JEAN COCTEAU AS A GRAPHIC ARTIST
The French critic, novelist and poet “unites writing” with surprising originality
Whatever the words “Jean Cocteau” may convey to readers of Vanity Fair, to which he has occasionally contributed his masterpieces, it is highly probable that “modern French writer,” or “poet, satirist and dramatist,” is all that most Americans associate with this well-known name. I must confess that to me “Jean Cocteau” meant (until very recently) even less: to wit, “gilt-edged literary flaneur.” I must also confess that my only definitely agreeable contact with Cocteau’s work had been established with his ballet Les Mariés de la Tour Eiffel; which articulate spectacle, alone and of itself, seemed to justify the existence of the otherwise deaf-and-dumb Swedish Ballet. As a final confession, I must state, that having been more amused by Les Mariés than by anything else in Paris—more, even, than by the police—I entertained a wish to meet the author of this excellent satire, but that my wish died an unnatural death. For at the apartment of Lewis Galantière (who has brilliantly translated several of Cocteau’s works) a militant superrealist writer and one of the most charming of people, by name Aragon, described his distinguished contemporary, Jean Cocteau, in terms so vivid as to convince me that, coming after such a portrait, Cocteau himself would be a distinct anticlimax.
On this occasion Aragon (in his best form) made several enormous assertions; the smallest of which was, that the renowned poet and author of such novels as Thomas l’Imposteur, Le Grand Ecart, etc., etc., did not know how to write French. My surprise when Aragon uttered this very superrealist statement was by no means negligible; but I was infinitely more surprised to learn that Jean Cocteau—doubtless overhearing, from the Eiffel Tower radio station, or in some even more obscure manner, those terrible words—had been moved to produce a volume, not of poems, nor yet of prose, but of drawings. My third surprise came when I opened this book and read the first words of the dedication to Picasso: “Poets don’t draw.”
Cocteau continues: “They (poets) untie writing and then tie it up again differently. Which is why I allow myself to dedicate to you a few strokes made on blotters, tablecloths and backs of envelopes. Without your advice I’d never have dared put them together.”
Judging by this profound and brittle bow to the greatest living draughtsman, and knowing Cocteau’s predilection for satire, I anticipated a mass of imitative pretense. And once again I was surprised. For Desseins (as this collection of more that 200 of Cocteau’s drawings is modestly entitled) reveals itself as a rather lengthy and random concoction of portrait sketches, scenes, caricatures, scrawls, imaginings—or what you will—strictly by a “poetic ironist” of this day and time, and possessing so much originality that if M. Picasso be to blame for its publication the world owes him a new debt of gratitude.
PICASSO. A brother-artist caricatured. Cocteau’s album is dedicated to Picasso, one of the greatest of the living painters.
But let us take a few examples of Cocteau’s drawing (the book is on sale in most of the New York book stores)—why not the person with the pipe, called Picasso, for instance?
Nobody, I am sure, will deny one thing: meeting him for the first time, the flesh-and-blood Picasso is a troll who has just sprung out of the ground. He is not a man. Picasso himself, I reiterate, is a troll—tightly made, genial, clinched, eyeful, and moreover (as E. O. once remarked, descending the Elysées with me one fragile and immortal evening) “with little velvet feet such as dolls should have.” Returning now to what I shall call this portrait of Picasso by Cocteau—let me assure any interested person who has not found him- or herself face to face with the original, that what Cocteau’s drawing expresses, first of all, is an uncouth aliveness which Picasso’s actual presence emanates. In other words, this sketch apprehends—in a spontaneous, acutely personal way—the tactile stimulus which a glimpse of the Spaniard, creature, or genius, called “Picasso” involves: the feathery jolt or, so to speak, shock of confrontation.
Now let us consider a bit the drawing by Cocteau which is called P. Picasso-Igor Stravinsky. In this drawing, Jean Cocteau (the poet, the satirist, the Parisian, the literary idol) stands off—politely, maliciously portraying two celebrities of the “aesthetic renaissance” of modern Paris, both of them foreigners, who happen also to be the world’s greatest living painter and the world’s greatest living composer. The extremely trenchant characterization admits of no tricks—the observer’s vision is direct—here again, we are refreshed by that rarest of all virtues: spontaneity.
COMRADES. The artist, Picasso, in conversation with the composer, Stravinsky. Cocteau’s drawing shows skill and subtle penetration. He is a first-rate psychoanalyst of graphic art.
MILLERAND. A conservative estimate of the former President of the French Republic without the usual cruelty of political satire.
The President of the French Republic, in itself a compelling delineation (which I reproduce) of M. Millerand, of contemporary politics, and of politicians in general should be compared with another drawing of the same personage, (not reproduced here) entitled “M. Millerand leaves Toulon” (in a wonderful gollywog automobile, with too much flunkeyism and too many salutes); just as the Picasso-Stravinsky drawing should be compared with “Stravinsky playing the Sacre du Printemps” (a portrait not only of Stravinsky in action, but of his music as well—for from the piano issue wire-ghost materializations, angular weirdnesses, remarkably suggestive of this composer’s unique combinations of timbres). And now, if one contrasts Cocteau’s version of the president of the French Republic with “caricatures” having for their parody our own Coolidge, one begins to realize how insensitive most of the pictorial satire is which is being perpetrated in the U.S.A.—not that one can’t mention Bob Minor, Covarrubias (via Mexico), Gropper, Frueh—and also, if one is peculiary wide-awake, one begins to suspect that whereas Art is mobile, all mere classifications are stationary. (Take for instance, the following specimen of classification, which adorns an article on caricature in the Encyclopaedia Britannica:
“Few traces of the comic are discoverable in Egyptian art—such papyri of a satirical tendency as are known to exist, appearing to belong rather to the class of ithyphallic drolleries [sic] than to that of the ironical grotesque.”
If this means anything it should be shot at sunrise.)
To proceed further with Cocteau’s drawings: I wonder just how any classification would effect Cocteau’s extraordinary mobile interpretation of Georges Auric, the bright particular star in that singularly unluminous constellation of composers known as Les Six? Less intuitive, coarser, than the ectoplasmic Auric, but still a notable achievement, is another of Cocteau’s satires called L’Expressioniste—a roly-poly personage, lolling over backward and dangerously warping the unhappy piano in a hey-day of unordered ecstasy.
AURIC. A drawing of the French modernist of music and member of “Les Six” who appears several times in Cocteau’s Book.
PIANO PLAYER. One of the most extravagant of the Cocteau drawings, satirizing the composing methods and execution of the French Expressionists of music.
Next we come to the portrait of Pierre Loti. Primarily, this drawing is the creation of an extremely sensitive individual: secondarily, it is the reaction of a “modern” (though by no means “super-realistic”) writer to the “great literary figure of established reputation,” the (defunct) “national genius,” the over-worshipped narrator of exotic and iridescent tales. Anybody even superficially acquainted with the work (play would be a better word) of Loti, or with his literary-naval career, or with both, cannot fail to be impressed by the cruel delicacy, the unpitying skill, with which he has here been snared.
And now (at a dreadful risk) I should like to make a very few general remarks. The drawings from Cocteau’s book selected here for reproduction give a fairly accurate idea of what Cocteau means, when he says that a poet “unties writing and ties it up again differently,” in so far as such a statement means anything what
ever (or in so far as writing resembles a necktie). The point, however, is this: a writer, assisted by “blotters, tablecloths and backs of envelopes,” has presented us with a collection of what he prefers to call “strokes,” certain of which are—to employ the most abused word in our language—beautiful. A number of these “strokes” (like the Picasso-Stravinsky sketch) may, if properly cued, roll into the pocket of “caricature”; whereas others, like a superb line drawing of two sumptuous horses, which Cocteau fortunately calls Les Rimes Riches, refuse to occupy any pigeonhole, except the meaningless one of “Art.” Moreover, in the course of perusing this book of Desseins, we encounter a variety of drawings which insist on falling into several categories at once; which is why I stressed, a moment ago, the dangerous futility of classification. Finally, there is a thing (no better term suggests itself) called Le Chant du Condamné à Mort, whose few lines are responsible for the most gruesomely morbid emanation which I have yet encountered in a drawing (although, perhaps, a person has to have known prisons to appreciate the precise flavour)—and this “Song” silences, to my thinking, any kind of classification, unless we are content with the label: Cocteauism.
LOTI AT HOME. An admirable thrust at the Loti tradition. Cocteau has caught the mood and spirit of the author of “Madam Chrysanthème” in what one may call a caricature of his psyche.
This mention of “morbid” brings me to the drawings comprised in Cocteau’s latest book, of which the most remarkable group, unquestionably, is Le Mauvais Lieu. The “content” or “subject matter” of the drawings in this group (or rather, the conventional prejudice aroused by that content) will render their appreciation, in the land of the free, problematic. Nevertheless, be they “ithyphallic drolleries” or be they something else (“works of art,” for example), certain of these Mauvais Lieu satires—along with a few other ironic “morbidities” and a goodly number of drawings whose subject matter will not generate a qualm in the soul of the most vicious of moralists—establish beyond question the fact that Jean Cocteau, whom we have hitherto known as a writer, is a draughtsman of first-rate sensitiveness.
From Vanity Fair, September 1925.
HOW TO SUCCEED AS AN AUTHOR
Some hints to young writers on the art of marketing their literary wares
By Scribner Tickel, Author of: “Can Spring Be Far Behind”
How to succeed as an author?
That is the problem, and a most difficult problem to solve. Obviously, the first thing to do is to publish a book and become famous. But that brings us to another difficulty. How are we to persuade a publisher to bring out our first book? Now, there is only one way to make a publisher think well of a manuscript by an unknown writer and that is to tell him that it was written not by yourself, but by some famous author, preferably Joseph Conrad, Henry James, H. G. Wells, or Michael Arlen. If a young author of moderate talent will only submit his first book to a New York publisher under the name of one (or more) famous authors, his path is certain to be strewn with primroses.
But, under his own name? Never!
The second rule is to get Heywood Broun to review it. And the third and last rule is to find a catchy title for it.
Listen, for instance, to the story of Charles James Smith, the ambitious and talented young author, who is here heard assailling the doors of Messrs. Harper, Appleton, Page & Co., Publishers, of New York.
Publisher—No, I cannot publish your book. You wrote the book and you are quite unknown, and that is all there is to it.
Author—But, well—you see, I really did not write the book.
P.—I’m sorry, but that doesn’t make any difference.
A.—But Joseph Conrad wrote my book. He wrote it while I was in Italy.
P.—Ah, why didn’t you say so before? And another thing, why didn’t Conrad sign it?
A.—Because he had a cold and went to Switzerland instead.
P.—I have a terrible cold myself.
A.—But this cold of Conrad’s was in Italy.
P.—So was Conrad. Nothing remarkable in that.
A.—But the book deals with what the book deals with. It is unique because it is unique. There is nothing like it because there is nothing like it, as Henry James said in the middle of the street, at Budapest.
P.—What was James doing in Budapest?
A.—Trying to find a synonym for “mushroom.”
P.—Did he?
A.—Of course: “umbrella.” It took him eleven months.
P.—To find an umbrella?
A.—Quite the contrary: to write my book.
P.—Not that it makes any difference, but I thought you said that Conrad wrote your book.
A.—Yes, Conrad wrote it first, but James wrote it afterwards.
P.—Oh, I see. How did that happen?
A.—Accidentally. They were such good friends.
P.—And did James sign it?
A.—Not quite.
P.—What do you mean by “not quite”?
A.—Well, to tell you the truth, he tripped over a nasturtium early one morning, and almost immediately left for Russia in a taxicab with a paper bag full of oranges.
P.—It is true that his asthma was very bad?
A.—Very. It was positively ornamental.
P.—And who wrote your book next?
A.—H. G. Wells. But that was in Dublin, and besides, it was raining.
P.—It always rains in Dublin, so that doesn’t make any difference.
A.—But you don’t understand: James stole Wells’ umbrella in Dublin, which Conrad returned to James in Italy: whereas Wells lent Henry James Joseph Conrad’s cold, all in exchange for the asthma.
P.—Is it possible?
A.—Yes, but it is also untrue that Michael Arlen writes hurriedly. For instance, he wrote my book in two hours and twenty-five minutes.
P.—Where and when, may I ask?
A.—Of a Thursday, beside the point, in a gondola off Long Island.
P.—Well, well.
A.—Yes, he is indeed a sick man.
P.—In that case I really cannot publish your book, because I believe you wrote it, because the people who wrote it (because you did not write it) did not sign their names. Is that perfectly clear?
A.—It would be, if Arlen had not signed his name.
P.—Oh—so he signed his name?
A.—In Prague, yes. But somebody bought the manuscript on the Aquitania for twelve pounds.
P.—I should have rather expected that you would almost have preferred to pawn your, shall we say, watch?
A.—I would not part with my watch for two reasons: third, because it was not a Christmas present; and fifth, because it always makes me ill to ride backwards.
P.—Indeed. That throws a completely new light on the matter.
A.—And I don’t drink and smoke.
P.—Magnificent. May I ask if you have any children?
A.—Thousands of them.
P.—Girls or boys?
A.—Twins.
P.—M-m-m. Have you any critical opinions on your manuscripts?
A.—I should say I have.
P.—From whom?
A.—No less a critic than Heywood Broun himself.
P.—What did he say?
A.—It was all rather spectacular. Heywood was standing on the sidewalk when his eyes fell on the manuscript. As he read on, a sort of terror convulsed his face—for the first time in the man’s critical career he was speechless—then, literally tearing his glance from my chef-d’oeuvre, and addressing the nearest policeman, he murmured gradually: “We have been cleansed by pity and terror.”
P.—Not really!
A.—Yes; really and truly.
P.—And then?
A.—Then, braced by this praise, I tried it on the Diamond Brothers, the murderers.
P.—Your manuscript?
A.—The same.
P.—They were enthusiastic?
A.—Positively electrified.
P.—What is your book ca
lled, if I may ask?
A.—Well sir, after considering such titles as Lord Jack, The Golden Vase, Mr. Whittling, and The Emerald Fedora, I hit upon a nomenclature at once succinct and euphonious—
P.—Which is?
A.—“The Sea-Urchin’s Lullaby, or Why They Wanted Children.”
P.—My God, man: why didn’t you tell me that first? Bully title! Bully! Of course I’ll publish it!
From Vanity Fair, September 1925.
THE ADULT, THE ARTIST AND THE CIRCUS
A mildly philosophic plea for the performers, the menagerie and the freaks
Editor’s Note: You enjoy the theatre and you enjoy art, but do you enjoy the circus? Did you go to the circus this year? And if so, did you have a really good time? If you are bored at the circus, or if you don’t go for fear of being bored, read what a “modernistic” writer and painter has to say on this subject—then, at the very next opportunity, visit the circus and be bored—if you can be!
When something joyous, which made our childhood particularly worth while, fails to delight us as adults, we go through the apparently serene process of assuming a lofty attitude toward the “outgrown” pleasure. Upon close inspection, however, this process proves to be far from serene. Take our grown-up disdain of the circus, for instance. What actually happens, from the moment when the circus first occurs to us until the moment when we dismiss it as “childish,” is nothing less than a BATTLE.
For, at the very thought of “circus,” a swarm of long-imprisoned desires breaks jail. Armed with beauty and demanding justice and everywhere threatening us with curiosity and Spring and childhood, this mob of forgotten wishes begins to storm the supposedly impregnable fortifications of our Present. We are caught off our guard—we must defend ourselves somehow: any weapon will do. We seize the idea that a circus is nothing but a big and colourful toy especially invented for the amusement of undeveloped or naif minds. With this idea and the idea that the theatre is an enlightened form of entertainment worthy of our mature intelligences, we lay about us wildly; until—after a brave struggle—the motley horde retreats, abandoning its dead and wounded. But we ourselves are not unscathed: our wounds give us no peace; we must somehow forget them. Accordingly we betake ourselves to a theatre or to the movies. There, under the influence of a powerful anaesthetic known as Pretend, we forget not only the circus but all our other sorrows, including the immortal dictum of that inexorable philosopher Krazy Kat: It’s what’s behind me that I am.
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