1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910450025203321

Autore

Hand Seán

Titolo

Michel Leiris : writing the self / / Seán Hand [[electronic resource]]

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cambridge : , : Cambridge University Press, , 2002

ISBN

1-107-11266-4

1-280-15191-9

0-511-11623-3

0-511-03959-X

0-511-15811-4

0-511-32995-4

0-511-48579-4

0-511-05316-9

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (xi, 259 pages) : digital, PDF file(s)

Collana

Cambridge studies in French ; ; 70

Disciplina

848/.91209

Soggetti

Self in literature

Identity (Psychology) in literature

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015).

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. 229-254) and index.

Nota di contenuto

Introduction: the deaths of Michel Leiris -- Texts and Contexts -- Unities and identities: Leiris and surrealism -- Recasting the self: from surrealism to ethnography -- Autobiographical frameworks: from ethnography to L'Age d'homme -- Positional play: La Regle du jeu -- Secreting the self: Journal 1922-1989 -- The Quest for Presence in La Regle Du Jeu -- Excess of joy: the beginnings of presence in ' ... Reusement!' -- Organs of learning: sensing presence in Biffures -- The act of union: being-in-the-world in La Regle du jeu -- Thanatography: non-being as the limit of autobiography.

Sommario/riassunto

This is the first full-length study in English of Michel Leiris's work. Frequently cited as a central figure in contemporary French culture, Leiris was an outstanding writer whose double career as ethnographer and creative writer places him at important points of intersection within French cultural history. Seán Hand explores Leiris's active participation in some of the most striking intellectual and artistic movements of the



twentieth century: surrealism in the twenties, ethnography in the thirties and existentialism in the forties. Hand locates his writing in these different contexts in relation to the major artistic, political and philosophical concepts of the period. He goes on to argue that Leiris's multi-volume autobiography La Règle du jeu stands as the model form of self-enquiry in the twentieth century. More broadly, Hand explores Leiris's continuing obsession with the notion of  'presence'. Informed by recent critical theories, Hand offers a multi disciplinary approach to this intriguing writer.