Georges Bataille Book order

Kontroverzní a fascinující novela Nebeská modř nás vtahuje do politicky a sociálně napjaté Evropy třicátých let. Protagonista Troppmann, zmítaný apatií a destruktivními impulzy, postupně prochází Paříží, Vídní nebo Barcelonou, až nakonec sezná nemožnost uniknout vlastnímu osudu. Je fascinován smrtí, erotikou a absurditou, sleduje rozklad vlastní identity i společnosti kolem sebe. Násilím prostoupená touha jej unáší do míst, v nichž zuří občanské nepokoje, dochází k atentátům nebo se schyluje k válce. A představa smrti, její dechberoucí blízkost, znamená jediný způsob, jak takovou touhu ukojit. Setkání s ní nevede ke zbabělému ponížení - naopak se překlápí v bezbřehé přitakání životu, které Troppmann zakouší v náručích svých tří osudových milenek. Dílo vzniklé v polovině třicátých let, avšak vydané až roku 1957, vyniká kombinací svrchované obraznosti, existenciálních úvah a provokativního, často až tabuizovaného obsahu. A nejen že odráží krizi meziválečné Evropy, ale zároveň nutí i dnešní čtenáře konfrontovat temné a iracionální aspekty lidské povahy.

Exploring the depths of surrealism, this collection of essays by George Bataille offers a thought-provoking analysis that challenges conventional perspectives. Renowned for his controversial views, Bataille delves into the intersection of art, philosophy, and the human experience, making a significant contribution to the understanding of surrealism. His incisive writing invites readers to confront complex themes and embrace the provocative nature of the surrealist movement.

Georges Bataille's postwar writings reflect his quest to navigate the moral and political challenges of his time. Through the journal Critique, which he founded in 1946, he explored the sacred's role in modernity and critiqued existing moral frameworks, advocating for a new hyper-morality that embraces excess. This collection features essays addressing influential figures like Samuel Beckett and themes such as American politics, existentialism, and the nature of play. Bataille's work challenges readers to reconsider societal limitations on expression and human experience.

Including a number of short essays by Bataille and Leiris on aspects of the other's work as well as excerpts on Bataille from Leiris' diaries, this collection of correspondence throws new light on two of Surrealism's most radical dissidents. In the autumn of 1924, just before André Breton published the Manifeste du surréalisme, two young men met in Paris for the first time. Georges Bataille, 27, starting work at the Bibliothèque Nationale; Michel Leiris, 23, beginning his studies in ethnology. Within a few months, they were both members of the Surrealist group, although their adherence to Surrealism (unlike their affinities with it) would not last long: in 1930 they were among the signatories of "Un cadavre," the famous tract against Breton, the "Machiavelli of Montmartre," as Leiris put it. But their friendship would endure for more than 30 years, and their correspondence, assembled here for the first time in English, would continue until the death of Bataille in 1962.

The first English-language translation of an essential, early work key to understanding the French philosopher's later thought. In the decade prior to the publication of Inner Experience (L’expérience intérieure), the twentieth-century French philosopher Georges Bataille produced a nascent masterwork containing some of his most original and extensive reflections on a range of subjects. With thoughts on ritual sacrifice and military conquest, the nature of laughter, and the mechanisms of capitalism, The Limit of the Useful, as Bataille had planned to title the work, illuminates the philosopher’s later corpus, yet it remained unfinished and unpublished in his lifetime, and untranslated until now. This is the first English-language translation of what Cory Austin Knudson and Tomas Elliott argue is one of Bataille’s most structurally consistent works. Paired with draft essays and plans for The Accursed Share, along with over a hundred pages of appendixes and notes, the volume distinctively elaborates Bataille’s thought. The Limit of the Useful spans a decade of rich intellectual ferment in Bataille’s life as he first formulated his challenge to capitalism, engaging with concepts and ideas in ways not seen in his other published works. The volume bridges the gap between Bataille’s surrealist literary writings and later scientific pretensions, drawing attention to, and filling in, an overlooked lacuna in his oeuvre.

Na rok przed Historią oka napisałem książkę zatytułowaną W.-C.: drobna książeczka, całkiem szalona literatura. W.-C. była żałobna, tak jak Historia oka jest młodzieńcza. Rękopis W.-C. spłonął, żadna to strata przy mojej obecnej rozpaczy: był to krzyk przerażenia [...] Jeden z rysunków w W.-C. przedstawiał oko: oko szafotu. Samotne, solarne, nabite rzęsami, otwierało się ono w lunecie gilotyny. Rysunek był podpisany wieczny powrót, a ta przerażająca maszyna była bramą wiodącą ku niemu. Biegnąc znad horyzontu, ścieżka wieczności prowadziła przez ów szafot. Pewien wers-parodia zasłyszany w skeczu w Concert Mayol podsunął mi pomysł na komentarz: Boże, jak smutna jest krew ciała na dnie wiórów.