Letter from Artaud to Paulhan published in La Révolution Surréaliste

Paris, 3, rue de Grenelle (VIe).

Jean Paulhan,

After the explanations to which I gave myself in your presence on the subject of this obscene Claudel, in consideration of the services rendered and of a friendship that is infinitely torn and troubled, but finally sometimes effective, reducing my indictment to the simplicity of the two points to which your letter testifies, is pure and simple smut but which does not disfigure you, on the contrary.

This rascality distances me from you, and what's more, it judges you and highlights your ease.

Because the man I saw rolling his head on his chest in the absolute inability to answer a specific question, like the child who slips away (so Jean Paulhan, you are the child, if you are the child you have to say it so that we know), this man obliged to constantly regain grip on his own nothingness cannot reproach me for any ease, any absence of soul.

I will not add any insult to the description of your attitude. It takes a lot more, believe me, to make me doubt myself. I know where I hurt but it is not this small part of my mind that Jean Paulhan can reach.

ANTONIN ARTAUD

P.-S. – Regarding the Jarry demonstration, it is the very principle of theater that your collaborator calls into question in the February issue of the N. R. F. But the Jarry theater has nothing to do with theater. All this, therefore, does not interest us. So I won't respond to your stupid colleague. As for the meaning and principle of a manifestation like this, here is what I will agree to say about it:
I do with a text exactly what I please. But a text on a stage is always a poor thing. So I embellish it with screams and contortions which have a natural meaning, but which are not for pigs. I am therefore not surprised that the dwarf who signs these reviews saw a similar performance as a modern comedy piece.

Another reason why I'm afraid to give you my answer is that I would have to expose myself to one of those long and broad castrations of texts, strewn with broken sentences and words reduced to the expression of a hair, to which you have accustomed us.