Black, Brown, & Beige: Surrealist Writings from Africa and the Diaspora

Surrealist Revolution

by Franklin Rosemont (Editor), Robin D.G. Kelley (Editor)

Surrealism as a movement has always resisted the efforts of critics to confine it to any static definition--surrealists themselves have always preferred to speak of it in terms of dynamics, dialectics, goals, and struggles. Accordingly, surrealist groups have always encouraged and exemplified the widest diversity--from its start the movement was emphatically opposed to racism and colonialism, and it embraced thinkers from every race and nation.

Yet in the vast critical literature on surrealism, all but a few black poets have been invisible. Academic histories and anthologies typically, but very wrongly, persist in conveying surrealism as an all-white movement, like other "artistic schools" of European origin. In glaring contrast, the many publications of the international surrealist movement have regularly featured texts and reproductions of works by comrades from Martinique, Haiti, Cuba, Puerto Rico, South America, the United States, and other lands. Some of these publications are readily available to researchers; others are not, and a few fall outside academia's narrow definition of surrealism.

This collection is the first to document the extensive participation of people of African descent in the international surrealist movement over the past seventy-five years. Editors Franklin Rosemont and Robin D. G. Kelley aim to introduce readers to the black, brown, and beige surrealists of the world--to provide sketches of their overlooked lives and deeds as well as their important place in history, especially the history of surrealism.

Genres: Poetry, Africa, Nonfiction, History, Theory, Literature, Art

416 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Franklin Rosemont was co-founder of the Chicago Surrealist Group. He was born in Chicago, Illinois. His father, Henry, was a labor activist. His mother, Sally, was a jazz musician.
He edited & wrote an introduction for What is Surrealism?: Selected Writings of Andre Breton, & edited Rebel Worker, Arsenal/Surrealist Subversion, The Rise & Fall of the DIL Pickle: Jazz-Age Chicago's Wildest & Most Outrageously Creative Hobohemian Nightspot & Juice is Stranger than Friction: Selected Writings of T-Bone Slim. With his wife, Penelope Rosemont, & Paul Garon he edited The Forecast is Hot!. His work has been deeply concerned with both the history of surrealism (writing a forward for Max Ernst & Alchemy: A Magician in Search of Myth) & of the radical labor movement in America, for instance, writing a biogaphy of Joe Hill.
He is the author of the poetry collections The Morning of a Machine Gun: Twenty Poems & Documents. Profusely Illustrated By the Author, The Apple of the Automatic Zebra's Eye, & Penelope: A Poem, as well as An Open Entrance to the Shut Palace of Wrong Numbers, a book that explores the phenomenon of "wrong numbers" from a surrealist perspective, published by Black Swan Press in Chicago in 2003.
Rosemont and his wife urrently live in the East Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago, managing the Charles H. Kerr Publishing Company, the world's oldest, continuously existing socialist publishing house.

Reviews

[Maddy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well, I have some reading to do.

[M.W.P.M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Black, Brown, & Beige brings readers a selection of poems and writings by Surrealist authors outside of the white male canon, including: Étienne Léro, Aimé Césaire, Clément Magloire-Saint-Aude, René Bélance, John La Rose, Léon-Gontran Damas, Joyce Mansour, Henri Kréa, Tchicaya U Tam'si, Jean-Joseph Rabéarivelo, Fenton Johnson, Bob Kaufman, Hart Leroy Bibbs, Jayne Cortez, and Sunny Ra...

From Étienne Léro...

Abandon to electrical detentions
Our hands and the birds
The elevator carries off
The trees and the photographs
The river keeps our head of hair
The night strangles itself to the banging of doors
and you begin the adventure again.

- Abandon, pg. 39

From Aimé Césaire...

Let us count:
the madness remembering
the madness howling
the madness seeing,
the madness unleashed

Who and what are we? Admirable question! Haters. Builders. Traitors. Hougans. Especially hougans. For we want all the demons
Those of yesterday, those of today
Those of the yoke, those of the hoe
Those of the forbidden, of prohibition, of marronnage

and we mustn't forget those of the slave trader...
And so we sing.

We sing of poisonous flowers bursting across furious prairies; skies of love slashed with embolism; epileptic mornings; the white blazing of abyssal sands, the descent of wreckage in the course of night struck by wild scents.

What can I do about it?

You must begin.

Begin what?

The only thing in the world worth beginning.

The End of the world, my God!

Make room for me. I will not get out of your way.

Sometimes I am seen, in a grand toss of the hat, to snatch an overly red cloud, or a caress of rain, or a prelude of wind,

don't sedate yourself too much:

I force open the yolk sac keeping me from myself.
I force open the great waters which gird me with blood

I, only I check my place on the last train of the last surge of the tidal wave,

I, only I

take up the tongue in the final anguish

I, oh! only I
ensure that I receive from the straw

for you who one morning will hoard my words in your beggar's pouch and will take, as the children of fear while htey sleep,

the oblique path of flights and monsters.

- In the Guise of a Literary Manifesto, for André Breton, pg. 76-77

From Clément Magloire-Saint-Aude...

Surging hours
in a fiery façade
Sparks echo
toward the mirror of time
Little bells child's rattles
a wild mop of hair
sound a halt
to the messenger's song

- Talisman, pg. 102

From René Bélance...

Hopelessly, I left perception behind
under a bay of rooftops
Crimson dawn no longer spreads a path
to welcome our weary footsteps
our silver voices
I hold a memory of mists, past times
torches lit our way
I drink deeply of the sands of oblivion

- Awareness, pg. 106

From John La Rose...

The lineal connection
Between space and time
Tangles like ship's rope

No coils unwind
But stretch their stench
To unobtained oblivion

Torment,
Twined in an underbrush
Of corroding custom,
Unwinds itself in inky blood lettings
Unstatisticated.

Memory
Mounts its past
In muddled pride

- Connecting Link, pg. 113

From Léon-Gontran Damas...

For a moment believe
in a hand without a glove
a hand luminous of springtime
naked in the birth of spring
springtime born from magic
magic of rhythm
the toothless
diseased mob
single-eyed and paranoid
cried all over
my insane heart without hate

- A Single Instant of Belief, pg. 130

From Joyce Mansour...

My mother eats me
Tortures me
And to prevent me from following her
She buries me
I eat my family
I spit on their remains
I hate their tightrope diseases
And their ear hallucinations
Be careful of toothpaste
That bleaches without destroying
It is wiser to have fun by devouring one's own people
Than to walk on all fours
To drink
Or try to please
Girls

- Fresh Cream, pg. 166

From Henri Kréa...

Oh yes the lovely scenery
Lofty appearances
Good breeding
Correctness
Good manners
Distinction
Just the right amount of mineral water
The cold elegance of milk
Hermetically sealed
Oh yes oh yes

- Oh Yes, pg. 176

From Tchicaya U Tam'si...

I pulled up my throat with multicoloured glass
I wished to kick chance in the pants
my second victory
a little pox on the brain
and I don't know how to save myself
then I dreamt of returning
to my village
with eyes behind dark glasses
and I had to fear my sorcerer

I leaped the sea
with my sensual insomnia

salt fills my head

I must arm my people
against their destiny tonight
in order to name it later
in golden figures
he earned his death
long live love

- Against Destiny, pg. 182

From Jean-Joseph Rabéarivelo...

A purple star
evolved in the depth of the sky -
a flower of blood unfolding on the prairie of night
Evolve, evolve.
You see nothing of her but her myriads of eyes
her triangular reptile eyes,
that open one by one
among celestial lianas.

- A Purple Star, pg. 189

From Fenton Johnson...

Look, my weary brother, ere you die;
Night is here, the phantom nigh;
Soul of rabbit with the magic breath,
Soul of Life and foe of living Death.
Ere we die, my brother, ere we die;
O'er the hills the phantom shadows lie;
Rabbit ghostly soothes your aching fears,
Rabbit ghostly dries your endless tears,
Ere we die, my sister, ere we die.

- The Phantom Rabbit, pg. 211

From Bob Kaufman...

Abomunists join nothing but their hands or legs, or other same.
Abomunists spit anti-poetry for poetic reasons and frink.
Abomunists do no look at pictures painted by presidents and unemployed prime ministers.
In times o national peril, Abomunists, as reality Americans, stand ready to drink themselves to death for their country.
Abomunists do not feel pain, no matter how much it hurts.
Abomunists do not use the word Square except when talking to Squares.
Abomunists read newspapers only to ascertain their Abominubility.
Abomunists never carry more than fifty dollars in debt on them.
Abomunists believe that the solution to problems of religious bigotry is, to have a Catholic candidate for president and a Protestant candidate for pope.
Abomunists do not write for money; they write the money itself.
Abomunists believe only what they dream only after it comes true.
Abomunist children must be reared abominubly.
Abomunist poets, confident that the new literary form "foot-printism" has freed the artist of outmoded restrictions, such as: the ability to read and write, or the desire to communicate, must be prepared to read their work at dental colleges, embalming schools, homes for unwed mothers, homes for wed mothers, insane asylums, U.S.O. canteens, kindergartens, and county jails. Abomunists never compromise their rejectionary philosophy.
Abomunists reject everything except snowmen.

- Abomunist Manifesto, pg. 231

From Hart Leroy Bibbs...

Be bleak spring but roll on northwards
with me through central park sign winding trail,
around the lake and reservoir,
through the hilly, singing, bird sanctuary
over the underpass of the horse;
the newly discovered path where a tale
was told but five minutes ago -
by one who had returned southward
of a sinister black bar

- Black Spring, pg. 253

From Jayne Cortez...

I know they want me to make it
to enter eye dropper and invade pills
turn around or get shot
I know they wanna vaccinate me with
the fear of myself
so I'll pull down my face and nod
I know they want me to make it
But I'm not in a hurry

- Making It, pg. 256

From Sunny Ra...

Then another tomorrow
They never told me of
Came with the abruptness of a fiery dawn
And spoke of Cosmic Equations:
The equations of slight-similarity
The equations of sound-similarity
Subtle Living Equations
Clear only to those
Who wish to be attuned
To the vibrations of the Outer Cosmic Worlds.
Subtle living equations
of the outer-realms
Dear only to those
Who fervently wish the greater life

- Cosmic Equation, pg. 278

From Ted Joans...

Bob Kaufman has said, "I acknowledge the demands of surrealist realization," and his great dazzling poem, "Song of the Broken Giraffe," is an affirmation of his surrealization. Kaufman is one of true poets that became known during the Beat Generation. His images are more magical and humorous than those of his contemporaries. Immersed in the Marvelous, Kaufman confronts the human condition directly in all its tragic facets. Yet he giggles while struggling. He is one of the greatest poets on this planet Earth.
Kaufman is like Bird - he too has always been "High on Life." He is the man that walks down crowded streets talking aloud to himself in spite of many (too many) unhip people running in the opposite direction, instead of toward him. Kaufman is a Bird (of the poetic word) called Bob. His Solitudes give us all a chance to share his poetry with the international multitude.
Dig him!

- Kaufman is a Bird Called Bob, pg. 312

[Brandon Desiderio · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great insight into the internationalist reality that was the surrealist movement—and how true to its roots it was in its vision of emancipation of humanity from oppressive forces, most notably imperialism and colonialism. Some exceptional, visionary writers highlighted here (and some great connections to surrealism, like Thelonius Monk, for instance). Rosemont also provided much-needed context that has helped navigate my interest in surrealism and more than a mere aesthetic movement (it was not as such, despite our culture's whitewashing as such).

[Jordan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Informative intros, perfect selections. Only criticism would be that it's a bit varied in its conceptualization of the overall text, but (reminding myself of how I write for uni), it finds a way to rationalize this.

[Acacia · Rating 4 out of 5]

lovely selections

[EIJANDOLUM · Rating 5 out of 5]

“The cloud advances without ceremony on the sands and among the dunes: “The abyss summons up the abyss,” says a curious voice entwined in the hollow of my ear. I think I see the spirit of Théophile Gautier prancing on the shore.”
— Joyce Mansour

[Kenning JP Garcia · Rating 4 out of 5]

The struggle is surreal.