Benjamin Péret - Wikipedia Benjamin Péret From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to navigation Jump to search Benjamin Péret Born (1899-07-04)4 July 1899 Rezé, Loire-Atlantique, France Died 18 September 1959(1959-09-18) (aged 60) Paris, Île-de-France, France Nationality French Known for Writing Movement Dada, Surrealism French literature by category French literary history Medieval Renaissance 17th 18th 19th 20th century Contemporary French writers Chronological list Writers by category Essayists Novelists Playwrights Poets Short story writers Children's writers Portals France Literature v t e Benjamin Péret (4 July 1899 – 18 September 1959) was a French poet, Parisian Dadaist and a founder and central member of the French Surrealist movement[1][2] with his avid use of Surrealist automatism. Contents 1 Biography 2 Works 3 References 4 English translations 5 External links Biography[edit] Benjamin Péret was born in Rezé, France on 4 July 1899.[3] 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. During a routine movement of his unit via train, he discovered a copy of the magazine Sic, sitting upon a bench on the station platform, which contained poetry by Apollinaire – sparking his love for poetry. Towards the end of the war, still in Greece, he suffered from an attack of Dysentery which led to his repatriation and deployment in Lorraine for the remainder of the war.[4] After the end of the war he joined the Dada movement and soon after, in 1921, he published Le Passager du transtlantique – his first book of poetry before he abandoned the Dada movement to follow André Breton and the emerging Surrealist movement, working alongside and influencing the Mexican writer Octavio Paz. In the fall of 1924 he was the co-editor of the journal La Révolution surréaliste, becoming chief editor in 1925. And in 1928, before emigrating to Brazil in 1929 with his wife Elsie Houston, he published Le Grand Jeu. Two years later in 1931, a mere few months after the birth of his first son, Geyser, whilst living in Rio de Janeiro, he was arrested and expelled from Brazil on grounds of being a 'Communist Agitator' – having formed, with his brother-in-law Mario Pedrosa, the Brazilian Communist League which was based upon the ideas of Trotsky.[5] After returning to France, he went to Spain at the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War and fought on the Republican side. Back in France, in 1940 he was imprisoned for his political activities. Upon his release he sailed for Mexico with the aid of the American-based Emergency Rescue Committee to study pre-Columbian myths and American folklore. He had originally wished to emigrate to the United States but was unable to do so due to his Communist affiliations. Péret went to Mexico with his partner, the Spanish artist Remedios Varo. In Mexico City he became involved with the European intellectual community around the Austrian painter and surrealist Wolfgang Paalen living there in exile. He was particularly inspired by Paalen's huge collection and knowledge about the "Totem Art" of the Northwest Coast of British Columbia; 1943 he finished a long essay on the necessity of poetical myths, exemplified with the mythology and art of the Northwest Coast, which was then published in New York by André Breton in VVV.[6] While living in Mexico City Péret met Natalia Sedova, Trotsky's widow. He remained in Mexico until the end of 1947. He returned to Paris and died there on 18 September 1959. Works[edit] 1921: Le Passager du transatlantique 1925: Cent cinquante-deux proverbes mis au goût du jour, en collaboration avec Paul Éluard 1927: Dormir, dormir dans les pierres 1928: Le Grand Jeu 1934: De derrière les fagots 1936: Je sublime 1936: Je ne mange pas de ce pain-là 1945: Le Déshonneur des poètes 1945: Dernier Malheur dernière chance 1946: Un point c’est tout 1952: Air mexicain 1955: Le Livre de Chilam Balam de Chumayel 1956: Anthologie de l’amour sublime 1957: Gigot, sa vie, son œuvre 1960: Le premier tournage de porno References[edit] ^ Surrealist Writers Archived 1 November 2011 at the Wayback Machine. Alangullette.com. Retrieved 20 September 2011. ^ Atlas Press Trade Titles – Death To The Pigs – Benjamin Péret Archived 3 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine. Atlaspress.co.uk. Retrieved 20 September 2011. ^ Benjamin Peret | artist and art. The-artists.org (18 September 1959). Retrieved 20 September 2011. ^ [1][dead link] ^ Claude Courtot : Benjamin Péret (1899–1959). Benjamin-peret.org. Retrieved 20 September 2011. ^ Benjamin Péret: La parole est à Péret, New York 1943, also in: Œuvres complètes, Tome 6, Les Amériques et autres lieux, Paris 1992, p. 18ff English translations[edit] Four Years After the Dog. Poems of Benjamin Péret. Arc Publications, 1974. Irregular Work. Actual Size Press, 1984. Death to the Pigs and the Field of Battle. Atlas Press, 1988. From the Hidden Storehouse (Selected Poems by Benjamin Péret). Oberlin College, 1991. Mad Balls. Atlas Press, 1991. The Automatic Muse. Atlas Press, 1994. A Menagerie in Revolt! Selected Writings. Black Swan Press, 2009. The Leg of Lamb: Its Life and Works. Cambridge, MA: Wakefield Press, 2011 External links[edit] Biography portal  French Wikisource has original text related to this article: Auteur:Benjamin Péret  French Wikiquote has quotations related to: Benjamin Péret Benjamin Péret at Find a Grave A Menagerie in Revolt! Selected Writings of Benjamin Péret (Publisher website) Authority control BIBSYS: 90345706 BNE: XX1065878 BNF: cb11919121g (data) CANTIC: a11325033 CiNii: DA03378915 GND: 118790307 ISNI: 0000 0001 0923 6771 LCCN: n50009673 NDL: 001142722 NKC: xx0060894 NLA: 35416742 NLI: 001436193 NSK: 000193086 NTA: 069368600 SNAC: w6445t6z SUDOC: 027064824 Trove: 945134 VcBA: 495/343799 VIAF: 90640237 WorldCat Identities: lccn-n50009673 Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Benjamin_Péret&oldid=960030743" Categories: 1899 births 1959 deaths People from Loire-Atlantique Dada Surrealist poets French communists French Marxists French Trotskyists Marxist writers French male poets 20th-century French poets 20th-century French novelists French erotica writers Burials at the Cimetière des Batignolles French surrealist writers Communist poets Hidden categories: Webarchive template wayback links All articles with dead external links Articles with dead external links from September 2011 Use dmy dates from May 2020 Articles with hCards Wikipedia articles with BIBSYS identifiers Wikipedia articles with BNE identifiers Wikipedia articles with BNF identifiers Wikipedia articles with CANTIC identifiers Wikipedia articles with CINII identifiers Wikipedia articles with GND identifiers Wikipedia articles with ISNI identifiers Wikipedia articles with LCCN identifiers Wikipedia articles with NDL identifiers Wikipedia articles with NKC identifiers Wikipedia articles with NLA identifiers Wikipedia articles with NLI identifiers Wikipedia articles with NSK identifiers Wikipedia articles with NTA identifiers Wikipedia articles with SNAC-ID identifiers Wikipedia articles with SUDOC identifiers Wikipedia articles with Trove identifiers Wikipedia articles with VcBA identifiers Wikipedia articles with VIAF identifiers Wikipedia articles with WORLDCATID identifiers Navigation menu Personal tools Not logged in Talk Contributions Create account Log in Namespaces Article Talk Variants Views Read Edit View history More Search Navigation Main page Contents Current events Random article About Wikipedia Contact us Donate Contribute Help Learn to edit Community portal Recent changes Upload file Tools What links here Related changes Upload file Special pages Permanent link Page information Cite this page Wikidata item Print/export Download as PDF Printable version In other projects Wikimedia Commons Languages Български Brezhoneg Català Čeština Deutsch Español Esperanto فارسی Français Italiano Македонски Nederlands 日本語 Polski Português Русский Svenska Edit links This page was last edited on 31 May 2020, at 19:45 (UTC). 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