I guess you've preempted my youthful reading of Nadja so now if I say it is a foundational text of my life and a true undersung classic I just sound like a sad pervert. But you're wrong*. Also, read Mad Love, which is a later book (this time he marries the subject, has a child, eventually divorces her) that connects to the earlier one in certain key ways. I hope to have a piece up on this soon, drawing on an interview with Pollizotti, who is not only a great translator but Breton's primary biographer in English. Perhaps it will change your mind a little.
*You are not wrong that Breton is using Nadja for his own purposes, just that you're wrong that the book is bad.
One thing Polizzotti said was that it was as much about Paris of the 20s -- and a Paris that even most Parisians were disinterested by -- as the other two major prose works of the decade by Surrealists, Paris Peasant by Louis Aragon and Last Nights of Paris by Philippe Soupault. In that context, Nadja herself is meant to fulfill a Surrealist role of demonstrating the power of the marvelous, of chance, and even of nonconformity to the (very uptight) bourgeois order that was to be epatered. But Breton actuallly makes himself out to be worse and more exploitative than he actually was, and a great deal of their exchanges, which you might think were invented, are corroborated by his letters and notes of the time. Which is to say, she is not a passive vessel, she drives the bus of her representation as much as he does in some ways.
I think that’s what I mean when I say this is more of a historical artifact; I do think the context is interesting, the story behind the story, but ultimately the text is the text.
Michael: Ultimately the text is the text, and you do not understand it, or Surrealism. And that is fine. You simply ought to stay in your wheelhouse, as the saying goes. No point in reviewing books where you know so little about the subject, or have so little interest in it.
As to its being a "historical artifact", to me, that could be said about almost anything of a certain age, including, or especially, that overripe, overrated piece of crap known as *Ulysses*. (which I'll wager you love). Without a sustained argument as to WHY *Nadja* lacks any merit except as being a document of its time, you'll forgive me if I take your assertions with the pinch of salt they deserve.
Thanks for the Matthias Enard recc. I read "Tell Them of Battles, Kings, and Elephants" last year and adored it. Would love to read more from him.
I guess you've preempted my youthful reading of Nadja so now if I say it is a foundational text of my life and a true undersung classic I just sound like a sad pervert. But you're wrong*. Also, read Mad Love, which is a later book (this time he marries the subject, has a child, eventually divorces her) that connects to the earlier one in certain key ways. I hope to have a piece up on this soon, drawing on an interview with Pollizotti, who is not only a great translator but Breton's primary biographer in English. Perhaps it will change your mind a little.
*You are not wrong that Breton is using Nadja for his own purposes, just that you're wrong that the book is bad.
I can definitely imagine a time when I would’ve been more open to its charms.
One thing Polizzotti said was that it was as much about Paris of the 20s -- and a Paris that even most Parisians were disinterested by -- as the other two major prose works of the decade by Surrealists, Paris Peasant by Louis Aragon and Last Nights of Paris by Philippe Soupault. In that context, Nadja herself is meant to fulfill a Surrealist role of demonstrating the power of the marvelous, of chance, and even of nonconformity to the (very uptight) bourgeois order that was to be epatered. But Breton actuallly makes himself out to be worse and more exploitative than he actually was, and a great deal of their exchanges, which you might think were invented, are corroborated by his letters and notes of the time. Which is to say, she is not a passive vessel, she drives the bus of her representation as much as he does in some ways.
I think that’s what I mean when I say this is more of a historical artifact; I do think the context is interesting, the story behind the story, but ultimately the text is the text.
Michael: Ultimately the text is the text, and you do not understand it, or Surrealism. And that is fine. You simply ought to stay in your wheelhouse, as the saying goes. No point in reviewing books where you know so little about the subject, or have so little interest in it.
As to its being a "historical artifact", to me, that could be said about almost anything of a certain age, including, or especially, that overripe, overrated piece of crap known as *Ulysses*. (which I'll wager you love). Without a sustained argument as to WHY *Nadja* lacks any merit except as being a document of its time, you'll forgive me if I take your assertions with the pinch of salt they deserve.