Nadja - Surrealist tale by André Breton - intriguing question?

Question

To those that haven't read "Nadja" by André Breton, read it.

To those that have, how would you take the words of Nadja? Are they the wanton ramblings of a deranged mental patient? Or are they just the words of a surrealist writer - devoid of logical thought, yet sane?

This is both a survey question and a comments question - I am doing research on this book and would appreciate any input.

Answer 1

Best Answer - Chosen by Voters

The Surrealists projected their idea of the unconscious as automatic, irrational, closer to nature, but also 'uncivilised' onto various figures of The Other. This can be seen in Bataille's fascination with so-called "primitive" art, and also in the depiction of women in Surrealist art. While the primacy of the imaginative and irrational formed an entrance into the artistic world for some privileged women like Leonora Carrington and Meret Oppenheimer, it mainly froze women as models and vessels for male writers' posturing. "Nadja" is Breton's figure of the Surreal, and of his own Surrealist work, projected outwards onto a woman -- as Freud projects his anxieties about psychoanalysis onto Dora in his famous case study.

"Nadja" could be read as a psychoanalytic case study of Breton & the Surrealist movement - anxieties about feminisation, identity, fixity, fame and meaning run through the book. A number of excellent readings begin with Nadja's discarded glove, and a sculpture of a glove in bronze owned (I think) by Freud. What is it about this glove - the abandoned, suggestive shape of a woman's hand - that so haunts Breton?

Answer 2

according to surrealists, the only difference between a sane person and an insane is that the second is more easily in touch with his unconscious mind.

Source(s):

my conscious mind.