Portfolio Opportunity #5: Exquisite Corpse

Joan Miró, Max Morise, Man Ray, and Yves Tanguy (1927)

Portfolio Opportunity #5: Write an Exquisite Corpse Poem with Your Group

(Note: Your groups should be solidified by class on Friday.)




       Exquisite Corpse is the most well known and practiced Surrealist composition method. Pioneered by Breton et al, the game consists of several to many friends gathered around a parlor table, passing a piece of paper on which each person writes a line. What is written doesn't have to sound "poetic" or prescribe to any sort conscious rationale -- the lines are generated "automatically" via writing out of the subconscious -- with the exception being that each line is written as a reaction to the line that came before it. As the paper is passed, it is folded so the recipient can only read the line that was most recently written. So something like this may happen:
Breton writes: "I am a box filled with gold"
Seeing "I am a box..." Éluard writes, "in a hallway of my tenement" then folds the paper over "I am a box..."
Seeing "in a hallway..." (and only "in a hallway..." Ernst writes, "the man rides a bicycle made of lollipops."

Compiled, the first three lines would read:

I am in a box filled with gold
in a hallway of my tenement
the man rides a bicycle made of lollipops.

Although, this game is played in different fashions with various sets of rules, this is the easiest version for our intents and purposes.

       Let's say that there's 4 people -- Amy, Benny, Candice, and Donald -- in one of our class groups. They collectively decide that they would like to write a corpse poem together for credit toward their portfolio. The exercise will work as such:
Using email, Amy sends her line to Benny, who sends his line to Candice, who sends her line to Donald, who sends his line to Amy. Everybody writes five lines each. Each line should be sent in a separate email with the # of the line in the subject heading. Remember, this must be done blindly. As in, don't use the same email thread throughout the whole exercise, or you'll know what's already been said and take a lot of the fun out of it.

       After, compile all of the lines in the order that they were composed -- minimal revision is okay, just to make sure that everything looks good, isn't rife with misspellings and poor grammar, and the lines kinda 'flow' together via punctuation, syntax, and grammar (although ambiguous punctuation, the agrammatical, and the asytactical often lend to welcome surprises).

       Lastly, after reading your finished poem, every group member should write a short reaction essay (2-4 pages) that details his/her personal experience writing the poem and what he/she thought of the finished product, using what you've learned of Surrealist practice to draw a thesis concerning the relevancy of Surrealism in the contemporary. Does this have any bearing on our reality as an alternative or, even, a full-fledged praxis or is it just another inevitably useless distraction like so much else?

Due: Friday, 3/11