In progress – looking for a publisher
Before punk, before the Beats, before existentialism, and beyond Surrealism there were two visionaries, two rebels, two friends…and two tragic heroes,
Antonin Artaud and Robert Desnos.
These two men should never be forgotten.
Please visit the Association Rodez Antonin Artaud for more information about Artaud’s life and work
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Featured
All Excerpts
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From Book 4: Resistance
This section presented in its entirety. Let us never forget those who fought so others could be free. In the protection of a dry creek bed we gobbled our tepid rations and leaned against the embankment in shifts to nap. “How’s your ankle, soldier?” Raymond asked me for the hundredth time as he lapped… Read more
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From Book 3: Aube
I understand Aube Elléouët-Breton still lives in Paris. This fictional section is offered in respect and affection. Artaud was still lecturing in Mexico City, and Louis was preoccupied with his upcoming marriage. Lee was preoccupied with her work. She was photographing Man Ray now and the two were at least speaking to each other.… Read more
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From Book 3: George Malkine and Louis Aragon’s Buttocks
I had a garden. Not much of one, but in Desnos’s scrabbly yard, between the two large sunken medallions in the ground that had been apparently stolen long ago from a cemetery, I managed to plant flowers, herbs, and even a few rows of carrots, and Louis and I would crawl through the lilacs… Read more
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From Book 1: Holiday with Artaud and Desnos
During breakfast the clouds gathered together and pelted the house with darkness and drops, a steady rain I could tell would not clear up soon. We dodged raindrops out to the woodpile, stacked up wood beside the hearth in the front room, built a fire in the fireplace and lit the lamps, and resigned… Read more
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For Veterans Day: Normandy
In memory of Rupert L. Harley. This section offered in its entirety. Waiting. The latrines were coated with diarrhea and vomit. Any bucket within reach of a man was overflowing with vomit. The smell of vomit pervaded the ship and even days of continued rain couldn’t wash it away. No man could eat… Read more
Photos from my visit to Paris to write this series
The Theatre de l’Atelier, where Antonin Artaud acted as a member of Charles Dullin’s troupe 
The last residents of Robert Desnos with a placard: “Here lived from 1934 to 1944 ROBERT DESNOS, French poet, arrested by the Gestapo and deported, he died because he believed in freedom, progress, and justice.” 
Those rose I laid on the grave of Desnos in Montparnasse Cemetery. Desnos was cremated with a rose at Terezin after liberation. 
The Select features prominently in my novel. 
A coaster from this cafe once a haunt of artists and the working class 
Artaud’s favorite cafe, where the waiters were so kind to him
The Double, a novel series
about Antonin Artaud and Robert Desnos
Read Excerpts
i have been working on this series for 30 years and it has taken me where I did not expect to go. I never set out to write this book. Artaud and I merely shared the same concerns about language.
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I do not intend to profit from the sacrifices of these two men. I only want the world to know about them and never forget them. Please explore this important work done by others.
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I’m not interested in a career or profit from this project, but only to introduce and update people about Antonin Artaud and Robert Desnos. Subscribe to my site to get updated when I add new stuff (until you don’t need to subscribe anymore).
About the Author
A novel, about my friends and beloved teachers who I’ve never met, Antonin Artaud and Robert Desnos.
It was Artaud who took over the book I tried to write, and it was knowing Artaud who led me to Desnos.
I am a writer, a former actress and dancer, and many other things. I have not been born yet; I am not in the world yet.
All I ask is Life. Therefore I offer this failed “spell.”
