DESNOS, Robert (1900-1945)

DESNOS, Robert (1900-1945)

Autograph letter signed « Robert Desnos » to Jean Carrive
N.p.n.d. [Paris, 10 Sept. 1923], 1 p. in-12° on lined paper, in blue ink
With autograph envelope, stamped and postmarked

An affectionate note from the poet to the very young surrealist Jean Carrive

« Cher ami,
Ne vous tourmentez pas tant.
Toujours très occupé je vous écrirai d’ici peu quand ma littérature sera claire.
Bonjour à [Pierre] Picon
Votre
Robert Desnos »

A solitary student from Bordeaux in open rebellion against family and social conventions, Carrive discovered the review Littérature and sought, through André Breton, to join the Parisian avant-garde circle. Wary of this overly prolific correspondent, Breton often entrusted Robert Desnos with the task of replying to him. Between the two young men there then developed an exchange of remarkable freedom and virulence (in sharp contrast to this gentle note), where provocation and a taste for literary subversion served as an implicit manifesto.
Carrive is among the nineteen names listed in the Manifesto of Surrealism (1924) as having “performed an act of absolute surrealism.” He contributed to the twelfth and final issue of La Révolution surréaliste in 1929, before distancing himself from the movement in the late 1920s. André Breton eventually settled accounts with him, among others, in the Second Manifesto of Surrealism (1930).