Dada and Existentialism

Dada and Existentialism

Elizabeth Benjamin Dada and Existentialism The Authenticity of Ambiguity

Elizabeth Benjamin University of Birmingham Birmingham, United Kingdom ISBN 978-1-137-56367-5 DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-56368-2 ISBN 978-1-137-56368-2 (ebook) Library of Congress Control Number: 2016949480 The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016 Th e author(s) has/have asserted their right(s) to be identified as the author(s) of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. Th e use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. Th e publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. Printed on acid-free paper Th is Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature Th e registered company is Macmillan Publishers Ltd. London

Acknowledgements I gratefully acknowledge the support of the AHRC for funding my period of doctoral study. I would like to thank my thesis examiners, Professor Elza Adamowicz and Dr Emma Wagstaff, whose invaluable comments have encouraged me to develop the work in its current form. Acknowledgements are due to Desearch, which published segments of Chapter 2 in an earlier article on Sophie Taeuber, Designing Identity: Sophie Taeuber, Dada, and the (Re)Construction of the Fragmented Self, and to HARTS & Minds for permission to include sections of The Sound(track) of Silence: Hearing Things in Dada Film in Chapter 3. I would like to express my thanks to my supervisor, Dr Stephen Forcer, and congratulate him on having put up with me for almost a decade, providing indefatigable support throughout my journey through higher education. My thanks and sympathies go to my parents for their moral support throughout my studies, for their willingness to be test subjects for my teaching, writing, and ideas in general. Thank you more fundamentally for instilling my incurable appetite for learning in the first place. Finally I wish to thank my husband Garfield, who has been a constant source of love and encouragement every step of the way, and to Squidge, who has been my unwitting cheerleader with his increasingly strong subdermal punches and kicks as my manuscript deadline approached. v

Contents 1 Introduction: I Rebel, Therefore We Are 1 2 Choice and Individuality in the Many Masks of Dada 13 3 Alienation and Reality in Dada Film 49 4 Responsibility and Justice in the Dada Literary Event 87 5 Censorship and Freedom in Dada and Beyond 123 6 Truth and Travesties in the Telling and Retelling of Dada (Hi)Stories 161 7 Conclusion: Let Us Try to Assume Our Fundamental Ambiguity 197 Bibliography 205 Index 221 vii

List of Abbreviations and Conventions For reasons of space as well as ease of identification, several frequently occurring core primary texts will be abbreviated as follows: AA Dada Art and Anti-Art, Hans Richter. First published 1964 (German); 1965 Thames & Hudson English edition used here. AB L Affaire Barrès [The Barrès Case], Marguerite Bonnet. 1987 collated text of 1921 Barrès trial; original José Corti French edition used here. D Dada, 1917 1921, Zurich and Paris. References followed by issue number. Digital originals used here. DE Dada and Existentialism, Richard Huelsenbeck, essay first published in Willy Verkauf, Dada: Monograph of a Movement (1957). Here cited from Memoirs of a Dada Drummer, originally 1969; 1974 Viking Press English edition used. E L Étranger [The Outsider], Albert Camus. First published 1942; original Gallimard French edition used here. EH L Existentialisme est un Humanisme [Existentialism is a Humanism], Jean-Paul Sartre. First published 1946; 1996 Gallimard French edition used here. EN L Être et le néant: Essai d ontologie phénoménologique [Being and Nothingness: An Essay in Phenomenological Ontology], Sartre. First published 1943; original Gallimard French edition used here. FT Flight out of Time: A Dada Diary, Hugo Ball. First published 1927 (German); 1974 Viking Press English edition used here. ix

x HC HR L MA MS N P PP T ZC List of Abbreviations and Conventions Huis Clos [No Exit], Sartre. First published 1947; original Gallimard French edition used here. L Homme révolté [The Rebel], Camus. First published 1951; original Gallimard French edition used here. Littérature, 1919-1924, Paris. References followed by issue number. Version used is digital original. Pour une morale de l ambiguïté [The Ethics of Ambiguity], Simone de Beauvoir. First published 1947; original Gallimard French edition used here. Le Mythe de Sisyphe [The Myth of Sisyphus], Camus. First published 1942; original Gallimard French edition used here. La Nausée [Nausea], Sartre. First published 1938; original Gallimard French edition used here. La Peste [The Plague], Camus. First published 1947; original Gallimard French edition used here. Phénoménologie de la perception [Phenomenology of Perception], Maurice Merleau-Ponty. First published 1945; original Gallimard French edition used here. Travesties, Tom Stoppard. First performed 10 June 1974. 1975 Faber and Faber edition used here. Zurich Chronicle, Tristan Tzara, first published in Richard Huelsenbeck, Dada Almanach (1920) (French). 1993 Atlas Press English edition used here. 1989 Wittenborn English edition referenced but not cited or abbreviated. Translations are my own unless otherwise indicated.