André Breton & Philippe Soupault – Magnetische velden

Les Champs Magnétiques was written long before any surrealist manifesto had been published, and is regarded as the birth of surrealism. The book is the first experiment with ‘écriture automatique’, a literary technique borrowed from spiritualism and free association in psychoanalysis. The result is an enchanting and evocative collection of prose and poetry, written in a trance in just one week by two young authors. According to Louis Aragon Breton and Soupault had grown into a “double-headed writer”. Magnetische velden is dedicated to the dandy Jacques Vaché, who committed suicide at early age with an overdose of opium.