beautiful gardens in bloom.'63 As much in this city so highly valued by Bataille as in The Story of theEye and in the article 'Eye' in the Critical Dictionary of Documents (where there is a coming together of elements supplementing the exegesis on another
60. OC, VOL. 1, p. 44. 61. DC, VOL. 1, p. 156.
62. See p. 9,
NOTE
8 in this volume.
63. DC, VOL. 1, p. 157.
31
Bataille & Leins level) terms that are usually thought of as opposites appear in conjunction: the terrible and the risible, the radiant and the sickening, the light and the heavy, the sumptuous and the ill-starred. The coincidence of contraries, one of the lines of force of Bataille's thinking and what the narrator of The Story aftke Eye feels himself dizzily impelled towards: 'Death being the only issue of my erection, with Simone and I killed, the world of our personal vision, intolerable for us, would necessarily be replaced by pure stars, devoid of any relation to outside eyes, and without any human delays or digressions, coldly achieving what seems to me to be the end of my sexual dissipations: a geometric incandescence (among other things a point ofconvergence of life and death, being and nothingness) and utterly dazzling.'M But all of this will only be articulated later, after Bataille has made his own the idea of the ambiguity of the sacred (or of the sacred as double-sided, left and right, opposites but complementary), an idea that he found in Marcel Mauss and which for hitn was to be an active firmament of speculation, just like the idea, ~qually -Maussian in origin, of dilapidation as a means of sovereignty-after he has absorbed Nietzsche's teachings, crucially, and at a different level from the sociological. For now, a philosopher in a savage state, he advances, not so much towards a tabula rasa ruled by reasons of method but towards a carefree looting of both moral imperatives and pathways plotted by some prudent logic, and he -seems to throw wholesale down on paper all sympathetic notions that either support or reflect his obsessions, a stock of themes later taken up and refined or enriched but all the more moving for their being only just wrenched out of chaos. What an extraordinary jumble it is, this fast-told talevin which all barriers are broken between things base and exalted, enmeshing the most foully
64. DC, VOL. I, pp. 33-4.
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From the Time ofLordAuch corporeal (excrement, vomit) and the most majestically cosmic (sea, storm, volcanoes, sun and moon and starry nights), the most trite (couldn't one say that Simone has a sense of treating certain objects with a sacred auraeggs, bull's testicles, the eye-as if she actually sat on them?) and the most paradoxically romantic (the young madwoman whose cor~se will be fouled by the heroine, irritated by a feeling of distance from it, and who later in Seville the hero will see as a vision of'disastrous sadness t ,65 and of extreme horror, finding the blue eye weeping and contemplating it, when the ecclesiastical eye half swallowed by Simone will strike him as seeming none other than that of the confined Marcelle who asked to be saved from a mythic cardinal, a 'cure of the gliillotine',66 who was in fact he himself as she had seen him during a tumultuous party in the course of which her ravings had been precipitated, and so frightening that she killed herself when she discovered that he and the cardinal were one and the same). Both human and nonhuman, the elements involved overlap, less in terms of some general symbolism than through personal associations presented .merely as' such by the narrator (in the event, a direct go-between to the author) and by way of a curious dialectic of Nature, reducing the universe to a cycle of terms each ofwhich would be only the reverberation ofanother or its transposition onto another register, a world become a dictionary where the meaning "ofwords fades away since all of them are defined by lone another. At the start of Solar-Anus, we will learn that 'the world is purely parodic, which is to say that each thing we look upon is the parody of another, or else the same thing in some deceptive form'. 67 And the
65. DC, VOL. 1, p. 69.
66. DC, VOL. 1, p. 43.
67. DC, VOL. 1, p. 81.
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Bataille & Leiris staggering Triumph of the Eye, which takes place before an altar with 'twisted, complicated decorations',68 evoking India and inciting to love, forms the last and the most suffocating of the tableaux vivants (these are sometimes imagined and sometimes acted out by the protagonists) by which The Story of the Eye is marked out. Isn't this the making material of a Surrealist collage or the kind of superimposition made possible by photography, an image of flesh and blood where the play of things, specifically the plays on parts of the body, would intervene in as troubling a way as the plays on words on which poetic puns are based? That Bataille wrote 'with no specific purpose, urged above all by the wish to forget ... ',69 which is to say in complete freedom (merely surrendering himself 'to obscene dreaming'),70 was probably necessary for the welling up of this fantastic combination, the result of some of the innumerable permutations possible in a universe so lacking in hierarchies that everything in it is interchangeable: firmly sheathed in female flesh, a wellnigh baroque construction whose luxuriance prompts thoughts of mysterious distances and the act of love, the murdered eye, overlaid through tender reminiscence by that of the girlfriend-suicide, this pale eye in which something extraneous and physiological-the traces of voluptuous micturation-mimics tears, and which, in the girlfriend still living, gives sight to that blind but greedy spot that colloquial metaphor likens to an eye. 'Lunar vision',"! an allegory of love and death, which appears to the narrator as the answer to his waiting, wide open for that inexpressible thing that can only be reached through rupture and tearing: 'I found 68. DC, YOLo 1, p. 59. 69. DC, YOL. 1, p. 73.
70. DC, VOL 1, p. 75. 71. DC, YOLo 1, p. 69.
34
From the Time of LordAud: myself facing what I imagine I had always waited for in the same way as a guillotine waits for a neck to slice into.'72 Words which 17 years later will be echoed by those in On Nietzsche: 'My rage for loving looks towards death as a window looks out on a courtyard. '73 If the Lord Auch of The Story of the Eye, a poem in the form of a novel whose tenacious power to entrance has a lot to do with the unvarying osmosis at work in it between the incongruously lyrical 'I' (the brew of abattoir waste, filth and blue sky) and the coldly autobiographical 'I' (the attempt to draw on a few known reference points so as to bring a little order into this apocalypse), if this Auch whose name is an abbreviated way of sending everything to what in baser language are called latrines and whose aristocratic prefix gives him the airs of a dandyish nickname, if this product of black humour is already a cover for the Georges Bataille who will later formulate an apologist theory of transgression and, breaking down the wall of received ideas, will strive with all his intellect to prevent other walls of ideals from closing in on him, one might say that this first book-which itself is at fault because of being published clandestinely and doomed to the hell of libraries-s-has no other end but to transgress, jostle and equalize, as ifin·a game. In this festival ofunmliness and insults to idols, where the outrage on the eminently solar organ of the eye reaches its high point as an outrage of major proportions, and where it is another 'eye of the police' (since it is the eye of a man of the church) that is subjected, like the hull's second testicle, to treatment that turns the female sex organ into the figure of a cannibal mouth, there is no end to the profound insights that appear, 72. DC, VOL 1, p. 69. 73. DC, VOL. 1, p. 76. Sur Nietzdu. Volante de chance was published by Gallimard in 1945.
35
Bataille & Leins though only at lightning speed or like brusque gaps in the clouds of a lowering sky that hides infinity. This story, a kind of waking dream deriving from the improbable without the least appeal to the marvellous, carved out of sundry digressions that are genuinely tragic and which, once its peak has been reached, turns to the masquerade of opera buffa as if, in order to be complete, the myth had to be degraded into some kind of Orpheus in the Underworld ('On the fourth day the Englishman bought a yacht at Gibraltar and we headed out to sea towards fresh adventures with a crew of Negroes'),74 has such a curtain fall, soap-opera-like in its appeal to a facile exoticism and its way of handling what seems to be the possibility of a sequel, that, without the slightest irony, we could talk about it as of a creation that is not yet mature but thoroughly adolescent, appropriately with' its heroes not quite adults, except for one. Whatever flame eats into them and whatever blackness their actions finally attain, the fact is that these heroes, who defy everything under the vault of the sky is as if they were part and parcel of Elizabethan theatre, remain imprinted with an irreducible childishness, all through impossible tribulations that belong somewhere other than in school holidays that are as endless in every respect as tortuous adolescent daydreams may suggest. A heyday of freedom that is never untrammelled enough, of amusement in the sense that Bataille will give to this word when, in 1930, he writes that 'amusement is the most glaring and of course most terrifying need of human nature' (Documents, Year 2, No.4, in the article 'Nickel-Plated Feet',75 in which we read that the popular trio whose illicit exploits are recounted in comic-strip form in the children's paper L'Epatant are a
74. OC. VOL. 1, p. 69. 75. OC, VOL. 1, p. 235.
36
From the Time of LordAuch little bit like 'figures from the Mexican Valhalla,76 simultaneously covered in blood and splitting their sides with laughter'). A heyday when the timehonoured taboos are systematically violated by those anxious and boisterous young gods, the narrator and Simone, and by their acolyte, all three of whom try endlessly to furnish their absolute leisure with aberrant actions summoned by their unquenchable thirst to feel themselves both outside any laws and outside of themselves.
76. DC, VOL. 1, p. 233.
37
GEORGES BATAIILE
On Michel Leiris*
•Editor's Title
Surrealism from Day to Day To Yves Breton, to whose friendship lowe the idea and the possibility ofwritinga book I love1
Chapter 1 1. My aim I have only just read the pages in The Rebel that refer to Surrealism.s My idea of Surrealism does not correspond to the one Albert Camus has. I myself remain bound to those minor, over-familiar aspects of a debate in
1. A notary in Avignon, Breton was a great bibliophile and Bataille dedicated L'AbbeC. to him in these terms: To Yves Breton. Only a stationmaster who is quite mad, but very wise, is worthy enough to manipulate the sentences and chapters of a book. A well-made library is a well-ordered derailment, a point in the universe where the universe is so prettily upturned that the upturning has become a fixed part of it. I believe I could have no better way of expressing my fond attachment to you, in this admirable library. Georges Bataille.
(Sale catalogue for The Literary Collection of Pierre Leroy: Major Surrealist and R>st-War Authors, 26 June 2002, Sotheby's France, Galerie Charpentier, NO. 35). According to the sale catalo~e for the literary library of Robert Moureau and Micheline de Belle-froid, Part 1, 3-4 Dece~ber 2003, Drouot Richelieu, NO. 96 (Albert Camus, La Corde), the sale catalogue for Surrealisme et poesie coniemporaine, editions originales sur grand paM manuscrits [etc.], Drouot, 14-17 June 1954 (with the title Bibliotheque d'un amateur also on the cover), relates to Yves Breton's library, even though his name does not appear. See also p. 69, NOTE 33 in this volume. 2. Written before I was able to take full account of the Camus-Breton controversy, published in Arts, October-November 1951. [Bataille's note]
41
Bataille & Leins which my voice, alas, was raised. But we must bring into a single arena the spreading slough of a life that mires everything and the vital forces that can deliver us from our bonds. I am very attached to the minor aspects and am unable to separate my worthwhile moments from the humility they give me. I am not writing this book in order to publish it. As far as the present moment is concerned, I write for myself, for those very few people who might chance upon these papers (I have no wish to interfere, except on one point: I should not like there to be any copies of these pages; I rule out their publication, nor could I even allow an extract to be given to this end).3 Of course I can change my mind and hand over the text to a publisher. . . . In any event, I would not do this with the aim of harm or denigration. I do like these petty, stick-in-the-mud antecedents that are almost unmentionable, like manure that feeds an always secret, always hidden truth, embarrassing to some extent, shame-inducing: it's the only kind I like. I love purity to the point of loving impurity; without it purity would be a fraud. I don't know whether this is compromise or rescue, I think I may be getting lost or going too far: vice of this kind has less hidden meaning in eroticism. . . . Its Dadaist. origins lend Surrealism a certain inextricable element. There is something studied and pretentious that goes hand-in-hand with crude childishness. The connection is so perfect that it is hard to tell which of these faults is the more to be detested. But anyone unable to appreciate the sweetish, soapy nakedness of prostitutes can have no feeling for what, in a similar way, attaches to the direst failures. I'll speak plainly
3. Written in 1951, 'Surrealism from Day to Day' was published after Bataille's death, in 1970. This is the version in the DC, VOL. 8, ed. Thadee Klossowski, 1976, pp. 168-84, without the variants that appeared in the notes.
42
Surrealism from Day to Day now: it's their only hope. If not for this, I would find people repugnant and I would despise their sincerity: it is bound up with these foul habits, and with the odious verbal ructions where all that is left is hideous, disfigured and holding the promise of a mute denial. I shall write as the spirit takes me, drawing on my memories, and with no hesitation in talking about myself, for it's myselfthat I have known the best and often it wasjust my own behaviour that asked the questions that matter to me. Most of all, though, I should like to make free with digressions; making free with digressions strikes me as the only approach conducive to what I have in mind. And yet my narrative might well be no different from the one I could have made of my 'literary life'.
2. Michel Leins I got to know Michel Leiris right at the start. I met him late in 1924: he was a friend of]acques Lavaud, who, like me, worked as a librarian at the Nationale. The three of us had a shortlived plan to found a literary movement, about which we had no more than the haziest ideas. I remember that one evening, when we had been drinking cocktails, we went to the bar-room of a little brothel in a street near the Porte Saint-Denis, a place one ofus had heard about. It was a good-natured brothel, friendly, and we had been drinking; I had drunk recklessly and too much, and I was the gloomiest of the three. Our discussions, which one of the girls joined in (not without a degree of lively interest, albeit off-beam), were most certainly trivial, as I recall, and their extravagance was doubtless likewise. But in those days, extravagance was cheap at the price for those delighted by it and they saw it as putting an end to the common-sense world. So much so that we felt the 'movement' was taking shape: all we had to do was publish some of our discussions (which I in my drunkenness noted down).... Apart from some weary affectation, none of this, of course, struck us as
43
Bataille & Leiris having much importance. Not long after, Leiris got involved with the Surrealist groups and we never mentioned the subject again; I think that the breadth and the toughness of the nascent movement gave him a shock. For a month or two, we didn't see one another. Neither of us was the type to explain himself: especially Leiris. My friend talked readily about drinks and bars. We sometimes spoke about literature, but with no more interest than about drinks or bars (and I can say that I was disappointed about this, but Leiris, who was younger, intimidated me: with him I had a sense of shame in talking about what absorbed me completely. Not only did I live with this sense of shame but, of the two of us, it was Leiris who was the initiate.). Finally, at my insistence, he spoke to me at some length about the Surrealists, and straightaway it struck me that this could be absurd but serious, even tedious. I was dissatisfied. It separated Leiris from-me. I was fond of him and he gave me to understand that our relation-
4. It was probably in November 1924 that Leiris joined the Surrealist group. 'Along with Masson's friends, who were already in touch with the group assembled around Breton, Eluard and Aragon (Artaud recently; Limbour on a longer basis, but somewhat remotely), [Roland] Tual and I myself joined, in the wake of Masson, who also brought Miro into the new movement' (Leiris, 'Elements pour une biographie [ofAndre Masson]', in the collective work Andre Masson, Rouen, 1940, pp. 11-12). See p. 208, NOTE 237 in this volume. Leiris's contribution to La Revolution surrtaliste essentially consisted of the early parts of Glossaire j'y serre mesgloses and some dreams. Several of his texts from the Surrealist period remained unpublished until after his death, when Catherine Maubon published them in E Evasion souterraine (Fata ~o~na, 1992). This collection notably includes 'Le Porcat vertigineux', dated 26 November 1925 and edited on the basis of a typescript which gave no dedicatee. In fact, this text was dedicated 'to Georges Bataille', as would subsequently be revealed by the manuscript held by Andre Breton ([sale catalogue, 7-17 April 2003, Paris, Drouot-Richelieu] Andre Breton, 42, rue Fontaine, VOL. Manuscrits, NO. 2089). For some unknown reason, 'Le Forcat vertigineux' was not published in La Revolution surrealiste, for which it was very probably intended.
44
Surrealism from Day to Day ship was secondary. I was interested only in things that were disconnected and inconsequential, except for my desire for a life of brilliance . . . I was right, a man with a second-rate life canjudge nothing: thinking he can be a judge of life, he judges only his own inadequacy. Moreover, I felt bad. I sometimes thought Leiris was being taken in, I feared a resounding hoax. All I could think ofwas some secret, enervated violence at work inside me, which meant, I believed, that I would stand out and be worthy of interest. I soon came to think that the heavy atmosphere of Surrealism would paralyse and stifle me. It would be hard for me to breathe in that atmosphere of ostentation. I found myself rejected and, since I experienced by contagion the shock that had directly struck Leiris, I had the feeling of being overwhelmed by a strange, fraudulent and hostile force that issued from a world without secrets, from a platform on which I would never receive nor accept a place but remain before it mute, worthless and helpless. What I discovered from Leiris's attitude and the change that had taken place in him was something I perceived only obscurely at first, but I must have had a clear sense of it very soon: it was a moral terror that had its source in the brutal manipulations of a ringleader. Personally, I was nothing but the receptacle for empty turbulence. I wanted nothing and I was capable of nothing. There was nothing in me that gave me even the right to speak in undertones. Suddenly, I was confronted with people who had assumed the voice of authority, who-perhaps from lassitude or out of boredom, but without being moved to action-had found within themselves this voice that was so categorical and alien to everything else, and had even willed it. Even before things went any further, I could feel the coldness that had taken hold of Leiris. Something had changed him: he was now taciturn, evasive and even more ill at ease than ever. He was all idleness, with a nervous edge that made a mystery of everything. At that time he was
45
Bataille & Leins elegant but in a subtle way, without the studiedness that later on diminished this elegance. He used to powder his whole face, using a powder as white as talcum. The nervousness with which he gnawed at his fmgertips close to the nails put the finishing touch to his moonlike appearance. His words were perhaps sententious, all the better to irritate himself, it seemed, and to be true to the type of fantasist who has been tripped up, the child put in the wrong who takes sudden care to observe the most punctilious discipline: he observed this discipline with an empty expression in his eyes that would dart about . . . obliquely avid for actions he dared not take: flight or disobedience.
3. Andre Breton It was only later that Leiris introduced me to Breton. He had given me to understand that Breton was the soul of the movement. He showed no lack of emotion when he spoke about the Confession dedaigneuse.» I asked him what justified the extreme authority that he had told me Breton enjoyed. His explanation was this piece of writing that he admired. I had read the First Manifesto and found it unreadable. I had said so unreservedly to Leiris. 'That may be,' he had said, 'but Poisson soluble. . . .' Poisson soluble [Soluble Fish] was published as an appendix to the Manifesto, and Breton offered it as an example of automatic writing. My shyness, my foolishness and my mistrust in my own judgement were so great that I resolved to think' what Leiris said with such insuperable conviction. More honestly, I strove (for it was my dishonesty that made me like Poisson soluble) to admire the Confession. But I never succeeded in doing so. If I admired it at all, grudgingly or vetbally, I did so with some unease and misgivings. 5. A text by Breton that appeared in 1923 in La Vte modeme, and was reprinted in Les Pas perdus, Gallimard, 1924.
46
Surrealism from Day to Day With that clever inflection of exasperation that gives his pronouncements their indulgent tautness, Breton declares: 'I never make plans' (with perhaps one exception, he says, touching on the complacency with which he feigns accommodation to the plans of others). I could scarcely believe what seemed to me from the very first as something better than a plan and more of a tiresome pretension; but since I myself made plans, these doubts struck me as petty! I was inclined to say nothing and I was put sorely to the test, so that I cunningly took care to debate with only the most debatable of counsels. Breton's method of reducing literatures to automatic writing was something I found tedious or, at best, ponderously amusing. I could enjoy an unsettling game as much as anyone else, but my interest was no more than idle, in keeping with my humble condescension and my provoking shyness. What did strike me as admirable about this method was that it withdrew literature from the search for vainglorious advantages, which I perhaps renounced, but as a writer does, in two minds: 'automatic writing' alone had the last word, the last word against a man in two minds. But it seemed to me that though Breton asked for silence from his listeners, he himself did not keep quiet. Thus, not only did I have to hold my tongue but I was to hear nothing but the measured, pretentious and skillfully bombastic voice of Breton. He struck me as conventional, without the subtlety of doubt and lamentation, and without those dread panics when nothing remains that is not undone. What I found most disquieting was not just the lack of rigour, it was the absence of that cruelty towards oneself that is quite insidious, joyful and half asleep, not setting out to dominate but to go a long way. In conditions like these, I abandoned my 6. That was what it was about to begin with. Because of a misunderstanding? But the misunderstanding took place. [Bataille's note]
47
Bataille & Leins silence and I entered into the ghastly game where I was sickened by my own pretension in balking at another man's pretension. I, in turn, had to inflate my voice, inflate it all the more and the more foolishly so as to rail against a bombast I outdid. To endure the mixture of silence and vociferous foolishness to which I then succumbed, what amount of morose energy did I not have to squander? I strayed into successive blind alleys from which I cunningly emerged only to keep on frightening or depressing myself with the commotion of my own voice.
4. Louis Aragon It took Leiris a while before he introduced me to Breton. But he brought about my meeting with Aragon, who at the time had a standing matched by no one. Surrealism's dazzling turbulence derived its glamour and urgency from Aragon's insolence. Breton was not seductive. One night, at midnight; Leiris was to meet Aragon with whom he had recently struck up a friendship. At Zelli's, a nightclub with perhaps more charm than ·any other: it was easy to get in, you could talk and drink at the bar (later, the place changed character and, first as us Nudistes, then as the Paradise, became a nude review club). I don't know whether Leiris was uncertain about taking me there. I have no idea what I looked like, but I was fairly bourgeois in appearance despite a certain extravagance of thought: so I had an umbrella with a bamboo handle.? Finally, after we had both been out and about since nine o'clock, we went there at midnight. Aragon was waiting for Leiris and immediately told him about some initiative of his that had gone awry that afternoon at the Chamber of Deputies. Those
7. I have already said a few words about this umbrella in EExperient;e interieure [DC. pp. 46-7]. [Bataille's note]
48
VOL.
51
Surrealism from Day to Day were the days of revolutionary undertakings and serious commitment. Aragon went on to draw this conclusion from his failure: 'We're too late on the scene to be playing Lassalle's game.' His comment astonished me and I found myself in sympathy with its absurdity. After that I ran into Aragon. I had liked Le Paysan de Paris [Paris Peasant], which now tells me what persistent fondness I have for an elegance of style that I often rate as the highest thing of all, especially if it is brilliant ... Aragon disappointed me from the first day. He was no fool, nor was he intelligent. I have often been afraid that I made this judgement on him because, at the start, his attitude towards me was that of an admired writer meeting a man of no significance.f But he amused me. I thought I grasped the failings of his mind. There was a lot of childish naivete in him and an inborn seductiveness that he needed to contradict. He had strong and sincere aspirations to seriousness and he overreached himself. I think he plays at being a great man in the same way as I imagined myself galloping away from the Sioux at the age of 10. Our shared misfortune was to live in a world that we felt had become empty and, for want of deep virtues, needing to find satisfaction, for ourselves or for a small number of friends, by assuming the appearance of what we did not have the means to be. The Russian revolutionaries wondered whether they were genuine revolutionaries: they were. The Surrealists knew that they could not genuinely be Rimbaud, and they were inwardly well aware that they were as far from revolution as from Rimbaud. YetAragon could give the impression of being a truly accomplished man; he was sought-
8. There was nothing unpleasant about this. He paid me no different attention than to anyone else met in passing. And, without a doubt, he was a charming man, indisputably kindand, moreover; extremely obliging to his friends. He was very much loved, much more than Breton. [Bataille's note]
49
Bataille & Leiris after and admired by everyone, but it was his misfortune to know enough to despise what he had, and he rejected the grapes that hung in ripe clusters in front of him. He had the charm of small-time luck-maybe it was that luck came easily ... He was not susceptible to the all-too-easy pleasure of satisfied vanity, but he could never forget or deny a brilliant plumage, always at the mercy of the temptation to surprise, seduce or deceive expectations. Admittedly, sometimes he would stop performing and let it be seen what an innocent he really was. I can remember him, at dawn, on the boulevard de la Madeleine, showing off a very beautiful moth that he had quiedy caught by the wings. One evening, when I was sitting writing at a table in the Deux Magots, he came and sat at the table next to mine and had a long, serious conversation with me. He talked to me about Marx and Hegel, setting out his own account of the current Surrealist doctrine. I let him speak for a long time, intervening only to note my own ignorance or sometimes to ask for some clarification on one point or other. In the end, however, I wanted to say my piece, 'Yet again, I mow nothing,' I said gently, 'about all these things of which you have spoken so well. But don't you have the feeling that you're an illusionist?' I smiled and he smiled.
5. The 'Fatrasies' Meanwhile, I had got to know Breton. At that time, he held court on the glass-fronted terrace of the Cyrano, a small cafe on Place Blanche. (This cafe is probably still there, but at any rate the decor will have changed.) Leiris, by then an acknowledged Surrealist, had taken me, and I had to deliver to Breton my translation ofithe Fatrasies, which appeared in the next issue of La Revolution surrealiste. The Fatrasies are thirteenth-century poems whose point is to make no sense whatsoever. Paul Eluard reproduced in full the translation I made in 1925, which was then published in his Premiere
50
Surrealism from Day to Day
Anthologie vivante de La poisie du passe. 9 I remember Breton telling me that these little poems 'are the best thing of all'. In support of his opinion, I quote these few lines by a celebrated thirteenth-century jurist: 10 Un grandhareng saur Avait assiegl Gisors Depart et d'autre Us deuxhommes morts Vinrent agrand-peine 11 Portant une porte Sans une vieille bossue Qui alla criant: 'A! hOTS' 1..£ en d'une caille motte us aurez pris agrand peine Sous un chapeau defeutre. A large smoked herring
Had laid siege to Gisors From end to end And two dead men Arrived carrying a door They heaved and strained Without a woman hunchback 9. Ed. Pierre Seghers, 1951, VOL. 1, pp. 41-4. This translation first appeared without the translator's name. [Bataille's note] 10. Philippe de Beaumanoir (1247-96), known mainly as the author of the Coutumes de Beauvaisis, but whose poems were published by the Societe des anciens textes francais, in two volumes, which I happened to receive as a prize for having come first in an examination at the Ecole des chartes. This is where I found those few pages of Fatrasies given in this collection and the note referring to the poems of the same genre published by Jubinal. Of course, Breton often used the same approach. [Bataille's note] 11. In 1925, I translated this as: avec de grands efforts. It was this hurried translation that Eluard followed. [Bataille's note]
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Bataille & Leiris Old and crying 'To the fore!' The cry of a dead quail Would have turned their hearts sore Under a hat made of felt.
Breton was surrounded by Aragon, Eluard and Gala Eluard (who, later, after having been Eluard's wife, would be Dalf's), At the time, the Surrealists had a striking effect: they could not but impress; their certainty left no doubt that the silence of the world dwelt within them. In their effortless insouciance, there was something heavy, something anxious and overweening that merely made people feel ill at ease. But the most oppressively disconcerting was Breton, whose friends of that time seemed to me to maintain this demeanour so insidiously at odds with other people; it kept them at a distance and brought on a kind of numbness that put a stop to speech together with an attitude of petrified intoxication. I very much liked this unaccommodating style, which I saw as having the value ofia sign. The majority of the latecomers among the Surrealists gave the impression of a contrary sign. Even today, I find it difficult to become attached to people who never have this indifferent languor, that doolally air of being all at sea, that wakefulness so absorbed it seems to be sleep. But this is precisely where the difficulty begins ... My visit to the Cyrano aroused mixed feelings. I was shy and my need for self-effacement was too great for me to confront those remote beings, individuals who conveyed the idea of a majestic life, yet one that was caprice itself. I knew that I would lack the strength to present myself-to them--as I was. As much as I liked them (or admired them), to the same degree they threatened to reduce me to powerlessness, literally to suffocate me. Breton said very little to me and I honestly could not have imagined any possible conversation with him. He complimented me on the introduction I'd written for my translation of the Fatrasies. 'Very nice!' he said good-
52
Surrealism from Day to Day humouredly. I was shocked: I had expected rigour and I could imagine nothing more disappointing than being appreciated on quite a different level from the one maintained by Breton himself, a level which properly ruled out the vulgarity of compliments. It is one of my most comical memories, in the sense that I have always been an unstable character, at the same time clinging and impulsive, inconsistent, unceremonious and anxious. I was so weary of my dull life, without any means or reputation, so envious of the truer life of these recognized writers and, above all, weary of being envious, so angry at the idea of the most furtive concession. Breton told me he would like to see me again and asked me to call him. I made up my mind to do so only after some time: a woman's voice replied that I should telephone again a few days later, without in the least giving reasons for such a delay. Before I hung up, by way of excuse I muttered that I had called because Breton had asked me to. I talked to Leiris about it and he warned me that it was best to leave it at that. I didn't ask him for any explanation and I discovered from him only much later on that I had made a very unfavourable impression on Breton. In his view I was nothing but an obsessive, at least that was the word used by Leiris.
6. WC. 12
Later (in 1947), Breton was to describe me as 'one of the few men in my life that it has been worth my while getting to lmow'.13 The only reason for my copying out these words, at this point in my narrative, is to connect the small events I am recording to the passing of time, in which nothing 12. ·WC., preface to Histoire de l'oeil', DC, VOL. 3, pp. 57-61. 13. "Ib Georges Bataille, one of the few men ... [etc]', Breton's inscription on the copy of Arcane 17 that he sent to Bataille (Surya, Georges Bataille, La mort al'oeuure, p. 505. This reference does not appear in the English translation).
53
Bataille & Leins endures. In 1925, I gave little thought to Breton's ill will towards me. For the most part, I was very sure of myself and my awkwardness was less to do with my doubts than with my excess of certainty. Of course, I did find Breton's hostility annoying but, given my view of his influence over Leiris, his friendship struck me as no less threatening. All I wanted was to remove those I loved or cared about from the reach of this influence. In any event, I found it a strain to live in a world where Breton's baleful ascendancy weighed upon the least submissive of minds and blunted their sensibilities to anything that failed to touch Andre Breton. Over time, Leiris valued me. He liked to go out with me. We got on wonderfully well, that is despite a tenseness that isolated him in a miser.. able solitude. On my wanderings through the bars and cafes I would also run into Aragon, Roland Tual, Desnos, Boiffard, Tzara, Malkine and others. I quickly made friends with Masson, who happened to be Leiris's mentor and oldest friend. I even saw ] ouhandeau two or three times, well away fro~ the Surrealist sphere of influence. Soon, a delightful trio appeared on the scene: three friends, Marcel Duhamel (currently, the editor of the 'Serie noire'), the painter Tanguy and Jacques Prevert, who lived together in a splendid little house in the rue du Chateau. I often saw Dr Fraenkel, 14 whom I liked a great deal and who had played his part in the good old days of the Dada movement (and who was writing the 'Letter to the ,Directors of Insane Asylums' for Issue 3 of La Revolution surrealiste). The reason I got on
14. Bataille's friend and doctor and, for a time, his brother-in-law (see pp. 90-1, Letter 9, 15), Theodore Fraenkel (189~ 1964) was also the friend and doctor of Michel and Louise Leiris. He had been Bataille's fellow student at the lycee and the medical faculty at the University of Paris and had published some articles in the magazines of the Dada movement, as well as in Liuerature. His Cornets 1916-1980 was recently published by Marie-Claire Dumas with a biographical commentary: editions des Cendres, 2002, pp. 131-53. NOTE
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Surrealism from Day to Day so well with Fraenkel was that, like me at the time, or even more so, he was a very quiet night bird; there was a kind of nocturnal sadness, though ridiculous deep down, that we clung to and that epitomized the two ofus. I had written a little book with the title u(C., under the name Troppmann. It was illustrated with some drawings including one that showed a guillotine whose aperture appeared as an eye, which was also the setting sun. A road through a deserted landscape led to this promise of death. Underneath it I had written the title L'Eternel Retour (The Eternal Return), along with the caption: 'God, how sad is the body's blood in the depths ofsound!, From start to finish it was a cry of horror, a cry of horror at myself. TIlls cry had a kind of gaiety, perhaps a crazy gaiety, but more funereal than crazy. I understand what horrified Breton about me. Had I not wished it upon myself? And wasn't I truly an obsessive? What Leiris had probably told him about my book before he met me must have struck him as sinister. What is more, I now imagine that he could have felt a degree of unease face-to-face with a man he annoyed, who would never breathe freely in front of him, who lacked innocence and resolve. Whatever the case, when faced with someone as underhand and multifaceted as Breton, it is futile to attribute over-simple motives to him, and the quarrel I later took up with him taught me that there was much to be lost by following his lead on the score of facile denigrations.
7. Antonin Artaud Soon, to some extent, I got to know Antonin Artaud. I met him with Fraenkel in a brasserie on rue Pigalle. He was goodlooking, rawboned and sombre; he had a fair bit of money, which he earned from his work in the theatre, but for all that he still looked half-starved; he didn't laugh, he was never childish and, despite his being a man ofifew words, there was something touchingly eloquent in the rather grave and extremely edgy silence
55
Bataille & Leiris he maintained. He was calm; this dumb eloquence of his was not convulsive, but sad, even despondent, deeply tormented. He resembled some imposing bird of prey, with dusty plumage, captured at the point of taking flight and fixed in that position. I have depicted him as silent. It has to be said that Fraenkel and I were at the time the least talkative of individuals: it might have been contagious; in any case, it did not foster conversation. Artaud would talk to Fraenkel about his nervous troubles. He used drugs, was in a bad way, and Fraenkel tried hard to make his life easier. He and Fraenkel conferred in private. Then there would be no talking at all, so that Artaud and I got to know one another fairly well without ever having spoken. Ten years later, one evening at dusk, I suddenly ran into him on the corner of me Madame and rue Vaugirard. He shook my hand vigorously. It was the period when I was trying hard to be politically active. He said to me point-blank: 'I mew you'd involved yourself in some good things. Believe me: we need to create Mexican-style fascism!' He went on his way without elaborating. This left me with a disagreeable feeling, though only partly; he frightened .me but at the same time gave me a peculiar impression of us being in agreement. Some years later, I heard him give a lecture at the Sorbonne (but I didn't go up to him at the end). He was talking about art in the theatre and in my half-asleep state of attention I saw him stand up all of a sudden; I realized what he was saying: he had decided to make us privy to the state of mind of Thyestes when he grasped he was eating his own children. In front of an auditorium filled with bourgeois (there were hardly any students), he held his belly in both hands and let out the most unearthly scream that ever issued from the throat of a man. This was as disturbing as it might have felt had one of our friends abruptly gone raving mad. It was
56
Surrealism from Day to Day dreadful (perhaps the more so for having been only acted). In time, I learned about the outcome of his trip to Ireland, which was followed by his being locked up. I could have said that I didn't care for him ... and I had the feeling that someone was fighting my shadow or walking over my grave. I was sad at heart, and then I thought no more of it. In early October 1943, I received a mysterious and very unclear letter. This letter reached me at Vezelay, at a point in my life that was simultaneously good and unhappy and which today leaves me with a memory of both dread and wonder.P I saw that the signature was Artaud's, and I scarcely knew him, as you have seen. He had written it at Rodez where he had read L'Experience intirieure, which had come out at the beginning of the year. The letter was more than half crazy: it was about Saint Patrick's staff and a manuscript (on his return from Ireland his madness revolved around Saint Patrick). This manuscript, which was to have turned the world upside down, had disappeared. But his reason for writing was that L'Experience intirieure, which he had just read, had showed him that I had to be converted, to come back to God, and he had to send me word of this ... I'm sorry that I no longer have this letter. I had given it to someone who was putting together an edition of Artaud's letters and had asked me if I had any such documents from him in my possession. I had lent my letter despite the small likelihood of its publication ... I had simply given my opinion: it was palpably the letter of a madman. But I cannot remember at all who it was that asked me for it-it was a long time ago-and the only person I have asked to give it back tells me he never had it. I'm quite sorry about this. I had been touched to receive it. And I am sad now to have to let its contents be so vague. I cannot even be definite on the accuracy of
15. We think that L'Alleluiah. (OC, VOL. 5, pp. 393-417) dates from this period. [Note by Thadee Klossowski]
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Bataille & Leiris what I have said about its concern with Saint Patrick. I would be surprised if I had really got this wrong, but memory, even when it dwells on striking things, is always a little unstable, a little elusive. The entreaty that I should become devout, addressed to me in such touching, even fervent terms, has remained clear in my mind.
8. Anticipating the Shipwreck I caught sight of Artaud on the terrace of the Deux Magots after he came back from Rodez.I" He didn't recognize me and I made no attempt to be recognized by him; he was in a frightening state of decrepitude, I've never seen a man who looked so old. Some of his writings were published then and I couldn't read them without a feeling of poignancy. Though I believe everythi~g was done at the time just as it should have been, despite all this I could see something ghastly, ghastly and inevitable. One day, not long before, Henri Parisot had shown me a long telegram, both indignant and grandiloquent, frotn Dr Ferdiere, the chief physician at the Rodez asylum, prohibiting the publication of the letters under the title Letters from Rodez: Parisot could not find sufficiently damning words tb condemn Ferdiere's attitude. I found myself in agreement: we had to disregard this, particularly since the book's publication would bring in some'money and help-the poor man to' live. But there was a fundamental worry at the thought of publishing 'the Writings ·0£ a' madman wh<;> might get better; while these writings would always bear witness to his madness. In the circumstances, one might have considered Artaud to be above the categories of sanity and madness. But is anything ever that clear-rut? Wouldn't a lasting cure be conditional upon forgetting? Whatever the case, I found the abuse heaped on Dr Ferdiere the most distressing thing. From Antonin Artaud's position, it was 16. Artaud returned to Paris on 26 May 1946.
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Surrealism from Day to Day easy to unders~nd: he had been under the care of Ferdiere, who had used electric shock treatment, and the patient had frequently had reason to disagree with his doctor's decisions. But were Artaud's friends to believe him about some fixation he had? I knew Ferdiere and I can all too well picture him exasperating his patients despite himself. He is a very good-hearted fellow, as secret anarchists often are, drowning in too much arrogant talk, jabbering awayand getting on one's nerves in the end. He must have done his best and if he is to blame for any blunders (though no one will ever know about them, he being the only one who could tell us, and being a person who would not have done anything he regarded as a blunder), it is indisputable that he greatly improved the state Antonin Artaud was in. These claustrophobic writings, which are like the final bursts of light from the sinking wreck of Surrealism-and which continue to bear witness to this movement's fantastical, eye-popping aspect-would not have seen the light of day without Ferdiere, in spite of the preposterous telegram to which I have referred. What is unique about these writings is their shock, their violent infringement of customary boundaries, the cruel lyricism that cuts short its own effects, intolerant of the very thing to which it gives the surest expression. Maurice Blanchot quoted from them with reference to himself (1946): I started out in literature writing books in order to say that I could write nothing at all; whenever I did have something to say or to write, my thinking wasat its most resistant. I never had any ideas and two short books, each 70 pages long, turned on this profound, intractable and endemic absence of ideas.l?
17. These two books are L'Ombili( cUs limbe5 and u Pese-nerfs, as identified by Artaud in the following sentence, left out by Blanchet, Both were published in 1925. the former with
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Bataille & Leins Commenting on these few lines, Maurice Blanchot wrote: It is hard to see what might aptly be added to these words, for their candour is so trenchant, and they are more clear-sighted than anything a writer could have written about himself" showing what a lucid mind it is that has endured the trial of the Marvellous in order to become free.
This last phrase of Maurice Blanchot's strikes me as an exact epilogue to the entire Surrealist adventure, something envisioned from the moment it first gave hesitant utterance to its ambitions. I believe that Maurice Blanchot is right to implicate in these last words the very principle of a m6vement that has for the most part avoided the reef and the spectacular shipwreck which Antonin Artaud's final years offer for our contemplation in the light shed by disaster.lf What is more, Artaud's turbulence was no less significant at its dawn thanatwhat I believe was the twilight of the SurrealIst evening. Whatever the case, to my knowledge it was Antonin Artaud who drafted the substance of that declaration of 27 January 1925, which was perhaps not the most outstanding expression of nascent Surrealism but which for me retains the
editions de la NRF (74 pp.), the latter without the name of any publisher (the printer was Leibovitz, 42 pp.). They were reprinted in BOOK 1, VOL. 1 of Artaud's Oeuvres completes, Gallimard, 1976. 18. Artaud's comments as quoted by Blanchot are taken from a letter dated 27 July-13 September 1946, addressed by Artaud to Peter Watson for publication in the British magazine Horizon, but in the end not published there. They were quoted by Blanchot in his article 'Du merveilleux' (L'Arche, NOS 27-28, May 1947, p. 133), an article never published in any collection. After Artaud's death his letter was published in its entirety in Critique (NO. 29, October 1948) with the title 'Une lettre d'Antonin Artaud, introduction a la lecture de son oeuvre', and with an intn;ollction by Bataille. Artaud's letter to Peter Watson appears in OC, VOL. f2, Gallimard, 1974, pp. 230-9, with Bataille's introduction (pp. 334-5).
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Surrealism from Day to Day significance of having been the first text passed on to me (by Leiris, on his return from the Midi, in the circumstances I have already noted) and of having been the occasion of a sympathy which I imagined to be without reservation and which in reality derived from a misunderstanding. Maurice Nadeau reproduces this declaration in The History of Surrealism, 19 and here I reprint the second paragraph: Surrealism is not a new, or easier, means of expression, nor even a metaphysics of poetry. It is a means of total liberation of the mind and of all that resembles it.
The ninth paragraph also said: It [Surrealism] is a cry of the mind turning back on itself, and it is resolved in desperation to sunder its shackles.
I read this declaration at a cafe table, in the great mental confusion
and the state of lethargy in which I then was managing to survive-with distress. Still, today, I have the same reaction as the first time and I still understand it as if I had read: ' ... of the mind turning against itself ...'. Even forewarned, I make this same mistake, so great remains my hatred of the 'mind', not just of intelligence and reason but of the entity writ large that sets its cloudiness against the murky filth. Likewise, I had understood 'liberation of spirit' as if this was about being 'delivered from evil'! Perhaps I was not really mistaken, or only halfwrong, and this indeed is the reason why I am right to speak as I do of Artaud, who, writing what came before in 1925, in 1946 wrote: '... and the garlic mayonnaise contemplates you, mind, and you contemplate your garlic mayonnaise: And fmally shit to 19. Maurice Nadeau, Histoire du surrealisme, VOL. 2, Documents surrtalistes, Le Seuil, 1948 (The History of Surrealism, trans. Richard Howe, Penguin 1973). The Declaration 0[27 January 1925 was drawn up by Artaud and signed by 26 Surrealists, Leiris among them.
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Bataille & Leins infinity! ... '.20 But in the end this is quite open, quite empty, quite like the noise that fades to nothing and at last is heard no more.
20. Letter to Peter Watson, OC, BOOK 12, p. 238.
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The Publication of 'A Corpse' (15January 1930)21
In the autumn of 1929 the Second Manifesto appeared in La Revolution surrealiste. Andre Breton took issue with me in it, primarily accusing me of rallying the dissidents and outsiders of Surrealism against him. He said: Perhaps Monsieur Bataille has the wherewithal to group them together; and if he manages to do so I will find that very inter~sting. Already setting off on the trip organised by Monsieur Bataille are Messieurs Desnos, Leiris, Limbour, Masson and Vitrac; it is hard to explain why Monsieur Ribemont-Dessaignes has not yet joined them. 22
In short, the Second Manifesto indicted those Surrealists cited in the 'first' who, in Breton's view, had morally lost the right to appeal to the movement: Artaud, Carrive, Francis Gerard, Limbour, Masson, Soupault, 21. As far as 1 recall, 500 copies of ~ Corpse' were printed. But I am sure that I destroyed around 200 of these in the clear-out before a house move. Some were printed on coloured paper. [Bataille's note] 22. La Revolution suTTealiste, Year 5, NO. 12, 15 December 1929, p. 16; Breton, Oeuvres completes, VOL. 1, pp. 824-5. Desnos, Leiris, Limbour and Vitrac had published articles in one or more of the first seven issues (from April to December 1929) of Documents, which Bataille edited with the title of 'general secretary' (see p. 12 in this volume). Masson had been the subject of an article by Carl Einstein in Issue 2 (May). Ribemont-Dessaignes did not contribute to Documents. Since May 1929, he had been editing his own magazine, Bifur (another of Breton's bete noires), to which Desnos, Leiris, Limbour and Vitrac also contributed.
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Bataille & Leins Vitrac, Jacques Baron, Pierre Naville, Desnos, Ribemont-Dessaignes, Tristan Tzara. 23 In fact, the dissolution of the group was even more serious than these first ruptures suggested. Michel Leiris had counted himself out a long time since24 and, more or less between the writing of the Second Manifesto and its appearance, Jacques Prevert, Max Morise and Raymond Queneau, Breton's brother-in-law at the time,25 had made the break; as if to give substance to Breton's allegations, they had taken up with me. To tell the truth, there was never anything amounting to a new, heterodox group that would have matched the first. Personally, at that time, I never put forward anything other than eroticism or what derived from erotic subversion. Around that time, I was attempting to set up the publication of an erotic almanac whose clandestine publisher was to be Pascal Pia (later in charge of Combat, then editor of Carrefour). Not long before, in 1927, he had pJIblished Aragon's Le Con d' Irene with etchings by Masson, and, in 1928, he had published The Story of the Eye under my pseudonym, Lord Auch,26 Auch being the abbreviation of 'aux chiottes', used at the time by my friend Fraenkel, one of the first exponents of Dada, with 'Lord'
23. Jean Carrive (1905-63), a Surrealist from the very first, was subsequently known for his translations of Kafka. Gerard Rosenthal, known as Francis Gerard (1903-92), also a Surrealist from the very start, became a lawyer and was one of Trotsky's collaborators. On Jacques Baron, see pp. 92-5, Letter 10, NOTE 22. 24. Leiris wrote: 119February 1929-My official break with Surrealism' (joumal1922-1989, p. 159), this bein~ the date of his (negative) response to the letter-questionnaire on the 'modes of joint action to be continued or resumed' sent out by the Surrealists to more than 70 linteliectu;ls with revolutionary tendencies'. In fact, he had distanced himself from the group early ip 1928, along with Desnos, Limbour and Masson. k
•
25. See pp. 90-1, Letter 9, NOTE 15. 26. The two books 'were published in 1928, by Rene Bonnel with Pascal Pia's artwork. For The Story of theEye, see pp. 8-9, NOTE 7 in this volume.
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The Publication of 'A Corpse' having for me the meaning it has in English translations of the Bible (the illustrations for The Story of the Eye-lithographs-were again by Masson). Masson then gave me some wonderful illustrations for Justine (and I still hope to publish the finest of these in a small volume), Leiris gave me a text that he subsequently developed into L'Age d'homme27 and Limbour gave me a delightful story that has probably been mislaid. Maurice Heine, without it causing him to cut himself off from Breton, gave me a very fine piece of unpublished-writing by Sade. I myselfwrote a 'Valeur d'usage de D.AF. de Sade' (Use Value of D.A.F~ de Sade), which I have destroyed. 27. Bataille adds in a note: 'This is the explanation for the dedication of a second edition of this very fine book (Gallimard, 1946); the first edition, published in 1939, has no dedication', but he does not give us the wording of this 1946 dedication ('To Georges Bataille, who prompted this book') nor say why it was missing in 1939, an absence that can probably be accounted for by Leiris's reservations towards Bataille during the 1935-~8 period and, more specifically, at the time when the Contre-Attaque and Acephale groups were formed (1936-37), as is borne out by Bataille's letter to Louise Leiris inJuly 1936 (p. 115-16, Letter 18). Did Leiris merely send the first edition of L'Age d'hon;trne to Bataille? Perhaps not, if one considers that the book left the presses on 15 June 1939, only a few days before their disagreement about the College de sociologie, expressed in Letters 20 (pp. 119-22) and 24 (pp. 130--33), of 3 and 6 July respectively, and that there is no mention in these letters of the book being sent. Nonetheless, Bataille did prompt L'Age d'homme in two respects: because he had commissioned from Leiris the erotic text which was the first version of the book; also, because he had advised his friend to undertake the psychoanalysis which, in large part, lay behind the definitive version. Both of these reasons were offered by Leiris in a radio interview with Paule Chavasse that was broadcast in January 1968: The writing of L'Jge d'homme was prompted by Georges Bataille (...] who was responsible for editing a collection of erotic books to be published clandestinely. He asked me to give him something, [...] a kind of autobiography relating to eroticism [•..]. So there was a first version done with that in mind [.•. J. Then [...], on Bataille's advice, I had myself psychoanalysed [...J. It was the psychoanalysis that gave me the idea of going back to this book which had remained-I won't even say on the stocks, since it was regarded as finished-it had remained in my desk. drawer; and that gave me the idea of taking up this book and developing it by putting
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Bataille & Leiris The economic crisis, which very quickly affected the trade in luxury books, prevented the project from coming to fruition; no erotic movement of any kind came into being. In fact, the signatories of the second Corpse, which appeared on 15 January 1930,28 were never united by anything
in other things rather than merely erotic things. And it became LAge d'homme. The first version formed the core of it, very slightly reworked in the sense that when it was to be published clandestinely I had been quite unconcerned in terms of vocabulary, whereas for a straightforward book I was obliged not so much to rot things out, but to trim some of my expressions a little. There you arel It turned into this book.
Before L'Age d'homme, in 1930, Leiris had dedicated a poem to Bataille: 'Lamoureux des crachats' (reprinted in Haut mal, followed by Aulres lancers, Gallimard, 'Poesie' collection, 1969, pp. 58-60). Moreover, we have come to know since the Breton sale that Le FOTfat uertigineux, a Surrealist text of November 1925 published shortly after Leiris's death on the basis of a manuscript that did not include any dedication to Bataille, had been the subject of another manuscript carrying the mention 'to Georges Bataille' and delivered to Breton apparently for publication in the first 1927 issue of 1A Revolution surrealiste. This did not hap .. pen, though, probably because only one issue of the magazine was published between December 1926 and March 1928, namely the issue of9-10 October 1927 (see p. 44, NOTE 4 in this volume). For his part, Bataille dedicated EErotisme to Leiris in 1957, noting in his foreword: I could not have written this book if I had had to work through the problems it set me unaided. I would like to make it clear that my efforts have been preceded by Michel Leiris's Miroir de La tauromadue, which envisages eroticism as an experience bound up with the experience of life, not as an object of knowledge, but of passion and, more deeply, of poetic contemplation. It is particularly because of Miroir, which Michel Leiris wrote on the eve of the War, that this book had to be dedicated to him.
28. Un Cadaore, Imp. sp. [Imprimerie speciale] du Cadavre, no date, pamphlet 37 x 32 em, 4 pp., with a portrait of Andre Breton, depicted with a crown of thorns (he is 33 years old and has been denied by the 12 Apostles who make up the 12 signatories). The title Un Cadavre is the same as that for the Surrealists' pamphlet against Anatole France, in October 1924, the name of the print shop likewise being the same. It was republished in Tracts surrealistes etdeclaratums collectives, 1922-1969, VOL. 1, 1922-39, pp. 132-48 and 426--1,and VOL. 2, 1940-69 and supplements to VOL. 1, p. 441.
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The Publication of ~ Corpse' other than hostility.29 I am now inclined to believe that the strict demands made by Breton which led to that widespread split of 1928-29 were fundamentally justified: Breton had a desire for communal dedication to the same overriding truth, a hatred of any concession in the matter of this truth of which he wished his friends to be the expression, unless they were no longer to be his friends, things with which I am still in agreement. But Breton made the mistake of being too narrowly attached to the outward forms of this fidelity. One consequence of this was an unease made all the greater for his having a kind of hypnotic prestige-an exceptional instant authority-which he used without any great reservation or any genuine prudence. His mood is changeable and he gives way to it more easily than to any concern for respecting.other people. This is how he was able to mistreat Aragon (this must have been in 1928, which was when his fame was at its peak), to the point where the latter left the studio in rue Fontaine after a scene one evening, and said to Masson, who was with him: 'To think that I broke offwith my family to end up with that.' Breton's authority had, in fact, something of paternal deafness about. it. Moreover, it is my opinion that, by the same token, a more patient and reflective character would not have succeeded in forming a community dedicated-to the deep meaning of the Surrealism that was Andre Breton's dream. Indeed, there is nothing in this principle that is distinct enough and, above all, authoritarian enough,
29. The 12 signatories were Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes, Jacques Prevert, Raymond Queneau, Roger Vitrac, Michel Leiris, Georges Limbour, Jacques-Andre Boiffard, Robert Desnos, Max Morise, Georges Bataille, Jacques Baron and Alejo Carpentier. The title of Bataille's text was 'Le lion chatre' (The Castrated Lion; DC, VOL. 1, Premiers ecrits, 1922-1940, ed. Denis Hollier, pp. 218-19). Leiris's was titled 'Le bouquet sans fleurs', the title ofa text by Breton that appeared in La Revolution surrealists, No.2, 15 January 1925, pp. 24-5 (Breton, Oeuvres completes, VOL. 1, pp. 895-8) and in which he responded to some of his detractors who accused him 'of not acting in a ·way more consistent with his ideas'.
67
Bataille & Leiris to rut through modern individualism and personal pride. There is a contradiction between the freedom essential to Surrealism and the rigour without which it becomes tarnished and substitutes the banality of life for the overriding project to which it lays claim. Whatever the case, a narrow literary milieu had taken shape, not around me but around the magazine Documents (which, under the title of 'general secretary', I actually edited, in agreement with Georges Henri Riviere, who is now the keeper of the Folklore Museum at the Palais de Chaillot.t? and in opposition to the titular editor, the German poet Carl Einstein) and the majority ot the signatories to the second Corpse have, in fact, contributed to Documents-this collaboration was proof of their very weak! cohesion. It was Desnos who had the idea of responding to the Second Manifesto by harking back to the form and title of the pamphlet that had sullied the . public funeral of Anatole France, but this time with Breton as the target, the pamphlet and the drastic breakup of the group proclaiming his demise. I remember that at the time we were in front of the terrace of the Deux Magots. I talked about it to those around me; the idea struck them as a very good one and my friend Georges Henri Riviere immediately found me the 500 francs needed for publication. The next time I saw Desnos, he told me that it was a bad idea after all, that he had talked about it not quite in earnest and that on reflection thought that rather than working to discredit Breton it would, instead, work greatly to his advantage. I was not sure whether he might be right. But I had set things in motion and, despite his misgivings, I managed to persuade Desnos to, give me a text after all. Jacques-Andre Boiffard undertook to produce a photomontage based on the page in La Revolution surrealiste where all the group's participants are
30. The musee des Arts et Traditions populaires.
68
The Publication of 'A Corpse' represented 'rith their eyes closed, their gaze in one sense turned inwards.s! I am sure today that Desnos was right: there are a lot of things in my life with which I no longer concur, and A Corpse is among them. I hate that pamphlet as I hate the polemical parts of the Second Manifesto. These impetuous, precipitate accusations arise from complacency and rash excitability; how much preferable would silence have been on both sides. Doesn't Breton himselfwrite in a 'caution': By allowing the SecO'TUl Manifesto of Surrealism to be republished today, I persuade myself that time has done the job of blunting its polemical sharp ends. I hope that it has by itself corrected the sometimes hastyjudgments I put forward, even if this is to some extent at my own expense. g2
My only reservation: that I miss the youth where haste could be overriding, where it did not seem that passion was ever worthy of mistrust. I was wrong but inexperience hardly strikes me as a sorry thing; the necessity of experience is the flaw in accomplishment: if we were not so moved by the babble of childhood, our deep thoughts would never have the lightness which is the measure of their depth.P
31. In the same issue that the Second Manifesto had appeared in. 32. ' Avertissement pour la reedition du Second maniftste du surrealisme', Breton, Oeuvres com-
pUus, VOL. l,p. 835. 33. This text was written by Georges Bataille, around 1954, for the benefit of Monsieur Yves Breton. On Yves Breton, see p. 41, NOTE 1 in this volume.
69
Racism
The word race necessarily has two meanings: the one being precise, in so far as it is possible, and answering to the requirements of science; the other vague, when we make do with appearances as a way of distinguishing two races. In the first sense, we will say of a people or an individual that they are of Negro race, whereas in the second we talk about the dark-skinned races. In practice, the scholarly idea of race does not operate on the social level (in practice, moreover; it never operates if it is a matter of individuals). The racial questions, whose political significance has latterly been so great, only ever operate through crude distinctions. Science only ever intervenes -this domain in order to affirm the inanity of these popularly held distinctions. It also robs of its value in particular the distinction that seems generally the most valuable, that of the colour of the skin. The pigment upon which this colour depends does not in fact have any fundamental character: a dark-skinned people moving to a different climate could, in the long term, lose the pigment; conversely, the pigment could have given colour to peoples who are not of the Negro race. In any case, the Ethiopians and the Polynesians are not Negroid; some people even see the Ethiopians as belonging to the Caucasian race, and the Caucasian race corresponds to the white race of our fathers, as the Negroid to the darkskinned race. When it came to the Jewish race, the distinction was even more indefensible since, in order to judge a man's race, one officially had to resort to the difference in religion.
"in
70
Racism J
At the heart of racist attitudes there is, therefore, an enormous absurdity and, since it involves the most shameful cruelties, nothing is more natural than to see racism as a scourge that must be destroyed. We should add that this scourge seems both recent and quite avoidable. It was alien to Antiquity, and the Islamic world of today is indifferent to matters of colour. And we are tempted to picture it as a doctor might a disease that did not exist in the past and that can, for example, be wiped out with antibiotics, or as a fireman might see a fire to be put out by water. Racism has a foundation and this is a bad foundation, so it has no reason to exist ... We must fight against the error that lies behind racism, an error that the Ancients did not commit. It strikes me that this is a simplification, and that if we talk about the evil of racism we have missed something out if our position is in terms of whether racial distinctions are precise or not. Of course, racist antiSemitism is a more pernicious form of hatred than hatred for those faithful to the Jewish religion but, after all, it is only the old anti-Semitism in a form applied to irreligious masses. Could we not see in the end that the word racism is a mistake? This is straightforward for us to,remedy by replacing it with the expression, phobia of others, or by a neologism, heterophobia, neither of which can immediately signify anything concrete or easily pinned down. But it is clear that racism is a specific aspect of a deep heterophobia, inherent in humanity and whose general laws we cannot avoid. Hatreds between village and village, fighting between village and village are no longer virulent today, but we know what intensity they had until only recently. They were so fierce in the middle of the nineteenth cen- . tury that in Paris, stonemasons from Limousin formed distinct clans according to their place of origin and fought one another on the building sites. At the outset, heterophobia is external, but it can persist within a given political community (which is the case in point), and there only has to be some
71
Bataille & Leins sufficiently lasting criterion, which now is plainly that of difference. The Limousin clans kept going so long as the stonemasons who had left maintained a contact with the village and returned to it now and then, but trade union activity diminished them (it replaced clan antagonism with class antagonism). Anti-semitism is more solid (I might add that the best means of mitigating it was the war in which:Jewsand non-jews fought side by side). In Antiquity, subjugated populations soon fought with their conquerors against the latters' enemies. The tangible differences between one people and another were slight and the Jews were the only ones not to undergo assimilation, isolating themselves and openly maintaining a difference from the rest: their participation in the armed struggles of the modern world is recent. The worst case is that of the Blacks, whose glaring difference is ineradicable. One could describe the antagonism as inevitable, to the extent that a tangible difference has a property of stability: so it is futile to argue that" difference is ill-founded according to science. It is not a question of science: in racist attitudes, theory had only a secondary influence. To see racism as an evil idea is to turn away from a problem whose essentials are never located in ideas: nor are they in Nature. They are contingent and aleatory, they are historic, which is to say human. Of course, the differences at stake are never irreducible. They are and they operate, but they remain at the mercy of movement. The Brazilians resolved the problem without having decided to resolve it: circumstances saw to it that too few individuals managed to keep themselves secure from the, mixing of 'races'. Indians, blacks of African origin and whites fused together. Colour prejudice does not exist there. The survival of the pure white race makes no more sense there than the existence of an aristocracy, scant in number, preserving its distinction in alliances. But when it happens that a white proletariat keeps itself secure from mixing colours, as in the
72
Racism J
United States or in South Africa, while the blacks form a mass that is oppressed and hard to contain, the crisis reaches an acute point. The more the mass of whites is numerically weaker in relation to the coloured masses, the stronger heterophobia becomes. The situation then is irreducible. The essential aspect of these antagonisms stands out all the more crudely in this latter situation. The difference in question has always had a meaning: it marks a political inferiority. The same difference does not operate everywhere in the same sense. In the Muslim world, superiority immediately belongs to the black Muslim who had an advantage over the white Christian. In Muslim countries, colour, therefore, cannot have the meaning of inferiority; it did not exist as difference. Each time a difference determines antagonism, in the eyes of those who mark it out, it signifies the inferiority of the other. It therefore has enormous scope, to the extent where it is possible to oppress anyone affected by this difference. Oppression is possible everywhere, but it cannot assume substance in the same way if the oppressed person is in every detail similar to the oppressor. The oppression of the man of colour is therefore a privileged form of oppression. It is the easy oppression of a unanimous mass exercised over a mass that is unequivocally differentiable. We can describe the oppressor's attitude as being morally base in the extreme. It implies the stupidity and cowardice of a person who attributes to some external sign a value that has no meaning other than his own fears, his guilty conscience and his need to burden others, through hatred, with the deadweight of horror inherent in our condition. Individuals hate, it would seem, to the same extent that they are themselves to be hated. It is beyond doubt, if we picture a white man and a black man, that, in the words of.Michel Leiris, 'between their physical differences and their different atti-
73
Bataille & Leins tudes of mind there is no demonstrable relationship of cause and effect'. It is cultures and different modes of cultural development that are at the origin of their opposition. But moral censure is only ever the expression of powerlessness. This racial antagonism is the form currently assumed in this or that condition or place by currents of opposition that in any case sweep through human masses, and whose diminution alas cannot be brought about by showing that they are not givens in Nature. Human existence is not natural existence and what these arbitrarily motivated phenomena of antagonism do is set historic human behaviours against the immutable behaviours of animal interest. MICHEL LEIRIS, La Q}testion raciale devant La science moderne. Race et civilisation, Paris, Unesco, 1951, octavo, 48 pp.34
Unesco has very felicitously entrusted Michel Leiris, an ethnographer attached to the musee de l'Homme and, moreover, a writer well-known in particular for his remarkable book EAge d'homme (see Critique, NO. 11, April 1947, p. 291),35 with the task of writing a short work summarizing the most significant known facts relating to the problems produced by race antagonisms. In this, Michel Leiris summarizes the position he has based on detailed study:
34. The title is Race et civilisation, the title of the series being 'La Question raciale devant la science moderne'. The book was reprinted by Leiris in his collection Cinq etudes d'ethnologie, Gonthier, Denoel, 1969, reissued by Gallimard, 1988, 'Tel' series. 35. 'Regards d'outre-tombe', an article by Maurice Blanchet on £Age d'homme, Aurora and Nuits sansnuit, reprinted in Maurice Blanchot, La fhrt du feu, Gallimard, 1949, pp. 247-58.
74
Racism Racial prejudice is no more a hereditary than a spontaneous phenomenon; it is a 'prejudice', which is to say a value judgment without .objective foundation and cultural in origin: far from being intrinsic to anything or inherent in human nature, it is one of; those myths which derive from self-interested propaganda rather than from an age-old tradition. Since it is linked essentially to antagonisms that rest upon the economic structure of modern societies, we shall see it disappear insofar as populaces transform this structure, as with other prejudices which are not causes of social injustice, but rather its symptoms (p. 46).36
This is based on an analysis of the objective situation, which shows in !act that racial differences are fundamentally no more than differences of culture. This is undeniable, and it is equally undeniable that at the same time as social injustice brings about currents of opposition between individuals, it incessantly renews these currents. I believe however that there is a need for some reservations about the reducing of 'racial prejudice' to the action of propaganda. Of course, there is nothing natural at the basis of this prejudice. But it arises from wider currents than those channelled by the action of propaganda in its various forms, which run through the social structure and interfere with economic currents.
36. 'Tel' series, pp. 79-80.
75
GEORGES BATAILLE AND MICHEL LEIRIS
Correspondence
1924-61
Editor's N ole
Eighty letters and postcards were recorded. FORlY-SIX FROM BATAILLE:
Forty-one received by Leiris and held in the Jacques Doucet Literary Library: twenty-seven classified Mss., 43.152 and 43.187 to 43.212; twelve classified, 43.214 to 43.225, and two not yet classified (NOS 23 and 79). One (NO. 11) not sent by Bataille or not received or held by Leiris but of which there is a copy in the manuscript department of the Bibliotheque Nationale de France, classified NAF 15.853, f.10l, One (NO. 21) not sent: ibid., classified NAF 15.853, ff 99-100, One (NO. 18) intended for Louise Leiris and not sent: ibid.• classified NAF 15.853, f. 98, One (NO. 30) received and destroyed by Leiris and mentioned in his
Journal 1922-1989, One (NO. 69) addressed to Louise Leiris and held in the Jacques Doucet Literary Library, classified Ms. 43.213. THIR1Y-FOUR FROM LEIRlS:
Thirty-two held in the manuscript department of the Bibliotheque Nationale de France, classified NAF 15.854, if. 24--58, 79
Bataille & Leiris One (NO. 26) not found but which Bataille received and copied out in his notes for 1£ Coupable, One (NO. 24) not sent, held in the Jacques Doucet Literary Library and not yet classified. A number of these letters have already been published in the following
three works: Le College de sociologie, 1937-1939 [The College of Sociology, 1937-1939],
texts introduced by Denis Hollier, new edition, Gallimard, 1995, Folio Essais: two letters from Bataille and three from Leiris. Georges Bataille, Choix de lettres, 1917-1962 [Selected Letters, 1917-1962], standard edition, introduced with notes by Michel Surya, Gallimard, 1997, Les Cahiers de la NRF: twenty-six letters from Bataille. Georges Bataille, EApprenti sorciet; du Cercle communiste democratique a Acephale [The Sorcerer's Apprentice, from the Democratic Communist Circle to Acephale], texts, letters and documents (1932-39), compiled, introduced and with notes by Marina Galletti; prefaces and notes translated from the Italian by Natalia Vital, editions de la Difference, 1999, Folio 'Essais): three letters from Bataille. These previous instances of publication are noted thus: College, Choix and EApprenti. Some letters, primarily those concerning the College of Sociology, have also been published in Gradhiua or other periodicals.
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1. BATAILLE TO LEIRISI
[Paris (?), 1924] Dear friend, Are you still bored? I am too alone to take this business of boredom seriously on my own account. The things that exert an influence on us in Paris through friendship or from any other reason are idiotic. If what I express is something different from what I have to say, forgive me: which~is to say that all this goes on being as muddled as it is. Nor do I believe that the extreme simplifications that I finish up'with on my own really mean anything, but it is not very hard to work out how I manage to get myself a bargain out of all the various prospects we come to believe in here in Paris. Of course we are not yet at the point of proceedings that can be brought into the open, but if hypocrisy makes us unwilling to risk nothing more than the conviction that failure would bring us to the height of ridicule, I am all the more inclined to play and lose: I'm used to it. Clearly nothing of greater consequence than writing this page for example. In friendship, Georges Bataille
1. BLJD, Ms.Ms. 43.187. Published in Choix, p. 56.
81
2. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS2 [Paris (?), 1925] Dear friend, As usually happens after having met you, I was seriously dis-
couraged last night, but this time with a bad conscience, which is to say persuaded that I was in a deplorable state of mind and despising myself. I realized quite clearly that I was only an eclectic and an opportunist and on the instant it struck me that nothing could be more despicable. Today I make no bones about protesting to the ~ontrary, that my mistake lies in my tendency to put myself in the wrong and particularly with you, probably because I lack courage and also out of affection for you. I can even see precisely in my potential for eclecticism and opportunism, which after all for me are only weapons in the service of an unreserved intransigence, the main reason to hope that my current efforts may come to ,something. It remains to be seen how far it is possible to go along this track. Yesterday I recognized that it was possible that I had already gone too far. Indeed it is possible that I have relied a bit too much on my personal influence. However, this is only a very relative disappointment and the only wrong that I'acknowledge in myself, in this circumstance, is that I started out there, but that
• 2. BLJD, Ms.Ms. 43.188. Published in Choix, pp. 57-8.
82
Correspondence 1924-1961
was how it happened. I should obviously have preferred to put it off till later, but, at a certain point, I would have thought I was retreating had I had the patience to wait and I have not wavered when faced with what would certainly have struck you as impossible or dangerous. As for the principles that we have to adopt once and for all for possibilities of this kind, I consider it necessary to establish them as quickly as possible: I imagine that you have anxieties in this respect but I ask you forthwith to wait patiently until I can clearly set out my way of seeing to you. If my letters, or what I write, have more practical value than what I say to you, I do not ultimately believe that this is the case so much because my writing does not sufficiently bring out contradiction as that my natural distaste for everything that is precise and persuasive prevails when we are together and then I speak without conviction and without really knowing what I want to say. Yours in friendship, Georges Bataille
83
3. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE3 [Paris, Thursday] 16 July [1925] Dear friend, Could you translate into modern French one or two of the most noteworthy Fatrasies, and send them, with a brief bibliographic note, to Breton, 42 rue Fontaine, or to me-if possible within the next week? They would appear in October, in Issue 5 of the RS.4 I hope you are well and I hope to see you soon, before I leave. B-est wishes, Michel Leiris Is 9 p.m. on Wednesday at the Select in Montparnasse all right for you?
3. BNF-Mss., NAF 15.854, f. 45.
4. La Revolution surrtaliste, where they would appear in Issue 6, 1 March 1926, pp. 2-3.
84
4. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE5 [Cap d'Antibes (Alpes-Maritimes), August 1925] Dear friend, I'm going to get married, oar of light moorings denied.f Michel Leiris
5. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 57. Postcard showing 'Cap d'Antibes, Villa "Eilenroc", Path through the rocks'. addressed to Monsieur Georges Bataille, 85 rue de Rennes, Paris. Postmark illegible. 6. Leiris had left in early August with Daniel-Henry and Lucie Kahnweiler and Louise (Zette) Godon for a holiday in Antibes, to join Andre and Colette Masson. '[Zette] and I did a lot of talking' and on August 7, 'we had scarcely arrived on the Cote when we got engaged' (EAge d/homme, Gallimard, 1939. p. 194). Their marriage took place on 2 February 1926.
85
5. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE' La Preste [Pyrenees-Orientales], [Thursday] 21 [August 1930]
I'm leaving for Spain soon. Here you find grass snakes even in the hotel. Affectionate regards, Michel
7. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, £ 56. Postcard showing 'The Pyrenees Orientales, Route de 1a Preste. Prats-de-Mello and Tour de Mir electric power station (1540 m)', addressed to Madame and Monsieur" Georges Bataille, 24 avenue de la Reine, Boulogne-sur-Seine (Seine). Postmark illegible.
86
6. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE8
[Zaragoza, Sunday 31 August 1930] See you soon, I'm back on the 4th. Affectionate regards, Michel
8. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 24. Postcard showing 'Zaragoza, Plaza de Toros', addressed to Madame and Monsieur Georges Bataille, 24 avenue de la Reine, Boulogne-sur-Seine (Seine). Postmarked: 5.7.1931.
87
7. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE9 Kayes ([French] Sudan), [Saturday] 4 July [1931]10 Very affectionate regards Michel
9. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 58. Postcard showing Kayes, addressed to Monsieur and Madame Georges Bataille, 24 avenue de 1a Reine, Boulogne-sur-Seine (Seine), readdressed to La Ciotat (Bouches-du-Rhone). Postmarked: 5.7.1931. 10. The Dakar-Djibouti field trip headed by Marcel Griaule (1898-1956}-to which Leiris belonged as secretary-archivist-s-left Bordeaux on 19 May 1931 and stayed in Dakar from 31 May to 12 June. Kayes and Kita (from where Letter 9 would be sent) are on the road that took the field trip to Sanga, where it stayed from 29 September to 19 November and where Leiris studied the secret language of the Dogons, the subject of his degree thesis at the Ecole pratique des hautes etudes, examined in 1938 and published after the War: 1A Languesecrete des Dogons de Sanga (Soudan franfais), Institut d'ethnologie, 1948. [What was referred to as 'French Sudan' is now Mali-Trans.]
88
8. BATAILLE TO LEIRISII [Paris, July 1931] My dear Michel, My failure to write to you has not been out of neglect but probably because I have too much friendship for you not to be sensitive to a great many things. In any case I would not have made a decision to write to you with platitudes or unpleasant things. I am leaving for the country truly very disgusted with a life that is unfortunately no different from the one that you led here. Last night I saw black dancers at the Exposition.P dancers brought onto a platform like cows in a cart. But I do not believe that the impossibility of certain things could have been more striking for me than it was there for what separates the blacks from the whites invited by the Trocadero museum.P I cannot see for a moment what any kind of agitation might mean if it does not exclude me quite categorically from all these sad existences. Believe in my wholehearted friendship, Georges
11. BLJD. Ms.Ms. 43.189. Published in Choix, pp. 62-3. 12. The Exposition coloniale, which was held in Paris, at the bois de Vmcennes, from 5 May 1931. Its exact title was 'La plus grande France, exposition coloniale internationale' (Greater France, the International Colonial Exhibition). 13. Musee d'Ethnographie du Trocadero.
89
9. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE14
Kita (French Sudan), [Thursday] 22 July [1931] Dear Georges, Your letter reached me this morning. The blacks and the whites have at least one thing in common: they all lead sad existences. And I don't see what any kind of agitation can mean, outside the pleasure of this agitation itself. I left very disgusted and I remain very disgusted, because one only really travels quite alone. But everything seemed preferable to me than the life that anyone of us is forced to lead in France at this time. Believe in my wholehearted friendship-despite that 'a great many things' to which you tell me you have been sensitive-and be assured that there is no other motive for all my actions than a terrible struggle against ennui. By the simpleton's method, moreover; as, for example, when I replace a city aesthete's spleen with the colonial cafard ... I thank you and Sylvia15 for having been so,kind to Zette after my departure; she has written telling me about this. The affection shown to her is what touches me most at this time.
14. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 49. 15. The actress Sylvia Bataille, nee Makles (1908-93), whom BatailIe had married in 1928 and from whom he separated in 1934. She had three older sisters: Bianca (1894--1931), wife of Theodore Fraenkel, Rose (1902-86), second wife of Andre Masson, and Simone (1905--99),
90
Correspondence 1924-61 In twenty years time we shall both probably be quite done for. Here's hoping you have a happy New Year! Michel
wife of Jean Piel. SylviaBataille became the companion ofJacques Lacan in 1939 and married him in 1953. Several of the Makles sisters had been fellow students of the Kahn sisters and had remained their friends: Simone Kahn, wife of Andre Breton and then of Michel Collinet, and Janine Kahn, wife of Raymond Queneau. They were cousins to Denise Kahn-the Berenice of Aragon's novel Aurelien-who was married successively to Georges Levy and Pierre Naville.
91
10. LEIRIS TO BATAlLLE16 Gedaref (province of Kassala, Anglo-Egyptian Sudan), [Sunday] 1 May 1932 17 Dear Georges, It is only as I begin this letter that I realize today is the first of May. I will leave it up to your perspicacity to meditate upon this symbolism (if, however, you absolutely wish to find some in this fact); as for me, I have overmuch phlegm to do so. What are you up to? What do you have to say? What are you doing? I shall probably not surprise you when I say that after my little gallop across the ethnographic flower-beds, I am beginning to come back to feelings that are more human. In other words, I am thinking about my friends . . . It will soon be a year since I began my jaunt around this country. The main thing I can say about it is that one always finds a fairly large number of things that are exactly the same in
16. BNF~Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 25.
from
17. Gedaref is 150 km Gallabat, a frontier town between Anglo-Egyptian Sudan (Sudan as it is now) and Ethiopia. The field trip's members were obliged to stay in this region from 20 April to 31 May before obtaining authorization to enter Ethiopia. On 1 July, the group arrived at Gondar, where Leiris then studied the cult of the zars genies, the subject of his book La Possession et ses tlSpects thidtraux chez les Ethiopiens til Gonder [Possession and its Theatrical Aspects among the Ethiopians of Gondar] (PIon, 1958).
92
Correspondence 1924-61 Europe so as to be sure of total boredom, at least from time to time. But it must be admitted that on the other hand the Bernardin de Saint-Pierre style 18 would likewise be deadly.dull in the long run, if a European ever managed to get involved in it (for stories like White Shadows on the South Seas have no realitynot to say any Iikelihood-other than in the cinema). 19 The great attraction lies in walking around and making contact with a considerable number of very varied samples of (white or black) humanity. In other words, breaking the circle.
18. The reference is to the authorofithe novel Paul et Virginie-Trans. 19. White Shadows on the South Seas, a US film begun, then abandoned, by Robert Flaherty, completed by and credited to William S. Van Dyke (1928). The actors were Monte Blue and Raquel Torres. Ado Kyrou describes it thus: Skin colour is the enemy trampled on by the white doctor and the young Tahitian woman in White Shadows on the South Seas. The doctor, the only survivor from a plague ship, lands on a Polynesian island and is soon laid low by alcohol and tropical diseases. He expects nothing more from life. The love of the young native woman brings about his radical transformation; in this 'earthly paradise' which had been only a hell, love erupts as one of the finest visual poems ever seen. Thejoy of living will banish ideas of 'civilized' and 'native', the sun will shine more intensely, and the doctor will perish defending his love, having put up armed resistance to drive away 'his own kind', intruders bent on ~nstaUing 'civilization'. It is impossible to describe the magnetic beauty of this river of love and I must say once again: the cinematic image achieves this miracle of immersing us in a total experience of the marvellous.
Ado Kyrou, Le SUTTealisfTU au cinema [Surrealism in the Cinema], editions Arcanes, 1953, p. 132, a book published in a series tided 'Ornbres blanches' (White Shadows) [which happened to be the French titleof thefilm in question-1l'ans.]. Ifwe are to believe an advertisement that appeared in Issue 11, 25 November 1933, of the magazine Masses, Van Dyke's film was screened on 9 December 1933 as part of a film evening organized by the 'Friends of Masses', preceded by a talk titled "The Savages and the Civilised', given by 'our comrade the ethnographer Michel Leiris' and the film Au pays du scalp ('a documentary on the most savage peoples of South America').
93
Bataille & Leins That is surely what I was most in need of. You know with what bitterness I can reproach my best friends for not being other than as they are. Not because I really think that they would be better being other, but out of a simple liking for change. You, more than others, have experienced it . . . If I wanted to translate my current state of mind towards my friends into the noble language of dialectic, I should say that I have reached the 'negation of negation', in other words [re]conciliation.20 Having broken the circle, I have nothing more urgent than to seek to re-form it. Write to me, I should like that. How are you faring in the concert of creaks and cracks? What effect is the crisis having: amusement? irritation? How much ink has been spilt over the great Aragont! affair? Is poor Giacometti a bastard, or isn't he? And what about the Baron household?22 I won't tell you that these affairs will entertain me in themselves, but they will at least take me closer to my friends. And what major projects do people have going on right now? Not many, I surmise; or else well done for having the heart for it and my wholehearted admiration for men with some stamina left! 20. The brackets are Leiris's, 21. Aragon's indictment for 'inciting servicemen to insubordination' and 'provocation to murder' in his poem Front Rouge (RedFront) of October 1931. The Surrealists had protested in a number of publications and the pamphlet 'the Aragon Affair' came out in January 1932. 22. This is probably a reference to the domestic situation of the writer Jacques Baron (1905-86)-a close friend of Leiris, who had met him in 1924 in the Surrealist group, and the author most notably of L:An I du surrealisme [Year 1 of Surrealism] (Denoel, 1969)-and not his elder brother Francois Baron (1900-80) who, having belonged to a group of writers and artists in the 1920s, had become a colonial administrator and with whom Leiris had stayed in Dakar at the start of the Dakar-Djibouti field trip, in June 1931.
94
Correspondence 1924-61 Currently, my own project (entirely theoretical that is) would be to take a trip to South America, or even Afghanistan or TIbet. 1 But to hell with polar expeditions-you don't meet enough people on them after all. Still, I'd rather like to eat some pemmican.... Don't think I'm being ironic. Let me tell you something in all sincerity: the thought of seeing you again in not so many months time gives me a profound pleasure, but the idea of even once sitting in Montparnasse or any cafe whatsoever in any other part of Paris makes me feel sick. And another thought makes me melancholy: that we shall probably go and see a film, in the cinema-so human! My dear Georges, how happy I should be i£it were all those I love who were to come and join me here; instead of the opposite! All my love to you and Sylvia, Michel Once more, in wholehearted friendship!
95
11. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS23
Letter neversent, neverreceived or not kept 24 [Paris (?), September or October 1932] My dear Michel, My not writing to you stems not at all from neglect but because I have already written a letter and it has riled me. If there is something that must be of significance for you, it is the fact of hardly having anything in common with your past preoccupations any longer but, if one is to write to you, it is impossible to stand aside very much from the preoccupations one knew to be yours and which, after all, are the only thing one is aware of about you besides the fact that they bored you to tears. Youwrote to me (but your letter dates back to the first of May) that you're always disgusted that people are not other than as they are. I don't think I am any less disgusted than you. It is all I can say. But perhaps what is more disheartening is that the relationships one has with people are always in conformity with conventions of a kind that everything that could be othe» is excluded. I do not imagine that epistolary relationships can easily be an exception. I am also puzzled by your ironic tone about 'major' projects (yet another part of your letter that you must have completely for23. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.853, f. 101. Published in Choix, pp. 72-3. 24. It does not appear in the Leiris bequest to the BLJD.
96
Correspondence 1924-61 gotten five months on). I find that in this European society that is so utterly deadened, we have no option but to form the project of finding a way out, and not just episodically. If such a project is foolish, futile, or even major, that is too bad, but for my part I shall never put up with being incorporated into a senile confraternity of gossips and bores. I say this as naively as I can, and not at all aggressively since I have no doubt that you do not wish for such a thing any more than me. I would rather be done for than become one of their illustrations, even of the tenth order. (But this is not a reason for behaving like a pretentious idiot on the pretext that people say one needs to have some status.) All of these questions must besides be very far away from you, since they are indeed only asked over here, which is to say in the place upon which we are ultimately dependent but where you for a long time have had the luck not to be. Very affectionate regards, Georges
97
12. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS25 Paris [second semester of 1933 (?)]26 Nine o'clock My dear Michel, Forgive me, but an unforeseen complication prevented me at the. last moment, first from going to the circle,27 then from being able to telephone in time. I am sorry after what you've told me. I hope however that Pie128 will be there and that you will not be completely lost at the wretched circle. I am anxious to see you and I shan telephone you but it would be tedious to give you this vague explanation on the telephone. My very best regards, Georges 25. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.222. This letter was written on notepaper headed: Cafe de Flore, 172 bd Saint-Germain, Paris. Tel. Littre 55-26. 26. Leiris returned to Paris in February. 27. The Cercle communiste democratique, which was led by Boris Souvarine, and to which Jean Piel belonged, along with Bataille, Queneau and Leiris. In the words of Edouard Lienert: I remember: having seen them [Bataille, Leiris and Queneau] at some of the circle's meetings, but they did not take part in discussions, if I rightly recall. I even wondered why they bothered to come. I got the impression that being militants wasn't their sort of thing (Edouard Lienert, 'D'un cercle a l'autre', in Boris Souvarine et 'La Critique socials', ed. Anne Roche, La Decouverte, 1990, p. 53).
28. Jean Piel (1902-96), brother-in-law of Bataille and Andre Masson. He was a friend of Dubuffet, Limbour and Queneau-his fellow-students at the lycee in Le Havre, and had met
98
Correspondence 1924-61
Masson through Dubuffet at Queneau's around 1927. It was Leiris who introduced him to Bataille (jean Piel, La Rencontre et la difference, Fayard, 1982, pp. 123-4). He was one of those most active in Critique, which was set up in 1946 by Bataille, whom he was to succeed as editor of the magazine. On Bataille and Queneau, see Jean Piel, 'Georges Bataille and Raymond Queneau during the 1930s and 40s'. in the catalogue of the exhibition Georges Bataille et RaymondQueneau 1930-1940, Billom (Puy-de-Dome), 10July-l 0 September 1982, pp.3-9.
99
13. LEIRIS TO BATAlLLE29 [London, Friday 3 November 1933] Horse Guards stuffed popes on the throne ofJupiter. Zette When Neron [sic] passes by.gO Michel
[illegible word] Florence'"
29. BNF-Mss, ~AF 15.854, f. 26. Postcard showing 'London, Nelson's Column and National Gallery', addressed (in Louise Leiris's writing) to Monsieur and Madame G. Bataille, 3 rue Claude-Matrat, Issy-les-Moulineaux (Seine). Postmark: 3.11.33.
30. This line is in Engluh.-T,.ans. 31. Perhaps Florence Gilliam, an American music critic and Jacques Baron's companion at the time.
100
14a. BATAlLLE IO LEIRlS32 [Rome, Wednesday 14 A:priI1934] My dear Michel, I'm wondering what dire progress'" we're making back at home. When will things give way? Reading the newspapers from abroad makes everything seem insignificant and absurd, but my own life in Paris is that of my friends too. How tired I am. I have become so incapable of resting that I experience fatigue as a prison sentence. Sometimes I think that.personally, I am quite at the end of my tether. What's more, I'm still ill.34 Best regards, Georges
32. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.190. Postcard showing 'Roma, Piazza Navona', addressed to Monsieur Michel Leiris, 12 rue Wilhem, Paris XVIe. Postmark: Roma Ferrovia /8-9/14-IV/34-XII. Letter published in Choix, P: 100, where it is dated 8--9 December 1934. The •14-IV' on the postmark is barely legible but, on 14 April 1934, Bataille was defmitely in Rome. On the same day, he wrote to Raymond Queneau: 'I'm writing to you about the fascist exhibition' (Choix, p. 80). 33. An allusion to recent events: the Stavisky affair, demonstrations by extreme rightwing groupings on 6 February, the resignation of the government, a general strike (which Bataille regarded as a failure), the forming of the antifascist intellectuals' Committee of Vigilance [CVIA],etc. 34. In March, Bataille had had a serious collapse: heavy drinking, bedhopping, too little sleep and too much time in brothels. The trip to Italy was meant to get him back into shape.
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14b. BATAILLE TO LEIRIss5 [Friday 3 August 1934]
[Heading:] Write to me in Issy [-les-Moulineaux].
My dear Michel, I'm not joking but I am leaving for Privas to see Dr Adrien Bore1.86 Don't breathe a word to anyone about this piece of foolishness for I am on my last legs: all hell is raging in my head. If I get out of there I shall still have a nice smile for Laurence'? and a lively voice for talking to Michel Leiris, but I won't be very thirsty, I assure you. There is no better thing for cushing than the wheels of a train but that does not stop me from paying to get on board. What an absurd curiosity for what it would be better never to find; one ought not to have been born. For some time now I have been thinking that you're the one to whom I shall send a little word of friendship if ... but even that is impossible and there is nothing for it but to go on pegging out for as long as there are new days dawning. Georges Bataille
35. BLJD, Ms.Ms for 3.152 (letter attributed in error to Jacques Baron). Addressed to Michel Leiris, Sa Riera, near Bagur; Province ofGerena, Spain (see next letter). Envelope printed with the address Cafe de Vaudeville, 29, rue Vivienne, Paris, Postmark: 8.VIII.1934.
or
36. Dr Adrien Borel (188~ 1966), who psychoanalysed Bataille, Leiris and Colette Peignot. On Colette Peignot, see p. 117, Letter 19, NOTE 57. 37. Laurence Bataille (1930-86), the daughter of Georges and Sylvia Bataille.
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15. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE38
Sa Riera, [Wednesday] 15 August [1934] My dear Georges, Your letter finds me at Sa Riera,S9 on the holiday of the Assumption: Simone, Polly, Zette, Max, Gaston40 and I must be off soon to the 'fiesta' at La Bisbal. I don't think you're wrong about seeing Borel: there may not be a lot to be expected from psychoanalysis, but it can always be taken just as one would take an aspirin. It is neither stupid nor intelligent, merely effective or otherwise, as the case may be. I'm trying to work a little here but without enthusiasm, since I find it harder and harder to invent myths for myself. In the end I do what I can, writing being the only durable distraction that I have found for myself; and it would still be something to have this game at one's service! The village is very quiet and very lovely, too quiet and too lovely, I shall say, for it is always stuck there around you like a decor where gloom and discord and every kind of impossibility can have a field day jockeying for the upper hand. i\nyway, this is nearly always what happens to me when I'm travelling or on holiday. 88. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 48.
89. Sa Riera, in Catalonia. 40. Simone Breton, Zette (Louise) Leiris, Max Morise, Gaston-Louis Roux and Polly, his American companion.
103
Bataille & Leiris We saw Andre at Tossa.U He struck me as being very well and in fighting spirit. He leads a very well-ordered life and paints good pictures, in a medieval house with a well in the entrance hall and a patio. I envy his enthusiasm, which always saves him and allows him to draw nourishment from his torments. In this there is a kind of alchemy that we have not given up our despair of ever finding. But, believe me if you like, he is following the only way that can be followed. The only difficulty is to get there! Alas, to acquire this mystical exaltation it is not enough to apply Pascal's assurance that 'it will stupefy you'42 ... Everything I'm telling you here is quite futile, I realize. Allow that this is the lively way in which Michel Leiris addresses Georges Bataille but that to give their discussion weight there must be added a certain way of looking that is understood. Perhaps we only live for some of these ways of looking, which may give a kind of truth to the most absurd words spoken. We shall see one another again when the summer is over and there shall again be two of us feeling pegged out, which in my view is the only appropriate form of solidarity! As for everything else, 'mfiy the wind carry it', in the words of Francois Villon, whom I am re-reading at the moment.
41. Tossa de Mar, the Catalan fishing port where Andre Masson had moved in June with Rose Makles, 42. Pascal's 'wager' in the Pensees. Let us recall that, when his interlocutor asks him what he should do to aim for perfection, Pascal explains that his 'powerlessness to believe arises from [his] passions', he ought therefore to diminish them and imitate people who have made the wager to believe: 'it is in doing everything as if they believed, in taking holy water, in having Masses said, ~ etc. Of course even that will make you believe and will stupefy you' (Blaise Pascal, Oeuvres completes, ed. Louis Lafuna, Le Seuil, 'Llntegrale' series, 1963, p. 551).
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Correspondence 1924-61 If you see Borel after receiving this letter, give him my regards and tell him that I am trying hard to be good. By being very good I shall perhaps in the end have a right to my share of the cake, a sensational windfall after which there will remain noth.. ing more than for me to bite the dust, so that I'll make my exit in splendour, leaving no arguments for those nasty pessimists who deny every kind of glorious finale. Zette sends her best wishes. My affectionate regards, Michel Excuse the idiocy of this letter, which I am ashamed to reread and most of all to send to you after having re-read it. What you tell me has greatly moved me, at a point when I thought myself unfeeling. It almost made me weep. If the words were not so foolish and the comparison so ill chosen, I would tell you that I love you like a brother.
105
16a. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS43 [Paris, Sunday] 20 January '35 My dear Michel, Our conversation the day before yesterday could well confirm in me a way of seeing to which I have long since become accustomed, and this is a painful way of seeing because for me friendship has always mattered. But friendship cannot prevail against certain simple facts, which, though they may not be so for you, are abundantly clear to me. The project44 that we envisaged in those days makes it plain, which is slightly comic, or bitter, that on one level there is no more than the ghost of a friendship between us. Thus, I know where I want to take this in the most decided way, but our relationship has long been such that my purpose is not exactly unfamiliar to youthings are indeed simpler: for you, it is as if the question of their existence had never been asked. Where there might be some knowledge in you of what really matters to me, there is a void. And when I say a void, I also know what covers it up.
43. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.191. Published in Choix, pp. 101-05 (both parts, 20 and 21 January), and in EApprenti, pp. 119-24 (first part only, 20 January). The drafts appear in the Bataille archive of the BNF under the classification NAF 15.853, f. 92 (second part) and ff 93--7 (first part). The draft of the second part carries the mention 'double letter to Leiris towards the end of '34' in Bataille's handwriting. 44. It is not dear which project was being referred to.
106
Correspondence 1924-61 Don't imagine that there is hostility in my writing this. On the contrary, if I had any hostility towards you right now-as has happened-I would not have dreamed of writing to you. Moreover, I mow that I am also at fault, which does not prevent me from sometimes feeling extremely sad about all this. I imagine that my friendship contains something burdensome for those I love most. I can approach people I love less with more facility-above all, more humanity. Without the least doubt, the greatest disappointment I have had is the stagnation and the wearing thin of all friendship in my life which, in the course of very few years, becomes the emptiest of things, with only the past as its justification. This may not have much importance anyway but there is between us a misunderstanding that needs to be resolved. I cannot see why I should conceal even a part of what I think, However unapparent the result may be, I have made a great enough effort in the course of these recent years for me to be able to speak out without hesitation today. No one else has taken it upon himself to make any comparable effort. I can see this clearly enough to be sure that there is an interest-in a defmite sense of course-in bringing to light a certain number of coherencies, and throwing into the greatest relief the relatively contradictory movements that we represent. In doing this, I don't see anything to which there might be commitment in one sense or the other, the sole primary necessity being that of emergence from obscurity. A certain number of people aimed to hold a meeting so as to have a clear awareness that clarity could not be achieved without such a meeting. Xt the same time, it strikes me as impossible at present to find any other consistent reason for meetings. To this should be added, for the sake of averting any ambiguity, that in my view a 107
Bataille & Leiris clear awareness of the situation we find ourselves in should set out the value of a distinct attitude, even a distinct activity, this however being only a personal hope. I confess to you that I am shocked in what I feel most deeply at the idea of a new literary crowd. 45 I do not mean by this any moral repugnance: if such a crowd existed, I would not even hesitate to use it in as much as I found it in my interest. Admittedly, it is hard for me to imagine a more ill-chosen circumstance for bringing out a new Poore de Neuilly,46 given that at least half of those likely to participate in such a publication would refuse. Ultimately, I find only reasons to be surprised at seeing you inclined in.such a direction. In the first place, we were in agreement over the limits of possible collaborations. Besides, I expressed myself in precise enough terms to you and More 47 (repeating what I had already said successively to Lacarr'" and 45. Bataille does indeed write 'cohue litteraire' and not 'revue litteraire'. 46. The Poore 'de Neu.iUy, a magazine published in 1933 at Neuilly-sur-Seine, Editor: Lise Deharme. Managing editor: Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes, Contributions by Arp, Jacques Baron, Alejo Carpentier, Desnos, Drieu la Rochelle, Fargue, Jouhandeau, Lacan, Queneau, Ribemont-Dessaignes, Vitrac, etc. Only three issues of the magazine were published (NOS 1, 2 and 3-4). The project of a new magazine to which Bataille refers is probably that of La Betenoire, a magazine that was the idea of Leiris and Marcel More, which was edited by Maurice Raynal and Estratios Teriade and came out from April 1935 to February 1936 (eight issues). It published texts by .Antonin Artaud, Jacques Baron, Michel Le iris, Henri 'tdichaux, Raymond Queneau, Pierre Reverdy, Roger Vitrac, etc., but was condemned by Bataille and Masson, the latter describing it, in letters to D. H. Kahnweiler and Leiris, as a 'laughable little paper', as 'a louse on the baCk of the Minotaure' and an 'arse-wipe' (Andre Masson, LesAnnees surrealisus, correspondance 1916-1962, ed. Francoise LevaiUant, La Manufacture, 1990, pp. 249-61). Leiris only contributed to the first two issues.
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Correspondence 1924-1961
47. Marcel More (1887-1969), a polytechnician and stockbroker, literary critic, friend of Bataille, Leiris, Colette Peignot and her family, the author of books on Jules Verne and studies collected in Accords et dissonances and La Foudre tU Dieu, founder of the journal of religious research Dieuvivant (1945-55). 'A shadow figure (the shadow of Christ. the shadow of Satan), he was at once disturbing and touching, frantic, lost and saved' (Claude Mauriac. U Temps immobile, VOL. 10, £Oncle Marcel, Grassel, 1988. p. 159). On Marcel More, see 'Le tres curieux Marcel More', Digraphe, NOS 86-87, Autumn 1998. 48. According to Elisabeth Roudinesco, Jacques Lacan took part in the early meetings of ContreAttaque (jacques Laam, esquisse dJune vie, histoire d'un sys~ de pens/e. Fayard, 1993, p. 188).
109
Bataille & Leiris Caillois) about the reasons I saw for the prospect of a magazine. From these reasons it emerges that literary expression could only find a place in this magazine to the extent that it is spontaneously at one with a certain kind of inquiry: a disjunction between the two would rob the strictly intellectual initiatives of meaning, on the basis that these initiatives would in principle aim to establish the primacy of a lyrical knowledge (or something of the kind). The change in your way of seeing since our meeting with More can be explained in a very naive way by your conversations with Queneau.s? I told you from the start that I was surprised to see Queneau take an interest in the project of a collective publication. Of course, I am less surprised, even amused, to see him interested-I say this without bitterness, on the contrary-in order to try unconsciously to land it in a dead-end. I can all the more readily say of him that what he writes responds quite punctually to the free cohesion without which nothing is possible. Since, however spontaneous his books, he nonetheless places himself at the end-point of the most blatant intellectual initiatives, at the end-point of German phenomenology for example....
My very best regards, Georges 49. In his noteb~ks relating to Ls Coupable, Bataille mentions on 21 October 1939 the visit he has just had from Queneau following their rupture in 1934: It is strange that, shortly afJ.er a conclusive conversation with WUdberg which led to our falling out, Queneau should come to,see ~me: it is the first time he has come to see me s~ntaneously since hisdesertion (the word u not inexact) in 1934. Queneau was the first to desert me' (DC,VOL. 5, p. 514).
Jean Piel desaibes the relationship between Bataille and Queneau (though without mentioning the quarrel of 1994) in 'Georges Bataille et Raymond Queneau pendant les annees 30-40', pp. 3-9.
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16b. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS
[Monday 21 January 1935] I am the better advised for having slept on things and this morning I can only tell you how weary I am of little nincompoops and their goings on. I shall not attempt to put my case any further with people who cultivate thoughtlessness: Queneau, to the point of reproaching me for not having sought his collaboration (only to acknowledge within minutes that he was wrong); you, to the point of being unaware that, with me, you,were in the presence of a coherent worked-out plan (which I was able to set out only in front of More for the good reason that it had long become impossible for me to have a conversation with you that goes beyond the daily banalities to which you so resolutely attach importance). It pains me that there being perhaps-after all-some grievances against me, these grievances are of such a disturbing kind that they have impelled you to push for the utterly ridiculous business of the More grouping. I shall not dwell on the fact that Queneau and Leiris request me to step aside for them ... This is so childishly obvious that I am now giving up, leaving you, with sadness, to your pleasant slumbers. As for the meetings at Lacan's house, I should be grateful if you would let Queneau know that it is my intention to leave immediately should he tum up. Georges Bataille 111
17. BATAILLETO LEIRISsO [Paris, April 1935] WHAT IS TO BE DONE? IN THE FACE OF FASCISM GIVEN THE INSUFFICIENCY OF COMMUNISM We aim to hold a meeting so as to consider together the problems that arise for those who are currently radically opposed to the fascist aggression, unreservedly hostile to bourgeois domination, unable to trust any longer in Communism. We invite you to participate in this meeting that will take place on Monday 15 April, at 9 p.m. in the Bel-Air Cafe, 32 avenue du Maine (Metro: Bienvenue) Georges BATAILLE,Jean
DAUTR~51
Pierre
KAAN.52
50. BlJD, Ms.Ms 43.221. Typewritten statement followed, below and over the page, by a handwritten text of Bataille's, published in Choix, pp. 105-06, and in EApprenti, pp. 126-8. 51. Jean Dautry (1910--68), historian and contributor to La Critique sociale and to Masses. See
EApprenti, p. 110. 52. Pierre Kaan (1903-45), militant communist, later oppositional, whom Leiris had known in the 1920s. He was one of Jean Moulin's right-hand men in the Resistance. He was arrested on 29 December 1943, deported to Buchenwald, then to Gleina (in Czechoslovakia), and died of typhus on 18 May 1945, shortly after being liberated by Czech partisans. See EAPJnenti, pp. 12-15. See also Francoise Boutot and Francois George, 'Pierre Kaan ou la
112
Correspondence 1924-61 [Handwritten text:] My dear Michel, I am sending you this little paper even though you already know it. I should not like there to be any misunderstandings: this matter could not be simpler, nor more necessary, in the sense that what is publicly expressed is of more consequence than what is said in conversations. I admit that I am often rather surprised by what you tell me on such subjects. I do not see why we could not envisage things differently from everyone else. All of it is simple, very simple. If meetings could seem worse than useless, it is because no one had anything to say and not because they were meetings. As for what is possible or impossible, things today are as ever they were: all it takes is the will, but it is true that the will is not there until it is forced. As for the business of individuals, I mean to tum my back on them deliberately. Being as I am, I am hardly at risk of being 'used' by anyone else. It is people who know exactly what they want who use others and not the other way round. Besides, such things are not the issue right now; all that cormts is to see whether it is possible to help people become aware ofwhat they are experiencing and to stop them, if possible, from sleepwalking through it. My very best wishes, Georges
lucidite active' [Pierre Kaan or active lucidity], in Vuages de la Resistance, introduced by Francois George, Lyons, La Manufacture, 1987 (La Liberti de ['esprit, NO. 16, Autumn 1987), pp. 169-201.
113
Bataille & Leiris I have sent a paper of the same kind to Queneau but only to keep my conscience clear, without seriously thinking that he'll come and without wishing it.
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18. BATAILLE TO LOUISE LEIRIS53
Letter not sent54 [july 1936] My dear Zette, Michel does not know the injury he does me. It is a dreadful thing for me to speak to someone who is quite thoughtless. Anyone can think and say what Michel said to me and even rightly so, but because Michel cannot use the words of this 'anyone' whom I hate, in this there is something that for me could not be worse. Even if what I am doing is absurd, Michel well knows that I am crazy enough to stake my life this way. In what way could his atti . . tude be unbearable for me? I could not care less about the 'any.. ones' who will mistake what I do for something else, but that
53. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.853, f. 98. 54. Noted at top right in Bataille's handwriting is: 'Not sent/July '36'. This letter probably follows in the wake of; Leiris's refusal to join the secret society Acephale, founded by Bataille in May-June 1936. In 1989, Leiris confided in Bernard-Henri Levy that he regarded Bataille's project as 'faintly puerile', 'not exactly a piece of childishness, but not very far off" (Bernard-Henri Levy, us Avenlures de la liberu, Grassel, 1991, p. 175). After his death, a note by him was found in which the word 'ridiculous' was used: When made explicit, the half-voiced understanding some have is devalued, because what it is worth lies precisely in its needing only to be implicit. Seeing things like this, I could not belong to the secret society Acephale: making manifest among its members what Ijudged best kept hidden, seemed to me not to seal the almost tacit understanding institutionalized by its mere existence, but to reduce it to the ridiculous (Gradhiva, NO. Ig, 1993, p. 65).
See also Letter 75, 28 October 1960, pp. 217-18.
115
Bataille & Leins Michel is wrong and knowingly, that he is one of the few men in the world who knows what lies behind an enterprise as infantile as those of Masson and myself, that he should ask me to adhere to reasonings that to me are as alien as classroom lessons, that he pretends to be unaware that, stupid or not, what he spoke of was what matters deeply to me, I say as feelingly as I would love a woman, I suffer from it because I hate the fact that the limitation of existence today assumes the countenance of Michel. Understand that I am taking this out on Michel only to the extent that he tramples on the foundation of our friendship with a determination I find stupefying, and also I believe that of his friendship with Andre. He could stand back, but to fmd words that trample even if it is true that this is justified by the idiocy of what we have done, is precisely this kind of 'going too far' that can make everything ~ impossibly bitter. Believe in my friendship, Georges I shall not see Michel for a long time, out of consideration for him. But don't ever speak to me about all this, ever again. 55
55. In this same period, Leiris had in mind the founding of a new art review, the project that bears out his distance from Bataille: the latter did not feature in the list of some 60 contributors approached, among them Breton, Caillois, Georges Dumezil, Maurice Heine, Klossowski, Malraux, Queneau, Georges Salles, etc. (Michel Leiris, 'Un projet de revue' [Proposal for a magazine], a text compiled and introduced by:Jean Jamin, La Revue des revues, NO. 18, 1994, pp. 6-14). This project never came to anything.
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19. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS56
[ Saint-Germain-en-Laye] Saturday [September 1938] I enclose with this letter the card I wrote to you when I was with Colette.s? She is really better now but she has been in a dreadful state. It does seem that for the moment she is out of danger and yet I still had to call the doctor at nine o'clock yesterday evening. I am sorry not to have written to you sooner. I would then have given you even worse news. May I ask you to send us cards telling us what you are up to and somewhat making light of Colette's illness? I don't know what to add. What can possibly be said on another matter would not be very cheerful either. 58 It is my hope that you do not read the newspapers (never has this been a more futile 56. BLJD,Ms.Ms 43.192. Published in Cnoix, pp. 144-5. 57. Colette Peignot (1903-38) had been Georges Bataille's companion since 1935 and was a close friend of Leiris. She died on 7 September in the presence of her family and of Bataille, Leiris and Marcel More. In spite of the Peignot family's opposition, several of her writings were published by Bataille and Leiris in two volumes not made available for sale and under the pseudonym Laure: 1£ Sacr« [The Sacred] (1939) and Histoire d'une petite fllle [Story of a Little Girl] (1943; see pp. 156-60, Letter 35, NOTE 125), texts which are later to be found in Laure, Ecrits, fragments, lettres [Writings, Fragments and Letters], compiled by Jerome Peignot and le Collectif Change Uean-Jacques Pauvert editeur), a work which also includes a 'Vie de Laure' [Life of Laure] by Bataille and 'Georges Bataille et la mort de Laure' [Georges Bataille and the death of Laure] by Marcel More. 58. The international crisis provoked by the Third Reich's claims on the Czechoslovakian territory of Sudetenland, which was terminated by the Munich agreement, signed on the night of 29-30 September.
117
Bataille & Leiris exercise); the only thoughtful and informed people I have seen say that all the arguments and interpretations are absurd, that we cannot know anything at all about what may happen. I wish you a pleasant worry-free month this bad September. Affectionately, Georges [Card enclosed:]59 My dear friends, Colette has been really bad. She is doing better now. Her temperature has come down. I am with her at this moment and she tells me to send you all her good wishes. We would be sad that you are far away if, as Colette tells me, we were not so happy to know you are in that sunny place. All our best wishes to you and Limbourw Georges
59. Postcard showing 'Saint-Gennain-en-Laye, the roundabout of the Roses and the Terrasse', with the address: Monsieur and Madame Leiris, Hotel de la Tour, Porto, Corsica. 60. Georges Limbour was on holiday with Leiris and his wife.
118
20. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE61
Paris, [Monday] 3 July 1939 62 My dear Georges, Working to draft a report of the activity of the College of Sociology since its foundation in March 193763-a report which, as you know, I was to read out at tomorrow's session-I found myself inclined to consider more closely than I had done so far what the 61. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 28. Typewritten letter, published by Denis Hollier; it College de sociologie, pp. 819-21. All the texts relating to the College (lectures, discussions, publications, etc.) were published and commented on in this work. On the disagreement between Bataille and Leiris expressed in this Letter 20 and the four that follow (21--4), readers should refer in particular to Bataille's account ofi4 July (pp. 797-816) and to Denis Hollier's 'Epilogue' (pp. 817-44).
62. When Leiris wrote this letter; he was unaware that on that same day Bataille was writing to him (Letter 21). 63. The founding of the College by Georges Ambrosino (1912-84), Georges Bataille, Roger Caillois (1913-78), Pierre KIossowski (1905-2001), Pierre Libra (a figure Denis Hollier has no knowledge of: p. 28) and Jules Monnerot (1909-95) had been the subject of a 'Note on the foundation ofa College ofSociology' signed by these six individuals and published inAc/PIude, NOS 3-4, July 1937 (reprinted in College, pp. 17-28). Its first meeting took place on 20 November and, from the summer of 1938, it was headed by Bataille, Caillois and Leiris, although Leiris's commitment was appreciably less pronounced than that of the other two: Leiris never did anything more than lend his name to this enterprise to which his colleagues gave themselves body and soul. and for which they even for a time gave their souls in the hope
that it would assume bodily substance' (CoLUgtt pp. 797-8).
Meanwhile (late June) Caillois, 'conquered by Victoria Ocampo', had left France for Argentina, and Bataille and Leiris remained alone in the lists. After using the weekend of 1 and 2 July 'to begin the drafting or his presentation' (College, P: 797), Leiris wrote this letter to Bataille.
119
Bataille & Leiris College had been doing over the last two years, and I take such a critical view of it that I cannot really regard myself as qualified to set myself up tomorrow as a spokesman for our organization.v' But 'as soon as he had sent it, Leiris was unhappy. He felt guilty. Realizing the difficulty his non-participation would leave Bataille in, he decided to give him a verbal explanation. In any case, could he be sure that the letter would reach him in time? He therefore typed out another copy and went to take it in person to the addressee, probably at the Bibliotheque nationale, since it was a working day' (College, p. 821). This second typewritten version, also held in the Bataille archive (NAF 15.854, f. 27), has the same physical characteristics as the earlier. one (the typing, the paper, the folds) but the text is slightly different and it is pompously signed (out of bad. conscience?) 'Michel Leiris, member of the College de sociologie'. It is the second version which was first published: in 1970 in Bataille's DC, VOL. 2 (pp. 454-5), in 1979 by Denis Hollier in the first edition of ColUge (pp. 548-9) and in 1987 by Jean-Pierre Le Boulet in an annex to his edition of Bataille's letters to Caillois (Georges Bataille, Lettres d RogerCaillois, 4 aoUt 1935-4 1959, editions FolIe Avoine, pp. 147-9), accompanied, in this book, by the variants on the first version. In addition, the handwritten draft of it was formd among Leiris's
[tuner
papers by JeanJamin and published in 1993 in Gradhioa, NO. 13, pp. 70-1. The notes drafted by Leiris with his intervention in mind were also found by JeanJamin and published: 'Notes de Michel Leiris' (College, pp. 813-16). On 22 June, Leiris had written to Andre Castel (on Castel, see p. 184, Letter 53, NOTE 185): An account that I was supposed to give at the Col/igtdI sociolop (which my friends Bataille and
Caillois are involved in, as well as lean Paulhan) but was counting on sneaking out of---since I hate doing lectures-became something I needed to do, since Bataille really wanted me to speak at this final session, rejecting out of hand every reason I gave him for my non-participation. I shall therefore have to give up Sunday 2 July to preparing this statement, which I have not yet done and for which I have only two Sundays left, since the session is to be on Tuesday 4 july.
Andre Castel and Michel Leiris, Co.rrespondance 1938-1958, ed. Anne MailIis, editions Clare Paulhan, 2002, p. 102. 64. How is this defection to be interpreted? Ever since 'Le sacre dans la vie quotidienne" (The Sacred in Everyday Life), Leiris's presence at the College had been discreet, not to say mute. At any rate, more a friendly than a militant one. Mter he began to take on a role in the management (Monnerot had to be replaced) his name cropped up in letters about the College exchanged by Caillois, Bataille and Paulhan; he was consulted, but seemed never to take any initiative (ColUgt,
p.817).
120
Correspondence 1924-61 If the idea of a conference that we had aired with Caillois and a few others should assume substance when the summer is over; I shall develop my objections in the course of these discussion sessions. It should be enough for me today to bring up the main points on which my disagreement falls. 1) In the first paragraph of the 'note relating to the foundation of a College of Sociology', which appeared in the review Acephale and was reproduced in the NRF ofJuly 1938, it is indicated that the primary aim set out by the College is the study of 'social structures'. Well, it is my reckoning that very serious infractions of the rules of methodology established by Durkheim-an intellect that we have unfailingly recommended to ourselveshave been repeatedly committed at the College: work based on vague and ill-defined notions, comparisons between instances taken from societies with profoundly different structures, etc. 2) In the second paragraph, there is the issue of forming ourselves into a 'moral community' which would represent something radically distinct from the usual associations of scholars. Well, I make no bones about saying that if people who have come from the intellectual background from which we have come wish to set themselves up as an Order or a Church, they have a strong chance of simply resuscitating the worst forms of literary chapels. As for the foundation of an Order, it strikes me as utterly
premature, given that we have not succeeded in defining any doctrine. One does not found an Order for the sake of giving rise to a religion; on the contrary, it is from within religions that Orders are founded. 3) The third paragraph of the same note talks about the constitution of a 'sacred sociology'. Although I in no way fail to see 121
Bataille & Leiris the importance of the sacred in social phenomena, I consider that to underline it this much-almost to the point of making the sacred the sole interpretative principle-is in clear contradiction with the gains of modem sociology and, primarily, with the Maussian notion of 'total phenomenon'. I have no truck with the idea of aiming to make the College a learned society where people dedicate themselves to researches in pure sociology. But in the end, a choice has to be made, and if we lay claim to sociological knowledge as constituted by men such as Durkheim, Mauss or Robert Hertz, it is elementary that we should apply its methodology with rigour. Otherwise, we have to stop callirtg ourselves 'sociologists', so as to clear up any misunderstanding. To clarify all this, I am relying greatly on these discussion sessions which should take place when the summer is over, and I am sending you, and sending likewise to our friends, the assurance of my complete commitment to the preparation for this conference of ours (a few days ago, I jokingly spoke of it as a 'concilium') whose meeting I judge to be necessary. Michel Leiris
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21. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS65
Letter not sent66 [Saint-Germain-en-Lave (?), Monday] 3-VII-39 My dear Michel, I am sending you Caillois's text, but it seems to me quite impossible to read it out on Tuesday. It is a very questionable text, for me at any rate. It would even be hard for the discussion not to take a polemical turn. In Caillois's absence, then, there is no way I could talk about it. We therefore have to wait for Caillois to come back before we pronounce judgement. Another point is that Caillois is speaking in the name of the College, is even involving the College: in conformity with the statutes attached to i~, the text therefore must be discussed among ourselves before being read or published. Moreover, I don't believe it is possible to read the statutes such as they are. They seem perfectly fine to me, but there is some adjustment needed. And it is desirable (in any case, it is important for Caillois) that they should be communicated only after they have been adopted. It may be that there are some excellent principles in Caillois's Examination of Conscience. But there are pointless exaggerations, a cer65. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.853, fT. 99-100. Published in Choix, pp. 161-63, and in College, pp. 822-4. 66. With its numerous corrections, this is probably only a draft. It precedes Letter 20, from Leiris, by a few hours--even a few minutes, but its composition was abandoned by Bataille after Leiris's visit. It is placed here after Leiris's letter for the sake of conveying a better understanding of events.
123
Bataille & Leins tain emphasis upon secrecy and silence. Flagrant contradictions, in other words. (To say nothing of the attacks against me.) In Caillois's mind, this is a text linked to the statutes (or at the very least it could be linked to the statutes). Indeed, the statutes must always be published with a text of this order. If Caillois agrees to clarify what is obscure and seemingly contradictory, to rut out what looks like an internal polemic and to replace a veritable dance of rigorousness with the rigorous good sense expressed in any real undertaking, the Examination of Conscience could function as the basis for such a text: first because its general movement corresponds to the logic of development of an organization such as ours (an extreme reserve in terms of propaganda, along with sobriety and self-containment); secondly, because the expression of this reserve and this discretion must be first and foremost written into any programme of action (on condition that it tones down its ostentatious character). Be assured of my wholehearted friendship, Georges Bataille Without reading the statutes it may be possible to talk about aiming to bring about a closed organization in October, with statutes defining the CS as an organization raising the question of spiritual power.67 67. Attached to the manuscript of the 4 July lecture, a note in Bataille's handwriting brings up the question of spiritual power (College, p. 824, N0!E 1): Is it possible to find a reason to fig~t and die that is different from motherland or class, a reason to fight that would not be based on material interests? Can concern for the greatness of humanity when assumed by a small number alone constitute sufficient reason? But what do we mean exactly when we talk about greatness? Since classes have been at issue, could there be classes without the Church, without the sacred. without sacrifice? Could there be a society without spiritual power, radically distinct from temporal power?
124
22. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE68 [Paris] Monday 3 [july 1939], 9 p.m. Dear Georges, I acknowledge that I have been in the wrong in waiting until now to register my disagreement. My weakness is that I am unable to take up a position-to say yes or no-until my back is to the wall, and that, I well know, is no wa~ of sorting things out. I am surprised, however, that you have taken this letter as if you were its personal target; I do not see the College of Sociology as identified with you and, when I criticise the College of Sociology it is as a whole, as an organization to which I myself belong. By bringing you this letter,69 I hoped that we would discuss it, perhaps find a way through it, because I was sorry that my defection places you in a difficult situation. I was wrong, I repeat, not to have told you in reasonable time that I was plainly not up to giving a statement of the kind. I thought it was a matter of my usual inhibitions and that I would get over them, as has often happened to me, at the last minute. I refuse to believe that such a failing, however awkward it might make things for you momentarily, is of the kind to destroy our friendship. My affectionate regards Michel 68. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 47. Published in Gradhiva,
NO.
13, 1993, p. 72, and in College,
p.825. 69. Letter 20, of the same date.
125
23. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS70 [Saint-Germain-en-Laye (?), Wednesday] 5-VII-39 My dear Michel, I have already answered your letter"! in the course of the statement I gave yesterday,72 but in doing so I believed I had to shift the debate: the reasons I had for acting in this way arise from the statement itself. I now aim to answer the questions you raise directly. When I used the expression 'sacred sociology' for the first time (exactly when the College of Sociology was founded), I did not think that the discipline defined by these words could be situated precisely in the sociological tradition of the French school. To my mind, the experience of the sacred that each one of us might have, 70. BLJD, in the process of being classified. Published partially in Gradhiua, NO. 13, 1993, pp. 73-4, and in complete form in Choix, pp. 163-5, and in College, pp. 826--9. The transcription given here is from the College version. 71. Letter 20.
72. 'Le COllege de sociologie' (College, pp. 797-816). The statement reads thus: It is my view that the interest aroused by the College de sociologi«, both internally and outside, derived from the power it had to call everything into question. [...] This is why it pains me to see Leiris, who abstains from speaking today because of the doubts he has had about the sound basis of our activity; it pains me to see Leiris reproaching us for not bearing more of a resemblance to the academic scholars whose authority we invoke. Leiris-thinks that we are not following the rules of Durkheim's sociological methodology and that the importance we attribute to the sacred is not in keeping with Mauss's doctrine of the total phenomenon. He adds to these considerations the fear of seeing our efforts end only in the creation of the worst kind of literary chapel
126
(Coll~gt,
pp. 800-01).
Correspondence 1924-61 was something containing an essential significance. The very subject of the statement you made last year 73 shows well enough that this way of seeing was equally admissible for you and for Caillois. But if it is true that we bring our personal experience into the researches that we have pursued, conclusions have to be drawn from this. The experience of the sacred is of such a kind that it can leave nothing indifferent: anyone who encounters the sacred can no longer remain a stranger to it any more than a Christian could remain a stranger to God. From the outset, I saw this sacred sociology, to which a college could give form and authorization, as there.. fore being situated in a line of descent from Christian theology (it is in this respect that I gave my answer yesterday to Landsberg'stt accurate interpretation of my position). The issue was representing And thus: The disagreement registered by Leiris is mor.eover far from ruling put the possibility of further collaboration, once goals and limits hav~ been clearly established, above all once the modes of freedom necessary to the development of an initiative still at only a tentative stage have been made plain
(CoU~gt,
p. 802).
According to Denis Hollier: As self-styled sociologists, they [the members of the ColUgt] had come to view theirdiscipline
in a manner that could hard.Iy have failed to surprise the masters they had chosen for themselves. The latter had entrusted to their youthful ambition the future of the youngest of the sciences, the most recent offshoot of the tree 6f knowledge. In their hands, a peculiar operation was to transform it: sociology would no longer be a science, but something in the order ofa malady, a strange infection of the social body [...] (ColUgt, pp. 7-8).
73. '1£ Sacre dans la vie quotidienne', 8January 1938 (College, pp. 94-119). 74. 'Paul-Louis Landsberg (1901-44), German Jewish philosopher who emigrated to Spain (in 1933) then to France, close to the Catholicism of Emmanuel Monnier; the author of Essai sur ['experience de la mort (Essay on the Experience of Death), (Surya, Georges Batadle, la mort a l'oeuore, P: 324, NOTE 2; English translation, p. 537, NOTE 16). He was arrested and deported, and died of exhaustion during his internment in the prison of Oranienbourg.
127
Bataille & Leiris society and its mechanisms with this same awareness of the destinies that are involved in it that is typical of the theologian when he considers God and the Church. This is where rigour could find a way that would lead to spiritual power; at any rate, the direction towards activity is inevitable on that basis. It strikes me, moreover, that a tradition in line with Christian theology already exists, and it is one represented essentially by Hegel and by Nietzsche. In truth, we cannot be sure that Durkheim did not incline in the same direction, but that he was stopped precisely by those rules of sociological methodology that exclude lived experience as the basis of analysis. In any case, it was impassible for him to bring a true depth to the overall considerations he made of living society. Distancing ourselves from Durkheim-and from Mauss-at the very least when we have in mind contemporary life, is without doubt an unavoidable necessity for us. In general terms, the task we face on the basis of the tradition that I have just outlined may be a difficult one and the methods proper to it are still to be defined. Should the definition of these methods have been the starting point? I could certainly describe the roads I have followed, but I cannot be sorry for having followed them before having analysed them in their detours. It is perhaps a matter of chance that you brought up the question of method at the right time, precisely when we had advanced far enough and just when we were bracing ourselves for exceptional efforts to determine the foundations and directions of our activity. * 'I do not b~lieve that you can hold against me the bitter sadness I felt on Monday, nor what it led me to say. There are certainly as many 'or more absurd mistakes in what is said when
128
Correspondence 1924-61 one is on edge as there are omissions in what is said at times when one is paralysed by calm. Irrespective of these inextricable miseries, you know what the friendship that binds us means to me. Georges
* It seems to me that this position of principle deals fairly broadly with your letter as a whole. It does not strike me as necessary to add more than a few words with reference to the objection you raise that we wish to explain everything by the sacred; personally, I do not believe in the possibility of any explanation of a complex reality with recourse to anyone simple principle. It strikes me that some notion ottotal phenomenon is implicit in only this position. It m~y be that we have given the impression of an extreme insistence in one sense. But why should one necessarily think that one sees only what one speaks about? I am moreover convinced that Caillois has the same position as me and, if further clarification is necessary, I must recall that, at the College of Sociology, I spoke occasionally about total phenomenon, and that I even spoke about it as an essential idea.
129
24. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE75
Letter not sent [Paris, Thursday 6 July 1939] My dear Georges, I have had news indirectly about Tuesday's session and you can
be sure that I was happy to hear that it had been judged-by many at least, it seems-to have been the most significant session of the College of Sociology. So I no longer regret having kept silent and think that it was certainly more worthwhile to have acted as I did (despite the passing difference of opinion it provoked between us) than trying to get by with a statement of some kind in which my fundamental reservations would have been outlined to some degree. For want of dialectical skill, in the existing conditions of presentation it would have been impossible for me to formulate my criticisms in an appropriate way, and had I spoken I would therefore have had only the feeble recourse of leaving these objections in the background, or else keeping absolutely quiet about them. So as to make it quite clear in what spirit I am answering your letter, I am copying out, just as it is, a fragment of the note75. BLJD, in the process of classification. Published in Gradhiva, NO. 13, 1993, pp. 76-7, where it is dated [Paris, 6 July 1939] and introduced by Jean J amin in these words: two manuscript folios which undoubtedly represent a draft. It does not appear that Michel Leiris sent a fair copy of this letter, at any rate it has so far never been found among Georges Bataille's papers.
It was also published in College, pp. 829-32, in the transcription used here.
130
Correspondence 1924-61 book I began keeping over a year ago now, with the idea of a book about the sacred in mind.i" The error that consists in confusing 'communication' with 'perfect agreement' (achieved on the spot, outside any debate). This is, without any doubt, 100% and immediate agreement, without the least hint of 'communication'; inversely, there can be communication even within disagreement, communion in the very midst of debate. 'Communication', in short, implies deep agreement, and not just formal agreement-s-real agreement, even when, from the logical point of view, there is disagreement. 77
I shall now respond to your arguments. It goes without saying that the College of Sociology has never deliberately placed itself within any continuance of the Durkheimian tradition. All the same, such constant use has been made by various people of ideas elaborated by the French school of sociology (sacred right and sacred left, myth as collective representation bound to a ritual, the role of periods of intense social concentration in opposition to those of dispersion, the mechanism of institutions such as sacrifice, potlatch, etc.) that it seemed
76. A notebook with notes drafted by Leiris for his presentation at the College on 8 January 1938, 'Le sacre dans 1avie quotidienne', This notebook was probably begun in the autumn of 1937 and kept up after the presentation (until November or December 1938, or even later). It has 65 pages and was found among Leiris's papers and published in 1994: Michel Leiris, EHomme sans honneus; notes pour '1£ sacre dans la vie quotidienne' (The Man without Honour, notes for 'The Sacred in Everyday Life'), authorized edition, presented and with notes by Jean J amin, Jean-Michel Place, 1994, 'Les Cahiers de Gradhiva' series, reprinted in La Regie du jeu, Gallimard, Bibliotheque de la Pleiade, pp. 1119-54. 77. Ibid., p. 1151. For this passage, the transcription from Leiris's book has been retained.
131
Bataille & Leins indispensable-if one did not wish to see these ideas gradually veer away-not to lose sight either of what they represent exactly in the spirit of those who elaborated them, or of the roles of methodology which presided over their elaboration. If ethnographers, of whom I am one (I don't mean in terms of educational background, which means nothing, but because in the course of my travels I experienced what ethnographic observation actually is), already tend to see classic sociologists as people who falsify reality by over generalizing, what will they think of those who, on the basis of these already litigious schematizations, operate a schematization to the second power, a kind of super-schematization? I am not defending ethnography here, well knowing that in this domain scientific objectivity is a trap; I just want to say that if ethnographic observation is tainted at its root (because the whole collection ofrituals and beliefs could offer us only a fragmentary and perhaps f~llacious reflection of what is actually happening inside the heads of native people), any schematization operated in vitro on documents that are by now already suspect, far from rectifying the error, will only amplify it, given that it will mark one additional degree of imposition of our European casts of mind upon the facts. There is no 'lived experience' here that holds up: however intensely we imagined living the experience of the native person,. we cannot enter his skin, and it is always our own experience that we live, very separated from his or hers, because of our differences of culture and the factor of exoticism that gives us a particular view of things, without us disposing of any serious means of redressing this erroneous vision. In my view, the great merit of Durkheim's successors lies in their having tried to react against his apriorism by pushing towards a closer study of events; 132
Correspondence 1924-61 it can be said that overall (I note this in passing) the entire development of the French school of sociology has operated in terms of a contrary movement to what we propose: more and more, there is a tendency to proceed by statistics, cartography, as stark a recording as possible of the facts. 1 do not fail to recognize the extent to which such an approach is limited, defective, wretchedly inhuman; it remains to be seen whether a different method can be applicable by someone who, while judging it necessary to go beyond pure observation and to construct, judges that it is at least indispensable to work on data established with a minimum of approximation. 78
78. 'The manuscript breaks off here, without any signature' (Jean Jamin's note to the transcription that appeared in Gradhiva). This letter concludes the correspondence between Bataille and Leiris on the subject of the aims and methods of the College of Sociology,which did not resume its activities after War was declared. What should have been an assessment then became a crisis, one that Mars did not wish should be resolved. War prevented the good intentions of the College from being tested against a reality in line with their ambitions and their fantasies. (...Jturning in on itself, [the College] undid itself, carried away by the movement of communal discord that, in the role of sorcerer's apprentice, it had let loose with such wholehearted passion (ColUge, P: 798).
133
25. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE79 [Colomb.. Bechar or-Revoil Beni-Ounif, Saturday] 7 October 193980 The lovely streets that are all the luxury, the unheard-of luxury of days on leave. Affectionately Michel Sergeant Leiris Ordnance Depot Annex Revoil Beni-Ounif Sud-Oranais (Algeria)
79. BNF~Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 29. Postcard showing 'Colomb-Bechar, a picturesque street', addressed to Georges Bataille, 59 bis rue de Mareil, Saint-Gennain-en-Laye (Seine-et-Oise). 80. Since 19 September, Leiris had been in Revoil Beni-Ounif, near Colomb-Bechar, in the southern part of what was then the French department of Oran, on the frontier with Morocco. Mobilized on 1 September (the date of general mobilization in France), he had been posted to the 22nd BOA (Battalion of Artillerymen) as an 'ouvrier chimiste d'artillerie' (chemical technician in the artillery). since he had begun studying chemistry after his baccalaureat and done most of his military service (1921-23) at the Pasteur Institute. At Revoil Beni-Ounif, he w~s part of a group of 50 chemists who had the job of doing experimental tests on secret chemical weapons in the Sahara Desert. This episode was later described in a book by Albert Paraz (1~99-1957), Le Lac des Songes (Bourg-en-Breese, Editions bressanes, 1950); as one of the main characters, Leiris goes by the name Daniel Meurisse. On 8 September, the eve of his departure from Paris, he had had dinner with Bataille and, on the 9th, the latter referred to this meeting in a first version of Le Coupable, which he had just begun:
134
Correspondence 1924-61
A few hours earlier, last night, when I was having dinner wit!} [crn.s.sed out] X. (X. has been called up [crossed out] and leaves today but he is leaving [crossed out]), I had already soaked up a lot of wine. I asked X. to read a passage from the book that I was carrying around with me and he read it out loud (no one I know reads with more tough simplicity, with more passion.. ate grandeur than him). I was~ too drunk and I can n?longer recall the passage exactly. He himself had drunk as much as me. It would be a mistake to think that such a reading done by men under the influence of drink is merely a provoking paradox. Everything I can say that is most true about X. is that he [crossed 0U!] at the point in my life [crossed out]. I think that we are joined together in that we are both open without defences-from temptation-to forces of destruction, not out of boldness, but ~ children who never give up a cowardly naivety. His face with its pronounced features. marked by a punctilious reserve. at the same time clenched and feverish, wounded by the co~stant agony of an impossible inner turmoil, his shaven head (almost uniform in colour, as if made of wood or stone) perhaps make up something more contradictory than anything I have ever encountered: an obvious cowardice (more obvious than mine) but so marked by gravity, so beyond rescue that nothing could be more heartbreaking to witness; at one and the same time a little boy at fault and a venerable old man, a naive sailor on a spree and a stupid divinity losing his boulder-thick head in the darkness of the clouds ... People like [X.] and me can never ever aspire to sanctity. Do I know what we can aspire to? If we are closer to the saints than to other men, it is to the extent that we are 'little flayed gods'. Why shall I not become a little god if it is true that one may no longer laugh, get drunk, enjoy naked girls and then know ecstasy without being a god? (DC, VOL. 5, pp.497-8).
There is no indication in the Complete Works that X. is Leiris, but there can be no doubt about it (see Catherine Maubon. Leiris, Bataille et Sartre; poesie et engagement, 1939-1950' [Leiris, Bataille and Sartre; Poetry and Commitment 1939-1950], Europe, NOS 847-848. November-December 1999, p. 104. NOTE 7). I
135
26. LEIRIS IO BATAILLE81 Colomb-Bechar, [Sunday] 29 October 1939 Dear Georges, Here we are, coming up to that time of the year when we shall be able to look back in appalled contemplation at everything that has happened in the course of it. . .. There is nothing clear-cut that I want to say to you (any precision here would be sacrilegious), just that there are certain memories to which I return automatically when I am feeling low and that, when all is said and done, they tend to be reasons for hope rather than despair. It can only be that whatever binds us to certain others is the only thing that is humanly worthwhile, capable of surviving no matter what vicissitudes. I amsticking to a solemn style of words here-very remote from my habitual one-and it makes me a little ashamed, for reasons of embarrassment, or human respect (to make yet another sacrifice to my obsession with playing things down). I think that
81. This letter does not feature among those that are held in the BNF under the shelf mark NAF 15.854. Copied out by Bataille into his notes on Colette Peignot for 1-4 Coupable, it is to be found in OC~ VOL. 5, pp. 516-17. It is preceded by these words: '7 November. It is a year today since Laure died. I am transcribing this letter from Leiris that I received on Sunday [5 November]. He had never expressed himself in these terms.' Laure had died on 7 November 1938 (see p. 117, Letter 19, NOTE 57). Transcription verified from the OC.
136
Correspondence 1924-61 you will forgive me and that behind my words you will discover everything that I should like to tell you with the same spontaneity as a flood of tears or a burst of laughter. Zette may well have told you that here they call me 'the Marabout', I see in this nickname that I have chanced to be given a kind of objective recognition of the idea that you, I and a few others have of ourselves to some degree. In these difficult times, I take this as a good omen for us all.... Do not fail to keep me informed about the progress of the publication.st In so far as will be materially possible for me, I am completely at your disposal. Once more, excuse the clumsy stiltedness of this note, and be assured of my very faithful and more than fraternal affection. Michel
82. This may perhaps be a reference to the edition of Laure's Histoire dJune petite fill«, which was delayed probably because of the War and the Occupation, and not published until 1943. See p. 142-5, Letter 31, NOTE 95.
137
27. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS83 Saint-Germain [-en-Laye], [Monday] 13-XI-39 My dear Michel, I did not write to you only after I got your letter. When I received it I hadjust begun a very long letter in which I spoke to you about a variety of things, about what was going on here. I shall send you that letter any day now.84 Today I should like to find the words to respond to what you have written to me. I cannot find them. All I want is for you to understand that the emotion I felt when I received it is at one with everything that has mattered to me. I would very much like to see you. Your letter even hinders me from finding the words. It is not words that can make you understand the affection that binds me to you.
Georges
83. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.193. Letter published in Choix, pp. 145-6. 84. No letter corresponding to this assurance by Bataille appears in the Leiris bequest.
138
28. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE85
[Beni-Ounif, Wednesday] 17 January 1940 My dear Georges, I do not write very much-and even very little! What I should like to find at the moment is a means of expression that goes deeper than words. All being well, you shall shortly receive a parcel, containing one of those solidified sand rocks that are known as 'sand roses' or 'desert roses'.86 It is a present I would have been very glad to T send to Colette. It is therefore to you that I address it. Be assured of my wholehearted" affection Michel
85. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 30 86. ·La Rose du desert' (The Desert Rose): the title of a sequence of 12 poems dated 'Cyclades-Sud-Oranais-Paris (1939-1940)' that Leiris later published in Exercice du silence, issue 1942-IV of Jean Lescure's literary review Messages, then reprinted in Haul mal. One of these 12 poems is titled 'La rose des sables' (The Sand Rose).
139
29. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS87
[Saint-Germain-en-Laye (?), Saturday] 17 February '40 My dear Michel, I write to you with sadness, for if I think about the past I feel horror-stricken by the fact that it has become so distant, so clearly out of reach. There are times when sadness rises much more than others and when one becomes much more aware that it is irreparable. I should also like to tell you how much I feel close to you but I surmise that you know this well enough and that there is no need to talk about it. I am eager for your return and for us to be able to talk. Here we live in a state of solitary withdrawal that it would once have been hard to imagine. I believe that cirrurnstances are such that for most people the bonds they have loosen or rather they dully break. Only those that have some meaning can resist or rather they are the only things that matter and can make no more compromises. I think this is only true of myself. I cannot imagine a flower that resembles you more than the 'sand rose': everything about you that is gritty-and even your bitten nails. I kept this letter in my pocket for several days before finishing it; I think that this is to do with a feeling of powerlessness to express myself.
Be assured of my wholehearted affection, Georges 87. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.194. Letter published in Choix, pp. 175-6, where it is erroneously dated 17 January 1940.
140
30. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS
[Early February 1941]
Letter destroyed by Leins, who mentions it in an entry of his Journal, dated 16 February.
141
31. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE88 [Paris] Tuesday 11 May [1943] My dear Georges, For a good while now I have been meaning to write to you, but you know how these things often happen: we put things off till tomorrow (which seems like nothing) then, one fme day, we notice that an incredible amount of time has gone by that way. First of all, let me tell you that I have re-read your book 89 and that, in printed form, it has made as great an impression on me as the manuscript. What I like about it most of all is the 'lived' side, the Journal' aspect. Pages like the musical ecstasy in Italy, the dream of Etna90 and the poems, for me are its high points and without a doubt are among the finest things I have ever read. 91
88. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 32. 89. E Expmenct interimTe, Gallimard, 1943, 'Les Essais' Series,
NO.
13, DC, VOL. 5.
90. On 22 November 1942, Leiris describes in hisJoumal a dream he had had 'one night recently', a dream which Cis curiously close to a dream reported by Bataille in E Experience interieure and which [he] heard about only today' (ed. Jean jamin, Gallimard, 1992, P: 369). 91. Andre Castel having written to say that he had just 'read the outstanding work' by Bataille, Leiris replied to him on 20 May: Bataille's book is indeed outstanding-and even better than outstanding: pages such as those that describe musical ecstasy in Italy or the dream of Etna stand, in my view,among the finest in our literature (Andre Castel and Michel Leins, Cortesptmdance 1938-1958, ed. Anne Mai1lis, ~ditions
142
Clare Paulhan, 2002, p. 155).
Correspondence 1924-61 Our friend Lagrange92 must have told you that I have not yet been able to see to 1.£ Petit,93 and that I apologize for this. I think that this week I shall be able to go and check on how it is going. As for the Histoire ... L[egrand]94 has delivered it to me: 5 anciens, 6 Mulberry, 21 plain (out of 22).95 Before distributing them I should like to be quite clear whether the missing plain copy is the one that is in your possession (or is it Legrand's copy?) and whether I should hold back a copy on ancien for you and get it to you. Through More I discovered that Couturiers" is preparing a review ofiEExpenence ... for the Catholicmagazine Renamtres.vt
92. Michel Fardoulis-Lagrange, whose reaI name was Michel Fardoulis, and Lagrange his Resistance name.
93. Le Petit was published by Bataille in 1943 under the pseudonym Louis 'Irente, with the printer's date given as 29 June 1934 and with the name of the publisher (Georges Hugnet) omitted. The print run was 50 copies: five on pur fil Vidalon (numbered 1-5), five on Holland (6-10), 40 on Marais cream vellum (11-50), as well as three author's copies on pur fil Vidalon (A:....C) and 10 for non-commercial purposes on Marais cream vellum (I-X). Le Petit was reprinted in the DC, VOL. 3, pp. 33-69. 94. The printer of the book by Laure mentioned in the previous sentence.
95. Laure, Histoi'm d'U7U petiu fille. 1943, 33 copies printed for non-commercial purposes: five on ancien paper. six on Tonkin Mulberry and 22 on Arches, Text edited, introduced and anna. tated by Bataille and Leiris (see pp. 136-7, Letter 26, NOTE 82). 96. Louis Couturier (1910-88), literary critic, author; under the name Michel Carrouges, of
Les Machirus cllibataiTtls, La Mystique du surhomme, and studies of Breton, Eluard, [the ascetic and explorer] Pere de Foucauld and Kafka. 97. There was no way of checking whether this article had indeed been published in Rmcontres, since the BNF:'s holdings of this magazine were inaccessible, but this may very u~Experience interieure" , [The meaning of'CExperience interieure'], which appears in the collectionJeux etpo/sie. b~ Pie Duploye, Natadja Lequeux, Maxime Chastaing, etc., Lyons, editions de l'Abeille, 1944, pp.157-64.
likely be the article by Michel Carrouges, 'La signification de
143
Bataille & Leiris Father Danielou would also like to write an article but has no idea where to place it. 98 I would be very curious to know what kind of press you'll get. I think we have to expect a good number of misunderstandings! I am waiting for the second proofs of my collection of poetry99 and I am, besides, thoroughly fed up at having to write twenty lines for the publisher's blurb. 100 This reminds me of the best days of Documents (the untold anguish I went through before I could deliver my copy) or the College of Sociology ... What irritates me in the present instance is being obliged to explain myself in relation to this retrospective-nay. anachronistic-collection. In relation to the blurb and the wrapper: I saw the wrapper for your book, 'beyond poetry' .101 Coming from you, it was strik-
98. It does not appear that Reverend Father Jean Danielou (1905-74) ever published this article. 99. Haul mal, Gallimard, 'Metamorphoses' series edited by Jean Paulhan, printer's date 10 June 1943.
100. In Biffures (La Regie du jeu, Gallimard, Bibliotheque de la Pleiade, 2003, p. 170). Leiris wrote 'la priere d'inserer' (the publisher's blurb), as he does here. He used the masculine form [Ie priere ...] from the 1960s on. 101. On the wrapper of EExperiente inthieure. The text of the blurb (printed, like the wrapper, on orange paper) was as follows: We are perhaps the wound, the malady of nature. Were there a case of necessity, it would be up to us-moreover possible, 'easy'-to make the wound a cause for celebration, a strength of the malady. The poetry in which the most blood was shed would be the strongest. The saddest dawn? The one that heralds thejoy of the day. Poetry would be the sign announcing greater inner agonies. The musculature of the human body would only be wholly deployed, would only attain its highest degree of strength and perfect movement of 'decision'-whatever, and however, the human being demands-in the trance of ecstasy.
144
Correspondence 1924-61 ing; I would have been happy to see that you located yourself on the basis of poetry. That is certainly in keeping with your article 'Le sacre',102 one of those with which I felt myself completely in agreement. It is certainly not a matter of rejecting poetry; one must only go beyond it. In other respects your experience is also located 'beyond' mysticism. What are you doing for the moment? I hope that Burgundy is proving congenial. Here, things are more or less the same as ever-perhaps even a little more dismal from there being fewer and fewer of us. It all continues to be a ~sorry business! I look forward to your reply to my questions and also your news. Once again, excuse the delay and be'assured of all my affection. Michel
Can't we release from its religious antecedents the possibility-still open, however it seems-of the mystical experience for the unbeliever? Release it from the asceticism of dogma and the atmosphere of religions? Release it in a word from mysticism-to the point of connecting it to the nakedness of ignorance? Beyond all knowledge is non-knowledge and whoever would become absorbed in the thought that beyond his knowledge he knows nothing, had he in himself Hegel's inexorable lucidity, would no longer be Hegel but a painful tooth in Hegel's mouth. Would the great philosopher lack only one diseased tooth?' (DC, VOL. 5, pp.
422-3).
102. 'Le sacre', Cahiers d'art, Year 14, NOS 1--4, 1939, pp. 47-50; DC, VOL.
1,
pp. 559-63.
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32. BATAILLE TO LEIRISI03
[Vezelay, Wednesday] 9 June [1943] My dear Michel, I wrote to you by return post when I got your letter and I heard through Frenaud that you had received nothing. 1M I fear that, failing to remember the house number, I must have left it blank and then posted the envelope with the address incomplete.... In any case, to be precise, I can tell.you that the missing copy of the Histoire is the one I asked Legrand to keep for himself. Could you reserve an 'ancien' copy for me and have me sent a plain one? 1\8 for Le Petit, it would be very good if you could concentrate the copies. It's such a long time since we have talked about it that I no longer have any clear idea of what we agreed. It really bothers me to have entangled you in so many things. Is your collection of poems coming out soon? Paulhan asked me for something for the NRF, under new editorship.... I agree in principle because it is Paulhan himself asking me. Is he still contributing to it? Who is? Carrouges was the only name mentioned in Paulhan's letter.I 05 103. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.195. Letter published in Chou, pp. 185-6. 104. Andie Frenaud, who, together with Leiris and Queneau, was on the editorial board of Jean Lescure's magazine Messages in 1943-44. See pp. 149-51, Letter 33, NOTE 109. 105. Pierre Drieu la Rochelle edited the NRF (Nouvelle Revue Fra~aise) from 1940 with the
146
Correspondence 1924-61
What a bizarre posthumous existence! Write to me. The entire past that we share to so great an extent has become such a smouldering thing now that it is dead. Affectionate regards, Georges There is no point in sending me Le Petit, for I know it, just the Histoire, because I should like to see how it looks. Can you get a copy oi.Le Petit to Lagrange? blessing of the German authorities and without great success. After his resignation in the spring of 1943, it was planned to give the editorship of the magazine to Jacques Lemarchand (1908-74), its theatre critic. Paulhan, who had refused to contribute so long as the magazine was edited by Drieu, urged writers to panicipate in the new version, but. it seems, did not intend to participate himself. The episode was reponed in these terms in the clandestine us Leures fraTlfaises, the organ of the Comite du front national des ecrivains (IDe Committee for the United Front of Writers, which would soon change its name to the eNE, the Comite national des ecrivains): In the spring. we learned once more that DRIEU was talking-about taking his own life, but in preparation he was going to resign from his functions as editor of the Revue so as not to drag it with him into the grave ... According to the latest news, DRIEU has not yet killed himself. But it is a certain LEMARCHAND. in search of a social position, who has now been summoned to the bedside of the dying man. UJ Nouvellt Revue fra1l{Qise will no longer have any political character. Not at all. It will become a free and independent review entirely devoted to the service of the Mind. Around its resurrection a miracle is proclaimed. Bravely, the search is embarked upon for former contributors dispersed far and wide. [...JThe COMrrE DU FRONT NATIONAL DES ECRNAINS has a duty to denounce this camouflage as a crude trap. [...] If the NRF. under its new mask. does not succeed in grouping genuine writers around itself-and it depends upon our actions that it should not succeed-there will be nothing left for it but to accept death ... with or without DRIEU LA ROCHELL'E' ('Cagonie de La Nouvelle Revue fra~ise [The Death Throes of the Nouvelle Revuefra~ise]. an anonymous
article [by Claude Morgan, Edith Thomas and Paul Eluard], in the clandestine Lettrtsfro.1lftJu-
es, No.8, July 1943, pp. 3-4).
147
Bataille & Leiris
When the negotiations over Lemarchand's appointment had come to nothing, the NRF ceased publication after the June 1943 issue: it refused 'to come out after long, repugnant death throes' (according to an unnamed author). Drieu killed himself after the Liberation, on 15 March 1945. It was his third attempt. The CNE had been founded in 1941 by Jacques Decour and Jean Paulhan, in agreement with Aragon. In 1943 it numbered, in the Occupied Zone, some 20 writers including Leiris and-to mention only those close to him, Andre Frenaud, Jean Lescure, Sartre and Queneau (who, along with Leiris, was introduced by Paulhan), Bataille had no part in it.
148
33. LEIRIS TO BATAILLEI06 [Paris] Sunday 20 [june 1943] My dear Georges, Here is the plain copy that you asked me for. In addition, I am putting one aside for you, on ancien paper. We have had something of an 'event' happen here (we had been extremely deprived of suc~ things, apart from the category of events that justifies the existence of the press and the radio). What I'm referring to is Sartre's ylay,. on the theme of the Oresteia. It is a pity that you didn't see it, but at any rate you can read it. Whatever one might think of it, this is a play that matters, the first by someone of our generation that contains nothing whatsoever reminiscent of boulevard theatre, however refined. It also has a sense of sacrilege in it that I fmd first-rate. My collection of poems will'be distributed shortly. I already have proof of this in my hands and I find it correctly executed. I think that you will be able to read it soon. You will probably have readJean Grenier's review of EExperience intirieure l07 in Comredia. IOB It is an utterly dull article, that of an academic whose main concern is not to compromise himself:
106. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 31. 107. Jean Grenier; 'Une nouvelle religion' (A New Religion), C011U1!dia, NO. 103, 19 june 1943, p. 2. This article was reprinted, with the first two paragraphs cut, in the Revue d'histoire de la philosophie et d'histoire ginirale de la civilisation, new series, NO. 38, April-June 1944, pp. 175-7. 108. Comadia, first published between 1907 and 1937, came out again from June 1941 to
149
Bataille & Leiris As for the new NRF, I don't think it will be any different to us than the old one. Since I haven't been asked for any contribution, I have not had to refuse, but Frenaud has perhaps already told you what the Messages l 09 editorial board thinks of it: we all found ourselves in agreement not to alter our first position in any way. For the Whitsun holiday, Zette and I went to Limousin, where we found everyone in very good form and where I had long conversations about aesthetics with HeinLIIO We talked a lot about Schoenberg-you doubtless remember that I had written an article on him that Schaeffnert-! insisted should be rejected by Documents! I have just re-read this article and to be sure it contains some blunders from the technical point of view, but I still stand by it l 12 and I still feel completely in agreement with that period of our lives when we so gladly would take on certain kinds of philistine at one fell swoop ...
August 1944, on a weekly basis, edited by Rene Delange, with the agreement of and under the control of the occupying power. Its ambiguity in terms of Franco-Gennan collaborationnotably in the cultural pages edited by Marcel Arland--enabled it to attract a number of authors above suspicion of collaboration, primarily Sartre (an article on Melville's Moby Dick, in 1941) and Paulhan (extracts from us Fleurs d8 Tarbes and articles on Duranty, Fautrier, Feneon and Braque, between 1942 and 1944). Other contributors were Honegger; Audiberti, Montherlant and Giraudoux. On Comadia, see Cisele Sap iro, 1A Guerre des emvains, 1940-1953, Fayard, 1999, pp. 42-3 and 551~.
109. Messages, a magazine edited by Jean Lescure (born in 1912). After two issues published in 1939, it reappeared as a semi-clandestine publication from 1942. Raymond Queneau contributed to it from the second issue of 1942, Leiris and Bataille (who had been brought in by Queneau and Leiris) from the fourth issue of 1942. At the time of Leiris's letter, the members of its (somewhat informal) 'editorial board' were Andre Frenaud, Mounir Hafez, Leiris, Jean Lescure, Queneau, Jean Tardieu and Raoul Ubac. Messages was one of the most prestigious lit-
150
Correspondence 1924-61 I believe firmly in everything that assumes an air of gaiety-one of the themes in Nietzsche's teaching that make most impression on me. I should like to give an increasingly gay twist to what comes to me when I am writing. Write back to me. Very affectionate regards. Michel
erary reviews of the intellectual Resistance. SeeJean Lescure, PoisU et liberte; histoire de Messages, 1939-1946, editions de l'IMEC, 1998. 110. Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, whose wife, Lucie, was the mother of Louise Leiris. The Kahnweilershad fled to Saint-Leonard-de-Noblat, near Limoges, inJune 1940 and were in hiding there after the advent of Vichy'santi-semiticlaws.During the Occupation, Leiris and his wife paid numerous visitsthere. Leiris's 'everyone' includes [lie Lascaux and his wife Berthe, known as Bero (Lucie Kahnweiler's sister), who had also fled to Saint-Leonard-de-Noblat. Ill. Andre SchaefTner (1895-1980), musicologist, head of the Department of Ethnomusicology at the Musee de l'Homme, and a friend of Leiris. 112. Leiris subsequently published it with the title 'Quant a Arnold Schoenberg' (Concerning Arnold Schoenberg) in the programme of the International Festival of Chamber Music in Homage to Arnold Schoenberg, in Paris in January 1947, the 'blunders' probably having been excised with the help of Leibowitz. Leiris reprinted this article in the new edition of Brisees, Gallimard, 1992, Folio Essais.
151
34. BATAILLE TO LEIRISl13 [Vezelay] Sunday [27 June 1943] My dear Michel, In much agreement with your turn to gaiety. From my part, I should just like to combine it with a concern to see things through to the end: I have never felt more remote from things that take refuge in imprecision (for me, this is the same as an absence of movement or a liking for rest). Of course, that distances gaiety now and then but it could not care less. I like Aminadab l 14 more and more because of its comic and solemn doubleness (of course, I'm thinking of the end). What is frequendy tiresome about gaiety is that it goes hand-in-hand with resting. I have read The Flies. 115 I find it awkward to talk about. You have seen how Sartre has written articles about Blanchot's books in the Cahiers du Sud.116 I discovered that he was now doing the same
113. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.196. Published in Choix, pp. 193-.5. 114. Maurice Blanchot, Aminadab, Gallimard, 1942. 115. Sartre's play had been published by Gallimard in APril and had its first performance on 3 June with Charles Dullin at the Theatre de la Cite (formerly the Theatre Sarah Bernhardt, renamed under the Occupation because Sarah Bernhardt was Jewish). It had a subsequent run from October of that year and Leiris wrote a review of it (unsigned), published in us Lettres franfaises with the title 'Oreste et la cite' (reprinted in Brisees). 116. • "Aminadab" or the fantastic regarded as the language', Cahiers du Sud, April and May issues, 1943. The article by Sartre to which Bataille alludes in the next sentence is 'Un nouveau mystique' [A New Mystique] (on EExpmence intmeure), which also appeared in Cahiers
152
Correspondence 1924-61 thing with me ... Anyway, I prefer The Flies since I found this out. I had previously read three pages of it in a magazinelt? and this had robbed me of any desire to read the rest ... Now I've read it all. For me, it lacks a certain quality of secrecy that existed to some de-gree or other in the things we liked together (let us say as in Gerard de Nerval). It is a fabrication (even with certain weaknesses-the language does not hit home, at least when read). Don't you find that having done with guilt in this way is ultimately superficial? If Sartre had committed a crime ... I have no liking at all for this opposition between man in a state of error and man in a state of truth; it strikes me as abstract and it must have heel). Sartre's way of making up for this to give his Orestes a vacillating, even troubled aspect. I am a bit annoyed at having sent something to Paulhan. Frenaud had spoken vaguely abo~t Lernarchand and I would cer.. tainly have refused him but Paulhan'wrote to me in his own name. For all that, my text contains a phrase that would have been quite out of keeping with the earlier NRF and I have to say that 1 am not inclined to attribute any extreme importance to these questions. On the contrary, inclined at this point to publish . . . even after weighing it all up. As for guilt (I return to this), it strikes me as empty that one should put up with it coolly, negatively. In Le Petit, what clinches things for me is the little poem on p. 42.118 How could a guilty du Sud, in the October and December issues, 1943. Both studies were reprinted by Sartre in Situations, BOOK 1, Gallimard, 1947. 117. Confluences, April-May 1943. 118. DC, VOL. 3, p. 65:
maftluTe estun ami aux yeuxde vin fin
153
Bataille & Leins man, one without gaiety, avoid having some remorse? In flight, not in lucidity. But a guilty man's gaiety (what I mean is a guilty man's innocence) remains, it seems to me, the most unreachable thing in the world. Be assured of all my affection, Georges Thank you very much for the postal order.U? . On the subject of my article for the NRF, I'm really having a lot of bother finishing it. I have tried to tell myself that a few words about heroism-saying that it represented a flight (in relation to some deep-seated problem) in the sense that it shifts the ill luck onto the vanquished-would settle things, but this is, as always, too vague, even if the overall sense has a direction (which et mon crime estune amie aux leores de fine je me bronle til raisin metorche de pomme (my crack is a friend a man with eyes of fine wine and my crime is a friend a brandy-lipped woman I wank with grape and wipe myselfwith apple) 119. This probably refers to one of those instances when the Leiris' helped out Bataille financially, particularly when he was ill or without work, occasions which seemed to be acknowledged in the dedication written in their copy of EErotisme (published in October 1957): ITo Zette and MichelJthis book in which they will find/what their friendship/has helped/so deeply. With/great affection/Georges' (BLJD, LRS.2061/2). See also, 'Georges Bataille: As TIme Goes By', pp. 225-42 in this volume.
154
Correspondence 1924-61 is scarcely e~ident). If I could count on some collective position, it would simplify things a great deal for me. [In the margin: for example, iftMessages ruled it out, etc.] This would be the only way for me to withdraw my text (if there is time). If you could tell me something that is not too vague in this respect, I would try to settle things with Paulhan. I rather have the impression that he has caught me in a trap. On reflection, I should be surprised if he contributed something himself even though he has asked me for a contribution . . . without any reservations ...... All in all, I should have been better informed. I did actually write, but I only got a reply quite a long time afterwards. For the guilty man, I myself see no way out except to persevere with the crime, as Sade says of the Republic (in La Philo[sophie] dans le boud[oir]): gay perseverance. Sartre's freedom is rational and that is all. Electra desetting Orestes is the void, is suicide. This is a fabrication: no struggle against the real stranglehold of guilt. Georges
155
35. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE120 [Paris] Tuesday 6 July [1943] My dear Georges, I imagine that you won't be mistaken about what I meant when I talked about 'gaiety'. Obviously, this was neither insouciance nor facility. It is a straightforward question of 'style', like, for example, the gaiety of Socrates dying. The sinister joke quality assumed by the revelation at the end of Aminadab (which I am beginning to prefer to Thomas l'Obscur)121 could also, at a stretch, be regarded as deriving from this very particular genre of'gaiety' . I agree with you about the 'secrecy' (in other words, poetry) that is lacking in The Flies. I have read and re-read the book attentively, I have seen the play staged twice and I am very enthusiastic about it: it is the only play by one of our contemporaries that breaks decisively with the boulevard or vaudeville spirit. That does not mean, however, that everything about it is totally satisfactory. The character of Orestes is, in fact, rather abstract. Much more at any rate than the character of Electra (of whom we have a recent example in the person of Violette Nozieres).I 22 But isn't it a 120. BNF-Mss.NAF 15.854, fr. 33-34. 121. Maurice Blanchot, Thomas l'ObsCUT, Gallimard, 1941. 122. Violette Nozieres (1915-66), accused in 1933 of having poisoned her parents. After being sentenced to death she was reprieved and her sentence was commuted to hard labour for life and, later, in 1942, reduced to 12 years. She was released in 1945 and rehabilitated
156
Correspondence 1924-61
in 1963. She had been regarded by the Surrealists as a symbol of resistance to parental authority and had been paid homage to in the booklet Violette Nozieres, with poems and drawings by Breton. Char, Dalf, 'Ianguy, etc. (Brussels, Nicolas Flamel, 1933), reissued as Violette Nozieres, poemes, dessins, correspondance, documents. with a preface by jose Pierre, Terrain vague, 1991, 'Le Desordre' series.
157
Bataille & Leiris mistake to regard Orestes as a 'guilty man'? He does not act out of passion but kills in order to carry out an act ofjustice and, above all, to affirm his freedom! This is why he is able to have respect for the Erinyes, and why he does not sucrumb under the burden of remorse (without however finding rest; doesn't he say: 'But I can no longer feel remorse. Nor can I sleep'?) In these conditions, admittedly, it is hard to understand how-without taking upon himself the guilt of others and becoming a kind of scapegoat-he can deliver others from their remorse. It may be that underneath all that there is an idea of religion more or less in line with Voltaire's: that it was invented by deceitful priests; if we remove these priests, the religious anguish will disappear on the instant. I do not believe, however, that Sartre meant to say anything so crude as this. Even after they have been delivered, the people of Argos will not become as carefree as the people of Corinth; is it not said, in relation to them, towards the end, that 'human life begins on the other side of despair'? The hardest thing to accept is, of course, this position of Orestes in relation to remorse: neither guilty nor innocent, he measures all the gravity of his action (without being crushed by it) but this action that he knows to be just will nonetheless prevent him from being able to sleep. Is one to think that what Sartre wanted to take on, rather than the feeling of guilt itself, was the complacency in remorse? Whatever the case may be, this is a play whose like we have not: seen for years, and whose subversive character is not to be scorned. As for the text that you have given to the NRF, you can say that the editors of Messages have decided unanimously not to pub-
158
Correspondence 1924-61 lish anything by people who contributed to this magazine, even in the revised form that it has inclined to since Lemarchand was put in place. I have just had a conversation with Lescure about this on the telephone and he is entirely in agreement. So as not to offend Paulhan, just find a pleasant way of presenting the matter to him. To return to Sartre, I have read his study on Blanchot which appeared in the last two issues of Cahiers du Sud. I find it exaggeratedly severe and I have told him so, moreover. The opposition he draws between the fantastic in Kafka (authentic, because for Kafka there is a transcendence) and the fantastic in Blanchot (bogus, for want of such transcendence) strikes me as artificial: in Blanchot, there is no God as there is.in Kafka, but there is however a type of transcendence-that kind of YES-NO which is so closely akin to what your 'inner experience' takes as its subject. What differentiates Sartre from us is that he is fundamentally a rationalist. He is a philosopher and not a poet. For me, a large part of the question comes down to this. A litde while ago, I read the, Volonte d'impuissance, for which I have to write a preface. 123 This is something I set a good deal of store by, for you know how much I liked Sibastien. 124 But you will not be surprised when I tell you that I am somewhat embarrassed; anyone would be, I think, in my place, and you know me well enough to be aware what proportions such an embarrassment can
123. Michel Fardoulis-Lagrange, Volante d'impuissaru:e, with a preface by Michel Leiris and plates by Raoul Ubac. This book came out in June 1944 as the third number of Messages for that year. Leiris's preface appears in Brisees with the tide 'Michel Fardoulis-Lagrange et le roman poetique' [Michel Fardoulis-Lagrange and the Poetic Novel]. 124. Michel Fardoulis-Lagrange, Sebastien, l'enfant et l'orange, Debresse, 1942.
159
Bataille & Leiris assume with me! No matter: I shall try to apply myselfwith 'gaiety', perhaps with lyricism, another form of gaiety! I hope soon to be able to send you my book of poems; I am waiting to get the review copies out any day now. Did you receive the Histoire d'unepetite fiUe?125 All the copies planned have now been distributed, except Borel's (but I expect to go and see him within a very few days). Write to me, if you have the time and inclination, as you have just done. Your letter gave me great pleasure, with its bait of argument, which forces me out of my laziness. Unless something untoward happens, Zette and I are going to Limousin at the end of this month. We shall be back by 10 or 15 September. Very affectionate regards. Michel
125. By Laure. See p. 117, Letter 19, NOTE 57.
160
36. BATAILLE IO LEIRIS126
vezelay, [Wednesday] 14 July 1943 My dear Michel, I wrote to Paulhan to ask him for my,article back. But I have already received a letter from Blanchot telling me that the magazine 127 would not be coming .out any more ... authorization withdrawn. I have just received Haul mal. I think that I already knew almost all of it, but the collection is-impressive and even heartrending for me. Yet I am now writing a book against 'poetic ambiguity'.128 What it will emphasize, moreover, is the suffering that results from the unreality of poetry (while the religious attitude consisted in believing in it, in judging revelations from the poetic state to be truthful). What I want, is to be what poetry evokes, which is to say what it creates out of nothing. It really is, as you were saying, something beyond poetry, quite the opposite of denigration. Be assured of my affection, Georges
126. BLJD. Ms.Ms 43.197. Published in Choix, p. 198. 127. The NRF.
128. La Haine de La poesie (Editions de Minuit, 1947), later edition published with the title Elmpossible (1962), DC. VOL. 3.
161
37. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS129 [Late 1943 or early 1944 (?)] 130 My dear Michel, It is a very long time since I have had a letter from you. I have had news of you from Sylvia,131 who told me on the telephone that I could go to you on my next trip to Paris. I must say that I am touched by this and it matters a great deal that I shall see you this way. Likewise, I ask you to thank Zette on my behalf. I am somewhat worn out at the moment. Affectionate regards, Georges The plan is that I shall be in Paris on the morning of the 16th. Besides, I shall write to you again. My letter is absurd; all in all, I am tired but I am well.
129. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.225. 130. The date of this letter is extremely uncertain and has only been placed here in the sequence by virtue of the resemblances between the handwriting and the paper and those of other letters around this time. 131. Probably SylviaBataille.
162
38. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS132
[Samois, April 1944]
My dear Michel, I sold off the house in Saulieu 133 six weeks ago.... I shall go to Paris for the day this Sunday. I shall telephone you early in the morning; .perhaps we can fix a time to meet. In relation to this, could.you let Francoise or Rene 134 know so that they can leave a key wijh the concierge should they be out l
132. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.223. Published in Choix, pp. 1944]; the date matched with this note:
20~9, where
it is dated [Samois, April
From April to October 1944. G. Bataille was to stay in Samois, in Seine-et-Marne, near Fontainebleau, where he was insufflated with a pneumothorax; here he was also with Diane Kotchoubey de Beauharnais, whom he met in 1943 at V~zelay, and for whom he left Denise Rollin-Le Gentil.
Bataille was to live with Diane Kotchoubey de Beauharnais (1918--89) from 1945 and he married her in 1951. Samois is a small commune on the edge of the Forest of Fontainebleau, on the left bank of the Seine. 133. 'Saulieu, in the COte-d'Or, near Vezelay, It has not been possible to identify this house' (Choix. p. 209, NOTE 2). 134. Francoise and Rene Leibowitz, who were in hiding in the studio that Bataille had lived in during the winter of 1943-44 and which he had just left to go and live in Samois. This was the studio of the painter Balthus, at 3, cour de Rohan, not far from the Leiris house, and Balthus, the brother of Pierre Klossowski, was a friend of Bataille. It was in this studio, while it was still occupied by Bataille, that, probably in late March, the first of the fiestas took place that were attended by the Leiris', Simone de Beauvoir, Jean-Paul Sartre, J anine and Raymond Queneau in the March and April of 1944. Simone de Beauvoir mentions these fiestas in La Force de l'age, Gallimard, 1960, pp. 587-9. On this studio, see Surya, Georges Bataille, La mort d l'oeuot«, p. 425; English translation, p. 347.
163
Bataille & Leiris (and whether it is possible for Rene to buy at Girard and Barrere 135 before Sunday a map that was missing the other day)? I am still writing quite a lot, very withdrawn from the world, with a piquant sensation of Damocles. They have just installed a siren on the right bank of the Seine. There are masses of lilacs here, irises and wisteria. The forest seems like peace itself, but when the day comes it will bum like a match. I am sorry about Saulieu; it was a good idea, though you ought to look for somewhere less high up. There are no more vines in Saulieu (not even more than here). There (ire a lot of Germans leaving, from here for instance, which ought to allow some opportunities. Until Sunday, I hope. My affectionate regards to you and Zette, Georges
135. Girard et Barrere, a publisher in Paris, at 17 rue de l'Ancienne-Comedie, who specialized in publishing geographical maps and guides.
164
39. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS136
[Samois, Friday] 14-4-44 My dear Michel, I received your letter of the 10th this morning.P? I thought of course that it was ill-advised to come. It will, I hope, be for another day ... as soon as possible is an expression loaded with meaning these days. Yet if you had come yesterday you would have seen a little show of dive bombing. This bombardment en pi,qui does indeed resemble the other kind of pique in the bullring, but it would make any torero tum pale and it is a lot noisier than sticking darts in the bull. I fear that by the time you corne this type of! entertainment will have ended in these parts. My best wishes to Zette. Affectionate regards to you, Georges
136. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.198. Published in Choix, p. 209. 137. Not found.
165
40. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS138 [Samois, June 1944] My dear Michel, I sent you a wire to let you know that there was all the room you wanted at the weekend. Later on, it will probably be impossible since the rooms will in theory be rented for the season very shortly. I hope that you will all make up your minds. I can put up a single man but I have no sheets. In any case, it seems that for now there are all the rooms needed, and they are very clean, up until the fourth. Don't delay telephoning, however, since someone else might well book them any day now. If you give me notice, I shall go to the Fontainebleau road to wait for you. Of course, I can book the rooms myself if you telegraph me. Affectionate regards to you and Zette, Georges The hotel is called La Petite Jeannette. I am still preoccupied by the questions that we raised the other day on the subject of a magazine (more than about a magazine, strictly speaking). I would give a lot right now if we could talk about it again with Sartre and Camus.P? I think that the way things are handled after the War will have real importance. 138. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.201. Published in Choix, p. 211, where it is dated [Samois,June 1944]. 139. This was probably the project for the publication of LesTemps modemes, whose editorial board at one point was to include Camus, who in the end backed out from lack of time.
166
41. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS140
[Samois, August 1944] My dear Michel, Since I have the opportunity I am sending you a sign of life (after all, I have just discovered that everything within 20 kilometres of Samois is generally agreed to have been destroyed). 141 I am very moved by what I have learned about events in Paris. Leave with your mind at rest. 142 I am eager to have news, but the post seems to have died on me. The means I am using to send my letter does not appear to have any possible reciprocity. Here, things were wound up in three days of violent fighting, but on the other bank. Give my best wishes to Zette. My affectionate regards to you. How often I have thought about you in these past days. Georges 140. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.199. Published in Choix, p. 213. 141. Bataille referred to the Liberation battles in the Samois area in the pages headed 'August 1944. Epilogue' in his :J ournal, February-August 1944', the third part of Sur Nietzsdu (DC, VOL. 6, pp. 171-82). On his side, Leiris penned 'Notes on the liberation of Paris' (15-26 August); these are included in hisJoumal, pp. 389-416. 142. We are unable to tell which departure by Leiris is being referred to by Bataille: perhaps a trip (in September) to Lot-et-Carrone, where Daniel-Henry and Lucie Kahnweiler had taken refuge in September 1943.
167
Bataille & Leins Do not forget your promise of a weekend in Samois (where we are still eating well). Just tum up, you couldn't make me any more delighted. I imagine that people will be able to leave Paris freely within a few days, and since this morning peace has reigned over the land again as if nothing had happened.
168
42. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS143 [Paris] Wednesday [November 1944]
My dear Michel, I am not sure whether I told you that I am thinking of a collection for Nietzsche's centenary. 144 With this collection in mind I have prepared a kind of statement that I have to read out to a number of people (four or five, including Blanchot and maybe Queneau if he is still here) at home on Friday evening at nine o'clock. I hesitated about asking you to come, being afraid that it would bore you. Yet I should like you to come, it would 'give me much pleasure if you came. On the other hand, I haven't asked More' (or Couturier) because the only question that arises (for me, at any rate) is whether a nonChristian spiritual life is possible and what it might be, a question that cannot arise for a Christian. Of course, I shall explain things to More and Couturier. Xt any rate, I shall still be here on Saturday and Sunday and I should be happy to see you. Affectionate regards Georges 143. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43~200. Letter published in Choix, pp. 232-3, where it is dated [Paris, November 1944]. 144. Nietzsche was born on 15 October 1844. The collection of writings by Nietzsche, Memorandum, maxims and writings compiled and introduced by Georges Bataille, appeared in February 1945, at the same time as Bataille's book (written in February-August 1944), Sur Nietzsche. Volonte de chance, both books published by Gallimard. On Nietzsche's centenary, see Bataille's draft for an article 'Nietzsche's Centenary', not published at the time but now to be found in Choix, pp. 217-24, after a letter to Tristan Tzara dated [September 1944].
169
43. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS145
Vezelay, [Tuesday] 19 February 1946 My dear Michel, I must now put together a magazine devoted to book reviews-under the title Critique146 and with an editorial board consisting of Albert Ollivier,147 Monnerot,148 Eric Weil,149 Pierre Josserand 150 and maybe Blanchot.P! I fear that in general you have no particular interest in this kind of activity;152 however, I am coming to you with a reason that might strike you as exceptional. I should like there to be an article on EEnfantpolaire 153 in this magazine as soon as possible. I think that Limbour is a long way from having the place that he is due and, in so far as what I publish might remedy that, I have to do what I can. But I don't see anyone other than you able to speak about him as called for in just a few pages. Since circumstances have prevented you from giving me an article for the volume I published on Spain,154 perhaps this time at least you could envisage this study on Limbour. Give my best wishes to Zette. My best regards to you. Georges Bataille 145. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.202. 146. The first issue of Critique came out in June. The magazine was subsequently published by editions du Chene for some months, then by Calmann-Levy (1947-49) and, after a yearlong interruption, by Minuit (beginning in October 1950). On the founding of Critique, see Surya, Georges Bataille, la mort a l'oeuore, pp. 449-58 (English translation, pp. 368-75), and Sylvie Patron, Critique 1946-1996, Pairs, IMEC, 1999, pp. 29-48.
170
Correspondence 1924-61 I shall be in Paris on the 28th and I'll telephone you to fix a time for us to meet. As an author and series editor, Bataille began working for Minuit in 1947, through the intervention of Jean Lescure, On Bataille, Critique and Minuit, see Anne Simonin, us Editions de Minuit 1942-1955, Ie devoir d'insoumwion (editions de l' IMEC, 1994), pp. 313-20, 339--44 and 361-4.
147. Albert Ollivier (1915-64), historian and journalist, member of the NRF editorial board before June 1940, author of La Commune (1871) (published in 1939), Saint-justet la force des choses (1954) and 9 novembre 1799: le 18 brumaire (1959). He was a militant in the Jeune France movement, went into the Resistance and, after the Liberation, wrote for Combat. He was a friend of Camus and Malraux. In February 1946 he was a member of the editorial board of LesTemps modemes, as he had bee~ since its foundation in October 1945; this board was dissolved in April 1946. 148. Jules Monnerot (1909-95), author of La Poesie modemeet le sacre (1945) and Sociologie du communisme (1949). In 1937, he was a sig~atory of the 'Note sur la fondation d'un College de sociologie' (see p. 119-22, Letter 20, NOTE 63), later refusing to take part and denouncing it as a new 'literary coterie'. H~ was an anti-colonialist militant in the 1930s, a member of the National Council of the Rassemblement du peuple francais from 1948 to 1953, and he appeared on the list ofijean-Marie Le Pen's Front National in the European elections of 1989. 149. Eric Weil (1904-77) was a German philosopher who became a naturalized French citizen after Hitler's rise to power. He taught at the University of Lille. Author of Logiqu« de la philosophie (1951) and of works on Hegel, Kant and Pico de la Mirandola. 150. Pierre josserand (1898-1972), a colleague of Bataille at the Bibliotheque nationale and a specialist in Prosper Merimee 151. Maurice Blanchot did in fact sit on the editorial board with the four others mentioned. 152. Leiris did quite a lot of book reviews before the War (notably in Claret, Documents, 1.A Critique sociale and the NRF) but very little after it. He published only six articles in Critique. Two of these we~e before Bataille's death: 'Conception et realite chez Raymond Roussel' [Ideas and Reality in the Work of Raymond Roussel] (October 1954) and 'Le realisme mythologique de Michel Butor' [Michel Butor's Mythological Realism] (February 1958). The four after it were: IDe Bataille I'Impossible a l'impossible Documents' (August-september 1963) [translated in this volume as 'From Bataille the Impossible to the Impossible
171
Bataille & Leins
Documents], 'Qui est Aime Cesaire?' [Who is Aime CCsaire?] (May 1965), 'Panorama du Panorama [de Limbour]' [Panorama of Limbour's Panorama] (August-September 1976) and 'Bacon le hors-la-loi' [Bacon the Outlaw] (May 1981). On Leiris and Critique, see Sylvie Patron, 'Michel Leiris entre Critique and Les Temps modemes', in her book Critique, pp. 73-81. 153. This tale by Limbour, published in 1922 in two small-circulation magazines (Aventure and Des) was very likely not to be found in 1946. It would only be reissued in 1972 in the collection Soleils bas (Callimard, 'Poesie' series). According to Catherine Maubon, Leiris rejected Bataille's suggestion: Not of course that he should talk about his friend Limbour, but more categorically that he should contribute to a magazine which it was clear Bataille intended to use as a platform for his polemic against Sartre and existentialism (Catherine Maubon, 'Leiris, Bataille et Sartre',
Europe,
NOS
847-848. November-December 1999, Michel Leiris, p. 103).
Indeed, he did not contribute to Critique until 1954. In Minuit's (1956) 'catalogue extract' which is reproduced in the work by Anne Simonin, Leiris does not appear on the list of 'Critique's main contributors', a list that gives some 40 names. Leiris did publish an article on EEn/ant polaire, but more than 20 years after Bataille's request and in the review AtoU (No.2, September-November 1968): 'Boule Blanche pour
DEn/ant polaire''" reprinted in Zebrage. In Critique, ah article tided 'Lceuvre de Georges Limbour', 195-205, was written by Andre Dhotel,
NOS
30-34. March 1949, pp.
154. EEspagne libre, preface by Albert Camus, Calmann-Uvy, 1945, ~ctualite series edited by Georges Bataille.
172
44. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE155 [Paris] Friday 10 October [1947] Here are the addresses you have asked me for: Dr Alfred Metraux.Pf Great Neck, 12 Welwyn Road, New Yorkl. Georges Dumezil.I-? 82 rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs, Paris (6e). Tel. Danton 69-17. Affectionately, and see you soon, I hope M.L.
155. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 35. Official postcard from the Musee de l' Homme, addressed to the HOtel Saint-Remain, 7 rue Saint-Roch, Paris (ler). Postmark: 10.10.47. 156. Alfred Metraux (1902-63), Swiss ethnologist, naturalized as an American citizen in 1941, Bataille's fellow student at the Ecole des chartes in 1921-22, colleague and friend of Leiris from 1934. He killed himself in April 1963, nine months after Bataille's death and a few weeks after having written an article about him for the issue Critique was preparing on its founder: 'Rencontre avec les ethnologues' (Critique, NOS 195-196, August-September 1963, Hommage a Georges Bataille, pp. 677-84). No articles by him appear to have been published in the magazine during Bataille's lifetime. 157. Georges Dumezil (1898-1986)t historian of religions and specialist in Indo-European mythologies and languages of the Caucasus. No articles by him seem to have been published in Critique.
173
45. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE158
Paris, [Friday] 17 October [1947] Dear Georges, You will shortly receive a letter from Joseph Tubiana,159 suggesting one or more book reviews for Critique. I think he would be able to make some interesting contributions, in particular on Islamic matters. Affectionately Michel
158. BNF-Mss. NAF 15.854, f. 36. Official postcard from the Musee de l'Homme, addressed to Vezelay (Vonne). Postmark: 18.10.47. 159. This letter has not been found in the Bataille archive of the BNF.Joseph Tubiana (born in 1919), an ethnographer and linguist, and a specialist in the peoples ofi Chad and Ethiopia, with this wife Marie-jose Tubiana published the Conies zaghasoa, [Zaghawa Tales] collected in Chad, with a preface by Leiris (Les Quatre J eudis, 1961, reissued by C Hannattan, 1989). On the suggested book review. see p. 176, Letter 47.
174
46. LEIRJS TO BATAILLEl60 Paris, [Wednesday] 22 October [1947] Yet another potential contributor to Critique (ethnology and sociology, psychology, etc.), This is Rene Passeron,161 3 rue des Orchidees, Paris (13e). He is a painter and writer who is, I believe, in touch with Bonnefoy.162 I think this is the last name I have to bring to your attention. Affectionately Michel
160. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 37. Official postcard from the rnusee de l' Homme, addressed to Vezelay (Vonne). 161. Rene Passeron (born 1920), an artist, painter and researcher on the philosophy of art, the author of Encyclopedie du surrealisme (1975) and of works on Salvador Dalf and Rene Magritte, and co-editor with Adam Biro of the Dictionnaire ginhal du surrealisme et de ses environs, PUF, 1982. 162. Yves Bonnefoy, we may presume.
175
47. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS16S [Late 1947 (?)]
My dear Michel, Here is Tubiana's article. With every apology: it is unfortunately out of the question to publish it now ... 164 Very affectionately, Georges
163. BLJD,"Ms.Ms 43.224. A card in the form of a visiting card. 164. We don't know which article this was and why it was not retained by Bataille. It does not seem to have been published in any other magazine, if we are to go by the bibliography of Joseph Tubiana that appears in us orientalistes sont des aventuriers. Gui~landt offerle aJoseph Tubiana parses eleves etses amis [Orientalists 'are Adventurers. A Tribute to Joseph Tubiana by His Pupils and His Friends], writings compiled by Alain Rouaud, Saint-Maur-des-Fosses, editions Sepia, 1999.
176
48. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS165 Vezelay, [Wednesday] 9 February 1949 My dear Michel, It is some weeks now since a third party told me about a suggestion from Paulhan: that he would like to re-publish Laure's writings in Metamorphoses. 166 He would have Charles Peignot' s167 agreement. O£ course, this is a project for someone other than myself and I am not sure what to think of it. And, of course, nothing is possible unless in agreement with you and, at the same time in agreement with Borel. 168 Paulhan is particularly keen on the Histoire d'une petite fiUe. It strikes me as being very difficult to publish this text properly during the lifetime of Colette's mother. 169 For that matter, I don't know whether she is still alive (but More 170 must know). 165. BLJD, Ms.Ms43.203. TIlls letter was written on paper headed: Critique, general review of French and foreign publications. Callmarm-Uvy, editeurs, 3 rue Auber, Paris. Tel. OPE. 08-02 - 08-03. Published in Choix, pp. 393-4. 166. Series edited for Gallimard byJean Paulhan. 167. Charles Peignot (1897-1983), Colette's brother and head of the Peignot family. 168. Dr Adrien Borel (see p. 102, Letter I4b,
NOTE
36 and pp. 103-05, Letter 15).
169. Suzanne Peignot, nee Chardon in 1876, married to Georges Peignot in 1896. She was still alive at the time of this letter and died in 1962. 170. Marcel More was a friend of the Beignot family (see pp. 106-10, Letter 16a, NOTE 47).
177
Bataille & Leins There is no urgency (Paulhan-and this is rather absurdhad not even asked my friend to talk to me about it, it was the latter's initiative). All the same, it seemed to me that the question had been seriously raised and that I ought to be able to respond, which would be impossible for me without you. I shall be in Paris on Saturday during the day. It may well be difficult to meet you, but I shall telephone in any case. I shall return to Paris between 20 and 24 February. Affectionate regards to you and Zette, Georges If this project came to anything.I"! the few writings that have not yet appeared would of course have to be published. You know that the manuscripts are at quai des Augustins. l 72
171. It never did. The Ecrits tU LaUR would not be published until 1971t by J~rome Peignot, Charles's son.with Jean-] acques Pauvert. 172. At Leiria's house, on quai des Grands-Augustins.
11.8
49. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS173 Vezelay, [Wednesday] 9 March 1949 My dear Michel, I haven't written to tell you how happy I was with the evening that we spent together; Diane 174 was just as happy as me. I haven't written to you yet because I was caught up in some work that was late. I should particularly like us to settle right away on a date for you to come here for the weekend. It is a bit ridiculous, 175 but we have the problem that we are being asked to commit ourselves in various quarters and I should like to talk to you first. If you could call me in the next few days at Vezelay number five (but before 8 p.m.), it would be extraordinary bad luck if you didn't reach me, especially if you telephone before lOin the morning or between 1 and 4 p.m. Anyway, you can place the call like this: ·1 want to book a call to Monsieur Bataille, on Vezelay number five', and if by some extraordinary chance I'm not there you will know at least at what time I'll be back. Forgive me for this absurd letter; but Diane and I will take the most enormous pleasure in having you here and nothing
173. BLJD. Ms.Ms 43.204. This letter was written on paper headed: Critique, general review of French and foreign publications. Callmann-Uvy, ~diteurs, 3 roe Aubel; Paris. Tel. OPE. 08-02 - 08-03. 174. Diane Kotchoubey de Beauharnais (see pp. 163-4, Letter S8,
NOTE
132).
175. Two additional words which are hard to read.
179
Bataille & Leins would be more annoying than to have waited for this and then to have to say that 'this or that day is impossible', etc. So far, the only day when we are expecting someone is Sunday 13 March. Very affectionate regards to Zette and you. Georges
180
50. LEIRIS IO BATAILLE176 Paris, [Thursday] 10 March [1949] My dear Georges, Zette and I were extremely touched by your letter and we're glad to know that both you and Diane have such a happy memory of an evening that likewise delighted us. As for the weekend, it is absolutely agreed and we shall have great pleasure in visiting. Would Sunday ~ 10 April suit? We would arrive on the Friday and leave on the Monday. (It is impossible for us to envisage any closer date since Kahnweiler has to go away on a trip and Zette must of course wait for his return before she can leave the gallery.) I duly received La Part 'TTlaudite 177 and send you my warmest thanks. I plan to telephone Lambrichst'f soon "about sending books to the Antilles. 179
Thanks again for your note and very affectionate regards to you both. Michel 176. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 50. 177. Bataille, La Part maudite, essai d'economie generale, Part 1, La Consumation, editions de Minuit, print run completed on 16 February 1949 rCUsage des richesses' series, edited by Georges Bataille, No.2) and OC, VOL. 7. Bataille had sent his book with the dedication 'to Michel Leiria/and to Zette/with great affection/Georges Bataille' (BLJD, LRS.213). 178. Georges Lambrichs (1917-92), who was working at the time at editions de Minuit where La Part maudiu had been published. 179. On a field trip to the French West Indies and Haiti (july-November 1948), Leiris had asked several publishers to send him books.
181
51. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS180
Vezelay, [Monday] 21 March 1949
My dear Michel, Excuse me fur taking so long to reply. We are extremely pleased that we can expect you on 8 April.
Tell me which train you will be coming on; we shall send a car to the station. All being well, you should arrive around 10 p.m. and we shall, of course, expect you for dinner. Until then, and my very affectionate regards to both, Georges Diane sends her warmest regards.
180. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.205.
182
52. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE181 [Paris] Sunday 3 April [1949J My dear Georges, We confirm our arrival next Friday 8 April on the train that leaves Paris at 17h 30 and arrives at Sermizelles-Vezelay at 22h 27. We are extremely pleased! Affectionate regards to you both Michel I duly received La Part maudite and I am reading it with great interest. 182
The tiger in space=the sex act in time-this is a very nice equation! 183
181. BNF.Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 55. j
182. Denis Hollier records that 'whenever he was encouraged to talk about Bataille, Leiris liked to describe a conversation in which the latter had succumbed, in all seriousness, to cal.. culating his own chances of being awarded the Nobel Prize: the peace prize (for La Part mau.-dite), of course, not the prize for literature (for Madame Edwarda). He didn't get it' (Denis Hollier, c~Inenarrable', in Georges Bataille--apres tout [symposium 1993, Orleans], ed. Denis Hollier, Belin, 1995, p. 271). 183. For higher animals, reproduction is 'for the animal the occasion of a sudden, frenetic squandering of its energies, all at once carried to the extremes ofipossibility (in time, what the tiger is in space)' (La Pan maudiu, DC, VOL. 7, p. 41).
183
53. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE184 Paris, [Monday] 25 April [1949] Dear Georges, I have been wanting to write to you for some time to tell you what happy memories Zette and I have of our brief stay in Vezelay, As usual, with every day that went by I kept putting this off. But a letter sent to me from Nimes by Andre Castel 185-whom I told about your imminent move to Carpentras 186-has given me an excuse. Here is what he wrote to me about you: Of course I remember your friend Bataille and the very fine piece of writing, which I have just read through, about the death of Granero. 187 (Where else has G. B. written about toros apart from this?) 184. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 53. 185. Andre Castel (1902--87), a Nimes oenologist and noted bullfight reporter whom Leiris got to know in September 1938 through Jean Paulhan and whom he introduced to Bataille. During the Nimes bullfight season, Castel played host to artists and writers who were aficionados: Bataille, Cendrars, Cocteau, Leiris, Picasso, etc. See Annie Malllis, Picasso et Leirisdans['aTent; Us ecrivains, les artistes et les toros ... (1937-1957), Pau, editions Cairn, 2002. See also Andre Castel and Michelle Leiris, CorrespontkLna 1938-1958, a work notable for what Leiris wrote to Castel about Bataille on 10 February 1939: 'What you tell me about Bataille's articles gives me great pleasure, Bataille is my closest friend and we are very much as one in our shared ideas' (p. 88). 186. Bataille was appointed director of the Carpentras municipal library (known as the Imguimbertine Library) by an order of 17 May 1949, and took up his post on 1 September. 187. 'The eye of Granero', Chapter 10 of The Story of th» Eye (1928), OC, VOL. 1, pp. 52-6. Leiris referred to this scene from Bataille's story in 'From the TIme of Lord Auch', pp. 22-38 in this volume.
184
Correspondence 1924-61 'The faithful reader'-I have a good number of books by your friend and a collect [?] 188 of Grit from the first issue. I have been a subscriber since its 1st or 2nd year. I very much like everything G. B. writes even though it too often goes way above the plaza de toros where I usually do my stuff. So I would be delighted to see him again with you, here on a day when there is a corrida or even to have him as a guest if he can make it as far as Nimesit's very easy from Carpentras. Tell him that that he'll be made at home in my house. Carpentras is a pleasant town and the library is an interesting one with a collect[ion] of illuminated books [?] that is pretty much uniq?e.
The trip to Vezelay did me a lot of good and I got down to work again during the Easter holiday. I should like to be over and done with the Fourbis-the,follow-pp to Biffures-and move onto something elsel . Once again, let me say how enormously happy we are to have had those few days and with great affection to you and Diane Michel
188. Throughout this paragraph, the square brackets and their content are Leiris's.
185
54. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE189 [Paris] Sunday 2 April [1950] Dear Georges, You have probably heard from Sonia 190 that Zette and I were due to visit the Midi for Easter. Of course, we shall stop in Carpentras. We shall arrive next Thursday 6 April, on the 20h 55 motor coach, which' we shall have boarded in Xvignon (having arrived there by the train leaving Paris at 8.15 in the morning). Would you be so kind as to reserve a hotel room for us? On Saturday morning, we shall leave for Nimes, where Castel is expecting us to lunch and from where we shall leave on the Sunday for the Easter corrida in Arles.! 91 Castel, who has been in Paris over the last few days, is very insistent that you and Diane should also come to lunch. He has
189. BNF..Mss, NAF 15.854, fI. 51-52. This letter was written on paper headed: 53 bis quai des Grands-Augustins. VIe. Odeon 18-61. 190. Sonia Orwell, nee Brownel (1918-80), English literary critic whom Leiris had met in 1946 (before her marriage to George Orwell, in 1949). For him, she was 'my most loyal and attentive woman friend' CChevauchees d'antan' [1987], Zebrage, p. 251). Along with Georges Limbour, she had visited Bataille in Carpentras (Martine Colin-Picon, Georges Limbour: le songe autobiographique, Lachenal et Ritter, 1994, p. 215). She remarried in 1958, her second husband being Michael Pitt-Rivers. In 1964, as Sonia Brownel, she published an English translation of'... Reusement!', the first chapter of Biffures, as '... ppily' (Art and literature: An International Review, No.1, March 1964, pp. 132-5). 191.9 April 1950 ('bullfight calendar', in Leiris, La Course de taureau», Fourbis, 1991, P: 88).
186
Correspondence 1924-61 announced a fabulous menu ofwines and, in the afternoon, most probably a visit to Pierre Pouly's bull herd.l 92 Moreover, he would like to talk to you about a great project he has for extravagant expenditure to be carried out on an official basis: the free distribution of the surplus from harvests in the Gard departement to students and diverse categories of needy people, etc. Independently of this project, I would like it very much if you and Diane could come to this lunch, which.. will most surely be a great success! You can therefore rely (failing derailment 'or accidents of the kind) on our arrival on Thursday evening. Very affectionate regards to you both, Michel
192. The fann where bulls were bred by Pierre Pouly, matador, stock breeder, director of the Arles bullring and a friend of Castel (Annie Maillis, Midtel Leins, l'ecrivain matador, I.:Harmattan, 1998, p. 52, NOTE 32).
187
55. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS193
Carpentras [Wednesday] 19 April 1950 My dear Michel, Diane .is still in Carpentras. As a result I can make no plans to go to Aix. l 94 But bear in mind that you were supposed to stop off in Carpentras all being well and perhaps arrange something with Castel. You'll telephone me, perhaps? In any case Diane and I shall be very much looking forward to you stopping off here. The house should now be much more pleasant than when you were here last. Sonia is back, and there is no need for me to say that she too would be delighted to see you again. So I'm counting on seeing you soon, and I entrust you with giving my warmest regards to Zette.
My affectionate regards to you, Georges
193. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.206. Typewritten letter. 194. Aix-en-Provence, where Andre and Rose Masson lived.
188
56. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE195 [Aix-en-Provence] Friday 21 April [1950] Dear Georges, I was really hoping to see you in Aix, where everybody would have given you a good welcome. Unfortunately, it won't be possible for us to stop off in Carpentras. I got down to work again in Golfe-Juan 196 and here, and this makes me want to prolong my stay as much as possible. We therefore have to make our departure by plane from Marseille, which means we can stay on with the Massons until Monday afternoon. There is a possibility that we shall be back in this region in late July, when the music festival is on, so that we can see Don Giovanni and Cosi fan tutte. Perhaps we shall be able to arrange to see one another then? Mozart is certainly a match for a corrida! Tell Sonia that we are extremely sorry not to have been able to meet her. But I think she's going to stop in Paris for a little while on her way back to England. Andre has done some extraordinary pictures, illustrationsin the full sense-of his theory of 'instants'.
195. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 54. 196. Where Leiris was probably staying with Picasso.
189
Bataille & Leiris I imagine that you and Diane will have the opportunity to come to Paris before the end of July, and if so we shall be able to see one another before too long. My affectionate regards to you both Michel My very best to Sonia, whom we also hope to see soon.
190
57. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS197 Carpentras, [Tuesday] 12 September 1950 My dear Michel, Ii.. book about Don Juan just came out in July. It is actually a Donjuan de Marana. l g8 But it strikes me that I could do an article about Don Juan covering the three books: Pushkin's translation of Don Juan, 199 Jouve's boo~200 (whose publication in Switzerland during the War nonetheless justifies it being talked about now)201 and this life that claims to fit with the legend (this last, if only for the sake of opposing this claim). On the other hand, I shall try again to find the English book on Mozart that I mentioned to you. You mow that we are looking forward to your telephone call and the announcement of your arrival to come en masse and eat a big couscous for lunch ... This would be perfect from the 15th onwards (before that, I have the issue of Critique to prepare).
197. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.207. Letter most likely addressed to Leiris at the home of Andre and Rose Masson in Aix-en-Provence. 198. Esther Van Loo, Le Vrai Don Juan: don Miguel de Marana, with a preface by Andre Castelot, SFELl: 1950. 199. Pushkin, Le Convive de pierre. followed by La Roussalka, Russian text introduced and translated by Henri Thomas, Le Seuil, 1947. 200. Pierre Jean jouve, l'Universite, 1942.
u
'Don Juan' de Mozart, Fribourg, editions de la Librairie de
201. No article on these three books has been found in Critique.
191
Bataille & Leiris You must have seen that Aparicio and Litri will kill six novillos by themselves on the 24th. 202 Give my and Diane's very best to Rose and Andre, Affectionate regards to you and Zette, Georges
202. Julio Aparicio and Miguel Baez Litri, at Nlmes, on 24 September 1950, a novillada attended by Leiris (Michel Leiris, La Course de taureaux, p. 89).
192
58. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS203 Carpentras, [Monday] 11 December 1950 My dear Michel, I have received the article from Jean Laude. 2M Moreover, Jean Piel205 tells me that you would contribute, that you had suggested an article for Critique. I see only one solution. Laude's article gives me the impression that this is work of outstanding interest. My opinion is that Laude's article is more like a note. It would be better placed, I think, in us Temps modernes. You, on the other hand, could give Critique a more substantial piece, which could be the issue's lead article. Everyonewould win this way, I believe,Weingarten in particular. us Temps modernes probably can't come up with anything more significant than Laude's note (some three and a half pages 203. BLJD, Ms.Ms43.208. This letter was written on paper headed: Critique, revue generale des publications francaises et etrangeres. Les Editions de Minuit, 22 boulevard SaintMichel--ODE.22-56 and 22-57. Published in Choix, pp. 430-1. 204. Jean Laude (1922-84), author, notably of Arts de l'A.frique noire (1979), La peinture franfllise, 1905-1914, et l'arl negre (1968, 2 vois) and of a study on the aesthetics of Carl Einstein, published as an introduction to Carl Einstein's La Sculpture negrt in the review Mediations (No.3, Autumn 1961). 205. Jean Piel (1902-96), economist, author of La Fortune amiricaine et son destin (published in 1948 in the series 'CUsage des richesses' edited by Bataille), of memoirs titled La Renamtre et La difference (1982) and an introduction to a 1970 edition of Bataille's 1A Part maudiu. The two men were brothers-in-law when Bataille was married to Sylvia Bataille (see pp. 90-1, Letter 9. NOTE 15).
193
Bataille & Leiris when printed). If what Laude's article leads me to imagine about Weingarten is true, I think that only Critique, especially with an article by you, can adequately highlight what is at issue. I would publish Laude's article because I have no reason to say no to him, but feel that this.. is a mistake. 206 Excuse my not having written earlier (in particular, I sent a postal order to Zette with the idea that I would write the next day and that next day got put off). The fact is that I am almost swallowed up by work. All my affection to you and Zette, Georges
206.Jean Laude's article was subsequently published in Critique, NO. 45, 15 February 1951, pp. 184-7, with the tide 'Romain Weingarten, Le Thidlrede la Chrysalide, with six drawings by the author, Aubier, 1950'. Leiris published no article in Critique about Weingarten, but, when the latter put on his play Us Nourrices at the Lutece Theatre in November 1961, he wrote an introduction for the programme, a piece that was not reprinted in either Bristes or Zebrage.
194
59. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS207 Orleans, [Tuesday] 23 February 1954 My dear Michel, Would you apologize for me to Zette and give her my thanks for her second letter?208 We are expecting you, all being well then, on the train that leaves Paris on Saturday at 5h 40, and I am really glad that you're both coming. Can I ask you for a small favour? Would you remember me to the good offices of Mademoiselle Oddon209 and ask her whether she has the following works: AM. Hocart, Kingship (Oxford, 1927) idem Kings and Councilors [sic.] (London, 1936) Crawley, TheMystic Rose, a study ofprimitive marriage (London, 1902). Could you at the same time ask her for the shelf marks of these works, which I shall request, assuming Mademoiselle Oddon has no objection, on inter-library loan? But if it were possible for you to borrow just the first of these books (the one most important to me) on your own account and 207. BLJD, Ms.Ms43.209. This letter waswritten on paper headed: Bibliotheque de la Ville d'Orleans, 1. rue Dupanloup. Telephone: 31-23. Appointed by an order of 19 July 1951, Bataille had been the director of this library since 1 September. Letter published in Choix, pp.449-50. 208. Neither this letter nor the previous one referred to have been found. 209. Yvonne Oddon (1902-82), director of the library at the musee de l'Homme.
195
Bataille & Leins bring it here, I would make sure to consult it within the two days of your stay here, and you would be doing me a very great favour. I happen to be finishing a book for which I ought to have consulted all of these a long time ago, but not one of them is in the Nationale. 210 Forgive me for bothering you with this; the truth is that I am somewhat in difficulty. What I am doing is putting the finishing touches to La Part maudite by adding two parts to it, one on Eroticism and another on Sovereignty; 211 I work in such disorder that I have never found a way of consulting these books until now, at the point when the work is finished, so to speak! My very affectionate regards to you and Zette, Georges Youwill have a room at the Hotel des Arcades, on the Loire.
210. The Bibliotheque nationale, 211. While he was alive, of these Bataille published only I.:Erotisme (editions de Minuit, 1957), which was dedicated to Leiris. In magazines, he published only some fragments of 'La Souverainete', which remained incomplete and was published only in 1976-by Thadee Klossowski-in DC, VOL. 7.
196
60. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS212 Orleans, [Saturday] 17 November 1956 My dear Michel, It's a long time now since we've seen one another. I telephoned and found out thai you were in Nemours. 213 Perhaps the feeling I had for your mother, so much at odds with the image I have always wished to give of rpyself, has more significance for our long friendship than would at first seem. Besides, we are getting closer to death and what seemed most opposed seems more and more deeply connected. I am in any case certain that the feeling of tenderness that binds me so deeply to you is simultaneously close to death and close to the bonds that connected you to your mother. I say this somewhat in that harrowed state where there is no longer anything that from one day to the next can add to my being in it. I shall try to telephone as soon as I can. The fact is that since the summer I have hardly ever stayed in Paris for more than a few hours. Give my best to Zette. Yours with great affection, Georges
212. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.210. Published in Choix, pp. 465-6. 213. Leiris was in Saint-Pierre-lea-Nemours for the funeral of his mother Marie Leiris (1865-1956), who had died on 14 November.
197
61. LEIRIS TO Bf\.TAILLE214 Paris, [Tuesday] 20 November 1956 Thank you for your letter, my dear Georges. I think you couldn't have put it better; for today I am in that state of tender heartbreak that I experienced for the first time with Colette's death,215 at which I have a strange sense of being present all over again. It is too idiotic that we see so little of one another and you must telephone me as soon as you are in these parts. See you soon then, and a tender thank you again! Michel
214. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f.38. 215. Colette Peignot, in November 1938.
198
62. LEIRIS TO BATAlLLE216 [Saint-Hilaire, Monday] 17 December 1956 My dear Georges, We must absolutely see one another. Wouldn't the simplest thing be that you and Diane come here 2 17 for lunch next Sunday the 23rd? Georges Henri218 will be here. See you on Sunday then, as early as you can, I hope! And very affectionate regards to you both. t
Michel
216. BNF-Mss. NAF 15.854, f. 39. This letter was written on paper headed: Le Prieure, Saint-Hilaire par Chalo-Saint-Mars (S.&O.). Tel. CHALO 57. 217. Le Prieure: a property adjoining the village ofSaint-Hilaire par Chalo-Saint-Mars, near Etampes (Seine-et-Oise, later Essonne), bought by the Louise Leiris Gallery in early 1953. From the summer of 1954, Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler and the Leiris' spent most of their weekends and part of their summers there. It was in this house that Leiris died on 30 September 1990. 218. Georges Henri Riviere.
199
63. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS219 Orleans, [Tuesday] 22 January 1957 My dear Michel, I have been trying to telephone you at Saint-Hilaire and each time I've rung you haven't come (because in Paris I'm more likely to miss you). Remember that you were supposed to come to Orleans with Zette last Sunday, the 20th-at any rate, that was the initial idea. When are you thinking of coming now? Let us know a little ahead of time. You know how deeply our meetings matter to me. Increasingly, there is a poetic bond that seems to me the only thing to hold on to. While I've been writing to you I have received a letter from Georges Lisowski, whose name you may have seen on the list of intellectuals where you appear along with Mascolo, Nadeau and a few others including me. 220 He is a Pole whom I met in Zurich and whom I like very much. He is the secretary for a magazine that is doing a special issue on contemporary French literature, and if you could send him just a few pages for this, as likewise he has requested from Mascolo, Nadeau and myself, I think that the
219. BLJD, Ms.Ms43.211. 220. The call for an International Circle of Revolutionary Intellectuals, dated October-November 1956 and signed by some 20 notable figures including Bataille, Andre Breton, Aime Cesaire, Leiris, Georges Lisowski, Dionys Mascolo, Maurice Nadeau, Joseph Tubiana (Tracts surrealists et diclarations collectives 1922-1969, PART 2, pp. 162-4).
200
Correspondence 1924-61 whole thing }Vould work out more or less as we could wish. Of course, we don't have to send unpublished pages, just something that can stand on its own. It would be a good thing if you could do this and I should be really grateful to you. (On my account, I have sent a few pages taken from Le Coupable.) I am sorry to bother you. I wouldn't were it not that his kindness and everything else I have found in Lisowski have inspired a true friendship. In addition, it seems quite obvious to me that it is impossible to be indifferent to what is currently happening in Poland. 221 Diane and I send our very best to you and Zette. My affectionate regards to you, Georges The address: Georges Lisowski, 'Iuuirczosc (this is the title of the magazine),222 VI. Wiejslm, Warszawa, Poland. (Unfortunately, things have to be sent post haste.)
221. The Poznan working-class insurrection in June 1956, the return of WladyslawGomulka at the head of the Polish United Workers Party, the start of economic reforms, the release from prison ofCardinal Stephan Wyszynski and the establishment of a modus vivendibetween Church and State in October of that year. 222. The special issue of Tw6rczosc on French literature (Year 13, No.4, April 1957) included a piece by Bataille: 'Na marginesie zycia' CAux limites de la vie', an extract from Le eoupabk), two poems by Leiris: 'Piekna' and 'Nierozdzielni' ('Belle' and 'Frere et soeur', from Haul mal, pp. 61-3 and 160), and texts by Aragon, Camus, Char, Desnos, etc.
201
64. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE223 [Florence] Thursday 26 September [1957] What every Holofemes224 dreams oft With affection to you both. Michel As soon as we get back, we'll pay you a visit in Orleans. Meanwhile, my love to all three of you. 225
Zette It was lovely to have you in Saint-Hilaire.
223. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 40. A postcard showing •Florence, Uffizi Gallery, Judith, Botticelli (detail)', addressed to Monsieur Georges Bataille, Bibliotheque de la Ville, rue Dupanloup, Orleans (Loiret). 224. We should bear in mind the passage in £Age d'homme where Leiris describes at length the painting by Lucas Cranach the Elder which shows Judith holding the head of Holofernes. 225. The Batailles and their daughter Julie (born in 1948).
202
65. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE226 [Rome, Thursday] 25 September 1958 Rome is most certainly the city that would lend justificationif any were needed-to every transgression.... Affectionately Michel Hello you three Zette
226. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 41. Postcard showing a sculpture in stucco with the legend 'Roma, M[useo] Nazionale, Casa Romana (Stucchi)' addressed to Monsieur and Madame Georges Bataille, Bibliotheque, Rue Dupanloup, Orleans (Loiret).
203
66. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS227 Orleans, [Saturday] 6 Dec[ember] 58 My dear Michel Excuse me for not having given you any news as promised. But little by little this has been put off. I have also had some slight trouble with my eyes-but I hope that will soon be sorted out. Anyway you can see that I'm writing normally. I just have to wait for the day when my strength deigns to make a comeback. Slowly, it's on the way. My very best to Zette and from Diane too. Yours, affectionately, from us both. Georges
227. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.212.
204
67. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE228 [Venice, Friday] 18 September 1959 Yet again, we are in Venice. A performance of Monteverdi's Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda, after Tasso, put me in mind of our heyday: in those days, it would have called for an article in Documents (along the lines of Antoine Caron's229 Massacres) and that made me think about that Rape of Lucrezia 230 that my first trip to Africa made me miss. With affection to you both Michel Zette
228. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 42. Postcard showing detail 'Dalla pianta di Venezia del 1500 di Jacopo de' Barbari' [From Jacopo de' Barbari's map of Venice in 1500] addressed to Monsieur and Madame Georges Bataille, Bibliotheque de la Ville, Rue Dupanloup, Orleans (Loiret), 229. Leiris had published an article titled ~ Painting by Antoine Caron' about The Massacres under the Triumvirate (Documents, No.7, December 1929). This was reprinted in Zebrage. 230. This is very likely the play Le Viol de Lucrece, by Andre Obey, based on the poem by Shakespeare, which was staged for the first time on 12 March 1931 at the theatre du VieuxColombier by the Compagnie des Quinze, directed by Michel Saint-Denis, and with MarieHelene Daste in the role of Lucrece, On 12 March 1931, Leiris was still in Paris but probably absorbed in his preparations for the Dakar-Djibouti field trip, which was to leave from Bordeaux on 19 May.
205
68. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE231 Paris, [Tuesday] 5 January 1960 Dear Georges, I have duly received the Gilles de Rais2S2 and I have read your introduction with great interest; I find it persuasive: it gives a human dimension to the disproportions of a figure who has been until now as immeasurable as a creature of pure legend. You have probably heard about Camus's tragic demise and that Michel Gallimard has had to have major surgery.2SS In this respect too, for some months now things have seemed disproportionate. Little by little, one feels oneself taken over by an impression of being survivors, a complicated feeling that's a mixture of dread and shame, as well as a certain detachment based on the idea of out-and-out derision.... Let us hope for a 1960 that is less deliberately skewed towards wholesale death!
231 BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f.43.
232. Le Prods tk Gilles de Rais, the text of the two trials with an introduction and notes by Bataille, published in 1959 with the Club francais du livre (reprinted in DC, VOL. 10). Leiris's copy has the dedication 'to Zette and Michel./with the very, very old friendship,lever young,lof Georges' (BLJD; LRS.214 1/2). 233. Albert Camus died on 4 January 1960 in a car accident on the Vonne road. The driver of the car was Michel Gallimard-the nephew of Gaston Gallimard and a friend of Camuswho died a few days later as a result of his injuries.
206
Correspondence 1924-61 We must find a way of seeing one another in Paris, SaintHilaire or Orleans. The easiest would be to plan for a lunch at Saint-Hilaire on a Sunday or a Monday. Zette and I send our most affectionateregards to you and Diane. Michel
207
69. BATAILLE TO LOUISE LEIRIS234 Fontenay-Ie-Comte [Vendee], [Friday] 26 February 1960235
My dear Zette, Thank you for what you sent me. 236 This will complete the photos already taken (on the basis of the Salacrou album).2~7 Thank you also for the two colour reproductions. I am working on the book as best I can and I hope to finish within a month. Could you ask Michel for the exact reference of the painting of Judith and Lucrezia reproduced in the second edition of Uge
234. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.213. 235. Bataille was staying with his friend Andre Costa. 236. Photographs and drawings by Andre Masson sent by the Louise Leiris Gallery to illustrate Les Larmes d'Ems, which would be published with Jean-Jacques Pauvert in :June 1961. Louise Leiris is thanked at the end of the book. In 1971, Pauvert also published an edition augmented by unpublished letters from Bataille to Giuseppe Maria 1.0 Duca along with an introduction by Lo Duca. On Lo Duca, see p. 222, Letter 78, NOTE 262. 237. This undoubtedly refers to the collective work, Andre Masson, with texts by Jean-Louis Barrault, Georges Bataille, Andre Breton, Robert Desnos, Michel Leiris, etc., Rouen, printed by Pierre-Rene WoH: 1940. This was the initiative of Robert Desnos, who also coordinated it, and it was published (anonymously) by Armand Salacrou. It contained numerous reproductions of works by Masson. Printing was completed on 15 April 1940 and it remained in cellars at Rouen throughout the Occupation, only being distributed after the Liberation. A facsimile of it was published in 1993 (Marseille, Andre Dimanche editeur).
208
Correspondence 1924-61 d'homme] I would in fact like to have it reproduced in my book; I've forgotten which.museum the painting is in. 2s8 All my very best to Michel and Heini. 239 Yours affectionately, Georges
238. See pp. 210-11, Letter 70, NOTE 242. 239. Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler.
209
70. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS240 [Fontenay-Ie-Comte (?), March 1960] My dear Michel, Forgive me for not having written to you. Forgive me also for not knowing whether I promised the other day to do such and such a thing, for example to write to ] erome Peignot. My memory has truly become impossible ... Right now I am trying to finish a book, alas if I write 'come hell or high water' this is scarcely an exaggeration, since I find it so hard and especially since I am so late with it. Can I now ask you a question: Do you remember having shown me a book of engravings of tortures from the early 17th (or late 16th) century? 1\5 far as I recall, this book belonged to Heini. It seems to me that there was no text, but this is a memory going back to '25 or t30? Could it not be the work of someone called Cloppenburg? At any rate, I am almost certain at least that it was a Dutch book. If you could remember you would be doing me a great favour.24 1 240. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.218. 241. In the margin, in Leiris's handwriting: :Jan Luyken (1649-1712). Persecutions religieuses [The Martyrs Mirror].' Two engravings by Jan Luyken appear in LesLannesd'Eros, pp. 239-40, with the note 'coll, Henry Kahnweiler'. The title of the book by Johann Everhardts Cloppenburch (or Cloppenburg) mentioned by Bataille is Le Miroir de la tyrannie espagnol« perpetre~ awe Indes occidentales [...] mis en lumiere par un eveque, Bartolome de Las Casas (Amsterdam, 1620). One of the engravings from this book is also reproduced in Us Larmes d'Eros. p. 238.
210
Correspondence 1924-61 Another thing: Do you remember which museum has Cranach's double painting, Lucrezia andJudith, the one you fmally reproduced at the start of urge d'homme?242 Be assured of my wholehearted friendship, Georges
242. In the margin, in Leiris's handwriting: 'Picture Gallery in Dresden'. Nonetheless, Bataille did not opt for these two works by Cranach, but five others instead (pp. 84-7).
211
71. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS243 [Orleans, Tuesday] 22 March [19]60 My dear Michel, I've now become really ill after all. First it was hard for me to work. Then treatment at the Bogomoletz ordered by Fraenkel. 244 which is certainly doing something but for now leaves me in a state that is hard to tolerate. Compensated however by the prospect of getting better in the end. I should have written to you a long time ago if only to explain about talking to Jardot245-who was in agreement-more than a month ago, about the possibility of going together to Lascaux. 246 In any case could you tell J ardot or let him know that I'm sony not to have given any sign of life after the conversations we had together? Berhaps one day-perhaps after the Easter holiday-this trip would be feasible for me. For now I can only offer apologies. What is more, I am even more depressed than I am ill. Diane is in a terrible state of nerves, She can't-or very nearly can't endure me. 243. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.214. Published in Choix, pp. 526-7. 244. Theodore Fraenkel: see 'Surrealism from Day to Day', p. 54,
NOTE
14 in this volume.
245. Maurice Jardot (1911-2002). inspector of historic monuments, began working at the Louise Leiris Gallery in 1956, subsequently becoming one of its codirectors, 246. In 1955, Bataille had published Lascaux au la naissance de ['aft, with Skim.
212
Correspondence 1924-61 I am trying to do some work-without which I could not cope at all-but this is becoming well-nigh impossible without the full effect of my treatment . . . Forgive me for this long moan, which after all is to do with what is in theory a temporary condition.. Forgive me yet again for taking advantage of our friendship . Under normal circumstances I ought to go to Paris at the be~inning of next week. Perhaps we'll be able to see one another on Monday or Tuesday.. I shall try to telephone you. But if I am still in this high-pressure state, it is likely that I shall have to put off my trip to Paris-or reduce it to a minimum. Don't forget that the absurd and intolerable nature of my letter is because of the Bogomoletz, mainly at least. Give my very best to Zette and don't hold it against me that I have been incapable of writing in a more sensible vein. It is all the more inexcusable that I have taken advantage of this sense of indestructible friendship that binds me to you. Despite everything I can't send this letter without connecting it to my hope of getting through this with my fighting spirit, but what matters first and foremost in this fight is friendship. Georges
213
72. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE247 [Milan, Monday] 28 March 1960 Dear Georges, Thank you for the letter. I really hope that you'll get back on your feet and I'm counting on us seeing one another again soon, either in Paris or in Orleans. Affectionate regards to both of you Michel
[three illegible words] and 1 shall write to you Zette
247. BNF:Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 46. Postcard of 'Milano, Pinacoteca di Brera Bernardino Luini, Putto sotto un pergolato [Cherub under a Pergolar, addressed to Monsieur Georges Bataille, keeper of the Bibliotheque de la Ville, Rue Dupanloup, Orleans (Loiret).
214
73. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS248 Orleans, [Sunday] 3 April 60 My dear Michel, I found your card from Milan when I got back from Paris on Friday. I knew that you had arrived, but,You must forgive me for not having found a way to reach you during the ~ day; the only reason is the bad day I had with the state of my nerves. Nothing that serious when you consider that a treatment at the Bogomoleiz has put me in a worse state, but that however means that it is working and all that's needed mainly is to wait. I have just read Us Sequestres d'Altona. 249 It is very good and has had a powerful emotional effect on me. But as a whole I think that the world we enter in it is akin at least to the period we are reaching now. Give my warmest regards to Zette and thank her for having to write to me ... Very affectionately Georges ~
S. Diane has just got back from Vendee and she will drop in to
see Zette on Tuesday in the daytime: she'll telephone. 248. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.215. 249. Sartre's play [English title Loser Wins, US title The Condemned of Altona] was first performed in September 1959 at the theatre de la Renaissance and was published in that year's October and November issues of Les Temps modemes, then in volume form by Gallimard in ] anuary 1960.
215
74. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS250 Les Sables d'Olonne (Vendee), [Tuesday] 26 July 1960 My dear Michel, It would be hard for me to tell you where things are with me. Pinned down by efforts that exhaust me and yet are all too slow in bearing fruit, I've reached the point of sometimes being sorry that I am not more ill so that I could rest, at least for a few days. It appears that I will be able to get to Paris at the start of August. Perhaps we could meet. Give my warmest regards to Zette and be assured that my friendship with you remains just as great as all that it has meant tome, Georges
250. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.216.
216
75. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS251 Orleans, [Friday] 28 October 1960 My dear Michel, I am becoming so clumsy, so vague, so tired that I failed to make any attempt to call you on the telephone in time on my last visit to Paris. Yet, I should like nothin~ more than to see you. I should like to just as much ev~n if I did not have this specific reason: the return from China of one of my friends (perhaps you have heard mention ofJacques Pimpaneau)252 prompts me at least to contemplate the far-reaching consequenllces of the absurd initiative connected with Acephale, and you are~ one of those whom I feel obliged to bring up to date, on the basic points at any rate. 253 I am not thinking in the slightest about starting it up again but I cannot fail to
251. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.217. Published in Choix, pp. 549-50, and in EAPJrrenti, pp. 575-7. 252. The sinologistJacques Pimpaneau, who had been the prime mover of the 'Hommage to Georges Bataille' published in La Cigue, No.1, January 1958. This included Leiris's article 'Georges Bataille as Don Juan' (pp. 3-5 in this volume). Jacques Pimpaneau was with Bataille when he died, on 9 July 1962. 253. On 24 October, Bataille had written to Patrick Waldberg: I feel like a criminal so far only by intent, but I wonder how long I can go on not justifying certain pursuits: the reconstitution of a group that was dissolved (dissolved by a hostile fate). By an irony full of bad faith, that is what I feel I shan soon be guilty of. But is it possible to live innocently? [...) I am always, of course, in agreement on the principle ofa reunion with some people. But when it takes place-if it takes place-I shall propose an enlarged reunion where all those who have some connection with what we did in the past will be invited, the guest list being
217
Bataille & Leiris notice that there was something fundamental in this wild enterprise that has not been able to die, for all the remoteness that I myself have felt. This great sense of distance remains in my feelings of horror and dread at the thought of returning to the shabbiness I was able to accept, but without for a moment contemplating any return to the past; the question asked by this past seems to me to have value for others beside myself and I could not ask it without speaking of it to you. It seems to me that my dread and my horror have this meaning: that nothing could arise-for anyone-from what had distanced you from me at that time. Don't imagine that I am raving, but I am far from embarking on any real initiation, and likewise acknowledge that I am not one to shirk things. Anyway, it is only a matter of talking. With a serious view that this is something to be considered. I ought to have written to Zette, but I have been taken up for a long time by a backlog of obligations or meetings (in Paris, particularly) with my general condition being such that I was not yet quite up to them. Can I count on you to give her my apologies? Tell her how embarrassed I am that my neglect is so out of keeping with the feelings of profound gratitude connected to such a long-standing friendship. I feel weary, I am getting old, but if I think ofwhat makes us close, the past, the deep past, has not grown old in me. Georges drawn up either at this reunion or in advance by you and me and only confirmed at the reunion. I am saying no more about this to you, only to add one principle that in my view is solid. That this can only be in response to an inquiry that pre-exists in certain minds (Choix, pp. 544---8).
218
76. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS254
Fontenay-Ie-Comte (Vendee), Sub-Prefecture, [Tuesday] 14-11-61 My dear Michel, Let me tell you first that right now 1 am going through a very tough time. I must have written to you lately and 1 can only vaguely recall having done so, and at this moment it is beyond me to recall the contents of my letter ... 1 must write to you again because 1 am struggling right now to finish a book on time so as to avoid a delay of several months. I have been held up by illness and now here 1 am condemned to make an effort that is halfway intolerable to get through it. I cannot see who 1 can tum to apart from you. Before leaving Orleans I was unable to find an article from the Bulletin de la Societe fra'11fllise prehistorique.255 Today I have realized that the text of my book calls this article into question in a way that strikes me as, at the very least, extremely difficult to change. Is this article by Abbe Breuil himself? 1 think not, but it does take issue with Abbe Breuil, as far as I recall, in as much as Abbe Breuil concerned himself with these basic facts, or else, I think, he confirmed them. This is about two prehistoric drawings in a recently discovered cave (but perhaps the recent discovery was only of the drawings). There are two naked women apparently drawn in such a way that there is a strikingly erotic aspect to the drawing.
254. BLJD, Ms.Ms 43.219.
255. Societe prehistorique fra1lfaise
219
Bataille & Leins
Abbe Breuil himself states this. At least this would apply to one of the women. The article must date from around 1955 (more likely later). I have a notion that our friend Harper Kelley256 (given the general deterioration of my memory, I am afraid of getting the name wrong) might know. Can I ask you to give him my very best, to put this letter in front of him and ask him whether he remembers or whether he thinks any of his colleagues might remember this article? I can no longer recall whether there are any photographs with the article. I have a feeling there are only drawings by way of reproductions. And I think that the caves are located in Dordogne, more likely in the south of the Dordogne. I'm sorry for bothering you like this. Alas I'm working in such mental disarray that whenever I look at my manuscript again, more often than not I notice irremediable gaps, but the one I have told you about is apparently the most awkward. Thank you for your letter of the ninth257 which I have finally found after shifting a jumble of papers (I was sure I had brought it). The letter I can recall only vaguely is the one that yours replied to. I am writing or I shall write tomorrow at the latest to Jerome Peignot. Forgive the incoherence, relative at least, of this letter today. My wannest regards to Zette. Yours very affectionately, Georges
256. Harper Kelley (1896--1962), American prehistorian, student of Abbe Breuil, head of the Department of Prehistory at the musee de I'Homme after the Second World War. See Henry Field, 'Harper Kelley (1896-1962)', in Man, A Monthly Record of Anthropological Science, London, April 1963, p. 55.
257. Not found.
220
77. LEIRIS TO BATAILLE258 [Paris, Saturday] 18.2.61 259 Vergnes, R.-Gravures magdaleniennes de la grotte de la Magdelaine, pres de Penne. Bull. S. R E, XLI X, 1952, NOS 11-12, pp. 622-4, 3 figs. Betirac, B.-Les Venus de la Magdelaine.-Id., LI, 1954, NOS 3-4, pp. 125-6, 2 plates. Breuil, H.-Bas-reliefs feminins de la Magdelaine (Penne, Tarn) pres Montauban (Tarn-et-Garonne).-Quaternaria, I, Roma, 1954. [Handwritten:] My dear Georges, Here, from Kelley (who asks me to give you his very best), are the references for three articles relating to the female figures in question. It was probably Betirac's that he showed you. Yours affectionately Michel
258. BNF-Mss, NAF 15.854, f. 44. Typewritten folio with manuscript attached. 259. The date 18.2.61 was written by Leiris at the bottom of the letter.
221
78. BATAILLETO LEIRIS260 Fontenay-Ie-Comte (Vendee), Sub-Prefecture [Thursday] 23-2-61 My dear Michel, Thank you for your letter and forgive whatever is doubdess muddled in mine. I am very tired and I'm trying to finish the manuscript I'm working on so as to get it in on time. Unfortunately, this tiredness is truly excessive. At,any rate please thank Kelley, of whom I have a very positive memory. I have written to the editor of the series in which my book261 is to be published. His name is J. M. Lo Duca. 262 He is a Sicilian. I think he'll come to the Trocadero. In any case, I am convinced that the second of the references that Kelley has so kindly given me is the right one (as he himself believed).
260. BlJD, Ms.Ms 43.220.
261. Les Latmes d'Eros, Jean-Jacques Pauvert, June 1961, 'Bibliotheque internationale d'erotologie' series. Bataille sent a copy to Leiris with the dedication: Ito Michel, to ZetteJwho I am sad to see so little, often through/my own fault, with my/deep affection/Georges' (BLJD; LRS, 2091/2). 262. Giuseppe Maria Lo Duca (1910-2004), Italianjournalist living in France and whose first names were sometimes Gallicised as Joseph Marie. He was a cineaste and, in 1951, with Andre Bazin and Jacques Doniol-Valcroze,was a founder of Cahiers du Cinema. Between 1960 and 1980, he was the author of various works on eroticism (in particular, with Maurice Bessy, on eroticism in the cinema).
222
Correspondence 1924-61 I realize that I have not written to Jerome Peignot. And I shall probably do so. The letter I am writing you today-I am a little surprised but I don't think I'm wrong-is in fact logical ... All my affection, Georges
223
79. BATAILLE TO LEIRIS263 [Pamplona, 21 June 1961] A pity that Pamplona is so far away
Affectionately Georges Diane
263. BLJD, in the process of classification. Photograph showing three bulls in a street at Pamplona, sold and used as a postcard. Undated. Postmark: pamplona, 21.Ju=UN.1961 (the year is hard to make out and therefore only surmised).
224
MICHEL LEIRIS
Georges Bataille As Time Goes By
The writings that follow are all extracts from Michel Leins's Journal 1922-1989, thestandard edition introduced and annotated by JeanJamin (Gallimard, 1992).
1929
May Saw Zdenko Reich;' with Daumal and Benichou.s Reich is doing an article on the burlesque. In an essay of this kind it appears to be quite hard to avoid the stumbling block of Manicheanism, and not depict the burlesque as something objectively existing, in opposition to a non-burlesque. This is the stumbling block for Bataille in 'Le cheval academiquef but he seems to accept this position and do nothing to go beyond it. Daumal thinks that if we see burlesque forms as existing in themselves, this is because we imagine them from an anthropomorphic point of view.
1. Zdenko Reich, born in Yugoslavia in 1905. He settled in France in the 19205, in 1929 he joined Le Grand J eu, a group and magazine with Rene Daumal, Roger Vailland, Josef Sima and Roger Gilbert-Lecomte. He then contributed to Documents, to Surrealisme au service de La revolution, to Cahiers de l'Etoile and to Europe. In 1940, he was arrested as a conununist militant, then released. He returned to Belgrade where he held official functions after the War (see the Dictionnaire general du surtealisme et de sesenvirons). 2. Paul Benichou (1908-2001), author of studies on Nerval, Rousseau, Mallarme, the Romantic visionaries, etc. 3. Documents, No.1, April 1929, pp. 27-31, reprinted in DC, VOL. 1, pp. 159-63.
227
Bataille & Leiris
By this token, what is burlesque is man when deformed and monstrous. But why, for example, does a rhinoceros strike us as more monstrous than a lion? (p. 141)
I can sum up some of my present friends with a single word: Limbour too detached: Bataille, too 'aesthetically' materialist; Baron, too unperceptive a communist; Fraenkel, too sentimental; Kahnweiler, too much 'human dignity'; Jouhandeau, too prone to exaggerate. Nothing to be said against Masson. If I were to develop these critiques they could lead me to define my own position, to consolidate it as a consequence. (p. 147) 16 May
Saw Bataille, who gives me confirmation that his materialist thinking is of a Manichean kind. It would be interesting to study the relationships between these three things: the dialectic of contraries, Manicheanism, ambivalence. This could be dealt with in the article I have in mind to write about Satanism.! One could consider affective ambivalence as the unconscious origin of thinking about the conflict of opposing ideas, their resolution, their similarities. However, this is probably more than superficial, and much more vivid than real. Generalizations of this kind are always very tempting but, all in all, 4. This article does not seem to have been written. Unless Leiris has in mind his review of the book by Emilejules Grillot de Givry, Le Musie des sorciers, mo,ges et alchimistes, a review published in Issue 2 of Documents, dated May 1929, with the title 'A propos du ''Mus~e des sorciers" • [On tlie Museum of Sorcerers].
228
Georges Bataille: As Time Goes By they remain extremely gratuitous. Yet, there might be a way of presenting this in a 'poetic' manner that would register how this affinity is imposed on the imagination, without there being any question J of regarding it as having a serious basis. (p. 171)
28 May
Spoke about this journal with Bataille who has doubts about the point of such an enterprise. (p. 186) Told Bataille today that, for this notebook, I had in mind a gallery of all the people I know. I must get on with this project and make a stab at these portraits. It would be amusing to try and do something along the lines of La Bruyere'~~Carat:teres. If that were possible, I would have to complete the gallety with my own portrait. Alas, I think that if I were to undertake this in a systematic way I would end up with something very superficial and literary-and there is already too much verbiage and literariness in everything I write. I am obliged to acknowledge that so far this journal is very feeble and teaches me nothing about myself. Worse still, it allows me the illusion that I am doing better than nothing-which still remains to be seen. (p. 187)
2 June
Tomorrow I am starting work on Documents. I did everything I could to get this job but, obviously, now that I've succeeded, it's
229
Bataille & Leiris really irksome, and I imagine that with less time taken up I could be writing masses of things ... (p. 188) 4 June Everything I write, with scarcely any exceptions, is extremely poor. For instance, how greatly inferior my articles are to Bataille's, Limbour's or those by Desnos, even the mostjournalistic ones! One must never be proud of being incapable of writing an article for payment; it's merely proof of ineffectiveness. People like Edgar Allan Poe and Gerard de Nerval were literary professionals par excellence, journalists through and through. Since I'm working all day at the moment, I, should like it at least to have the result of taking my mind off these worries. Perhaps I could thereby find my way to some quite natural kind of poetry. (p. 188) 3
oJune
[Georges Henri] Riviere is the only man I knowwho can give one the impression that he has truly signed a pact with the devil. [...] It is quitenormal that such a man should have been a close friend of ] ouhandeau and, currently, of Bataille. (p. 193)
1 August I've been out with Bataille two evenings in a row. The Revue negre 5 and what it symbolizes is always a central feature of our preoccupations. (p. 195)
230
Georges Bataille: As Time Goes By 1934 16July
Meeting with Bataille: conversation about Beauty (I'm the one to put this term forward). Of course, no agreement! (p.285) 1935 26 December
Against the totalitarian tendency (or rather: the pretensions) of Surrealism: the artist should at no price interfere in any of the problems of the day (which he sees fatally from an aesthetic standpoint, inserting art everywhere, infesting everything with it, whereas at the start he saw himself as denying art by knocking down barriers [in doing so he has only succeeded in freeing the wild beast and making it more precious]);6 nor should he make pure art his objective, locking himselfup in an ivory tower, putting himself in a cage; merely, he should set himself all the problems of the day, but should resolve them in his way, by his own means. The ravages of art to be limited by keeping it within its barriers. The practical failure of Dada, which, removing the barriers, led only to the worst confusion, the mixing of 5. The review was Lew Leslie's Blackbirds, at the Moulin-Rouge. Not long before, in this same Journal (11 June, p. 190), Leiris had described it as a 'wonderful show', See the three articles published in Documents, No.4, September 1929: 'Black Birds' by Bataille, p. 215 (DC, YOLo 1, p. 186), 'Civilisation' by Leiris, pp. 221-2 iBnsees, pp. 31-7) and 'Les Lew Leslie's Blackbirds au Moulin-Rouge' by Andre Schaeffner, as well as the plate showing the troupe on board the steamer France, p. 225 (DC, YOLo 1, plates). 6. The square brackets and their content are Leiris's.
231
Bataille & Leiris aestheticism into everything. It is wonderful that as well as being a great musician, Satie was at the same time a good communist militant; but for him these things remained distinct: he did not make music as a Communist, nor communism as a musician. Returning art to its role as play, not gratuitous play, but the kind of play where everything that is human becomes engaged. Against the present point of view: I reproach Bataille with getting involved in politics, on the grounds that he is wasting his time with it, that it is making him ruin his poetic gift; for all that, Blue of Noon is still an admirable book, superior in literary terms to what is produced by those like me who lay claim only to literature. (p.294) 1936 7January
Saw Bataille yesterday, with Dora M.,' who is pretty and nice. Of course, Bataille is wrong about Contre-Attaque, its value is primarily literary, etc. but it is precisely this will to go beyond himself, this refusal to let himselfbe fenced in by literary boundaries, that is the sign of his poetic value. Making lIterature while one tells oneself that it is only literature: a way of not being a dupe but also another vicious circle. Yetthis will to go beyond himself does not necessarily have to assume a political form. (p.298) 7. Theodora Markovic, known as Dora Maar (1907-97), photographer and painter, member of the 'Masses' group. Bataille's mistress 'from late 1933 to early 1934' (Surya, Georges Baiaille, la mort a l'oeuure, p. 268; English translation, p. 219), she was a signatory, on 7 October 1935, of the ContreAttaque manifesto, 'the union for the struggle ofrevolutionary intellectuals', which Leiris had refused to join because, though agreeing with its aims, he found some of it to be 'not entirely responsible' (Bernard-Henri Levy, LesAventures de la liberti, p. 175). Also Picasso's companion from the summer of 1936 until 1943.
232
Georges Bataille: As Time Goes By 1941 16 February Two Srmdays ago, lunch at B[ataille],s, and Z[ette] and I were telling him-in the most measured terms-what we thought about his contributing to a collection edited by Pelorsonf The main argument put forward by B[ataille] is this (or boils down to this): 'What I have always regarded as the essence of things comes from my inner life; I have no cause to concern myself with what is outside myself (sic). 9 At the present time, it is not a matter of solidarity with those who are stricken down.' Last Sunday, I received a letter from B[ataille]. He was writing with some bibliographical references he was to give me, as well as sending a cheque to Z[ette] in part payment for a small debt, and he made the most of this opportunity to get on his high horse about our conversation of the previous Sunday: 'One cannot be saved by passivity'; what he calls my 'inertia' and-more pleasantly-my 'elegant purity' make no sense at all. I throw the letter in the wastepaper basket, with no intention of replying. 8. Georges Pelorson (born in 1909) was a writer and translator, a founder and editor (from 1937 to 1939) of the magazine Volontes, and a contributor to the NRF in the 1930s. After the fall of France in 1940, he became a Petainiste. On 31 January 1941. Leiris had written in this sameJournal, p. 335: Saw Pelorson at the Napolitain. As I had already made up my mind to do so. I rejected his proposal that I contribute to a literary magazine that he is to edit, and which is presented as more and less the basis for an 'association which is itself more or less under the patronage of the Ministry for Youth of the Vichy government.
This magazine seems never to have seen the light ofday. On the Liberation, Pelorson was placed on the list of'undesirablewriters' drawnup by the National Committee of Writers. After that he was a translator (primarily of Henry Miller) under the pseudonym Georges Belmont.
9. The (sic) is Leiris's.
233
Bataille & Leiris [... ] Whatever the B[ataille]s might say and any other partisans of a mystique, poetic or otherwise, but certainly one of quiescence, I am increasingly resolved to harden myself, even if this hardening should (as I was told by Audiberti, whom I met on Friday at the NRF) entail an 'intellectual sclerosis'. Inertia, silence, being shrouded in total negativity' are preferable to talking and acting in conditions such that for me would represent a repudiation that devalued and robbed of any virtue those accounts of myself that I have been able to give in the past. I have been thinking for some weeks now about this real disease of'literary people' who cannot imagine the possibility of saying nothing and for whom to cease publishing is equivalent to a kind of annihilation. Following the conversation with Audiberti (whom I liked a lot in the past, but who struck me the other day as appallingly verbose and garrulous), I also thought about the fraudulence-unconscious to some degree or other-of identifying poetic activity with "Thought', making poetry the supreme domain of the 'Mind', and declaring that it is of crucial importance to continue writing poems, because of the great necessity for the 'Mind' to continue. The mind exists, and continues, and will always continue (so long as we haven't turned into ants) quite well without any of your poems arid wild imaginings, my little friends! Poetic thought is a 'form of thought-to be precise: a form given to thought-as one of countless other forms of thought. For me, too, among all these different forms it is the one I like best, but that does not stop me from ~eeing it for what it is worth and putting it in its proper place. And, above all, I shall not have the impudence, as times are now, to dress up a wish to
234
Georges Bataille: As Time Goes By stand above the fray (worse than that: the nece- ssity whereby one has to justify to some people the fact of putting oneself in ·the position of having the upper hand) as a defence of spirituality, a spirituality that is much worse than the Christian kind (which is certainly not mine, but of which B[ataille]-I now wonder why!-is so contemptuous) since it remains bereft even o£ an illusion of sanctions. (All of this is written much more against B[ataille] than against Audiberti who, for his part, is at heart naive and has never claimed 1 to be what he was not.) [... ]
Now that we can no longer see a thing, what they all want (B[ataille], A[udiberti], and a few others like them) more than ever is to talk. As if speech, by itself were capable of clearsightedness and guidance. They will tell us, it is true, that 'speaking' is 'thinking'. Or, rather, they won't even realize that for them it's about nothing more than 'talk'. (pp.336-9) 1942 15 March
Who do I see? Naville.l'' Collinet;U Piel,12 More,13 now and then, Couturier-e and, sometimes, Picasso; Bataille, hardly ever; Paulhan and Queneau, fairly often. There are some people I scarcely
10. Leiris had met Pierre Naville (1904-93) in the heyday of Surrealism but had not got on with him. It was during the Occupation that they became friends. 11. Michel Collinet (1904-77), qualified as an agrege in mathematics, was a teacher, trade unionist and author of works on Marxism, syndicalism and Bolshevism. He married Simone
235
Bataille & Leins had time to get to know and I feel sorry that they're in the other zone: Rene Char, Pierre Leyrislf [...]. What a great pity to be dispersed like this. In these conditions, it's hard not to get into a rut. There is no shortage of feelings, but how much more fruitful these feelings would seem if we were sure that we could share them! (p.355)
27 September A dream, one of these last few nights: a trip to the mountains with Z[ette], K[ahnweiler], Jeannine and Simone P[iel]. We are off to visit a church built in the mountains. From some way away, I catch sight of this church. Huge human figures, in colours, like waxwork figures from the musee Grevin, or angels from the high altar at Santiago de Compostela, or steam-organ figurines on a merry-go-round, are sculpted on the facade. So big that they make me feel dizzy and fill me with dread, imagining what this dizziness will be like when I see them up closer, their size then truly dispro-
Kahn (sister of J anine Queneau and first wife of Andre Breton). In 1933, he was involved in the 'Masses' study groups, as were Bataille, Leiris and Jacques Soustelle.
12. Jean Piel: see p. 98, Letter 12, NOTE 27, and p. 193, Letter 58, 13. Marcel More: see p. 109, Letter 16a,
NOTE
NOTE
205.
47.
14. Louls Couturier: see p. 143, Letter 31, NOTE 96. Introduced by Queneau in February 1942, Michel Carrouges contributed to Jean Lescure's magazine Messages from the second issue that came out under the Occupation (Summer 1942). 15. Pierre Leyris (1907-2001) was an English specialist, translator of Blake, Dickens, 'I S. Eliot, Melville, Shakespeare and others, editor of the 'Domaine anglais' series at Mercure de France and the 'Poetes etrangers traduits' [Foreign poets in translation] series at Seuil. He was a regular contributor to the NRF in the 1930s and had reviewed L'Age dhomme for it in 1939.
236
Georges Bataille: As Time Goes By portionate-a vertigo that will augment that induced by the mountains, for the church is built on quite a steep spot. This dream is oddly akin to a dream described by Bataille in L'Exp&ience interieure and which I found out about only yesterday: after a walk on Mount Etna and a headlong flight from flowing lava, he enters a cave where he is filled with dread on discovering huge hwnan statues with frozen expressions of laughter; one of which resembles him. These statues are marked with the same character of divine serenity as mine. ..t
In my dream, the church to some degree merges with the rocky mass of the mountain and is perhaps directly hewn out of it, so that the statues, carved from the external walls of the church, also have the appearance of being drawn directly out of the rock face. (An dId memory: the rocks carved and painted by a country
cure, at Rotheneufi-f near Parame.) In the dream in question, it was perfectly clear that my vertigo was not connected merely with the greatness (in the double sense of the word) of the statues but, equally, to their beauty. (pp.368-9) 21 October The other evening, an idea from Paul Eluard about death: death, a natural thing, something that could bring about joy instead of that essentially Christian fear. To this, he joins Nietzsche, Bataille and all those who could be gathered together under the category of 'Dyonisiac'. (p.370) 16. A coastal resort in the area of Saint-Malo (Ille-et-Vilaine).
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Bataille & Leiris
1944 29 May A lapsus by Bataille yesterday, during a discussion in the course of which he called me an 'idealist' and a 'Kantian': 'the categorical aperitif'. (p.388)
1949 16 April 1949 (? Saturday) What I was saying to Georges Bataille, last weekend in Vezelay: how it is that when one makes love, ecstasy has no common measure '\ with climax; one can have a very intense climax while remaining lucid, since climax is a specifically localized sensation; inversely, one can dissolve into ecstasy without there being any local climax; instead of being a sudden, voluptuous rending, climax then seems like a mere conclusion (one has reached the top of the mountain, then it's over, almost without one noticing). (pp.471-2)
1966 22 August A feeling of perhaps still having 'friends' but no longer any 'comrades' (= fellow-workers or, at the very least, comrades who give you encouragement with the idea that they are working too). In this respect, a terrible gap left by Giacometti. Perhaps because with Bataille gone, he was the last. Limbour an~ Queneau are cer238
Georges Bataille: As Time Goes By tainly friends, and friends whom I admire, but it isn't the same thing: the fact that they are working merely gives me the great pleasure-or the great expectation of pleasure-of reading something by them. (p. 613)
1969 16 August In the days of Contre-Attaque, I laughed at Bataille over his idea of a holiday commemorating the guillotining of Louis XVI. But wouldn't such a holiday have been a nice happening with a political basis? All the same, Bataille's error still holds: a holiday of this kind was inconceivable before the Revolution, even more so in a time when the Revolution has lost ground (which was the case at the time, hence the necessity for a 'connter-attack'), I'm talking about an 'error' here, but I may be too hasty in using that word: wouldn't such an event have been a 'provocation', in this sense understood by Rudi Dutschke!? and the German students? (pp.635-6)
26 August Exegesis of the title La Regie du jeu: The magazine Le GrandJeu?18 Georges Bataille's idea of 'chance'?
17. Rudi Dutschke (1940-79), a leading figure in the student protest movement of 1967-68 in Federal Germany. 18. t» GrandJeu, 1928-30.
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Bataille & Leins Mallarme's 'throw of the dice' [I'm thinking of it now: a wish to justify gambling, is a wish to abolish chance];19 in the rue Blomet days, Andre Masson's card players; the glamour of expressions such as 'to go for broke', 'to stake one's all', 'to be a good loser', 'fair play', etc. (p.640) 1979 5 October
Something that was 'in the air' at the start of the 1930s (?)the theme of headlessness: Bataille, 'Base Materialism and Gnosis' (illustrated with human figures that have animal heads), in Documents;20 Leiris, 'The 'Caput Mortuum' or the Alchemist's Wife' (Seabrook's masked woman) in Documentsit) Max Ernst, La Femme 100 tete [= the woman without a head];22 Desnos, 'Les Sans cou' [those without necks]-poem title;23 19. The square brackets and their content are Leiris's.
20. Documents, Year 2, No.1, 1930, pp. 1-8, reprinted in OC, VOL 1, pp. 220--6. 21. William (or Willie) Buehler Seabrook (1887-1945), traveller, journalist and American photographer. Leiris's article, published in Documents, Year 2, No.8 [April or May 1931], pp. 21-6, was on the 'photographs reproduced here, which show a woman wearing a leather mask devised by him [Seabrook] and set up according to his directions in New York'. The text was reprinted without the photographs in Zibrage, pp. 3~ 1. 22. The square brackets and their content are Leiris's. 23. A poem tided 'Les quatre sans cou' [literally, 'the four without a neck', a pun on the expression 'faire les quatre centcoups'-to run ~Trans.] in Desnos's book LesSanscou, with frontispiece by Andre Masson, ImprimerieJ.AD., 1934. This poem appears in Fortunes, pp. 63-5.
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Georges Bataille: As Time Goes By the bodies with suns for heads in Masson's paintings; the magazine Acephale;24 Cf. also the Minotaur and the magazine of the same name. 25 My interest in possession (losing one's head in a state of trance) is connected to this. The first piece I wrote in this sense: 'Black Saints', a review of the film Hallelujah (in the Revue du cinema).26 A review of Seabrook's Eile magique (Haitian voodoo) in Documents. 27 Cf. automatic writing as 'dictation by the unconscious'. Lacephale is man with his reason decapitated (= amputated). (pp. 721-2)
6 October Might one perhaps say of what came about around BatailleDocuments, the 'College de sociologie', etc.- that it was a case of rationalizing28 the Surrealist valuing of the irrational?29 Karl Marx has a fine phrase in one of his youthful writings: 'Criticism should not be a passion of the head, but the head of passion.' (p. 722) 24. Acephale, 1936--39. 25. Minotaure, 1933-39. 26. La Revue du cinema, Year 2, Hallelujah (1929).
NO.
II, 1 June 1930, pp. 30-3, on King Vidor's film,
27. Documents, No.6, November 1929, pp. 334-5, review of Seabrook's book on Haiti and the voodoo religion, translated from the English by Gabriel Des Hons, with a preface by Paul Morand (Firmin-Didot et Cie, 1929). 28. Give a more scientific cast. [Leiris's note] 29. These remarks on the College de sociologie and this reference to the time of Documents were prompted by Leiris's reading of Denis Hollier's work Le College de sociologie, which had just been published by Gallimard. [Note by Jean Jamin]
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BataiUe & Leins 1982 30 April
'It isn't that I no longer have ideas, but. ideas don't dance for me any more' (remark by the ageing Georges Bataille to Sonia Orwell).30
30. Reprinted witli commentary in A coret aen, Gallimard, 1988, pp. 174-5. [Note by Jean jamin.] On Sonia Otwell. see p. 186, Letter 54, NOTE 190.
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ROBERT DESNOS, GEORGES BATAILLE AND MARCEL GRIAULE
Eye
The following texts were published in the 'Critical Dictionary' of Documents, No.4, September 1929,pp. 215-18. Thef uiere accompomied with illustrations that could not be reprinted here: The Eyes of Joan Crawford (aphotograph oftheactress), The Eye of the Police (reproduction of two pages of themagazine), Blood is Sweeter than Honey, 1927 (reproduction ofa paintingby Salvador Dal{) and Representation of the Evil Eye on an Abyssinian Amulet (photograph).
THE EYE. I) The image ofthe eye. Because of its poetic virtues, for centuries the eye has been employed for lyrical comparisons and allegories. Those authors who have found an analogy between it and the stars are too numerous to list. In metallurgy, the eye has tended to be regarded as a cavity, a hole: the eye of a track-rod, the eyelet (of a shoe). Then, by extension of this technique to the arts, one would talk about l'oeil d'une oeuvre, the look of a work, in the sense of eye as appearance. Hence, the expression you have an eye for it. Argot, which condemned the poetic language of images, has, of course, made great use of the organ of sight: Ie quart d'oeil (the police station) derives from the time-honoured proverb: sleep with only oneeye, likethegendarme, and, now with only a quarter fraction, takes it a bit further. Coco bel oeil, which has slipped from slang into bourgeois usage with a little whiff of the military stuffed shirt about it, refers less to the organ than to one of its functions: theglad eye. Its fragility has quickly allowed it to become a term of comparison with something precious: like the apple of my eye, then, again, by
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Bataille & Leins extension, like a sensitive spot which cannot be touched without serious cause, just as in the very wording of lynch law: an eye for an eye. Nor can we really go into all the numerous obscene meanings of this word, provoked by analogy with the private parts: mon oeil, creoer l'oeil (put out the eye) and the famous mettre le doigt dans l'oeil (to poke a finger in the eye), which, taken first in the figurative sense to express a concrete action, was then returned to its literal sense to express an abstract state (to be mistaken): what an admirable ideal-material virtue of meanings. The expression a l'oeil (for free) is a paraphrase of a medieval tale in which a poor beggar tastes the flavour of roast meat in its smoke and pays with the clink of his money. In this case, hearing is replaced by sight. ,
Pour vos beaux yeux (literally: for your lovely eyes; idiomatically: for the sake of your pretty face) was originally an expression used in chivalry. The virtue of the lovely eyes was rightly judged to warrant the risk of hazardous adventures. The degradation of amorous morality together with changes in social mores means that today-when 'sober-minded' people regard love as merely a trifle---cause and effect become confused and dying for the sake of lovely eyes is considered not an enviable fate. Ouvrir l'oeil et le bon (keep your good eye open) takes us back
to gendarme vocabulary. It has, however, a scientific basis, since it is unusual for anyone to have the same sharpness of vision in both eyes. Nonetheless, it probably refers to the need for a marksman to close one eye so as to take good aim. So it would probably be better to say: keep your bad eye closed.
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Eye Finally, we moved from the part to the whole, and the words pupils, lashes, eyeballs and eyelids entered current speech and reinforced a vocabulary of images: to knit one's brows, to cast an eye, to eyeball, etc., before slipping into common language. Robert Desnos 2) Cannibal delicacy. We know that civilized man is characterized by an acute sense of repugnance that is often hard to explain. Fear of inseots is probably one of the most singular and more developed of these revulsions and, among them, it is a surprise to discover the eye. Indeed, it would seem impossible to use any other word for the eye but seduction, nothing being more attractive in the human or animal body. But extreme seduction probably borders on revulsion. In this respect, the eye could be brought close to a blade, whose appearance likewise provokes sharp and contradictory reactions. This is what the makers of un Chien andalou) must have felt when, in the opening image of the film, they decided to make the love affair between the two characters a bloody one. A razor cut-
1. We owe this extraordinary film to two young Catalans, the painter Salvador Dall, ofiwhom we reproduce some characteristic canvases (on pp. 217, 229), and the director Luis Bufiuel. We refer the reader to the excellent photographs published in Cahiers d'art Guly 1929, p. 230), by Bifur (August 1929, p. 105) and by Variitis Guly 1929, p. 209). This film distinguishes itself from the banal avant-garde productions with which one might be tempted to confuse it in that it is the script that predominates. Certain very explicit events follow on from one another, admittedly without any logical sequence, but so deeply penetrating into horror that the audience is gripped as directly as in an action film. Gripped, and even by the throat to be precise, and without the least artifice: indeed, does this audience know how far things will be taken, either by the filmmakers or their like? Given that after shooting the slicing of
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Bataille & Leiris ting right through the dazzling eye of a charming young woman is what was being admired to the point of insanity by a young man who himself is contemplated by a small cat lying on the ground; he happened to be holding a coffee spoon in his hand and had a sudden desire to scoop up an eye in the spoon. J This is a peculiar desire on the part of a white man, for whom the eyes of the beef cattle, lambs and pigs that he eats have always been out of sight. For the eye, to use Stevenson's exquisite phrase, a cannibal delicacy, is on our part the object of such anxiety that we shall never put it in our mouths. The eye even occupies an extremely high place on the scale of repugnance, since it is, among other things, theeye of conscience. We know Victor Hugo's poem well enough: the hypnotic, lugubrious eye, the living ghastly eye dreamed of by Grandville in a niglitmare shortly before his death.s The criminal dreams he has just struck a man in a dark wood . . . Human blood has been shed and, in an expression that brings to mind an image of savagery, he has madean oaksweat. In fact, he is not a man but a tree trunk ... bleeding ... agitated and arguing the eye Bufiuel himself was sick for eight days (moreover, he had to film the scene with the donkey corpses in a foul-smelling atmosphere). we can hardly fail to see the degree to which horror fascinates-and that it is the only thing brutal enough to smash what stifles us. [Bataille's note] 2. Victor Hugo, a reader of Le Magasin piuoresque, borrowed from the admirable written dream, 'Crime and Atonement'. and Grandville's drawing, the likes of which had never been seen before. both published in 1847, for his story of the pursuit ora criminal by a tenacious eye: but it is of little use to observe that only an obscure and sinister haunting can explain this relationship. and not a cold memory. It is the erudition and kindness of Pierre d'Espezel that has brought to our attention this strange document. probably the finest of Grandville's extravagant compositions. [Bataille's note]
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Eye with itself ... with the murderous weapon above it. The hands of the victim are raised in supplication, but in vain. The blood is still flowing.
This is when the enormous eye appears, opening up in a black sky and pursuing the criminal through space, to the very depths of the sea, where it devours him after having taken the form of a fish. Meanwhile, countless eyes proliferate among the waves. Grandville writes about this: 'Would these be the thousand eyes of the crowd drawn to the spectacle of imminent slaughter?' Yetwhy would these ridiculous eyes be drawn, like a swarm of flies, to something so repugnant? And why would the front page of an illustrated weekly, published in Paris from 1907 to 1924, depict, with perfect sadism, an eye on a red background above scenes of bloodshed? Why is L'Oeil de La police, with its similarity to the eye of human justice in Grandville's nightmare, not, after all, merely the expression of a blind thirst for blood? Likewise, similar to the eye of Crampon, a condemned man approached by the chaplain a moment before the blade would fall; he pushes the chaplain away but, plucking out his own eye, he makes the chaplain a good humoured present of it, for this eye was a glass one. G[eorges] B[ataille] 3) The EviL Eye. Whether it is strange, unseeing or merely beautiful, for the civilized man as much as for the primitive, the eye has always been, and still is, the gateway to evil influences. Hypnotism is the extreme point of a phenomenon that has lesser degrees, such as the look of desire, the look of curiosity, or merely the hazy look focused on nothing.
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Bataille & Leiris At each of these degrees, the primitive fears it, and one can say that for him every eye is evil. He dreads the gaze of numerous animals, especially those whose eyes are round and staring; but he is even more frightened by the eye of man. These ancient beliefs have persisted in our cultures; they have \ found their way into our everyday language. We say 'piercing eyes', 'eyes like gimlets', 'to devour with one's eyes'. It would be easy to put together a dictionary of expressions relating to the magic of eyes, a commonplace of the average novel and the superior poem. To look at an object with desire is to appropriate it, to enjoy it. To desire is to defile; to desire is to take, and a primitive man who notices eyes cast upon his possession quickly makes a gift of it, as if there were danger for him in holding on to it, as if the gaze had laid upon the object a force ready to enter into play against any stranger. This gift, this abandonment, is above all prophylactic: a way of repelling any cause of misfortune, and this is partly how one should interpret the majority of presents given by indigenous people. The power of the eye is so strong that it is dangerous even when animated by simple curiosity. In Douze annies dans La Haute Ethiopie3 (p. 205), Antoine d'Abbadie describes an incident when. he was stared at by a large number of soldiers and how this prompted a woman who loved him to throw herself on him and cover him with her dress, shouting: 'Your cursed eyes will transfix me before seeing him!' Yet the soldiers' curiosity was benign.
3. Arnauld (and not Antoine) d'Abbadie (1815-94), Douze annees dans la Haute tthiopie (Abyssinie), L. Hachette, 1868.
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Eye If we consider the power of a look without ill will, we can imagine what force it can carry when expressing an evil wish. It does not surprise us that it should 'eat the hearts of men and the insides of cucumbers' (Migne, Sciences occultes, VOL. 2, p. 879),4 that it should dry up the udders of cows and cause the deaths of small children. It is important, therefore, to defend oneself against it, and numerous techniques are found for this. The most widespread means wearing an amulet round the neck that represents a single eye, or two. Magic formulas, written medicine-in magic, the articulation of a formula is in itself]efficacious-surround the face; they create a kind of solvent containing the evil, a vaccine made of;the dead bacillus, and wearing this remedy is tantamount to inoculating oneselfwith the evil influence and is, therefore, immunization. Another method is employed in the majority of African countries: the bucrane, or ox-skull. This is indeed a symbol of potent defence, recalling the animal being stopped in its tracks by a wild beast landing on its head from a branch above. A bucrane set in a field, on a fruit-laden tree, on a millstone (our scarecrows were not devised just for the sparrows, who laugh at them) or placed above a threshold (the idea of turning it into a decorative motif came later) is the best guard against mysterious powers. Its whiteness, the work of vermin and sun, will attract at first glance the eye of the passer-by or the visitor. It will capture 4. 'There were in Italy sorcerers who, with a single look, ate the hearts of men and the insides of cucumbers ...' (Encyclopedie theologique au sene de dictionnaires sur tomes lesparties de la science religieuse, published by the Abbe [jacques-Paul] Migne, VOL. 49, Dictionnaire des sciences occultes, VOL. 2, 1848, p. 879).
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Bataille & Leins this look, the first and therefore most dangerous-and here we should bear in mind all the magic of the first time-and will draw it in through the two holes of its empty eye sockets, leaving the eye, that lightning that breaks stones (Doutte, Magie et religion dans l'Afrique du Nord, p. 324),5 like a rundown battery. One could, I believe, take as an example of the same type a guard against the eye that I observed on the shores of the Red Sea, at Port Sudan. It consisted of a fish skeleton, probably an acanthopterous, its head impaled on a switch attached to a stockade. When alive, it has a kind of horn under each eye. Moreover, its phallic aspect may well have contributed to its having been chosen, for the phallus does indeed playa considerable part in the prophylactics of the evil eye (Otto Jahn, Bose Blick).6 But this is another question, one much too lengthy to go into here. M[arcel] Griaule 4) The eye at the Academie franfaise. Under the presidency of Monsieur Abel Hermant, the Academie undertook a revision of the expressions: mauoais oeil (evil eye), oeilde perdrix (soft corn on the foot), oeil pour oeil (an eye for an eye), tape-a-l'oeil (flashy goods), etc. It rejected the expressionfaire de l'oeil (to give the glad eye) as being too colloquial.
5. Edmond Doutte (1867-1926), La Societe musulmane du Maghrib: magie et religion dans l'Afrique du Nord, A. ] ourdan, 1909. 6. We were unable to find any work by Otto Jahn with this title. It could refer to Der Bose Blick by Ludwig Schneider (Berlin, 1838) or Der bose Blick und Verwandtes, ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Abetglaubens alZer Zeiten und Viilker by Siegfried Seligmann (Berlin. 1910).
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BERNARD
NOEL
Afterword: A Way ofLookingthat is Understood
The desire to commit a major indiscretion and to extract commensurate enjoyment is probably what draws us to correspondence. An intimacy will be exposed, we think, and simultaneously the secret mechanism of a relationship. We are, in other words, going to be privy to confidences . . . Such a hope presupposes that the work is incomplete without the life, and that the life can be added to it with the publication of that portion reserved to the author: his letters. In short, the life would cease to be inaccessible once it was dead. There is always some confusion between the biographical material and the life. The material in question is made up ofevents and relationships that can be ascertained, landmarks among which the life escapes, as it likewise escaped before from the living subject. Each detail gives the illusion that one will reach the whole, but this is as hopeless a business as attempts to pull a scrap of the past out of our own memories. Everything that survives can only survive in the condition of representation. And, unless it is made through direct presence, every communication must also pass through this. It is likely that a letter presetves a little of this directness and includes it in the framework of the representation. This is why it would hold its attraction for readers other than the correspondents, The bond of friendship brings with it communication of a specific and exceptional quality, at least one can hope so when, as in the case of Georges Bataille and Michel Leiris, it involves two protagonists renowned for their connection and the value of their work, Moreover, both of them saw
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Bataille & Leins communication as the expression of something sacred without the divine. This approach is clearer in Bataille than in Leiris, but their convergence is manifest in their common will to collect and publish, under the title Le Sacre, the writings left by Laure (Colette Peignot), Bataille's lover and Leiris's very dear friend. Readers who are well aware of this can hope for something more from the indiscretion than the sharing of friendly exchanges, for everything leads them to believe that the relationship between Bataille and Leiris will illuminate the very nature of the bond formed by friendship. They can expect this all the more given that the editors of this volume have brought together every available piece of the picture, which is to say new-found letters, writings by one or the other of the two about their relationship and all those passages in Leiris's Journal 1922-1989 where Bataille's name appears. Nonetheless, the same applies to a relationship as to a mystery, which does not owe its workings to the possession of a key but to assiduous close contact and the orbit of influence. Thus, one will discover very quickly that the correspondence is very irregular and full of gaps and that whenever the writings attempt some synthesis of the relationship, they do so clearly from the perspective of memory and not amid the flow of things. Bataille and Leiris met in the autumn of 1924 in a situation where mutual need prevailed, something apparently more tangible for Bataille than for Leiris, though it would orient their lives for nearly 40 years, up until Bataille's death, on 8 July 1962. Leiris introduced Bataille to Andre Masson shortly after their first meeting. A friendship was to develop between Bataille and Masson that had the same necessities as the one between Masson and Leiris: it leaves only a few traces in this correspondence. The main one, which strikes me as being of outstanding interest, can be found in a letter from Leiris to Bataille sent from Spain on 15 August 1934. Here, then, is the significant extract:
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A Way ofLooking that is Understood We saw Andre at Tossa. [...] I envy his enthusiasm, which always saves him and allows him to draw nourishment from his torments. In this there is a kind ofalchemy that we have not given up our despair ofever finding. But, believe me if you like, he is following the only way that can be followed. The only difficulty is to get there! [... J Everything I'm telling you here is quite pointless, I realize. .Allow that this is the lively way in which Michel Leiris addresses Georges Bataille but that to give their discussion weight there must be added a certain way of looking that is understood. Perhaps we live only for some of these ways of looking, whi&t maybe give a kind of truth to the most absurd words spoken. We shall see one another again when the summer. is over.and there again will be two ofus feeling pegged out, which in my view is the only appropriate form of solidarity!
This passage is the clearest expression of an affection which, on Leiris's side, would never again be so expansive, for it prefers 'a certain way oflooking that is understood' to any other kind of declaration. Through the breach opened in his reserve, Leiris goes so far as to append a postscript that ends: 'If the words were not so foolish and the comparison so ill chosen, I would tell you that I love you like a brother,' Leiris is always very tneasured in his sentiments or emotions, and he explores their expression with mistrust. There is, of course, a contradiction between this 'modesty' and the excesses of Georges Bataille. One might say that Leiris finds his own excess in the exercise of banality, of everyday ordinariness and the refusal to elevate debate. The friendly complementarity of the two men is built upon this mutually respected opposition. Their first serious difference will arise, not from this opposition, but from the way of dealing with 'communication'. While it is enough for Leiris to have 'a way of looking that is understood', Bataille will attempt the creation of a collective ritual.
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Bataille & Leins This is what one might call the Acephale question. Behind the magazine" of this title and on the edges of the College de sociologic, Bataille formed a secret society. The disagreement with Leiris arose from the latter's violent refusal to be involved in an undertaking that seemed to him 'puerile' and even 'derisory'. Masson drew the acephale figure that served as the emblem of the magazine although he did not participate in the secret society. This emblem carried a double power of meaning that spilled beyond its visual representation to suggest the impulsion of obscure forces and the expressive potency given to the body when the domination of the head no longer weighs upon it. When one considers the 'kind of alchemy' of which Leiris speaks in his letter of August 1934 about Masson's work, and if one pictures the way in which canvasses prompt an emotion that precedes the reading of their subject, it is doubtless possible to have some idea of what Bataille was looking for in those nocturnal ceremonies in the forest of Saint-Germain. Is it not that Bataille used ritual in a wish to articulate the inexpressible so as to channel the dark flux that blooms in the feeling of communication? His intelligence refused to make do with what was intelligible, just as his desire refused to move towards ecstasy without first having trodden the 'shameful dung'. What is intellectual understanding compared with the sensitive and soon torrential penetration of instinct? To trigger this movement, there have to be images charged with enough violence to abolish the fact of representation for the sake of what is murmured by the mouth of shadow. But this depends upon chance, and chance thwarts any mastery. The surprising thing is to find Leiris, in a letter dated 17 January 1950, penning this confidence: 'What I should like to find at the moment is a means of expression that goes deeper than words.' And he sends Bataille a sand rose, noting that he would have liked to send i~ to Colette (Peignot),
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A Way ofLooking that is Understood whom we know died on 7 November 1938. Bataille, struck by this object, replies: 'I cannot imagine a flower that resembles you more than the "sand rose": everything about you that is gritty-and even your bitten nails.' Another difference of opinion arises around Bataille's political commitment in Contre-Attaque. Leiris refuses any involvement while acknowledging the justness of the goal being pursued (resistance to rising fascism, with the inadequacy of Communism as a given). Leiris rebukes Bataille for wasting time on politics that he should be devoting to 'poetry', but he sees in this time wasted a rejection of limits and a 'poetic' action! And he acknowledges that Blue ofNoon, which had recently been written by Bataille, only to remain more than 20 years unpublished, is a very superior work to what is being written at the time, precisely because of its political implications . . . A disagreement of the same order, but this time the other way round, takes place in early 1941, when Leiris saw Bataille as too complacently occupied with literature. Each time, these differences seem as if they must lead to a defmitive falling-out, but there is nothing of the sort, so that the backing away and the favourable outcome give them the appearance of metaphysical domestic rows. Another instance of the 'only appropriate form of solidarity' appears in a letter from Bataille on 17 November 1956, 22 years after Leiris wrote those words. Bataille is writing to Leiris, who has just returned from his mother's funeral: Perhaps the feeling I had for your mother; so much at odds with the image I have always wished to give of myself: has more significance for our long friendship than would at first seem. Besides, we are getting closer to death and what seemed most opposed now seems more and more deeply connected. I am in any case certain that the feeling of tenderness that binds me so deeply to you is simultaneously close to death and to the bonds that connected you to your mother. I say this somewhat in that harrowed state where
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Bataille & Leiris there is no longer anything that from one day to the next can add to my being in it.
Leiris answers, on 20 November: 'I think you could not have put it better, for today I am in the state of tender heartbreak that 1 experienced for the first time with Colette's death.' With Colette's name, there reappears under the tenderness the continuity of friendship that is intensified in extreme circumstances with the avowal of a depth rarely articulated because its best expression remains 'a way of looking that is understood'. This way of looking, which is touching in its discretion, is the 'livelyway' ofconveying the inexpressible while keeping it at a distance. This way of looking had to be named once and to be at the same time pointed out: 'Perhaps we live only for some of these ways of looking, which maybe give a kind of truth to the most absurd words spoken....' The space of the sacred is fashioned from this ironic complicity in the environs of death. Then, the same applies to a correspondence as to a face, which sometimes allowsa glimpse of the invisible when its features are illuminated and a smile makes acknowledgement of revelation.
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Appendix: A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology
MISCELLANEOUS
Tristan Tzara: DadaManifesto 1918.
BATAILLE
LEIRIS
10 September 1897
20 April 1901
Birth in Billom (Puy-deDome). Father tobacconist. Studies in Reims, Epemay, Riom-es-Montagnes. Baccalaureat (1915). Death of his father (1915). Mobilized, then invalided out (1917). Serninaire de Saint-Flour (1917-18). Enters the Ecole des chartes (1918). First (?) sexual relationship (1918).
Birth in Paris (XVIe). Father, stockbroker. Maternal grandfather, senior civil servant. Studies in Paris. From the age of 11, goes to the Opera and attends the plays of Raymond Roussel, a friend of the family. Baccalaureat and the start of chemistry studies (1918). Nightlife, jazz as a revelation, first aspirations to writing poetry (1917-19). First sexual relationship (1919).
1918 Summer (?) Notre-Dame de Rheims, booklet published at the author's expense.
1920 Breaks with Catholicism.
263
Bataille & Leins 1921 Reads Proust. Autumn. Forms a friendship with Alfred Metraux at the Ecole des chartes.
February. Meets MaxJacob, who gives him lessons on poetry. Death of his father. December. Begins military service, which he will do in Paris.
1922 Levy-Bruhl: La Mentalite
primitive. Beginningof theyear: 'the liquidation of Dada as a movement' (Breton).
Felmulry. Receives diploma as an archivist-palaeographer. Thesis: an edition of EOrdrt de cheoaleti«, a thirteenth-century verse narrative.
30 October
A{arch~une.Schoolof
Fascists march into Rome. Mussolini assumes power 18 November Death of Marcel Proust.
Advanced Hispanic Studies in Madrid (fourmonth stay). Attends his first bullfight. July. Appointed librarian at the Bibliotheque nationale.
March. Discovers Freud Spring. Meets Artaud. July. Meets Andre Masson, Tual, Artaud and Limbour; becomes one of the pillars of the 'rue Blomet group' . End olthe year. Meets D. H. Kahriweiler and his 'sister-inlaw' (in reality, his stepdaughter) and collaborator, Louise Godon.
1923 Discovers Freud. Influenced by Leon Chestov, whom he continues to visit until 1925.
Summer. Becomes an habitue of the Kahnweilers' 'Boulogne Sundays'. December. Finishes military service.
1924 Breton: Les Pas Perdus. July. Assigned to the Marcel Mauss: Essai sur le don Department of Medals, (Essay on the Gift). Bibliotheque nationale.
264
Begins reading on ethnography.
Janoory. Ftrst publication: poem 'Desert de mains'.
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology Felnuary-March. First exhi-
Spring. Kahnweiler intro-
bition by Andre Masson.
duces him to Picasso.
June. Death of Kafka.
Summer. Meets Queneau and Desnos for the first time.
Autumn. Leiris and Bataille meet through Jacques Lavaud, a friend of the former and the latter's colleague at the Bibliotheque nationale; Lavaud introduces them, as Leiris put it, 'partly to assume the role of detached observer at whatever odd outcome such a meeting might precipitate'. Bataille tells Leiris about 'the chance there would be to launch a ~S movement involving a perpetual acquiescence to everything 'in the spirit of Zen' and which would have the advantage over the No movement that Dada had been of avoiding the puerile nature of a systematically provocative negation'. They toy with the project of founding a magazine whose office would be located in a brothel. Leiris introduces Bataille to Andre Masson; both of them admire Nietzsche and Dostoevsky, and they become friends.
October. Breton: Surrealist Manifesto. December. First issue of La Revolution surrealiste.
November. Along with Masson, joins the Surrealist group.
1925 Adolf Hitier: MeinKampf.
janUlJ,ry. Founding of the
First meetings with Theodore Fraenkel,
Institute of Ethnology at
Artaud, Desnos, Tzara.
the University of Paris,
Decides to begin psycho-
by Lucien Levy-Bruhl,
analysis with Dr Adrien
Marcel Mauss and Paul
Borel. Assiduously fre-
Rivet.
January. First contribution to La Revolution surrealiste. April. Simulacre, illustrated by Andre Masson (Galerie Simon).
jul,. Saint-Pol-Roux banquet,
quents brothels and gam-
where he is manhandled
bling houses. Begins read-
by the crowd and the
ing Hegel. Attends Mauss's lectures.
police.
November. First contribution to Clarel.
265
Bataille & Leins Leiris introduces Aragon to Bataille but the former regards the latter as a belated Dadaist and the latter deems the former neither foolish nor intelligent. Bataille, Leiris and Masson dream of forming a secret society that would be Orphic and Nietzschean; Leiris proposes to call it Judas'. Meanwhile, Bataille experiences Leiris and Masson's adherence to surrealism as an exclusion. Publication of Leon Chestov's L'~die de bien chez Th/stdi et Nietzsche, translated by Georges Bataille and Tatiana Beresovski-Chestov (editions du Siecle, 1925). Leiris reviews it in Clane, 30 November 1925.
1926 Aragon: Le lbysan de Paris. Paul Eluard: Capitale de La
douleur. Pierre Naville: 1A Revolution
et lesintellectuels. February. Founding by Boris Souvarine of the Marx and Lenin Communist Circle.
Fe1lruary. Marries Louise Godon. With Jean Bernier and Victor Crastre, is one of the Surrealists who found La Guerre civile, which is to be a replacement for Marcel Fourier's magazine Claru. But the new magazine is never published, because of hostility from the Conununist leadership.
March. At Breton's request and with Leins as intermediary, Bataille publishes his translations of some medieval FatrasieJ in La Revolution surrialiste. This is how he comes to meet Breton who. according to Leiris, describes him as an 'obsessive'.
July. First numismatic study Summer. Writes first articles on painters (Mir6 and published in Arethuset jourMasson). nal of art and archaeology.
266
A Bin-Bibliographic Chronology End o/the year. In Leiris's wake, Bataille becomes part of the rue du Chateau group (Duhamel, Preve.rt, Tanguy).
I Artaud: Le Pesenerf. Marcel Proust: L8 Temps retrouve.
1927 Meets Sylvia Makles, sister of January. Like Breton, Bianca Fraenkel. Aragon, Eluard, Peret and some others, Leiris joins the Communist Party (for just a few months). March or April. Le Point cardinal (Sagittaire). April-Se.ptember. Trip to Egypt and Greece.
1928 Aragon: 1£ Cond'lrene, illustrated by Andre Masson. Breton: Nadja and Le susrealisme et La peinture. D. H. Lawrence: Lady ChaUerley's Lover.
Publishes 'CAmerique disWith Queneau and Jacques Baron, puts in appearparue' in the Cahiers de La ances at the Marx and Republique des lettres, des sciLenin Communist Circle. ences et des arts, in an issue on pre-Columbian art. First meeting with Georges Henri Riviere. March. Histoire de l'oeil (The Story of the Eye) under the pseudonym Lord Auch, illustrated by Andre Masson. March. Bataille marries Sylvia Makles, Leiris is his best man.
1929 February. Breaks with the Surrealist group. First contribution to Cahiers du Sud.
267
Bataille & Leins 11 March. On Breton's initiative, a meeting of 'intellectuals
with revolutionary tendencies' is held to discuss plans for collective action. Bataille has refused to take part (far too many bloody idealists'), just as have Leiris (described as 'one of the aforementioned idealists') and Masson. April. FIrst issue of Documents, a magazine with Bataille as its moving spirit. In June, Leiris will become its editorial secretary for several months.
June. Through Masson, meets Giacometti for the first time. July. First contribution to the Nouuelle Revue francoise (NRF).
24 October. The Wall Street crash. 5 November. Jacques Rigaut kills himself.
August. Meets Marcel Griaule. Attends Mauss's lectures (1929-30). Nouember. Depressed, Leiris visits Bataille to ask for his razor, since he means to castrate himself. On Bataille's advice, he begins psychoanalysiswith Dr Borel. December. Second Manifesto of Surrealism, in which Breton takes issue with the erstwhile Surrealists who are contributing to Documents: Desnos, Leiris, Limbour, Masson, Vitrac,
1930 January. Un Cadavre (A Corpse), an anti-Breton pamphlet conceived by Desnos and much influenced by Bataille. Leiris puts his name to 'Le bouquet sans fleurs' (The Bouquet of No Flowers) and Bataille his to 'Le lion chatre' (The Castrated Lion). Souvarine forms the Democratic Communist
268
January. Death of his mother. June. Birth of Laurence, the
December. 'The Eye of the Ethnographer', his first
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology Circle, which replaces the Marx and Lenin Communist Circle.
daughter of Georges and Sylvia Bataille.
I
piece of writing on ethnograph~.
December. At Bataille's request, for an Almanadi erotique, Leiris writes, 'Lucrece, Judith et Holopherne', a first draft of L'Age d'homme. The ahnanac was never published.
1931
March. First issue of La Critique sociale, founded by Souvarine. April. Bataille and Leiris respond to the survey 'Connaissance de I' Amerique latine' (Knowledge of Latin America) sent out by the magazine Imdn. 14 April. Proclamation of the Spanish Republic.
April or May. Final issue of Documents. Summer (?). First meeting with Souvarine.
October. First contribution to La Cruiqu« socials. November. I1Anus solaire,
May. Boards ship at Bordeaux with the DakarDjibouti field trip. October-November. At Sangha (Mali), research into the secret language of the Dogons.
illustrated by Andre Masson (Galerie Simon). End of the year. Joins the Democratic Communist Circle.
1932 Celine: Voyage au boutde la nuit. Prevert: La Bataille de
July-November. At Gondar (Ethiopia), research into the cult of the Zdr genies.
Fontenoy.
269
Bataille & Leiris 1933
30 January. Adolf Hitler becomes Chancellor of the German Reich.
February. Returns to Paris. Is employed at the musee d'Ethnographie du Trocadero (musee de l'Hornme from 1936). June. First issue of Minotaure, a magazine edited by Albert Skira; Bataille and Masson come up with the tide and are to contribute to Minotaure for some time. This first issue, edited by Leiris, is on the Dakar-Djibouti field-trip.
13-14 July. Death of
Summer (?). Member of the Democratic Communist Circle. September. First contribution to La Critique sociale.
Raymond Roussel. December. Start of Stavisky affair.
1934 Early in theyear. Colette January. I1Afrique fantlnne 27 January. Resignation of Peignot visits him. (Gallimard). the Chautemps cabinet in First meeting with Alfred End of theyear (?). Separation the wake of the Stavisky Metraux, from Sylvia Bataille. affair. Daladier is February or March. Louise appointed President. and Michel Leiris move to 6 February. Demonstration of 2 rue Eugene-Poubelle extreme rightwing organi(XVIe). zations. Daladier resigns.
12 February. Antifascist general strike. Bataille, Leiris and Roland Tual take part in the Paris demonstration. 17 February. Founding of the Committee of Vigilance of April-May. Trip to Italy. Antifascist Intellectuals (CVIA) by Alain, Paul Langevin and Paul Rivet. March. Final issue of La
Critique sociale.
270
March. Member of the CVIA. July. Heads the department of Black Africa at the musee d'Ethnographie,
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology 30 June. In Germany, the
Night of the Long Knives.
1935 Boris Souvarine: Staline;
aperfU historique du bolchevisme.
Uean Paulhan's initiative), to which Bataille and Leiris will contribute.
January. First issue of the magazine Mesures
Early in theyear (?). Moves to
IFebruary First meeting with
76 bis rue de Rennes.
Jacques Lacan.
April. First issue of La Bite noire, conceived by Leiris and Marcel More. The magazine is condemned by Bataille and Masson. and Leiris will contribute to only the first two issues. Summer (?). Colette Peignot
comes to live with him.
April. First studies on
I
Raymond Roussel.
3 October. Mussolini invades 7 October. Inaugural manifesto of'Contre-Attaque, Union of Abyssinia.
Revolutionary Intellectuals in Struggle' initiated by Bataille and Breton. In agreement with its aims, but judging some of its ideas irresponsible, Leiris refuses to join. J
November. Begins an arts degree which he will finish in October 1937 (ethnology. sociology, history of religions. diploma in the Amharic language).
1936
16 February. Victory of the Popular Front in the Spanish legislative elections.
271
Bataille & Leins 5 May. Victory of Popular Front in French legislative elections.
April-Ma,. End ofContte-Attaque. Bataille writes 'La conjuration sacree' which marks the birth of the Acephale secret society. Leiris will refuse to take part, deeming the enterprise ridiculous and somewhat puerile.
June. First issue of Acephale, edited by Bataille.
17July. In Spain. start of rebellion led by General Franco.
December. Andre Masson returns to France.
Duember. S4crifit:a, illustrat-
Second semester (?). Plans the publication of an art magazine. Bataille is not among the 60 or so potential contributors approached.
ed by Andre Masson (G.L.M.).
19:47 Artaud: D'un Voyag' au pays
des Tarahumaros. Celine: Bagatelles pour un 'InQ,Sj(l(:1'I.
26 April. Bombing of
Cuernica,
March. Founding of the College de sociologie, whose first meeting will take place on 20 November. From the summer of 1938, it will be headed by Bataille, Caillois and Leiris. April. Founding of the Society of Collective Psychology by
Dr Rene Allendy, Bataille, Dr Borel, Leiris and Dr Paul Schiff. The chairman is Pierre Janet.
Summer. Trip to Italy with Colette Peignot.
August. TauTOJlltJclJies. illustrated by Andre Masson (G.LM.).
1938 Sartre: La Nauset. 13 March. Gennanyannexes Austria.
272
First meeting with Wtfredo Lam.
January. Presentation at College de sociologie: 'The Sacred in Everyday Life'.
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology 14 March. Bataille, Colette Peignot, Louise and Michel Leiris visit the spot. near Epemon. where Sade h~d wished to be buried. June. Graduates from the Ecole pratique des hautes etudes. July. Leiris publishes Miroir de Ie touromachie (Mirror of the Bullfight). illustrated by Andre Masson, in the 'Acephale' series edited by Bataille (G.L.M.). After Colette Peignot's death. the book will be dedicated to her.
29-30 September. Munich agreement (the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia).
November. 'Declaration of the College de sociologie on the International Crisis', signed by Bataille, Caillois and Leiris. 7 November. Colette Peignot dies in the presence of Bataille and Leiris. Before her death she had given Bataille some notes for Leins.
1939 Roger Caillois: Ehomme et le
sacre. 16 March. Germany invades Czechoslovakia. April. Bataille and Leiris publish Le Sacrl by Colette Peignot under the pseudonym Laure.
June. L'1ge d'homme (Gallimard).
I
4 Jul,. Appraisal meeting of the College de sociologie. Refusing to back the enterprise, Leiris is absent. 20 August. Nazi-Soviet Pact. 1 September. Gennany invades August. Glo.s.sairej', serre western Poland. me.s gloses, illustrated by
I
273
Bataille & Leiris 3 September. France and Britain declare war on Germany. 18 September. The Soviet Union invades eastern Poland.
Andre Masson (Galerie Simon).
September. Called up and sent to the Sud-Oranais with a group deployed to experiment with chemical weapons.
1940
April. Andre Masson, a collective work including writings by Bataille and Leiris.
June. Final issue of the NRF edited by Paulhan, who would be replaced in August by Drieu la Rochelle. 14 June. The Germans enter Paris. 22 June. France signs the armistice. 10 Jul,. The French parliament votes to assign full powers to Marshal Petain, who installs the French state. 20 August. The assassination of Trotsky. 3 October. The first Jewish laws are passed.
Lives with Denise Rollin.
April. Returns to France. Summer. Demobbed. Moves to the Kahnweilers' house at Boulogne-sur-Seine, Begins writing La Regie du
jeu.
November. Refuses to contribute to the NRF under Drieu's editorship.
274
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology 1941 Maurice Blanchot: Thomas First meeting with Blanchot. Febnulry. Arrest of the meml'obscur. Jul,. Madame Edwarda, bers of the musee de March. Andre Masson leaves under the name Pierre l'Hornme resistance netfor USA Angelique (ed. du work, 22June. Gennany invades Solitaire). Jul,. To avoid its confiscathe Soviet Union. tion, the Galerie Simon is bought by Louise Leiris and takes on her name.
1942 Blanchot: Aminadab. Camus: EEtranger. Ponge: Le PaTti pris deschoses.
23 February. Boris
vnae,
Anatole Lewitsky and five other members of the musee de l'Homme network are shot.
March. First issue of the semi-clandestine magazine Messages, which Leiris and Bataille will join in the wake of Queneau.
16 and 17 July. The Paris police arrest 13,000 Jews who will be handed over to the Nazis.
April. Suffering from pulmonary tuberculosis, leaves the Bibliotheque nationale.
1943 January.I1EX'JIlrience us Mouches. interieure (Gallimard). 2 February. German capitula- March. Moves to Vezelay,
Sartre: L'Etre et le Neant and
tion to the Russians at . Stalingrad.
April. Moves to 53 bis quai des Grands-Augustins (VIe). October. Meets Sartre for the first time.
March. Through Paulhan's introduction, joins the National Committee of Writers. April. First contribution to the underground Lettres franfaises.
275
Bataille & Leiris April. Publication by Bataille and Leiris of Histoire d·une petite fille by Laure (Colette Peignot). 10July. Allied landings in Sicily.
June. Le Petit, under the name Louis Trente (publisher not named [Georges Hugnet]). Start of relationship with Diane Kotchoubey de Beauharnais. Odober. Return to Paris.
June. First meeting with Camus.
December. Domaine fra1lfau, a special issue of Messages published in Switzerland, with contributions by some 60 French writers, including poems by Bataille and a fragment of Leiris's Biffures.
1944 February. Le Coupable 5 Man:h. Death of Max (Gallimard). Jacob in the Nazi transit April. L'Archangelique camp at Draney. (Messages). Moves to 6 June. The Allied landings Samois (Seine-et-Marne). in Normandy. October. Returns to Paris. 15-26 August. The liberation of Paris.
LAge de raison and U Sursis, the first two volumes of us Chemins de La lwerle (Roads to Freedom). 4-11 Febmary. The Yalta conference.
Sartre:
276
1945 Felmul,ry. Sur Nietzsche. Volonte de chance (Gallimard). May. Moves to Vezelay with Diane Kotchoubey. December. L'Orestie (editions des Quatre-vents), reprint-
February-May. Field trip to Ivory Coast and the Gold Coast (now Ghana). October. First issue, Us Temps modernes. Leiris is a member of the editorial board (up until May 1946).
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology 8 May. V-E (Victory in Europe) Day.
18 May a;W 8 JU'IU. Deaths of Pierre Kaan and Robert
ed in 1947 in La Haine de La poesit. Dirty (Fontaine), reprinted in 1957 in Le Bleu du del.
Novemb~.Nuiusansnu~
(Fontaine).
Desnos in the Nazi camps.
2 September. Capitulation of Japan.
October. Andre Masson returns to France.
1946 Rene Char: Feuillets
d'Hypnos.
Likely year of his divorce from Sylvia Bataille.
Meets Aime Cesaire for the first time.
I
June. First issue of Critique, founded and edited by Bataille. Prefening to write for Us Temps modemes, Leiris was to publish only two articles in Critique before Bataille's death.
IJury.
Aurora (GalIimard).
November. New edition of .cAge d'homme (preceded by 'On Literature considered as Bullfighting'). Leiris dedicates the book 'to Georges Bataille who inspired this book', a
23 November. Start of Indo-
dedication that did not appear in 1939.
China War.
1947 Camus: La Peste.
January. L'AUeluiah, catechisme de Dianus, illustrated by Jean Fautrier (librairie Auguste Blaizot), May. Methode de meditation May. Andre Masson et son univers, with Georges (Fontaine). · September. Histoire de rats Limbour (Geneva, editions (Journal de Dianus), illusdes Trois Collines).
277
Bataille & Leiris trated by Giacometti (Minuit). September. L4 Baine de III po~sie
Autumn. The Innl. 0/Joan Mir6 (New York, Curt
Valentin).
[EOrestie Histoire de rats and Dianus] (Minuit), l
new edition in 1962 with the title E Impossible.
4 MaTch. Death of Antonin Artaud.
1948 December. Birth ofJulie, daughter of Georges Bataille and Diane de Kotchoubey.
January. Trip to Algeria. February. First meeting with Claude Levi-Strauss,
June. La Regie du jell. I. BiffurG (Gallimard). July-November. FIrSt field trip to the French West Indies. September. La Langue secrite •• Dogons de Sanga (Institut d'ethnologie).
1949
1 October. Proclamation of the People's Republic in China.
February. La Part ma"dite. Essai d'economie ginirale, VOL. 1~ La Consumation (Minuit).
May. Takes up his appointment as director of the Carpentras municipal library. November. iponine (Minuit), reprinted in 1950 in £Abbe
c. 278
August-September. Trip to Rome, Palermo and Taormina.
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology 1950 Bataille's first contribution to Bouegh« was to contribute to it in 1958.
11 February. Death of Marcel Mauss.
OSCU1'S.
(Rome). Leiria
May. L'Abbe C. (Minuit).
1951 January. Marries Diane
March. Race et civilisation (UNESCO). Kotchoubey. May. Reviews Race et civilisa- October. 7bro, illustrated by Andre Masson (Galerie tion in Critique. Louise Leiris). Jum. Takes up his appointment as director of the Orleans municipal library.
1952 18 November. Paul Eluard dies.
MaTch-July. Second field trip to the French West Indies. December. Takes part in the Peace Congress in Vienna.
1953 5 March. Death of Stalin.
1954 21July. End of Indo-China War. 1 November. Start of the Algerian war.
279
Bataille & Leins 1955 Claude Levi-Strauss: Tristes
Ttopiques.
Serious health problems (cerebral arteriosclerosis). April. Lascaux ou la naissance de l'art (Geneva, Skira). September. Manet (Geneva, Skira).
June. La R~gle du jeu. II. Fourbu (Gallimard). September-November. Trip to China. November. Contacts de civilisation en Martinique et en Guadeloupe (UNESCO, Gallimard).
1956 May. Bagatelles
veg~tales,
illustrated by Joan Mir6 (jean Aubier). June. Leiris receives the prix des Critiques for BifJures and
Fourbis. Bataille is a member of the jury. 4 November. Soviet intervention in Hungary.
1957 May-July. Seriously ill, is
hospitalized twice. July. La Litt~rature et le mal (Gallimard). September. Le Bleu du del (jean-jacques Pauvert).
280
February. Balzacs en bas de case et icadorl sans majuscule, illustrated by Picasso (Galerie Louise Leiris). May. Attempted suicide 'by the ingestion of a large quantity of toxic substances'. Tracheotomy. September. Convalescence
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology and course of treatment in Tuscany with the Massons.
October. Bataille publishes L'Erotisme (Minuit), which is dedicated to Leiris.
1958
January. Issue of La Ciguif in homage to Bataille with a piece by Leiris: 'Georges Bataille as Don Giovanni'.
March. La Possession et ses aspects thedtrawc chez les Ethiopiens de Gonder
13 May. Insurrection in Algiers. 1 June. De Gaulle becomes president of France.
(PIon).
September. Second course of treatment in Tuscany.
1959 November. Le Proces de Giles de Rais, editor and with his introduction (Club francais du livre).
1960 Sartre: Critique de La raison dialectique. 4 January. Death of Camus.
July. Signs the 'Manifesto of the 121 on the Right to Insubordination in the Algerian War'.
281
Bataille & Leiris 1961 Interviews with Madeleine Chapsal, published in EExpress: Bataille in March, Leiris in May. March. J'ivantes cendres, innommees, illustrated by Alberto Giacometti ean Hugues). fune. Marrons sculptes pour Mir6, illustrated by Joan Mir6 (Geneva, Edwin Engelberts).
a
Jum. Les Larmes d'Eros
(jean-jacques Pauvert),
1962 18 March. Evian agreements, March. Transferred to the
ending the Algerian war.
Bibliotheque nationale (in the event, he will be unable to take up his duties), and moves to rue Saint-Sulpice, in Paris. 8 July. Dies in Paris. Leiris goes to his funeral in Vezelay with Maurice Blanchot and Jean Pie!'
1963 11 April. Suicide of Alfred
Metraux,
August-September. Critique publishes a 'Homage to Georges Bataille' which includes 'From Bataille the Impossible to the Impossible Documents' by Leiris.
282
A Bio-Bibliographic Chronology
Sartre: US Mots. January. Death of Theodore Fraenkel. 2 August. Start of the US intervention in Vietnam.
1964 December. 1.£Mort, illustrated by Andre Masson (Au Vent d'Arles).
March. Grande fuite de neige (Mercure de France).
1966 JantUlry. Death of Giacometti.
June. Ma mere (jean-jacques March. Brisees (Mercure de Pauvert), France).
September. La Regie du jeu. Ill. Fibrilles (Gallimard).
September. Death of Andre Breton.
1967-90 1974. Theone de la religion (Gallimard). 1970-88. Oeuvres completes (Gallimard).
1967. Afrique noire: la creation plastique, with Jacqueline Delange (Gallimard). 1969. Cinq etudes d'ethnologie (Gonthier, Denoel), Mots sans memoire (Gallimard) and Fissures, illustrated by Joan Mir6 (Aime Maeght). 1970. Wifredo Lam (Milan, Fratelli Fabbri). 1971. Andre Masson, 'Massacres' et autre« dessins (Hermann). 1974. Francis Bacon ou la verite criante (Fata Morgana). 1976. La Regie du jeu. ~ Frele bruit (Gallimard).
283
Bataille & Leins 1978. Alberto Giacometti. with Jacques Dupin (Aime Maeght). 1980. Au verso des images
(Fata Morgana). 1981. Le Ruban au cou d'Olympia (Gallimard). 1983. Francis Bacon, face et profil (Albin Michel). 1985. Langage ta"Kage ou ce qu~ les mots m~ dumt (Gallimard). 1987. Rows~ll' ingmu (Fata Morgana) and Ondes (Cognac. Le Temps qu'il fait). 1988. A cor et a cri (Gallimard) and Apropos de Georges Bataille (Fourbis).
24 September 1988. Death of Louise Leiris. 1989. Images de marque (Le Temps qu'il fait) and Bacon le hors-la-loi (Fourbis).
30 September 1990. Death at Saint-Hilaire (Essonne).
284
Periodicals to which Bataille and Leiris both contributed (1925-1962) Published in Paris, unless otherwise indicated
Acephak. Religion, sociology,philosophy. Published by Georges Ambrosino, Georges Bataille and Pierre Klossowski.--G.L.M. Two series chronologically overlapping. 1) 'Periodical Series': No.1 (24June 1936), No.2 (21 January 1937), NO. 3--4 (july 1937), No.5 (june 1939). 2) 'New Series' (a collection, in fact) which consisted of only one issue. Reprint (Periodical Series only): Jean-Michel Place, 1980. Bataille wrote for every issue in 'Periodical Series', Leiris for none of them. The only issue in 'New Series' is Leiris's monograph, Miroir de La tauromachie.
Botteghe oscure. Rome (Via delle Botteghe Oscure). A magazine founded by Marguerite Caetani, the Princess eli Bassiano. No.1 (1948) to NO. 25 (Spring 1960). Bataille contributed to it from 1950 to 1958, Leiris in 1958.
Cahiers d'art. Managing editor: Christian Zervos. YOLo 1 (1926) to YOLo 33-34 (1960). Leiris contributed to it in 1934, 1936, 1937 and 1945, Bataille in 1939 and 1945.
Cigue' (La). Managing editor: Jacques Maho. Two issues published (January and April 1958). An article by Leiris and one by Bataille, both in the first issue.
Combat. From Resistance to Revolution. 1941-74. Under the editorship ofAlbert Camus, Bataille published one article in 1944, Leiris two articles, in 1944 and 1948.
285
Bataille & Leins critique. General review of French and foreign-language publications. Editorship: Georges Bataille; Editions du Chene, then Calmann-Levy (1947-49) and, after a year-long interruption, Editions de Minuit (from October 1950). NO. 1 (June 1946), still publishing in 2007. Bataille published articles in nearly every issue, Leiris published one article in 1954 and another in 1958.
Critique sociale (fA). Review of books' 'and ideas. Managing editor: Boris Souvarine. Librairie Marcel Riviere. No.1 (March 1931) to NO. 11 (March 1934). The magazine was financed by Colette Peignot. Although many of its contributors belonged to the Democratic Conrmunist Circle (notably Bataille and former Surrealists such as Jacques Baron, Leiris, Queneau), according to Souvarine, La Critique socials was not the organ of the Circle. Nonetheless, Leiris wrote: l ...] we belonged [Queneau and I]-like Bataille-to the Democratic Communist Circle, which published a magazine, La Critique sociale' ('On Raymond Queneau', in Brisees, p. 272). Reprint: editions de la Difference, 1983. Bataille contributed from 1931 to 1934, Leiris from 1933 to 1934.
Documents. Ideologies, archaeology, fine arts, ethnography (until No.3, June 1929), then: Archaeology, fine arts, ethnography, variety (from No.4, September 1929). Illustrated magazine appearing 10 times a year. Editor: Carl Einstein. General secretary: Georges Bataille (who was, in fact, responsible for editing the magazine). Editorial secretary: Georges Limbour, then Leiris, then Marcel Griaule. Year 1, NO. 1 (April 1929) to NO. 7 (December 1929. Year 2, NO. 1-7, 1930. Year 2, No.8 [April or May 1931]. In all, 15 issues published. Reprint: Jean-Michel Place, 1991, dedicated 'to the memory of Georges Bataille and Michel Leiris'. Bataille and Leiris contributed to the magazine throughout its ron of publication.
EtemeUe Revue (L'). Founded by Paul Eluard and edited by Louis Parrot. NO.1 (June 1944) to No.2 Ouly 1944). New series, No.1 (1 December 1944) to NOS 5-6 (1946). The first two issues were published clandestinely. Articles by Leiris in 1944 (No.2, clandestinely) and 1945, and by Bataille in 1945.
Fontaine. Monthly review of poetry and French literature. Managing editor: Max-Pol Fouchet. Algiers, then Paris. NO.1 (November 1938) to NO. 63 (November 1947). Issues 1 and 2 were published with the title Mithra. Articles by Leiris in 1944 and 1946, by Bataille in 1946 and 1947.
286
Periodicals [man. Managing editor: Elvira de Alvear. Editorial secretary: Alejo Carpentier. NO. 1 (April 1931), the only one published.
This one-off issue includes texts by Leon-Paul Fargue, Jean Giono, Henri Michaux and representatives of '/,0, joven literatura ceniralizada en Paris' [literature by young writers based in Paris], namely Bataille, Leiris, Desnos, Soupault, etc.
Labyrinthe. A monthly journal of arts and letters. Geneva, Skira. Editor: Albert Skira. NO. 1 (15 October 1944) to NOS 22-23 (December 1946). New series. No.1 (February 1950) to NO. 2 (March-April 1950). Reprint: New York, Arno Press, 1968. Contributions by Bataille and Leiris in 1946. i
Leures nouvelles (Les). Managing editor: Maurice Nadeau. Editor (1953-54): Maurice Saillet. No.1 (March 1953) to 1977, No.1 (February-March 1977). Leiris contributed quite regularly to the magazine from 1956 to 1968, BataiUe contributed in 1956 and 1959.
Mercure de France. Bataille: 1949. Leiris: 1948, 1956, 1962 and 1963.
Messages. Two series. 1) Literary editor: Andre Silvaire, Three issues, January-February to May-June 1938. 2) Managing editor: Jean Lescure. Thirteen issues published: two in 1939, eight between 1942 and 1944 (six of these in France, semi-clandestinely, one in Belgium and one in Switzerland) and three in 1945 and 1946. Brought in by Queneau, Leiris contributed regularly to the magazine between 1942 and 1946. Bataille became involved shortly after Leiris and contributed likewise until 1946: What decided him was that Leiris and Queneau were with us, rather than the political aim of the enterprise, and contrariness rather than patriotism Uean Lescure, Poesie et liberte, histoire de Messages, 1939-1946, editions de l'IMEC, 'CEdition contemporaine' series, 1998, p. 179). The third issue of 1944 is Bataille's monograph, EArchangelique.
Mesures. Managing editor: Henry Church. Editorial committee: Henry Church, Bernard Groethuysen, Henri Michaux, Jean Paulhan (who was, in fact, the literary editor), Giuseppe Ungaretti. Year 1, No.1 (15 January 1935) to Year 6, No.2 (15 April 1940). Special issue, Hommage a Henry Church (15 April 1948). Texts by Leiris in 1936 and 1938, by Bataille in 1938 and 1940.
287
BataiUe & Leins Minotaure. Artistic and literary magazine. Managing editor/administrator: Albert Skira. Art director until No.9 (1936): Estratios Teriade. Editorial committee from NO. 10 (1937): Andre Breton, Marcel Duchamp, Paul Eluard, Maurice Heine and Pierre Mabille. NO. 1 (Uune] 1933) to NOS 12-13 (May 1939). Reprint: Geneva, editions d'art Albert Skira, 1981. 'It was Bataille and myself who had come up with the title of the magazine' (Andre Masson, Vagabond du susredlisme, editions Saint-Germain-des-Pres, 1975, p. 136). Leiris contributed to it in 1933, Bataille in 1936.
Nouvelle Revuefra'nfllise (La). Contributions by Leiris in 1929, 1933 and from 1935 to 1939. Bataille's only appearance in it is for the texts put out by the College de sociologie (1938). After the ~ Leiris refused to be involved and Bataille wrote for it in 1955. Quatre Vents (Les). Literary journal. Managing editor: Henri Parisot. NO. 1 (june 1945) to No.9 Qune 1947).
Bataille in 1945, Leiris in 1945 and 1947.
Revolution surredlist« (La). Editors: Pierre Naville and Benjamin Peret until No.2 (15 January 1925), Andre Breton from No.3 (15 April 1925). No.1 (1 December 1924) to NO. 12 (15 December 1929). Reprint: Jean-Michel Place, 1975. Leiris wrote for it from 1925 to 1927. Bataille published the medieval fatrasies in it in 1926.
Transition. Neuilly-sur-Seine, then Paris. Editor: Eugene Jolas, then Georges Duthuit, NO. 1 (April 1927) to NO. 27 (April-May 1938). New series, NO. 1 Uanuary 1948) to NO. 6 [October 1950]. Texts by Leiris in 1938, by Bataille in 1948. ~rve.
Managing editor: Estratios Teriade. No.1 (Winter 1937) to NOS 37-38 (Summer 1960).
Texts by Bataille in 1937 and 1938, by Leiris in 1954.
Voyage en Grece (Le). Tourism periodical. Published by the Neptos company in Paris, in association with the Greek National Tourist Office [and representing Greek transport companies]. NO. 1 (Spring-Summer 1934) to NO. 11 (Summer 1939). Special issue (July 1946).
Contributions by Leiris in 1934 and 1946, by Bataille in 1937 and 1946.
288
Bibliography
MICHEL LEIRIS 'Georges Bataille as Don Juan' first appeared as 'Le donjuanisme de Georges Bataille' in La Cigul, NO. 1, January 1958, , Hommage a Georges Bataille', pp. 37-8. Republished in Obliques, Les Pilles, 26110 Nyons, No.5, [fourth trimester] 1974, 'Don juan, analyse d'un mythe', VOL. 2, pp. 105-07. 'From Bataille the Impossible to the Impossible Documents' first appeared as 'De Bataille l'Impossible a l'impossible Documents', in Critique, Year 15, NOS 195-196, August-September 1963, pp. 685-93. Republished in Michel Leiris, Bristes, Mercure de France, 1966, pp. 256-66 (Gallimard edition, 1992, pp. 288.-99). 'From the Tune of Lord Auch', first appeared as 'Du temps de Lord Auch' in EArc, Aixen-Provence, NO. 32, [june] 1967, 'Georges Bataille', pp. ~15. Republished in the same magazine, '[Georges Bataille]' NO. 44, [March] 1971, pp. 3-10. These three articles were collected as Ii propos de Georges Batadle, Fourbis, 1988.
GEORGES BATAILLE 'Surrealism from Day to Day' first appeared as 'Le surrealisme au jour Ie jour', in Le Groupe la rupture [Breton, Artaud, Bataille, Aragon, Leiris], Le Seuil, 'Change' series, 1970, No.7, pp. 84-98. Republished in DC, YOLo 8, ed. Thadee Klossowski, Gallimard, 1976, pp. 168-84. 'The Publication of "A Corpse'" first appeared as 'La publication d' "Un Cadavre'" (15 January 1930), in Le Pontde tEpee, La Bastide d'Orniol (Card), NO. 41, October 1969, pp. 141-5. Partially reprinted in DC, YOL. 11, Articles, YOLo 1, 1944-1949, ed. Francis Marmande, Gallimard, 1988, pp. 571-2. 'Racism' first appeared as 'Le racisme', in Critique, NO.48, May 1951, pp. 460-3, and was written on the occasion of the publication of Leiris's book Race et civilisation, Unesco,
289
Bataille & Leiris 'La Question raciale devant la science moderne' series, 1951. Republished in DC, VOL.
12, Articles, VOL. 2, 1950-1961, 00. Francis Marmande, Gallimard, 1988, pp. 98-9. 'Eye', by ROBERT DESNOS, GEORGES BATAILLEand MARCEL GRIAULE. first appeared as 'Oeil', in Documents, No.4. September 1929. pp. 215-18, published as part of the magazine's 'Critical Dictionary'. Bataille's contribution was republished in OC, VOL. 1, Premiers Ecrits, 1922-1940, ed. Denis Hollier. Gallimard, 1970, pp. 187-9.
290
Works by Georges Bataille and Michel Leins in English Translation
GEORGES BATAILLE J
[With the pseudonym Pierre Angelique], A Tale ofSatisfied Desire. Translated by Audiart.
Paris: The Olympia Press, 1953. [With the pseudonym Pierre Angelique] The Naked Beastat Heaven's Gate. Translated by Audiart. Paris: The Olympia Press, 1956.
Prehistoric Painting: Lascaux or the Birth of Art. Translated by Austryn Wainhouse. Lausanne: Skira, 1955; London: Macmillan, 1980. Eroticism. Translated by Mary Dalwood. London: Calder, 1962.
Blue of Noon. Translated by Harry Mathews, New York: Urizen Books, 1978; London: Marion Boyars, 1979. [With the pseudonym Lord Auch] The ~tory of the Eye. Translated by Joachim Neugroschel, with essays by Susan Sontag and Roland Barthes. New York: Uri zen Books, 1977; London: Marion Boyars, 1979.
Monet, Translated by Austryn Wainhouse and James Emmons, with an introduction by Francoise Cachin. Geneva: Skira, 1983; London: Macmillan, 1983.
L'AbbeC. Translated by Philip A. Facey. London: Marion Boyars, 1983. VISions ofExcess: Selected UTitings, 1927-1939. Edited, and introduced by Allan Stoekl: translated by Allan Stoekl with Carl R. Lovitts and Donald M. Leslie Jr. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1985.
Inner Experience. Translated by Leslie Anne Boldt. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988:
Theory of Religion. Translated by Robert Hurley. New York: Zone, 1989. My Mother; Madame Edwarda; The DeadMan. Translated by Austryn Wainhouse, with
essays by Yukio Mishima and Ken Hollings. London: Marion Boyars, 1989.
291
Bataille & Leins The Tears of Eros. Translated by Peter Connor. San Francisco: City Lights Books. 1989.
The Accursed Share: An Essay on General Economy. Translated by Robert Hurley. New York: Zone. 1991. The Impossible: A Story of Bats Followed by Dianusand by The Oresteia. Translated by Robert Hurley. San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1991. On Nietzsdu, Translated by Bruce Boone, with an introduction by Sylvere Lotringer. New
York: Paragon House, 1992. The SolarAnus. Translated by Laurel Hirsch. Santa Rosa, California: Scissors & Paste
Bibliographies, 1996.
The Cradle of Humanity: Prehistoric Art and Culture. Edited and introduced by Stuart Kendall; translated by Michelle Kendall and Stuart Kendall. New York: Zone, 2005. The Unfinished System of Knowledge [Oeuvres completes-selections]. Edited and introduced by Stuart Kendall; translated by Michelle Kendall and Stuart Kendall. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 2001.
MICHEL LEIRIS Francis Bacon: Full Face and in Profile. No translator named. Oxford: Phaidon, 1983. Broken Branches. Translated by Lydia Davis. San Francisco: North Point Press, 1989. Rules of the Game, YOLo 1: Scratches. Translated by Lydia Davis. New York: Paragon House, 1991; Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997. Rules of the Game. YOLo 2: Scraps. Translated by Lydia Davis. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997. Aurora. Translated and introduced by Anna Warby. London: Atlas Press, 1990. Manhood: A Journey from Childhood into1M Fierce Order of Virility. Translated by Richard Howard. Chicago and London: University,of Chicago Press, 1992.
Other WOrks Frequently Referenced in this Book The College of Sociology (1937-39). Texts by Georges Bataille et aI. Edited by Denis
Hollier, translated by Betsy Wing. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1987.
Georges Bataille: An Intellectual Biography. Translated by Krzysztof Fijalkowski and Michael Richardson. London: Verso, 2002. (AU quotations in this book arein my translation-Liz. Heron)
292
Index
Abbadie, Arnauld d' 250
Bataille, Julie 202, 278
Ambrosino, Georges 119
Ba~lle,Launence
Aparicio, Julio 192
Bataille, Sylvia (nee Makles) 90-1, 95, 102, 162,193,267,269,170,177
Aragon, Louis 13, 24, 44, 48-50, 52, 54, 64,67,91,94,148,201,266,267
102,268--9
Baudelaire, Charles 5
Arland, Marcel 150
Beaumanoir, Philippe de 51
Arp, Jean 108
Beauvoir, Simone de 163
Artaud, Antonin 11, 44, 55~1, 63, 108, 264,265,267,272,278
Bellmer, Hans 9
Audiberti, Jacques 150, 234-5
Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, Henri 93
Babelon, Jean 13
Blanchot, Maurice 59--60, 74, 152, 156, 171,275,282
Bacon, Francis 283,284
Boaistuau, Pierre 22
Balthus 163
Boiffard, Jacques-Andre 54, 67, 68
Baron, Francois 94
Bonnefoy, Yves 175
Baron, Jacques 64, 67, 94, 100, 102, 108, 228,267
Bonnel, Rene 8, 64
Barrault, Jean-Louis 208 Bataille, Diane 163, 179, 181, 182, 185, 186,187,188,190,192,199,201,204, 207,212,215,224,276,278,279
Benichou, Paul 227
Borel, Adrien 9, 102, 103, 105, 160, 177, 265,268,272 Breton, Simone 103 Breton, Yves 41, 69 Breuil, abbe Henri 219-20, 221
293
Bataille & Leiris Bufiuel, Luis 28,247 Butor; Michel 171
247 Danielou, (Father) It. Rjean 144 Daumal, Rene 227
Caillois, Roger 110, 116, 119-21, 123-4, 127, 129, 272, 273
Dautry, Jean 112 Decour, Jacques 148
Camus, Albert 41, 166, 171, 172, 201, 206, 275,276,277,281
Deharme, Lise 108
Caron, Antoine 19, 205
Carrive, Jean 63, 64
Desnos, Robert 29, 54,63, 64,68-9, 108, 201, 208, 230, 240, 243-7, 265, 268, 277
Carrouges, Michel 143, 146, 236
Desportes, Philippe 6, 7
Castel, Andre 26, 120, 142, 184, 186--7, 188, 191
Dht>tel, Andre 172 Dostoevsky, Fedor Mikhailovich 11, 265
Cendrars, Blaise 184
Doutte, Edmond 252
Cesaire, Aime 172, 200, 277
Drieu la Rochelle, Pierre 108, 146--8, 274
Char, Rene 157, 201, 236, 277
Dubuffet, Jean 98-9
Cloppenburch (Cloppenberg), Johann Everhardts 210
Duhamel, Marcel 54, 267
Cocteau, Jean 184
Dumezil, Georges 116, 173
Carpentier, Alejo 67, 108
Descartes, Rene 30
Dullin, Charles 152
Collinet, Michel 91, 235-6
Durkheim, Emile 121, 122, 126, 128, 132
Collinet, Simone (nee Kahn) 91, 235-6
Dutschke, Rudi 239
Colomb, Christophe 9 Courbet, Gustave 18 Couturier, Louis (See Carrouges, Michel) 143,169,235-6 Crampon 29, 249 Cranach l'Ancien, Lucas 202, 211
Einstein, Carl 12, 14-15, 19, 21, 63, 68, 193 Elbe, Marie 18-19 Eluard, Gala 52
Crawford, Joan 245
Eluard, Paul 13, 44, 50-1, 52, 143, 147, 237,266,267,279
Da Ponte, Lorenzo 3
Espezel, Pierre d' 12-13, 248
Ernst, Max 240
Dalf Salvador 19, 28, 52, 157, 175, 245,
294
Index Fardoulis-Lagrange, Michel 143, 159
Hertz, Robert 122
Fargue, Leon-Paul 108
Hugnet, Georges 143, 276 .
Fautrier, Jean 9, 150, 277
Hugo, Victor 248
Ferdiere, Gaston 58-9 Flaherty, Robert J. 93
Jahn, Otto 252
Fraenkel, Bianca 90-1, 267
J ardot, Maurice 212
Fraenkel, Theodore 54-6, 64, 90, 212, 228,265,283
J arry, Alfred 7
France, Anatole 66, 68 ~
Frenaud, Andre 146, 148, 150, 153
Josserand, Pierre 170, 171 Jouhandeau,MarceI54,108,228,230
J ouve, Pierre Jean
191
Jubinal, Achille 51 Gaby8 Gallimard, Michel 206
Kaan, Pierre 112-13, 277
Gerard, Francis 63-4
Kafka, Franz 64, 143, 159, 265
Giacometti, Alberto 19, 94, 238, 268.278, 282,283,284 Gilbert-Lecomte, Roger 227
Kahnweiler; Daniel-Henry 27, 85, 108, 151,167,181,199,209,210,228,264, 265,274
Gilliam, Florence 100
Kahnweiler, Lucie 85, 161, 167, 264, 274
Grandville, Jean Ignace Isidore Gerard, dit 29, 248--9
Klossowski, Pierre 116, 119, 163
Granevo,ManueI26, 30, 31, 184 Grenier, Jean 149 Griaule, Marcel 15, 29, 88, 243, 249-52, 268
Kelley, Harper 220, 221, 222 Kotchoubey de Beauharnais, Diane (See Bataille, Diane) 163, 179, 276, 278, 279
Grillot de Givry, Emile:Jules 228
La Bruyere, Jean de 229
Gris, Juan 19
Lacan, Jacques 91, 108-9, Ill, 271 Lagrange, SeeFardoulis-Lagrange, Michel
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich 10, 50, 128, 145, 171, 265
Landsberg, Paul-Louis 127
Heine, Maurice 65, 116
Lascaux, Berthe 151
Hermant, Abel 252
Lascaux, tlie 151, 212
Lambrichs, Georges 181
295
Bataille & Leiris Lassalle, Ferdinand 49 Laude,Jean 193-4 Lavaud,Jacques 6-7,8.43, 265 Legrand 143, 146 Leibowitz, Francoise 163 Leibowitz, Rene 151, 163 Leiris, Louise 54, 65. 79. 85. 100. 103,
115-16,151,208-09,270,273,275, Leiris, Marie 18. 197 Lernarchand,Jacques 147-8, 153, 159 Lescure, Jean 139. 146, 148, 150-1, 159.
171.236 Leyris, Pierre 236 Libra, Pierre 119
Lienert, idouard 98 Limbour, Georges 11. 15,44, 63-5, 67, 98,
118. 170, 172. 186. 228. 230. 238-9, 264,268.277 Lisowski, Georges 200-01 Litri, Miguel Baez 192 Lo Duca, Giuseppe Maria 208, 222
Louis XVI 239
Luyken, Jan 210
Maar, Dora 232 Malkine, Georges 54 Mallarme, Stephane 227.240 Malraux, Andre 116. 171
Maner, Edouard 18-19 Marinette 8 Marx, Karl 50, 235, 241, 266. 267. 269 Mascolo, Dionys 200
296
Masson, Andre 8-9. 11-13.24.27,44,54.
63-5, 67, 85. 90, 98-9, 104, 108, 116, 189,191,208,228,240,241,256,258, 264,265.266,267,268,269,270,271, 272.273-4.275,277,279,280-1,283 Masson, Colette 85 Masson, Rose (nee Makles) 90, 104, 188.
189, 191, 280-1 Mauss. Marcel 19, 32, 122, 126. 128. 264,
265,268.279 Metraux, Alfred 9, 173. 264, 270, 282 Michaux, Henri 108 Migne, Abbe (jacques-Paul) 251 Mir6. Joan 11-12,44, 266, 280, 282. 283 Monnerot,Jules 119,120.170-1 Monteverdi. Claudio 205 More, Marcel 108-10, 111.117,143,169.
177,235-6,271 Morgan, Claude 147 Morise, Max 64, 67. 103 Moulin, Jean 112 Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus 3, 189, 191 Mylord l'Arsouille (See Seymour, Henry)
10
Nadeau, Maurice 61. 200-01 Naville, Denise (nee Kahn) 91
Naville, Pierre 64. 91, 235, 266 Nerval,
~ard
de 153.227,230
Nietzsche, Friedrich 3, 32, 35, 128. 151,
169,237,265,266,276 Nozieres, Violette 156-7
Index Obey, Andre 205
Polly 103
Ocampo, Victoria 119
Pushkin, Alexander 191
Oddon, Yvonne 195
Pouly, Pierre 187
Ollivier, Albert 170-1
Prevert, Jacques 54, 64, 67, 267, 269
Otwell, George 186 Orwell, Sonia 186, 242
Queneau, J anine (nee Kahn) 91, 235-6 Queneau, Raymond 64, 67, 91, 98-9, 101, 108, 110, Ill, 114, 116, 146, 148, 150, 163, 169, 235, 236, 238-9, 265, 267, 275
Paraz, Albert 134
Parisot, Henri 58. Pascal, Blaise 104 Passeron, Rene 175 Patrick (Saint) 57-8
Paulhan, Jean 26, 120, 144, 146-8, 150, 153, 155, 159, 161, 177-8, 184, 235, 271,274,275 Peignot, Charles 177, 178 Peignot, Colette 102, 109, 117, 136, 198, 258,256,270,271,272,273.276,286
Raynal, Maurice 108
Reich, Zdenko 227 Reverdy, Pierre 108 Ribemont..Dessaignes, Georges 63-4, 67, 108 Rimbaud, Arthur 49 Rivet, Paul 12, 265. 270
Peignot, Suzanne 177
Riviere, Georges Henri 9, 12-13, 14, 15, 68,199,230,267
Pelorson, Georges 233
Pollin-Le Gentil, Denise 163
Pia, Pascal 8, 64
Rosenthal, Gerard (See Gerard, Francis) 64
Peignot, Jerome 117, 178, 210, 220, 223
Picasso, Pablo 265, 280
1~,
27, 184, 189, 232, 235,
Piel, Jean 91, 98-9, 110, 193, 235, 236, 282
Roussel, Raymond 171, 263, 270, 271 Roux, Gaston-Louis 19, 103
Piel, Jeannine 236
Sade, Donatien Alphonse Francois de Salacrou,AnnandI7,22,65, 155,273
Piel, Simone 90, 236
Salles, Georges 116
PUnpaneau, Jacques 217
Sartre, Jean-Paul 148, 149, 150, 152-3, 155, 158-9, 163, 166, 172, 215, 272, 275,276,281,283
Pitt-Rivers, Michael 186 Poe, Edgar 230
297
Bataille & Leins Satie, Erik 232
Tzara, Tristan 54, 64, 169, 263, 265
Schaeffner, Andre 9, 150, 151, 231 Schoenberg, Arnold 150, 151
Vailland, Roger 227
Seabrook, William Buehler 240-1
Valery, Paul 7
Seymour, Henry dit Mylord l'Arsouille 10
Van Dyke, William S. 93
Shipman, Evan 11
Van Gogh, Vincent 20
Sima, Josef 227
Vidor, King 241
Socrates 156
Villon, Francois 104
Soupault, Philippe 63
~trac,RogerI9,63-4,67,
108,268
Soustelle, Jacques 236 Souvarine, Boris 13-14,98,266,268,269, 271 Stevenson, Robert Louis 28, 248
Waldberg, Patrick 110, 217 Watson, Peter 60, 62 Weil, Eric 170, 171 Weingarten, Romain 193-4
Teriade, Estratios 108
WI1denstein, Georges 13, 14
Thomas, Edith 147 Thyeste 56 Troppmann, Jean-Baptiste 9, 55 Trotsky, Leon 15, 64, 274 Tual, Roland 44, 54, 264, 270 Tubiana,Joseph 174,176, 200
298
Zette (See Leiris, Louise) 85, 90, 100, 105, 137, 150, 154, 160, 162, 164, 165, 166, 167, 170, 178, 181, 184, 186, 188, 192, 194,195,196,197,200,201,202,203, 204, 205, 206, 207. 208-09, 213, 214, 215,216,218,220,222
