The Collection

Home Page > Works > I Don't Like Saying Goodbye [This is a play on ' _À Dieu ne plaise!_' (God forbi...

    I Don't Like Saying Goodbye [This is a play on ' _À Dieu ne plaise!_' (God forbid!)]

    Manuscript

    Author

    Author André Breton
    People cited Folengo, François Rabelais, Jonathan Swift, Guillaume Apollinaire, Marcel Duchamp, Alfred Jarry, Francis Picabia

    Description

    Manuscript by André Breton in memory of Francis Picabia read on 4 December, 1953.

    I Don’t Like Saying Goodbye. Following an old custom Breton is here reviving and reactivating an outdated expression in saluting Francis Picabia’s memory with these words pronounced during his burial in Montmartre, on 4 December, 1953. It pays homage, a genuine homage, to someone the poet always considered, along with Duchamp and Picasso, to be the inventor par excellence. This explains why the rather conventional formula ‘pioneer of the modern spirit’ is reworked, in a new recognition of the ways Picabia may have influenced Breton and surrealism. [André Breton Workshop website, 2005]

    Signed hand-written manuscript and typescript, Paris, 3 December, 1953
    2 pages in-4° handwritten text on the back of Médium, letter-headed paper, with erasures and corrections, dated and signed by Breton, entitled ‘I Don’t Like Saying Goodbye’, in which Breton pays homage to Francis Picabia who had recently died:
    ‘When attending such funerals everyone should take pride in being fortunate to have known a man who never worried about the sufferings weighing over him. […]
    ‘Would you believe, my dear Francis, that a newspaper said I influenced you? We know it is the opposite. You were among the two or three great pioneers of what has been called, for want of a better expression, “the modern spirit”.’
    This text was read by Breton at Picabia's funeral at Montmartre cemetery and published as a booklet by P.A.B.
    1 typescript of the same text, incomplete, 2 pages in-4°. [catalogue of the sale, 2003]

    With thanks to Frabrice Pascaud, for his Arcane 17, number 2 of Médium of February 1954, in PDF. Please note the file is a bit heavy. [André Breton website, 2015]

    Bibliography

    - André Breton, in « Un pas de roses rouges », Médium, communication surréaliste, n°2, février 1954, p. 9
    - André Breton, « Adieu ne plaise », La Nouvelle NRF, 1er mars 1954, p. 489-491
    - André Breton, Adieu ne plaise, P.-A.B., Alès, 1954
    - André Breton (Édition publiée sous la direction d'Étienne-Alain Hubert avec la collaboration de Philippe Bernier et Marie-Claire Dumas), « Adieu ne plaise », Perspective cavalière, Œuvres complètes, tome IV, Écrits sur l'art et autres textes, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, Paris, Gallimard, 2008, p. 866-868, notice p. 1399

    Creation date03-déc.-53
    LanguagesFrench
    Physical descriptionMs et Ts - encre noire
    Library

    Bibliothèque littéraire Jacques Doucet, Paris : BRT 112

    Reference567000
    Breton Auction, 2003Lot 2373
    Keywords, , ,
    CategoriesManuscripts, Andre Breton's Manuscripts
    Set[Manuscrits d'AB] Perspective cavalière, [Journal] Médium
    ExhibitionDiscours d'André Breton à la mémoire de Francis Picabia
    Permanent linkhttps://www.andrebreton.fr/en/work/56600100421990

    See also

    2 Works
     
    False

    Adieu ne plaise

    -
    André Breton

    Allocution d'André Breton prononcée aux funérailles de Francis Picabia en 1953, éditée sur grand papier, avec gouache.

    Trois images, une notice descriptive, une bibliographie, un lien.

    False

    Médium, 2

    -

    Numéro 2 de la nouvelle série de la revue Médium, publié en février 1954 sous la direction de Jean Schuster.

    Cinq images, une notice descriptive, un lien. 

    [Journal] Médium