Adventures in 'Pataphysics: Collected Works I

by Alfred Jarry, Alastair Brotchie (Editor), Paul Edwards (Editor)

An anthology of previously untranslated texts by Alfred Jarry beginning with his first work, Black Minutes of Memorial Sand. Included are theoretical texts, aberrant journalism, and highly-wrought Symbolist poems; a practical guide to building a time machine; and the bizarre dramatic buffoonery that presaged Jarry's invention of his most famous character, Pere Ubu. Andre Breton had to devise his notion of "Black Humor" to adequately describe and account for the arcane absurdity of Jarry's work.

Genres: Fiction, Poetry, Philosophy, France, Literature, Art, Drama

336 pages, Paperback

First published June 19, 2001

About the author

Alfred Jarry was a French writer born in Laval, Mayenne, France, not far from the border of Brittany; he was of Breton descent on his mother's side.
Best known for his play Ubu Roi (1896), which is often cited as a forerunner to the surrealist theatre of the 1920s and 1930s, Jarry wrote in a variety of genres and styles. He wrote plays, novels, poetry, essays and speculative journalism. His texts present some pioneering work in the field of absurdist literature. Sometimes grotesque or misunderstood (i.e. the opening line in his play Ubu Roi, "Merdre!", has been translated into English as "Pshit!", "Shitteth!", "Shittr!", "Shikt!", "Shrit!" and "Pschitt!"), he invented a pseudoscience called 'Pataphysics.

From Wikipedia

Reviews

[Tosh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Any man who's last request before he dies is a toothpick is ok with me. Absurdity in literature started with this man. In fact he may have influenced the 20th (and 21st) Century in major ways. Dada, Surrealism, the theater of the Absurd, Pinter, Boris Vian, and probably various underground comics of the 60's all have this man as their patron saint of 'silly.'

Ubu Roi is his masterpiece that set the theater world on fire, and they're still trying to snuff that fire out. For those who love a beginning, a middle, and an end - forget it! Go check out Angela Christie.

[Matt Webb · Rating 3 out of 5]

'Pataphysics, like cybernetics, is an assault on the hypothesis of cause and effect.

Not that I learned much about 'pataphysics from this, though I've come away somehow understanding it much better.

As for these plays and essays as literature, I don't think I'm able to fully read the text. More practice required.

[Bill · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting for completists. The selections from his Speculations is the highlight.

[Andy Hickman · Rating 2 out of 5]

Elements of Pataphysics – Alfred Jarry (posthumously 1911) [translated]

I suspect this is a clever, witty and intellectual satire … but weird. **

French writer who coined the philosophical concept of 'pataphysics', the science of imaginary solutions. He died aged 36.

“I did not have my tuning fork any longer. Imagine the perplexity of a man outside time and space, who has lost his watch, and his measuring rod, and his tuning fork. I believe, sir, that it is indeed this state which constitutes death.”

“... [God's] first name is not Jack, but Plus-and-Minus.”
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