Black, Brown, and Beige: Surrealist Writings from Africa and the Diaspora
Surrealism as a movement has always resisted the efforts of critics to confine it to any static definition--surrealists themselves have always preferred to speak of it in terms of dynamics, dialectics, goals, and struggles. Accordingly, surrealist groups have always encouraged and exemplified the widest diversity--from its start the movement was emphatically opposed to racism and colonialism, and it embraced thinkers from every race and nation.\ Yet in the vast critical literature on...
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Surrealism as a movement has always resisted the efforts of critics to confine it to any static definition--surrealists themselves have always preferred to speak of it in terms of dynamics, dialectics, goals, and struggles. Accordingly, surrealist groups have always encouraged and exemplified the widest diversity--from its start the movement was emphatically opposed to racism and colonialism, and it embraced thinkers from every race and nation.Yet in the vast critical literature on surrealism, all but a few black poets have been invisible. Academic histories and anthologies typically, but very wrongly, persist in conveying surrealism as an all-white movement, like other "artistic schools" of European origin. In glaring contrast, the many publications of the international surrealist movement have regularly featured texts and reproductions of works by comrades from Martinique, Haiti, Cuba, Puerto Rico, South America, the United States, and other lands. Some of these publications are readily available to researchers; others are not, and a few fall outside academia's narrow definition of surrealism.This collection is the first to document the extensive participation of people of African descent in the international surrealist movement over the past seventy-five years. Editors Franklin Rosemont and Robin D. G. Kelley aim to introduce readers to the black, brown, and beige surrealists of the world--to provide sketches of their overlooked lives and deeds as well as their important place in history, especially the history of surrealism.
List of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Invisible SurrealistsPart 1. The First Black Surrealists Martinique Etienne Léro Légitime Défense Manifesto Civilization And the Ramps Abandon Put Simone Yoyotte Pyjama-Speed Pierre Yoyotte Theory of the Fountain Antifascist Significance of Surrealism Maurice-Sabas Quitman Paradise on Earth Jules Monnerot On Certain Traits Particular to the Civilized Mentality Indispensable Poetry Yva Léro Little Black Divers Aimé Césaire NégreriesJamaica Claude McKay Down to the RootsCuba Juan Breá My Life Is a Sunday Thoughts Juan Breá and Mary Low Notes on the Economic Causes of HumorTrinidad C.L.R. James Introduction to Red Spanish NotebookPart 2. Tropiques: Surrealism in the Caribbean Martinique Aimé Césaire Panorama Introduction to Black American Poetry In the Guise of a Literary Manifesto Keeping Poetry Alive Isidore Ducasse, Comte de Lautréamont Suzanne Césaire Poverty of a Poetry Aimé Césaire, Suzanne Césaire et al. Voice of the Oracle René Ménil Introduction to the Marvelous The Orientation of Poetry What Does Africa Mean to Us? Poetry, Jazz & Freedom Lucie Thésée Preference Georges Gratiant Extinct Volcano Aristide Maugée Aimé Césaire, Poet Review of Reviews Georgette Anderson Symbolism, Maeterlinck & the Marvelous Stéphane Jean-Alexis A Note on ChanceCuba Wifredo Lam Picasso Arrows in Rapid Flight Agustín Cárdenas One, Two, Three Jacques Roumain When the Tom-Tom BeatsHaiti Clément Magloire-Saint-Aude Utterances Talismans Not the Legend Three Poems The Surrealist Record On Poetry René Bélance Awareness Noise Encounter with Life Hervé Télémaque Why Are You Performing, Jean?Dominican Republic Aída Cartagena Portalatín Moon and MarbleTrinidad John Jacob Thomas Creole Proverbs John La Rose Connecting LinkPuerto Rico Luis A. Maisonet Freedom of Expression for Young ChildrenPart 3. South America Brazil João Cruz e Souza Black Rose Tenebrous Rosário Fusco Wind in the Woods Sosígenes Costa The Golden Papyrus The Red Peacock Fernando Mendes de Almeida Phantom Carrousel Jorge de Lima Howling DogsGuyana Léon-Gontran Damas For Sure Good Breeding A Caribbean View on Sterling A. Brown A Single Instant of Belief Negritude and Surrealism Wilson Harris Voodoo, Trance, Poetry and DanceColombia Heriberto Cogollo The World of a NohorPart 4. Africa Egypt Long Live Degenerate Art! Georges Henein Manifesto Art and Freedom Hot Jazz Between the Eagle's Nest and the Mouse-Trap Perspectives Jacques Vaché The Plain Truth A Tribute to André Breton Ikbal El Alailly Portrait of the Author as a Young Rabbit Post-Scriptum Anwar Kamel The Propagandists of Reaction and Us Ramses Younane What Comes After the Logic of Reason? Victor Musgrave Voices in the Twilight Albert Cossery The House of Certain Death Joyce Mansour Floating Islands Fresh Cream Forthwith to S North Express Response to an Inquiry on Magic ArtMorocco Robert Benayoun No Rhyme for Reason! The Obscure Protests Letter to Chicago The Phoenix of Animation Too Much Is Too Much Comic Sounds Abdellatif Laâbi Rue du RetourTunisia Farid Lariby Pome BrutAlgeria Henri Kréa Never Forever Once More Oh Yes Jean-Michel Atlan The Time Has Come to Call Up a World Baya The Big Bird Habib Tengour Maghrebian SurrealismSenegal Cheikh Tidiane Sylla Surrealism and Black African Art The Spirit of Unity---For FreedomCongo Tchicaya U Tam'si Against DestinyMozambique Inácio Matsinhe Painting as a Contribution to Consciousness I Became a Tortoise to Resist Torture The SnakeAngola Malangatana Valente Ngwenya Survivor among Millions Amílcar Cabral National Liberation and Culture Antonio Domingues The Influence of Aimé Césaire in Portuguese-speaking AfricaMadagascar Jean-Joseph Rabéarivelo A Purple StarSouth Africa Dennis Brutus The Sun on This Rubble Poet against ApartheidPart 5. Surrealist Beginnings in the United States, 1930s\\-1950s Fenton Johnson The Phantom Rabbit Tired George Herriman Positivilly Marvillis Jean Toomer Essentials Zora Neale Hurston How the Gods Behave Richard Wright Lawd Today Ralph Ellison The Poetry of It Bearden & the Destruction of the Accepted World Russell Atkins Upstood UpstaffedPart 6. The 1950s Surrealist Underground in the United States Ted Joans Ted Joans Speaks Bob Kaufman Abomunist Manifesto $$ Abomunus Craxioms $$ Abomunist Election Manifesto Tom Postell Gertrude Stein Rides the Torn Down El to NYC Harmony Percy Edward Johnston Variations on a ThemePart 7. Surrealism, Black Power, Black Arts Ted Joans Proposition for a Black Power Manifesto Hart Leroy Bibbs Hurricane Black Spring Jayne Cortez National Security Making it St. Clair Drake Negritude and Pan-Africanism Edward A. Jones The Birth of Black Awareness Ishmael Reed Boxing on Paper Katherine Dunham Ballet Nègre Notes on the Dance Melvin Edwards Lynch Fragments Joseph Jarman Odawalla Oliver Pitcher Jean-Jacques Frank London Brown Jazz Pony Poindexter Jazz Is More French Than American Anthony Braxton Earth Music Thelonious Monk Three Score Cecil Taylor The Musician Ornette Coleman Harmolodic = Highest Instinct Sun Ra Cosmic Equation The Endless Realm Babs Gonzales I Paid My Dues A.B. Spellman The New Thing in Jazz Dizzy Gillespie Gertrude AbercrombiePart 8. Toward the New Millennium: The Mid-1970s through the 1990s Aimé Césaire My Joyful Acceptance of Surrealism Homage to Frantz Fanon Jayne Cortez There It Is What's Ugly Poetry Music Technology Everything Can Be Transformed Taking the Blues Back Home Léon Damas Mainstream Statement Larry's Time Amiri Baraka The Changing Same James G. Spady Larry Neal Never Forgot Philly Charlotte Carter On Film Robin D.G. Kelley Reflections on Malcolm X Norman Calmese My Discovery of Surrealism Cheikh Tidiane Sylla Time-Traveler's Potlatch Ted Joans Kaufman Is a Bird Called Bob CogolloPart 9. Looking Ahead: Surrealism Today and Tomorrow Aimé Césaire I Do Not Agree to Receive the Minister Robin D.G. Kelley Surrealism Ayana Karanja Contemplation Melvin Edwards Thinking about Surrealism T.J. Anderson III At Last Roundup Vaudeville 1951 Michael Stone-Richards Surrealist Subversion in Everyday Life (with Julien Lenoir) Ron Allen Revelation Conversation between Eye and Mouth Anthony Joseph How Surrealism Found Me Extending Out to Brightness Patrick Turner Unrestricted Images Adrienne Kennedy People Who Led Me to My Plays Tyree Guyton There Is a True Magic Here Henry Dumas Will the Circle Be Unbroken? Deusdedit de Morais Café de Cherbourg Jayne Cortez Poetry Coming as Blues and Blues Coming as Poetry Free Time FrictionAfterword: Surrealism and the Creation of a Desirable Future, by Robin D.G. Kelley Bibliography Index
