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I find myself in China in a moderately important town, near Shanghai...

Manuscript

Author

Author André Breton
Person cited Paul Éluard

Description

Handwritten manuscript of a dream by André Breton dated 2 March 1926.

Alongside the five ‘Dreams’ in Clair de terre and the three dream transcriptions published in the first issue of La Révolution surréaliste (1 December 1924), this unpublished text, copied out in André Breton’s hand and dated 2 March 1926, features the appearance of Paul Éluard, against a background of colonial China. At that moment China was indeed in the news headlines, with a controversial intervention by the Western powers, against which the surrealists would protest. In this way, the dream brings together the two strands of poetic and political action. [Atelier André Breton website, 2005]

Handwritten manuscript, 2 March 1926.
‘I find myself in China…’, one and a half small in-4° manuscript pages by Breton in black ink with deletions and corrections, dated  2.3.26.
Manuscript of a dream by André Breton:
‘I find myself in China in a moderately important town, near Shanghai, an English colony built in the American style: enormous iron bridges (Brooklyn) and skyscrapers everywhere, the whole area is inhabited by an Oceanic tribe. I find the strength to drag myself to a room where I think I’ll get dressed so as to join Paul Éluard in Shanghai, if only the state of my wounds will permit.’ [Auction catalogue, 2003]

Translated by Krzysztof Fijalkowski