Tag: absurdist texts & documents
A Rave for Captain Cap!
Doug Skinner’s sublime translation of Alphonse Allais’s Captain Cap (Vol. I) has received a rave from the prestigious Leonardo Reviews in the UK. The complete text is now available online at this link
The review was written by Edith Doove (University of Plymouth) and here are a few excerpts:
“The translation into English of Captain Cap as the first in a series of three is both welcome and very timely. It is welcome since the Absurdist Texts & Documents Series by Black Scat Books project has filled an important void since the only other English venture into Allais’ writing, The World of Alphonse Allais, translated by Miles Kingston and published in hardback by Chatto & Windus in 1976, was made available in a paperback in 2008. But apart from long awaited, Captain Cap also comes at a timely moment because of the fact that its ironies are particularly opposite today as we witness global intellectual colonisation. The importance of not forgetting about the French context and its originality for a true understanding of this text was underlined by the former director of the National Library of France Jean-Noël Jeanneney when he launched a counter-attack against the American (U.S.A) imperialism by Google Books in which search results for European writers initially were mostly provided in English, (which resulted in the establishment of the Europeana Libraries – http://www.europeana-libraries.eu). The first book that Jeanneney showed in the course of recent documentary ‘Google and the World Brain’ (BBC, 2013) was Diderot’s Encyclopédie, which, without wanting to be overly chauvinistic, does put things in the right order. He dryly remarks (in French with English sub-titles) that on being confronted with the gift of a small thermo flask, brought to him by a Google Book VP in order to win him over, it was clear to him that they clearly did not understand who the director of the National Library of France actually was, or better, what he (commercially) represents. The documentary also identified similar misunderstandings or even better ‘misreadings’ by Google Books when, for example, the initial cataloguing of Walt Whitman’s famous book of poems ‘Leaves of Grass’ went under Gardening, and when it failed to recognize that Japanese books need to be scanned vertically rather than horizontally, turning any search result in complete nonsense. Such faux pas are hilarious after the event rather than the absurd way in which Allais’ texts actually points to – even anticipates – these kinds of dangers in an indirect or implicit way. So aside from the sheer pleasure of meeting an old friend, his observations have relevance now more than 100 years later.”
“This publication of Captain Cap is a little gem. It is wonderful that not-for profit publisher Black Scat Books, which seems to operate in true pataphysical tradition with former bookstore owner Norman Conquest (sic) as its ‘Président-Fondateur’ clearly respecting its French origins, has taken the initiative to bring Allais’ text to the attention of the English-speaking world.”
And on that note, let us remind you the edition is limited. You can order a copy here while they last.
Hooray for Captain Cap!
Happy Allais Day!
Button Up, Button Down
The free Captain Cap campaign buttons have all been claimed, but we still encourage our visitors to purchase a copy of the book—a treat in itself. Besides, volume II in our three-volume series by Alphonse Allais (translated by Doug Skinner) will be coming around the mountain soon, so you’ll want to collect the set.
As for the buttons (hand-drawn by Skinner), one lucky gent chose to enshrine his:
PHOTO: JIM McMENAMIN
Bang the drum early…
Hip! Hip! Allais! Alphonse! Hooray!
[TRUMPETS BLARING; BANNERS WAVING; BABIES SHRIEKING; READERS CHEERING; etc.]
Black Scat proudly announces the publication of Captain Cap by Alphonse Allais—the first of three volumes in a series of “captails” translated from the French by grand maestro Doug Skinner—who also illustrated the edition and produced its sublime cover.
Vol. I (“Captain Cap Before the Electorate”) covers the captain’s notorious political career—including an unexpurgated appendix of his favorite cocktails**.
That this work by Allais has never before appeared in English makes this a literary event worthy of balloons, noise-makers, champagne, and an inebriated marching band.
And to celebrate the Captain’s launch we’re christening this limited edition by offering a FREE Captain Cap campaign button to the first twelve connoisseurs who order a copy.
UPDATE (2/15): All the buttons are gone, alas.
Now if you’ve read this far and are wondering who Captain Cap was, here’s a brief excerpt from the translator’s introduction:
“Many discerning readers think Alphonse Allais was
the finest humorist France ever produced. I will have
to concur. Many go further, and class him simply as a
master of the short story. I will have to agree with that
as well. And many claim that his greatest creation was
that hard-drinking adventurer and inventor, Captain
Cap. I will go along with that too, but with one quibble:
Captain Cap really existed.
His real name was Albert Jean Baptiste Nicolas
Caperon, and he was born in Paris in 1864. His father,
Paulin Caperon, had inherited a fortune in his twenties,
and devoted himself to radical politics, bibliomania,
and banking, in no particular order. It was while
practicing the last that he sold railway shares in Alsace
to a Swiss bank; when Germany annexed Alsace in
1871 after the Franco-Prussian war, Germany confiscated
the stock. The Swiss bank wanted its money
back, leaving Caperon in an uncomfortable situation.
He resolved it by fleeing to Belgium, and then to
America, where he adopted the name of Peter Coutts,
and bought land in Mayfield, California (now Palo
Alto).”
We would be remiss did we not mention that the first title in our Absurdist Texts & Documents series was Masks by Alphonse Allais, for its author embodies the spirit which inspires this small press.
Captain Cap is limited to 125 copies, so we suggest you order quickly before it’s too late.
CLICK HERE AND CAST YOUR VOTE FOR CAPTAIN CAP
And have a drink on him!
___________________
**Be sure and try the recipe for Corpse Reviver (pg. 53)
Brain Raves
ADVANCE RAVES (BY ANTICIPATION) for COLD IN THE BRAIN:
“Nobody can add to the absurdity… nobody can imitate it successfully, nobody can hope to produce its fellow; it is perfect.”
—Mark Twain
“Not since Nabokov’s Pale Fire has there been…well, this.” —R. Queneau
“Gives bad poetry a bad name.”—Derek Pell
Cold in the Brain
Poems by Pedro Carolino
With annotations by Paul Forristal
Absurdist Texts & Documents No. 10
$10.00
5¼” x 8¼”, Perfect-Bound. Illustrated. 32 pp.
Limited to 69 copies.
Poetry / Unintentional Humor
SOLD OUT
Brain Drain
This lovely 18th century woodcut is but one of several illustrations included in Pedro Carolino‘s collection of poems, Cold in the Brain—just published in our Absurdist Texts & Documents series.
At first glance one might suspect that the image has been tampered with—(the subject appears to be wearing a headset)—but this is not the case. The illustration is simply that of a young, drooling poet in the throes of inspiration—wearing earmuffs to undoubtedly muffle distracting sounds while he listens to the voice of his muse.
Had the artist intended to create a headset, then we’d be admiring the work of a visionary artist far ahead of his time. Parenthetically, had Carolino been a poet “ahead of his time” (as opposed to a head of his time, which he probably was) we’d have chosen illustrations from the 20th century.
Pedro Carolino was a 19th century Portuguese poet and translator, best remembered (if at all) for his Portuguese-English phrase book, English as She Is Spoke (often falsely attributed to José da Fonseca). The book is a classic of unintentional humour since its author could not speak English. According to Wikipedia Carolino used a French-English dictionary “to translate an earlier Portuguese-French phrase book, O Novo guia da conversação em francês e português, written by José da Fonseca.” Without permission, Carolino added Fonseca’s name to the book in an attempt to cash in on that author’s successful work. As for Carolino’s poetry, it would never have seen publication but for an earthquake in Lisbon, during which a casket containing the manuscript was unearthed.
Paul Forristal is the former Jean Poquelin Distinguished Visiting Professor
of Carolino Studies at San Diego State University. He is the author of Ronan, the definitive biography of the Brazilian-born Equatoguinean football defender Ronan Carolino Falcão, which has been translated into four languages, including Portuguese, Spanish, and Equatoguinean Spanish. Paul is currently at work on a guidebook for Carolino Canyon, a 40-acre day-use facility nestled in the juniper-pinion forests near Albuquerque. He lives in the Illinois Valley of southern Oregon.
Black Scat’s deluxe, annotated edition of COLD IN THE BRAIN is limited
to 69 copies.
Laughter & Cheer for the New Year!
We proudly present a New Year’s treat—#9 in our Absurdist Texts & Documents series: A CAMI SAMPLER, translated from the French by John Crombie in Paris. The collection includes 10 zany, Dadaesque microdramas by Pierre Henri Cami, plus nine pages of his rare drawings. This is the first collection of Cami’s mini plays to be published in the U.S.
From the introduction by John Crombie:
“Though blissfully ignored for most of his life by the
English-speaking public, Cami (Pierre Henri) remained
for four full decades one of France’s most prolific,
and acclaimed, comic authors. Hailed by his idol and
admirer Charlie Chaplin as ‘the greatest humorist in the
world,’ Cami was somewhat willfully omitted by André
Breton from his Anthologie de l’Humour Noir—no doubt
on account of his huge popular success—but admired
by other Surrealists. Between 1910, when he founded
Le Petit Corbillard Illustré, the ‘humorous organ of the
corporation of undertakers,’ and his death in 1958,
Cami published well over forty volumes of minidramas
and comic novels—notably The Memoirs of God-the-
Father, The Adventures of Loufock-Holmes, The Son of
the Three Musketeers, and the travels of his perhaps most
famous creation, Monsieur Rikiki and the Rikiki family—
as well as countless songs, strip cartoons, screenplays
and even operettas. Many of these he also illustrated.
But Cami was best known for his ‘dramatic fantasies,’
written mostly for La Vie Drôle, the humorous column
published weekly by Le Journal, where he had stepped,
somewhat belatedly, into the shoes of that column’s
immortal co-founder, Alphonse Allais. Self-styled
microdramas of everyday life, of legend, of history
(and even of geography), of true (and false) romance,
and more often than not of volupté, these screwball
skits look backward to the music hall and Alfred Jarry,
sideways to the Marx Brothers and forward to, in
England, the Goons and, in France, to the Theatre
of the Absurd.”
Edition limited to 100 copies.
THIS BOOK IS OUT OF PRINT
Kate Moss Walks!
So begins one of the twisted tales in Samantha Memi‘s first collection of short fiction— KATE MOSS & OTHER HEROINES. OUT OF PRINT
Publisher’s Note: Read Elizabeth Archer’s interview with Samantha Memi in Black Scat Review #1.
