Various (McBride, John (Editor); Vangelisti, Paul (Editor); Artaud, Antonin; Hirschman, Jack)

Invisible City No. 6 (July 1972)

Fairfax, CA, USA: The Red Hill Press, 1972. First Edition. Folded Sheets. This sixth issue of Invisible City exclusively features the dada & surrealist legend Antonin Artaud (1896-1948), translated from the French by former poet laureate of San Francisco Jack Hirschman (1933–2021). Poet, translator, and editor of poetry anthologies and journals, Paul Vangelisti (b. 1945) founded the Red Hill Press with his friend John McBride, and they published Invisible City from 1971 to 1982, printing 26 issues in all. French dramatist, poet, essayist & actor Antonin Artaud endured a tragic life, facing medical misdiagnoses and psychiatric incarceration, before he discovered the poetic reveries of Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867) & Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1891). Artaud moved to Paris in 1921 at the age of 25, and began associating with writers, artists, and philosophers that inspired and appreciated him, aided by spoonful after spoonful of French laudanum. He apprenticed for theatre troupe leader Charles Dullin (1885-1949) before he joined forces with Roger Vitrac (1899-1952) in 1926 to found the Alfred Jarry Theatre in honor of the late dramatist Alfred Jarry (1873-1907). Both Artaud and Vitrac were expelled from the Surrealist movement by the principal theorist of surrealism André Breton (1896-1966). Artaud’s eccentric adventures were cut short when a destitute journey through Ireland left him damaged and paranoid upon his return to France, and he was institutionalized, received electroshock therapy, and died suddenly shortly after being diagnosed with cancer in 1948 with suspicion of a lethal overdose, whether or not it was intentional or self-inflicted could not be confirmed. Artaud’s contributions to literature, theatre, art, and philosophy have had a profound influence on artists of all sorts, including Beat Generation poets like Allen Ginsberg. The intersection of creativity and insanity is a tightrope walk with which Ginsberg was quite familiar. In Artaud, epiphany walks this tightrope hand-in-hand with delusion—and it is for this reason we find him resonant still today. Included in this issue of Invisible City: “Letter to Anyone Through Antonin Artaud”; “The Monkey’s Hand"; “Song”; “Notes for a ‘Letter to the Balinese’"; “Quarrel between the Bellhop and God”; “…Love is a Tree that Always is High”; “Address to the Dalai-Lama”; “Address to the Pope”; & “Last Letter on the Theater.” A secondary insert was added in 1974 titled More Artaud, “published by The Red Hill Press…on the occasion of Jack Hirschman’s reading at the Pasadena Museum of Modern Art, March 10, 1974, for inclusion in A SECOND ARTAUD ANTHOLOGY (Invisible City 6: July 1972: with addition, $1.50).” (pg. D) Hirschman’s Artaud Anthology was published by City Lights in 1965, so this issue is deemed the second though the stamp in the upper left corner of front page simply reads “An Artaud Anthology translated by Jack Hirschman.” More Artaud includes: “A Letter to Albert Camus”; “The Theater and Anatomy”; “Addendum to The New Revelations of Being”; “Deranging the Actor”; & “from Postscripts to The Theater of Cruelty.” Tabloid-Format Journal (11 5/8” x 17 1/2, unfolded): presumed first edition, first printing, though neither explicated as such. From the archive of Thomas Rain Crowe (b. 1949), the acclaimed American poet who was at the center of the Baby Beat Generation/ San Francisco Renaissance during the 1970s. The TRC archive was acquired, assembled & curated by Third Mind Books as a single item (see our item No. 1010), & its vast number of individual pieces are now being offered incrementally throughout this new year of 2025. The TRC archive collectively represents the entire legacy of the BBG/SSFR, & its critical collaboration-mentorships by the key figures of the original Beat Generation/ San Francisco Renaissance. See also Starting From San Francisco (item No. 3071), published by TMB, to obtain a thorough understanding of this important literary phenomenon from TRC himself. In relatively fine condition with mild age-toning at edges; mild-to-moderate creasing to corners and along folded edge; mild spotting, rubbing to front, back covers; bottom right corner of front cover is torn off, with a small closed tear just behind it on page 3; five small puncture holes along left edge of back cover. Fine. [Item #7465]

Price: $60.00