Supervielle sought to reconcile the traditional with the modern. He always kept his distance from the Surrealists (who dominated the literary world between the Wars). Thus, when André Breton, “Pope” of the Surrealist Movement, remarked that only a fool would refuse to imagine a horse galloping on a tomato, Supervielle retorted: “I'm more interested in how the horse got into the tomato, how the real is transformed into the unreal” (Paseyro, 182). One notices that Supervielle has replaced Breton's “on a tomato” by “into a tomato”. A horse on a tomato is but an irrational juxtaposition, whereas a horse entering a tomato is part of a process. Supervielle's imagination is not surrealist, but his own, and offers a strikingly unusual vision of the world. He tells us that, while…
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Citation: Martin, Graham Dunstan. "Jules Supervielle". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 08 December 2008 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=5720, accessed 22 November 2024.]
