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Death to the Pigs and Other Writings
One of the founders of surrealism, Benjamin Péret lived a life resistant to any aesthetic or political compromise. Though he was the writer most admired within the surrealist group itself, very little of his work has been previously translated. This, the first authorized collection, assembles his finest work—his novel, Death to Pigs and to the Field of Glory, poems, polemical and critical writings, and unclassifiable works like "Natural History" and "The Round-the-World Calendar of Tolerable Inventions."This volume will also include the first detailed biography of Péret to appear in English, based on sources only recently brought to light. Octavio Paz has described Péret's writings as "among the most original and most savage of our era." Breton wrote, "Humor here gushes from its source."
At last, the source is available in English.
At last, the source is available in English.
219 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1988
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About the author
Benjamin Péret
75 books36 followersBenjamin Péret (4 July 1899 – 18 September 1959) was a French poet, Parisian Dadaist and a founder and central member of the French Surrealist movement with his avid use of Surrealist automatism.
Benjamin Péret was born in Rezé, France on 4 July 1899. He, as a child, acquired little education due to his dislike of school and he instead attended the Local Art School from 1912. He too, however, resigned soon after in 1913 due to his sheer lack of study and willingness to do so. Afterwards he spent a short period of time in a School of Industrial Design before enlisting in the French army's Cuirassiers during the First World War to avoid being jailed for defacing a local statue with paint. He saw action in the Balkans before being deployed to Salonica, Greece.
Benjamin Péret was born in Rezé, France on 4 July 1899. He, as a child, acquired little education due to his dislike of school and he instead attended the Local Art School from 1912. He too, however, resigned soon after in 1913 due to his sheer lack of study and willingness to do so. Afterwards he spent a short period of time in a School of Industrial Design before enlisting in the French army's Cuirassiers during the First World War to avoid being jailed for defacing a local statue with paint. He saw action in the Balkans before being deployed to Salonica, Greece.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
May 24, 2017
As a Peret overview, this is excellent, even if not everything in it may be essential. We get a sampling of poetry from different sources, which may become a bit of a monotonous jumble to the untrained ear (in this case my untrained ear), a complete novel, strange shorter works that were published alone, and even letters to Breton from the front lines of the Spanish Civil War, where Peret supported the leftists, communists, and anarchists along with meeting Remedios Varo, with whom he later moved to Mexico. There are also a number of stories, many of which also appeared in The Leg of Lamb: Its Life and Works, allowing me to mostly zip past.
The novel here, from which the collection draws its name, took me by surprise. In the past, I was a little dubious of long-form Peret, As the disjointed and incongruous images pile up and overwhelm the semblance of storytelling which may persist for shorter stretches. Instead, here, he jettisons any pretense of continuous narrative, letting each chapter veer wildly in form and content. And it works as the forms show such wild invention -- story, list, transcription of government proceedings, and, best, a section written entirely in invented slang explained through hundreds of footnotes. Somehow, the extra layer of linguistic remove makes it that much funnier and more entertaining to read about a man who has just stopped being part of a tree attempting to give birth to a cat.
Even better, there's Peret's delightful scientific text, Natural History, which formed my introduction to him when it was excerpted in Green Integer, and subsequently posted on A Journey Round My Skull. Here's one section, but really the whole thing is wonderful.
The novel here, from which the collection draws its name, took me by surprise. In the past, I was a little dubious of long-form Peret, As the disjointed and incongruous images pile up and overwhelm the semblance of storytelling which may persist for shorter stretches. Instead, here, he jettisons any pretense of continuous narrative, letting each chapter veer wildly in form and content. And it works as the forms show such wild invention -- story, list, transcription of government proceedings, and, best, a section written entirely in invented slang explained through hundreds of footnotes. Somehow, the extra layer of linguistic remove makes it that much funnier and more entertaining to read about a man who has just stopped being part of a tree attempting to give birth to a cat.
Even better, there's Peret's delightful scientific text, Natural History, which formed my introduction to him when it was excerpted in Green Integer, and subsequently posted on A Journey Round My Skull. Here's one section, but really the whole thing is wonderful.
April 7, 2009
Don't be fooled by the 3 stars, this book is anything but mediocre. It's a mixed bag of 1 star parts and 5 star parts.
The poetry can be skipped, IMO. It's just one disconnected image piled onto another. Reading these poems is like watching those zillion-images-per-second Nike commercials. For an hour or two. Exhausting. You suspect it actually means something, but after a while that constantly pounding rthythm makes you too tired to care for meaning, you just want to get to the last line, asap. There are plenty highly original images and similes in there but they get crushed under the weight of the rest. Hard to believe that a respectable poet like Eluard called Peret the greatest living poet.
Another 1 star for the biographical introduction. Exceedingly boring in its attempt to chart Peret's many leftist political movements, as if anyone still cares about POUM and deviations from the Bolshevik-Leninist line of the Left Opposition.
The selected letters are political too, but more interesting, especially the letters to Andre Breton, written while Peret was involved in the Spanish Civil War.
There are specimen of automatic writing that I could have done without. Apart from the fact that most of it is pure gobbledygook, I don't believe it is genuinely automatic. It feels as fake as a Dali dream.
The prose fiction however is pure, mad gold. My favorites are _Hand in Hand_ (an absurd slapstick 'story' told in list form, in which each sentence is a numbered item) and the cosmographical _Natural History_. With its bizarre morphing of one crazy image into another this would make a wonderful animation. A true surrealist _Fantasia_.
"Air, in its natural state, constantly secretes pepper which makes the whole world sneeze. At ground level this pepper condenses so as to give trinkets in summer and newspapers in winter. These only need to be put in a cool place for them to be transformed into railway stations or sponges, depending on how many pages they contain."
BTW, the earth is not spherical but shaped like a bowl, and is one of the breasts of heaven. The other is to be found at the centre of the Milky Way.
I think Peret came from that other breast.
The poetry can be skipped, IMO. It's just one disconnected image piled onto another. Reading these poems is like watching those zillion-images-per-second Nike commercials. For an hour or two. Exhausting. You suspect it actually means something, but after a while that constantly pounding rthythm makes you too tired to care for meaning, you just want to get to the last line, asap. There are plenty highly original images and similes in there but they get crushed under the weight of the rest. Hard to believe that a respectable poet like Eluard called Peret the greatest living poet.
Another 1 star for the biographical introduction. Exceedingly boring in its attempt to chart Peret's many leftist political movements, as if anyone still cares about POUM and deviations from the Bolshevik-Leninist line of the Left Opposition.
The selected letters are political too, but more interesting, especially the letters to Andre Breton, written while Peret was involved in the Spanish Civil War.
There are specimen of automatic writing that I could have done without. Apart from the fact that most of it is pure gobbledygook, I don't believe it is genuinely automatic. It feels as fake as a Dali dream.
The prose fiction however is pure, mad gold. My favorites are _Hand in Hand_ (an absurd slapstick 'story' told in list form, in which each sentence is a numbered item) and the cosmographical _Natural History_. With its bizarre morphing of one crazy image into another this would make a wonderful animation. A true surrealist _Fantasia_.
"Air, in its natural state, constantly secretes pepper which makes the whole world sneeze. At ground level this pepper condenses so as to give trinkets in summer and newspapers in winter. These only need to be put in a cool place for them to be transformed into railway stations or sponges, depending on how many pages they contain."
BTW, the earth is not spherical but shaped like a bowl, and is one of the breasts of heaven. The other is to be found at the centre of the Milky Way.
I think Peret came from that other breast.
October 13, 2013
This book is genius. Deadly serious but also deadly funny, Peret embodies the refusal to accept the banal and trivial existence that society tries to force upon us and the passion to fight for a better world without the injustices which capitalism and religion breed, where creativity and self-expression are never censored, a world which we still have yet to see.....
This collection allows us to dream with Peret and inspires us to join the fight for the freedom of the heart....
This collection allows us to dream with Peret and inspires us to join the fight for the freedom of the heart....
May 12, 2017
Can appreciate the historical significance, but the writing, when it's actually there, doesn't hold up. A bunch of pissed-up nonsense for bereft arcana fucks.
December 22, 2008
Marcel Noll: What is Benjamin Péret?
Raymond Queneau: A menagerie in revolt, a jungle, liberty.
Raymond Queneau: A menagerie in revolt, a jungle, liberty.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews