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This is the first paperback edition in English of one of the most important and entertaining works of Surrealist fiction. Aragon's 1922 novel boldly appropriates the title and plot of a didactic 17th-century epic, recounting the adventures of Odysseus' son Telemachus; but the moralistic underpinnings of the original are replaced by a Surrealist's dedication to the strange, the beautiful, and the erotic. Though a classic of Surrealism, this is not automatic writing; on the contrary, it is a wryly self-conscious book, full of the kinds of intertextual games associated with writers such as Borges and Calvino. As the Huberts comment in their Introduction, "Aragon did not have to liberate his mind through automatic exercises; but by mastering and playing with the narrativehe succeeded in freeing himself from the constraints of mimeticismdescend[ing] into the diabolical nirvana of dada." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

An ode to disorientation
Louis Aragon (1897-1982) published the most enchanting of all surrealist novels, translated as "Paris Peasant," in 1924. Two years earlier, on the cusp between DADAism and surrealism he had inverted (and perverted) the 17th-century didactic book of the same title by Fenelon. Both authors imagined Telemachus, son of crafty Ulysses and patient (and far-from-guileless) Penelope, setting out to find out why his father has not returned to Greece with the other victors of the Trojan War.

Telemachus and his ancient Mentor (the goddess of wisdom, Minerva in gender-crossing disguise) wash up on the shores of Ogygia, where his father had earlier dallied with Calypso and her nymphs. The family resemblance is instantly noticed, and Calypso wants to take up with the younger image of the lover who abandoned her. He is also lusted after by the nymph Eucharis.

I am making it sound as if there was a plot, but the book is almost entirely digressions that are not senseless, but are mostly pointless, as Aragon played with words and the strange juxtapositions DADAists conjured and adored.I would estimate that the text is less than 20,000 words. Perhaps it is delightful in French, though I doubt it. It was certainly a provocation, including a lesbian tryst and the debauching a virtuous youth (the inversion of Fenelon). In the formulation of the helpful (trés academic) introduction by the brave translators), Aragon (et al.) "freed himself from the constraints of mimeticism in regard to fable, meaning, and language, ... dissociated language from significance... [and] generated a verbal overflow or overkill, kindling the desire for and the voluptuousness of verbal indulgence"... which is not everyone's glass of absinthe.

Pre-surrealist masterpiece
Aragon demonstrates his involvement in the Paris DADA scene with this excellent proto-Surrealist work.In the tradition of Alfred Jarry, he presents an utterly fantastic tale full of wonderful nonsense and absurdwit.That Surrealism arose from DADA is evident in his juxtaposing ofunrelated ideas and use of automatic writing techniques (the latter ofwhich produces an effect similar to Breton's Magnetic Fields).If you likethe work of Jarry, Schwitters, Tzara, and the like, then you will probablyenjoy this.

ACTION PACKED!
SCARED FOR LIFE! Porn queen runs to ex-husband as lover is taken in by Po-Po.I was all washed up and there was a relentless wave of phone calls upon me when I found this book. A treatise on parisian intellectualtheatrics, these adventures are an unbelievable example of how utterlylikable surrealist pretensions can be. It is sure to cheer you up (evencures minor ailments).

A difficult book to get into
Man oh man, what a trial it was trying to get into this book. I'm normally a fan of surrealist writing (see my reviews of Breton's NADJA, Aragon's PARIS PEASANT and Carrington's THE HEARING TRUMPET) but TELEMACHUS seems tome to be a rather torturous exercise in literary gymnastics. I've been toldthat in this work Aragon pulls out all the stops as he uses every pun,metaphor and literary device available to rework and subvert Frenchliterary traditions. It doesn't seem to have come off too well in thetranslation though. The plot is very loosely based around the adventures ofTelemachus, who is shipwrecked on a fantastical island with his androgynousMentor. On the way he is tempted by the blandishments of Calypso and hernymphs. But that's about as much plot as you get. The narrative (if one cancall it that) consists of sentences strung in a truly surrealist manner.Remember how the Parisian Surrealists were all enchanted by that one famousline by Lautreamont about the chance meeting of an umbrella and a sewingmachine? Well, in this work Aragon takes these surrealist juxtapositions tothe extreme. The result is initially surprising and one cannot doubt thestartling beauty of some of the images originally afforded by thistechnique, but when the entire book is written in this fashion, it getsvery hard indeed. Not a good introduction to surrealist writing at all--infact, it really put me off. Read it if you absolutely MUST. ... Read more

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surrealist novel, tr Simon Watson Taylor ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

I agree with the review below.
This book is good, but it's not that good. It's a nice little time capsule. Someone who is not interested in turn of the century Paris or surrealism probably wouldn't enjoy it that much.

Aragon critiques modern life
Louis Aragon's Paysan de Paris is a landmark in the history of modernist literature. The book basically illustrates the surrealist experiences of an "urban peasant" who sees Paris as an ancient, prehistoric landscape, full of mythical creatures. What Aragon does is to illustrate the fragmented and chaotic perception of modern life. Life in modernity is not anymore the predictable experience of past agrarian societies. It becomes agitated where the rule is to shock. Moreover, depicting Paris as an ancient mythical landscape instead of a modern sophisticated environment serves to criticize the dreamy character of capitalism where things appear as if they were always there, devoid of history and social relations. Aragon's book was essential in the development of modern aesthetic theory such as Theodor Adorno, Walter Benjamin, and Peter Berger

Not as good as Nadja, Les Champs Magnetiques, et al.
Louis Aragon, Paris Peasant (Gallimard, 1926)

Aragon, one of the people at the core of the dada, and later the surrealist, movements in France, is a fantastic poet, like most of them were. However, I'm finding, as I move out to explore the prose of the movements after twenty years of enjoying (and being influenced by) the poetry, that most of them were far better poets than they were novelists. There are exceptions, of course (Rene Daumal's unfinished Mount Analogue and Breton/Eluard's Les Champs Magnetiques both made my best-reads-of-the-year list in the early nineties), but Paris Peasant isn't one of them.

The book's not bad, for what it is, but it could have been so much more. It encompasses three prose works of Aragon's, two of which seem to be that curious mixture of fiction and nonfiction which has become so popular in recent years, and the third of which is indescribable by normal means other than to say it's prose. The first is a travelogue of sorts, a kind of gutter-level guidebook to an area of Paris that most tourists likely stayed well away from. At a hundred twelve pages, it's by far the longest piece in the book. It's also written in almost stream-of-consciousness style, with no real attempt at coherence or flow, making it a more difficult read than it needed to be. The second details an evening Aragon spent with Breton and Marcel Noll strolling through Paris; it's the strongest of the three, the only one where Aragon's long diversions (which are likely to put one in mind of James or Joyce, though Aragon lacks the command of language of either; that, however, could easily be the fault of the translator rather than Aragon himself) really seem as if they're contributing to the piece, rather than distracting. The third, "The Peasant's Dream," doesn't really seem to fit into the short story or memoir categories; it's tempting to hang the godawful "flash fiction" moniker on it, or it would be were it not fifteen pages long. It's not bad, really, but it's not all that great, either; it's just there.

A minor, at best, work in the surrealist catalogue. There are many other things that belong in your collection before you set your sights on this one. ** ½

An amazing read!
Often considered one of the definitive surrealist novels (along with Andre Breton's NADJA), Paris Peasant is an exhilarating read. Aragon takes us through a special guided tour of Paris--not the Paris as we know it withits Eiffel Tower and other famous landmarks, but a Paris of crumblingarcades, dilapidated shopfronts and suburban parks. Aragon imbues thedetritus of the city with poetry and magic, and shows us how the surrealistspirit lives in the outmoded structures of civilization. His ode to thePassage de l'Opera, at that time threatened by Baron Haussmann's plans forthe redevelopment of the city, is a tacit challenge to the rapaciousness ofcapitalism and modernization, with its quest for the ever-new and itsdestruction of the past. Every urbanite will find something to identifywith in this marvellous portrait of Paris in the 1920s.

Ideal English Edition
This new edition of a scare work is welcome not only for the exposure it provides to Aragon and his work (if it can be called that), but for the loving manner in which it is produced. From the covers to the typeface to the translation of newspaper column margins, editor Damon Krukowski and designer Naomi Yang, known more for their musical than literary endevours, have brought attention to the smallest detail, the kind of attention that is the substance of the text itself. The translation, from a 1971 edition, flows perfectly; just alien enough from standard English to draw attention to Aragon's linguistic differences, but not a characature of French style. It would be hard to imagine a better English edition of this work. James L. Wolf ... Read more

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This book acquaints the English-speaking public with the life and works of Louis Aragon and his wife Elsa Triolet, both novelists. It presents these two writers together, as they themselves wanted to be studied. In 1964 they started the interwoven publication of their fictional works, stressing that neither of them could be understood without reference to the other. The work examines their early years, then analyzes the works of the two writers in the light of the fruitful exchange of experiences, emotions and ideas which they enjoyed. The author met the writers in person, and has devoted many years to the study of their work. ... Read more

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