Including a number of short essays by Bataille and Leiris on aspects
of the other's work as well as excerpts on Bataille from Leiris'
diaries, this collection of correspondence throws new light on two of
Surrealism's most radical dissidents.
In the autumn of 1924, just before André Breton published the Manifeste
du surréalisme, two young men met in Paris for the first time. Georges
Bataille, 27, starting work at the Bibliothèque Nationale; Michel
Leiris, 23, beginning his studies in ethnology. Within a few months,
they were both members of the Surrealist group, although their adherence
to Surrealism (unlike their affinities with it) would not last long: in
1930 they were among the signatories of "Un cadavre," the famous tract
against Breton, the "Machiavelli of Montmartre," as Leiris put it. But
their friendship would endure for more than 30 years, and their
correspondence, assembled here for the first time in English, would
continue until the death of Bataille in 1962.