Analysis

of André Breton ‘First Surrealist Manifesto 1924’

I find this manifesto particularly interesting in the way that it is
written and how it goes about saying what needs to be said. It is
written almost in the style of a thought experiment, I believe this was
done so that society may comprehend the dreamlike nature of the
topics that are being discussed. The main thing to keep in mind that
before this the genre of surrealism didn’t exist, it may have existed in
ways of things that looked like and represented a dreamlike quality;
as many of the anti-realist notions conveyed in surrealism has its
roots in Dadaism. But before this Manifesto, surrealism as a
definition did not exist. Meaning that everything discussed in this
manifesto is being debated for the first time, as such many of the
ideas would have been dismissed as nonsense or misunderstood by
our largely rationalist society; unfortunately not much has changed,
the masses can still appreciate the beauty of art, but they are still
very close-minded when it comes to understanding or looking for the
deeper connotations that the work has to offer. To truly understand
anything of what lies beneath a surrealist painting, one must be truly
open-minded.

During the first part of this Manifesto Breton talks about the current
society that she lived in, a society that had seen the rise of the art
moment Dada and the fall of the communist upraising of World War
two. This is a world that had previously been shaped by fear, stress
and violence and now that the conflict is over; they were seeing the
changes that would mark a new era. I society build upon the ideology
of knowledge, creativity and freedom. I believe the genre of Dada
marked this era and that the First Surreal Manifesto was making the
next leap in the creative progress. This idea of a developing and
evolving creative colligate, can be summed up in 2 short sentences of
the first paragraphs of this manifesto. ‘We are still under the reign of
logic’ and ‘perhaps the imagination is on the verge of recovering is
own rights’. There are parts in the manifest that truly challenge my
knowledge and reasoning, such as the repeated use of the highly
acclaimed name of Sigmund Freud; who is mentioned in the first
paragraph, he was mainly know as the fonder of psychoanalysis and
for his written work The Interpretation of Dreams. Within the
confines of the book he states that dreams are in principal symbolic
allowing the sorting of repressed wishes and emotions. So the idea of
this manifesto being more of thought excrement is brought up again.

The next 4 paragraphs are done in a much more poetic style, but each
paragraph represents a reflective view from Breton’s perspective on
the different stats or phases of ones dream. In the 1950s Eugene
Aserinsky and Nathaniel Kleitman. Hooked people up to an EEG
(Electroencephalography) Machine, they thought that the would
prove that a sleeping brain, was an inactive brain. They found the
contrary; the brain is actually rather active during sleep and that
brain waves will oscillate. During this time there is acutely a cycle,
much like the 4 phases described within these paragraphs.

Phase 1 within the limits
This paragraph tries to describe the confines or emancipation of the
dream. She is trying to understand a dream in some respect; she is
trying to tease out her thoughts. To make the idea of a dream less of a
paradox.
‘Only memory clams the right to edit’, an interesting sentence as it
puts forward the idea that dreams never seem whole, due to there
random nature.
‘(1) It is important to note that noting leads to a greater dissipation of
the constituent elements of the dream’, this is because dreams are
made up of our experiences; meaning that your emotions play are
large role in a dreams landscape.
‘Perhaps my dream of last night was a continuation’, the idea that
dreams is a running narrative continued from one night, to the other.
This is where the idea of the dream and the contemplation of what
makes a dream, delves into the world of philosophy.
‘The ‘reality’ with which I am concerned even exists in the dream
state, or that it does not sink into the immemorial’. This is bring into
question what is reality and if her reality is the basis of her dreams.
‘Then why should I not concede to the dream what I sometime refute
to reality’, If her reality makes up her dreamscape, does mean
refusing to except her dreams as part of that reality, is a way of
refusing actuality although?
“Why should I expect more of a dream sign that I do of a daily
increasing degree of consciousness?’ this is yet another reference to
Freud; the more aware we become of our dreams, the less tangible
the dreams become in return.


Faze 2 I return to the walking state
This next passage is much in the style of Freud, in the sense that it
almost conveys the psychosexual nature of a dreamscape and how it
realties to the awakened mind. ‘The mind hardly dares express itself
and, when it does, it is limited to stating that this idea of that woman
has an effect on it’

Faze 3 the mind of a Dreaming man
This paragraph tackles the idea that dreams are angelic and chaotic
in there nature. Because of this the dreaming man will have no idea
where the dream will lead him or how it will lead him. All the man
knows is the events are happing before his eyes and because of this
the mind is satisfied. And when the mind dose get a hold of things,
one will either go mad with power though a lucid dream or wake-up.
‘A mans awakening is harsher, if he brakes the spell to well.’

Phase 4 when the times comes
The final phase shows the realization of their dreams and is a
documented account of the creation of the surrealism movement.
‘I believe in the future resolutions of these two state—outwardly so
contradictory –witch are dream and reality, into a sort of absolute
reality a surreality, to speak.’ A short antidote is provided about
Saint-Pol-Roux a French poet, basically it that The Poet Works whilst
he sleeps. One of the largest and most symbolic points provided
during this manifesto was this short sentence. ‘A man is cut by the
window’, this sentence was suggested to have come to her mina
dream; which adds to the over all symbolic meaning and conjecture
this sentence has. This sentence is trying to make a statement, that
there is a difference between a man in the waking world and a man in
the sleeping world. It’s slight differentiation like the refraction
caused by a pain of glass, no matter what side of the glass your on,
the other side will look distorted. The other meaning is that you
cannot physically touch the other side of the glass. There is one more
meaning and that is only if this sentence truly came form a dream;
the meaning of this sentence reflects Breton’s struggle caused by her
emotions and distress.
The final lines of this manifesto go about elaborating and
documenting the creation of the term surrealism. It also shows the
methods in which Breton and Philippe Soupault went about creating
poetry that had a form of pure emotion. The creation motioned was
to speck your mind for long periods of time without stop.
The most important part of this manifesto is the end, where Breton
defines the term Surrealism.
This entire manifesto is in a way a thought experiment, as well as a
literal experiment and a form of poetry. For these reason it should
not be a manifesto. But what makes it a manifesto is that ones
dreams and goals are being layer out on the table for all to see. The
thing that makes this manifesto truly unique is that its one true and
stated goal is realized. Burton dreamed, to bring dreams into reality
to create a new medium that would be recognized for its unique out
look on life. The surrealist out look a nonconformist outlook, to deny
what others say, to object to laws of physics, to object to logic and
reason, to make, do and feel whatever you want. Where world is
created by the mind of a madman, where chaos and harmony reign
tougher.
This is what this manifesto is about, the realization of a dream.