In a mythical African land, some shipwrecked and uniquely talented
passengers stage a grand gala to entertain themselves and their captor,
the great chieftain Talou. In performance after bizarre
performance--starring, among others, a zither-playing worm, a marksman
who can peel an egg at fifty yards, a railway car that rolls on calves'
lungs, and fabulous machines that paint, weave, and compose
music--Raymond Roussel demonstrates why it is that Andr? Breton termed
him "the greatest mesmerizer of modern times." But even more remarkable
than the mind-bending events Roussel details--as well as their
outlandish, touching, or tawdry backstories--is the principle behind the
novel's genesis, a complex system of puns and double-entendres that
anticipated (and helped inspire) such movements as Surrealism and
Oulipo. Newly translated and with an introduction by Mark Polizzotti,
this edition of "Impressions of Africa" vividly restores the humor,
linguistic legerdemain, and conceptual wonder of Raymond Roussel's
magnum opus.