Petra James (Université libre de Bruxelles)
In my presentation I would like to present my book published in 2012 in the publishing house Classiques Garnier under the title Bohumil Hrabal: Composer un monde blessant à coups de ciseaux et de gomme arabique. The book concerns the period of 1950s-1970s, a period of renewal of the avant-garde practices after the Second World War. It focuses on the analyses of collage and montage in the works of Bohumil Hrabal (1914-1997) in comparison with those of Claude Simon (1913-2005) and of experimental poetry, particularly that of Brion Gysin (1916-1986) and William S. Burroughs (1914-1997)’s cut-up. Without neglecting the different sociocultural contexts of the post- avant-garde in Czechoslovakia and the western neo-avant-garde, this work mainly concentrates on the aspects of memory, history and destruction, the major features of the collages and montages of Bohumil Hrabal. Coming from an avant-garde heritage and infused with subversive power, these collages and montages elucidate the development of the avant- garde after the Second World War that profoundly changed the development of art. Since collage and montage can transcend the boundaries of different art forms, taking into account works of art in the concerned period is an integral part of the analysis. In this period the practice of collage and montage goes hand in hand with the philosophical and ethical reflections on the ruin of western civilization.