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Correspondance #1
Correspondence: The Foundation of the Situationist International 6/57-8/60
Letters by writer, filmmaker, and cultural revolutionary Guy Debord conjure a vivid picture of the dynamic first years of the Situationist International movement. Yesterday, the police interrogated me at length about the journal and other Situationist organizations. It was only a beginning. This is, I think, one of the principal threats that came up quickly during the the police want to consider the S.I. as an association to bring about the destruction of France.—from CorrespondenceThis volume traces the dynamic first years of the Situationist International movement—a cultural avant-garde that continues to inspire new generations of artists, theorists, and writers more than half a century later. Debord's letters—published here for the first time in English—provide a fascinating insider's view of just how this seemingly disorganized group drifting around a newly consumerized Paris became one of the most defining cultural movements of the twentieth century. Circumstances, personalities, and ambitions all come into play as the group develops its strategy of anarchic, conceptual, but highly political “intervention.” Brilliantly conceived, this collection of letters offers the best available introduction to the Situationist International movement by detailing, through original documents, how the group formed and defined its cultural to bring about, “by any means possible, even artistic,” a complete transformation of personal life within the Society of the Spectacle.
- GenresPhilosophyArt
400 pages, Paperback
First published October 13, 1999
About the author
Guy Debord
91 books682 followersGuy Ernest Debord was a French theorist, writer, filmmaker, hypergraphist and founding member of the groups Lettrist International and Situationist International. In broad terms, Debord's theories attempted to account for the spiritually debilitating modernization of the private and public spheres of everyday life by economic forces during the post-WWII modernization of Europe. Alienation, Debord postulated, could be accounted for by the invasive forces of the 'spectacle'—"a social relation between people that is mediated by images." Central to this school of thought was the claim that alienation is more than an emotive description or an aspect of individual psychology; rather, it is a consequence of the mercantile form of social organization which has reached its climax in capitalism. Debord committed suicide, shooting himself in the heart at his property on November 30, 1994.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
February 7, 2009
Fascinating document, but as literature not as interesting as his other writings. What would have been fascinating if they printed the letters to his first wife Michelle Bernstein. For whatever reason, Bernstein refused to be part of this book both in the French and English edition.
But what you do get is a series of letters regarding the organization of the International Situationists, and Debord's rigid sense of organization and planning. It's amazing that he was only in his mid-20's during this period and he was working with men who were a lot older than him.
Without a doubt Debord was one of the great 'thinkers' or intellectuals of his time. A rather romantic figure, he also was the image of 'youth' during the writings of these letters. This is the first volume and I am really looking forward to the 70's, which i hope will be correspondence to Gerard Lebovici, his mysterious and equally fascinating publisher.
But what you do get is a series of letters regarding the organization of the International Situationists, and Debord's rigid sense of organization and planning. It's amazing that he was only in his mid-20's during this period and he was working with men who were a lot older than him.
Without a doubt Debord was one of the great 'thinkers' or intellectuals of his time. A rather romantic figure, he also was the image of 'youth' during the writings of these letters. This is the first volume and I am really looking forward to the 70's, which i hope will be correspondence to Gerard Lebovici, his mysterious and equally fascinating publisher.
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June 20, 2022a fine diving board into the mysterious waters of the situationists. provides a skeleton of the movement in these years both in terms of detailing personnel relations and changes in real time and clarifying the ideas and concerns of each of the members. occasionally dry and repetitive; talk of dates, delays, materials, not to mention the typically french practice of obfuscating every little thing but more often than not interesting and informative. also just amusing at times, reading this 25 year old castigating men twice his age for very obscure sometimes seemingly petty reasons, reading this 25 year old elucidate his thoughts on this most mercurial of movements. after all what is there to concretely say of something that mainly exists in negation to what already was and had been, how do you explain and harder still realize the dual desire to attain and abolish utopia?
September 12, 2023
This week on the real housewives of the Situationist International, we see the rise and fall of all these creatives.
July 13, 2021
A book about a movement that had almost nothing to say.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews