Essays reflecting on the science of imaginary solutions, from an
influential figure in pataphysical thought
Pataphysics: the science of imaginary solutions, of laws governing
exceptions and of the laws describing the universe supplementary to this
one. Alfred Jarry's posthumous novel, Exploits and Opinions of Dr.
Faustroll, Pataphysician, first appeared in 1911, and over the next 100
years, his pataphysical supersession of metaphysics would influence
everyone from Marcel Duchamp and Boris Vian to Umberto Eco and Jean
Baudrillard. In 1948 in Paris, a group of writers and thinkers would
found the College of 'Pataphysics, still going strong today. The
iconoclastic René Daumal was the first to elaborate upon Jarry's unique
and humorous philosophy. Though Daumal is better known for his
unfinished novel Mount Analogue and his refusal to be adopted by the
Surrealist movement, this newly translated volume of writings offers a
glimpse of often overlooked Daumal: Daumal the pataphysician.
Pataphysical Essays collects Daumal's overtly pataphysical writings
from 1929 to 1941, from his landmark exposition on pataphysics and
laughter to his late essay, "The Pataphysics of Ghosts." Daumal's
"Treatise on Patagrams" offers the reader everything from a recipe for
the disintegration of a photographer to instructions on how to drill a
fount of knowledge in a public urinal. This volume also includes
Daumal's column for the Nouvelle Revue Française, "Pataphysics This
Month." Reading like a deranged encyclopedia, "Pataphysics This Month"
describes a new mythology for the field of science, and amply
demonstrates that the twentieth century had been a distinctly
pataphysical era.
