Home » Writing & Publishing » Literary Theory » Dear Artaud...

Dear Artaud...

© Shaun Michael Jex

Somewhere, deep under the earth, your rotten and decaying corpse is resting, the stench of mold that surrounds you cannot even be covered with French cologne. The world has continued to turn since your death, and now I sit in a room with the window closed, eyes shut, and try to escape the stench of modern life and art. Words and actions are still cold and dead. There is no purification through Dionysian fire, no magic in art, the magic that you so desperately screamed for.

Culture and life are still at odds, action and art still considered separately. All things now produced as art, are consumed like valium, and numb the senses, the mind and the heart. When we read of love, we do not feel it. When we read of fear and pain, we do not taste anxiety, stress, or adrenaline. There is no catharsis; there is only the crooked ingestions of dead analysis and academia that spills from the pen of some fool.

Dear Artaud, I am tired. The world of art is an uphill climb. The art I have visions of in my mind, it seems is to grand to ever be realized in life. I long for art that thrashes the senses, purifies and tries the soul, and ignites the imagination. I flip through the pages of your book, The Theater and It's Double, and the words brand my eyes. I cannot escape you, or the ideas that the two of us share in common.

I am frustrated. I am discouraged. I sense the feeling of longing to make art something greater than it is, but feel impotent to do so. I try to shy away from the task, but you rest there, traces of you, in your pages, proding me on, forcing me to continue, lifting me to new levels. And despite what you have done for me, all I can say in return is God Damn You. I'm tired. God Damn you for being right.

The copyright of the article Dear Artaud... in Literary Theory is owned by . Permission to republish Dear Artaud... in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.