Locus Solus. Impressions of Raymond RousselLocus Solus. Impressions of Raymond RousselRAYMOND ROUSSEL’S IMPRESSIONS D ’AFRIQUE, MARCEL DUCHAMP’S LARGE GLASS AND THE LURE OF EARLY TWENTIETH-CENTURY SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY Linda Dalrymple Henderson Marcel Duchamp’s masterwork La Mariée mise d nu par ses célibataires, méme (Le Grand Verre), executed between 1915 and 1923, is a techno-scientific allegory of sexual quest executed on two panes of glass with a variety of non-traditional materials, including dust, lead wire, lead foil, and mirror silver. Standing nearly nine feet tall, the Large Glass is part of a text-image project for which the artist began making hundreds of notes in 1912—notes that he considered to be as important as the Glass itself and that he published in several subsequent “boxes.” Duchamp’s project was a wholesale attack on contemporary painting, which he believed had become mindlessly preoccupied with the touch or “hand” of the artist. His stylistic goal ‘was to avoid traditional techniques associated with the métier of painting (c.g., oil and canvas) and to put art “once again at the service of the mind”; he also sought to counter artistic virtuosity by employing chance in creating certain elements of the Glass. In terms of subject matter, the narrative of the Glass presents a wry commentary on sexual relationships via the hopeless quest of the mechanomorphic, three- dimensional “Bachelor Apparatus” below for the unreachable biomorphic four-dimensional Bride above, Duchamp carefully defined the complex processes of the Glass in his notes, making it possible for us to chart the execution of each of the individual elements. For his techno-scicntific allegory, Duchamp found rich visual and verbal inspiration in the exhilarating developments in contemporary science and technology, in addition to the widespread interest in the possible existence of a “fourth dimension” of space during this period? Forte contents of Duchamp’s 2 Duchamp, 2s qutedia mes 3.On is sb se LD. several published boxssof notes, Johuson Sweeny, The Grey” Henderson, The Fourth Dimension sce The Brings of Marcel’ “Teouble wih At ia Tis Contry" and Non-Bucldean Geometry in Duchamp, ed, Michel Sanouilet (1946) in Wridngs,p. 125 Moder art (iow: Frinton and Fines Peerapn (1973; New ‘Univesity Press, 1983; new ed, Yorks Da Capo Press, 1988). (Cambridge: MIF Fras, 2012) 146Linda Dalrymple Henderson In particular, the rapid-fire series of discoveries in the 1890s and early years of the twentieth century—X-rays, electrons, radioactivity, and wireless telegraphy—made science something that could hardly be ignored, as commonly held notions of matter and space were overturned and new ways of seeing and communicating changed the lives of ordinary people. In advance of Duchamp, both Alfred Jarry and Raymond Roussel had recognized in contemporary science .a rich source for the fantasy and the humor they cultivated in their writing. While Jarry obligingly made his sources clear, Roussel’s use of science and technology was more oblique.* Yet when Roussel’s 1910 novel Impressions d'Afrique, which he later adapted into a play, is read with an eye to current scientific developments, as Duchamp would have read it, his work shows clear evidence of such concems—in addition to his better-known adulation of the science fiction writer Jules Verne.$ After Duchamp mentioned Roussel’s importance for the Large Glass in his 1946 interview with James Johnson Sweency, Roussel’s name came up frequently in subsequent published conversations.* Among these, his comments to Sweeney and later to Pierre Cabanne are the most complete. In the context of Duchamp’s advocacy of art as. an “intellectual expression,” he spoke to Sweeney of the writers Jean- Pierre Brisset (particularly his “philological analysis of language” and his puns) and Roussel as “the two men in those years whom I admired for their delirium of imagination.” Of Roussel, Duchamp explained: The reason I admired him was because he produced something that I had never seen. That is the only thing that brings admiration from my innermost being—something completely independent—nothing to do with the great names or influences. Apollinaite first showed Roussel’s work to me. It was poetry. ‘Roussel thought he was a philologist, a philosopher and a metaphysician, But he remains a great poet.... It was 4600 ay ani ‘Roots (925, ane Toor and Statement, Serge "Peeps, forexample, Wakilé Bow Yock SUN, Stier (Stata Cae, 1992 entomon, Duchamp Comet, 1977) 9.18 ae 2Dectanp gute a Sey, 6 Fora compete tis of ‘Grarmatie®p 0 SRowsel fe toVern's _Dachanp erento Route Soommereihc pain -—iniacriltcvipre nse ne How! thou Coraitofly” 19 Marcel Dacha: here 147 |Impressions d'Afrique and The Large Glass fundamentally Roussel who was responsible for my glass, La Mariée mise a mu par ses célibataires, méme.... This play of his [Zmpressions d’ Afrique] which I saw with Apollinaire helped me greatly on one side of my expression. I saw at once could use Roussel as an influence, T felt that as a painter it was much better to be influenced by a writer than by another painter. ‘And Roussel showed me the way: Because of Duchamp’s emphasis on Roussel as a great poet in prose, along with his expressed interest in Brisset’s use of language, most scholars have treated the artist’s debt to Roussel solely in terms of the latter's remarkable play with language. Yet the initial impact of Impressions d'Afrique on Duchamp was not due to its language. but rather to the events of the performance at the Théatre Antoine. As Duchamp explained to Cabannne DUCHAMP It was tremendous. On the stage there was a model and a snake that moved slightly —it was absolutely the madness of the unexpected. I don’t remember much of the text. One didn’t really listen, It was striking ... CABANNE Was it the spectacle more than the language that struck you? DUCHAMP In effect, yes, Afterward, I read the text and could associate the two.” “The madness of the unexpected” on the stage at the Théatre Antoine would have been produced by the play’s succession of strange events and fantastic constructions or “machines.” Roussel’s creations must have been a delightful surprise at a time when Duchamp’s own. interests were tuning inereasingly away from painting toward mechanical techniques and subjects. Presented in a completely madcap context, Roussel’s “scientific” machines would indeed have provided Bibi 9 Duchamp, ae quoted in Pere Cabenne, Dialogues with Marcel Duchanp (New York Viding Press, 1971), pp. 33-34, Dachamp alte nots that be once caught taht of Rouse playing ‘hott atthe Regence, 148,Linda Dalrymple Henderson Duchamp with “something that [he] had never seen,” as he told Sweeney. At the end of his life, Roussel wrote a book for posthumous publication, Comment j'ai écrit certains de mes livres, which appeared in 1935, According to Roussel, the writing of his books, such as Impressions d'Afrique, Locus Solus, and others, “involved a very special method,” which “it seems to me that it is my duty to reveal ... since I have the feeling that future writers may be able to exploit it fruitfully.” As Roussel explains, his most frequently used technique was to choose “two almost identical [sounding] words” to which he “added similar words capable of two different meanings, thus obtaining two almost identical [sounding] phrases” with quite different meanings; he would then try to write a story beginning with one phrase and ending with the other. In addition to his longer initial and concluding phrases, Roussel provided several pages of examples of pairings of such homophones or neat-homophones, whose evolution from a familiar expression to an alternative, fantastic equivalent generated a number of the individual elements of Impressions d'Afrique. Thus, for example, “fraise [strawberry] a nature {raw}” becomes “fraise [ruff] d nature [the journal La Nature},” which gave Roussel the idea for the character Seil-Kor's clown-like neck ruff made from the blue pages of this science journal." Although Duchamp would have had no idea of the extent of Roussel’s linguistic games until after the 1935 publication of his explanatory text, he clearly detected Roussel’s punning when he read Impressions d'Afrique following the performance.” He then engaged actively in a similar kind of wordplay in parts of the Large Glass, generating, like Roussel, “imaginary combinations” of machines and scientific events suggested, in part, by linguistic invention.” 10 Rowse How FWitep.3. 13 ForDuchwnpvetaand bey soe rs sta py a fhe pases alr “Conception we Realy inthe Bid 7. (butler) de vie and butt (phow) Wor ofRaynoad Rousse” Art ‘deve see Hendeson, Duchamp & Literate no. (Sumer 12Duchamp mentions having in Context pp 168-9, Prone” 1968) p12 read Rouse ltr explanatory volume in Cebaane, Dialogues, palImpressions d'Afrique and The Large Glass Like Duchamp, Roussel loved to explore dictionaries." In fact, much of the writing on Roussel has treated him as if he had invented the worlds of Impressions d'Afrique and Locus Solus while hermetically sealed away from contemporary life, armed only with his dictionaries and the novels of Vee, Yet Michel Leiris, who knew the mysterious Roussel personally, had noted as early as 1935 his enthusiasm for the books of astronomer and occultist Camille Flammarion’ Since the late 1970s and 1980s scholars such as Anne- Marie Amiot have examined Roussel’s works in the context of Flammarion’s scientific philosophy, arguing that the writer was not as naive as he had often been portrayed to be.* Roussel’s interest in Flammarion suggests, for example, that he would have known his L'Inconnu et les problémes psychiques of 1900 (published in English as The Unknown), with its reprinting of Sir William Crookes’s table of electromagnetic wave vibrations and its discussions of X-rays and of telepathy.” Moreover, Roussel’s constructions in Impressions d Afrique demonstrate his awareness of current scientific issues such as radioactivity and electromagnetism, as well as the occult phenomena to which such prominent scientists as Flammarion and Crookes linked these developments. One can easily imagine Roussel poring over La Nature, the source of Seil-Kor’s ruffled collar, which was filled with extensive, up-to-date coverage of the latest developments in science and technology—from the discoveries of the Curies and others to the new wireless telegraphy." 14 FarDachampand the Layowsse 16 See, forexample, Anne Mire 17 Soe Camille Flnmsion, dictionary one ofhis verte Atio Ur mite moderns Linear eles problimee books see Lawrence D.Stefa, “Inprssonsd frie” do paychigucs (Pars lammesion, ‘The Peston of charpy Raymond Rowse, Achves de 1800), "Glass" inthe Development of Later Modems, 0.176 (Pcs Hist (New York: Givind, Mina, 977.3. Secalso 18 Georges Rall also aoted 1977, p.36.On Rovssl's pasion Antesarie Ami, "LTdGalogie the taportaace of la Natur and focencylopadiedicionmies, rouscicene dane cus Soba: iistpe of populareed sence ‘cysilly beZarouse andhis Raymond Reuss at Camille for mpreation d'Afrique. See Savor the Beschrel see Flammaion,*in Actes da” Gorges Rall, “Rien pet Mishel Lainis, Roussel ingém —_colloquedefeccoogi politique, We," Lr, 20.59 (1974) 9 4, (ark Fata Monga, 1987}. September 15-20, 1960, 15.16 (Pas Libraie Kincteck, 1982), pp. 115-23; and Masacika 15 Seo Lins Rowse! Fingéns, Tan, “Le Mor ete temps: 1.15. in 1928 Reuse was Reymond Reuss! et Caile Famiasion's guest the Flamin,” Europ, 89,65 Observatory of Juvgy (Lei, (October 1988), pp. 96-105 Conception and Realty” p72; Roussel Ving, pp 81-83). 150Impressions d'Afrique had been published in book form in 1910 and was performed with a script by Roussel in 1911 and, in revised form, in 1912.” Figure 1 is a poster from the 1912 engagement at the Thédtre Antoine, the year in which Duchamp, Guillaume Apollinaire, and Francis Picabia attended the play. The poster itself gives a sense of the strange, collage-like nature of Roussel’s text: Impressions d'Afrique is a collection of seemingly unrelated events and performances that take place in the central plaza of the capital of the African kingdom ruled by the emperor Talou VII. The reader of Roussel’s book leams only in the second half of the narrative that the non-African characters are a group of shipwrecked Europeans who are performing at their “Theater of the Incomparables” in order to gain their freedom, as are two additional characters, the chemist Louise Montalescot and her brother. In the play, this background and the histories of the individual characters and their specific 19 See Raymond Rouse, Impressions de Pai ‘iphme mer 191; Prs ‘Stoic Par, 1983) tnd Raytond wee Impressions of fc, aes Tiny Port Rayer Heppendal Berkeley: Univeniy of Califaraia Press, 1967), 151Impressions d'Afrique and The Large Glass interactions with Talou and company is presented earlier, giving the seemingly totally random events some relationship to one another.” Impressions d'Afrique should be read by anyone interested in Duchamp because it is so rich in material relevant to his ideas and works from late 1912 onward. Michel Carrouges cited three examples of what he termed “bachelor machines” in Jmpressions 4 Afrique: Louise Montalescot (with the metallic breathing tubes in i her shoulder making her a human-machine) and her mechanical i creations such as the whalebone statue of a Helot (Spartan slave) i rolling on a carriage on gelatinous rails (fig. 2); the lightning-rod : bed on which Djizmé is exceuted (fig, 3), and Fogar’s “photo- graphic plant”! Other specific comparisons between aspects of Roussel’s tale and Duchamp’s works have been relatively rare and have focused most a) i i i | i Fagwe2“Thesneofeamé ——_Figue’3:"Djnntvoluntatly whchnsralingsaraisot Skewes ig” ‘ale ens often on Louise with her metallic lung tubes as a Bride-like figure, on her creation of a painting machine, and on the back-and-forth motion of the Helot’s carriage on its rails as a prototype of Duchamp's Chariot or Glider in the lower section of the Large Glass: Noting Roussel’s machines that paint, weave, or make music, Rosalind Krauss 20 Rayer Ueppectl Reymond Snot 195).p.29,3132. cites mma” e Se Hovcil A Grical Study” 22 Sem fr nar J Coldg. Lie 3 Ther ae ie (este taveniyal Marcel Dacha Tie Bae Sut cee et Califor Pres, 1967p. 33. Sopp Bare by Her Bachelors, Caw Pais Minas 1979) ‘Bron (Now York: Viking Press, pp. 13-2. 21 See, for example, Michel 1973), pp 49-50, Soe elo Jeane Catoxges, "Mode demplo;” Parse Plate "Machines ds inJunggesllenmaschinen,©d,—anpige Inpresionsdtfique Hirald Seeman (Bers i La Marige mie duper ses 152Linda Dalrymple Henderson Figure: Ta thenno-mechanialbexium orchestra” has remarked briefly on the general theme of the mechanization of artistic cteation in Roussel’s fale.” ‘Yet there is much more about Louise, an avid chemist with wide scientific interests, that would have interested Duchamp. Likewise, there are other examples of human-machine hybrids in Impressions Afrique, and, in addition to Louise’s painting machine, a number of other commentaries on artistic virtuosity, including the role of chance in artistic creation. Beyond chemistry, additional scientific themes include electricity, electromagnetism, and vibrations —both electromagnetic waves, such as visible light, and other types of vibrations, particularly musical sounds. “Molecular alterations,” “atomic transformations,” and newly discovered clements with miraculous properties (all suggesting contemporary developments in atomic theory and radioactivity) also figure in Roussel’s tale. Finally, hypnosis and magnetism are present, as they had been in Jarry’s works and in Villiers de l’Isle-Adam’s 1886 L'Bve future One of Roussel’s machines most clearly derived from contemporary science is the chemist Bex’s “thermo-mechanical orchestra,” which functions by means of the thermal sensitivity of “bexium,” a new metal discovered by Bex (fig. 4). On a rolling platform, Bex wheels out a large glass cage enclosing his complex 23 Seo Rosalind Kross, 250n famy see Healerson, 26 For Ben's machine, see Passages im Modor Slptare Duchamp in Context, ch 400 Rout, Impress. 40-45, (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, Ville, oe id, p. 49-30, 1977, pp. 69-16 95-96, 24 Rousse, Impressions, p. 126, 266. 153Impressions d Afrique and The Large Glass musical construction with horns, strings, keyboards, and percussion as well as two cylinders. Out of the top of the cage rises “the fragile tube of an excessively tall thermometer,” which may well have inspired Duchamp's 1921 “assisted readymade” Why Not Sneeze, Rose Sélavy?, with its thermometer extending out of a bird cage.” Bex’s machine is powered by a concealed electric motor, and electricity also controls the two cylinders that produce the temperature changes to which the bexium responds: “The cylinders --. Served two opposite purposes—the red one containing a generator that produced constant heat, while the white one incessantly manufactured an intense cold, capable of liquefying any kind of 28s” (a process that would be central to the lower half of Duchamp’s Large Glass). The miraculous qualities of bexium, as well as the later discussion of the special balm that Bex had developed by ‘means of his “Jearned triturations” in order to be able to handle the metal, strongly suggests that Roussel’s bexium was indeed a takeoff on radium, which had been a dominant theme in La Nature from 1903 to 1904 and continued to be discussed regularly.” As the bexium reacts to temperature changes, different individual instruments are brought into play, and the resultant vibrations in the ‘transparent walls of the cage produce the sounds of the “orchestra.” Roussel’s musical training is apparent as he describes in detail the performances of cach instrument, which, significantly, are of virtuoso quality, even though no human hands touch them (the keyboard’s keys “moved of their own accord,” for example).” Virtuosity without the “hand” of a musician is a recurring theme in Impressions d'Afrique, asa variety of musical “machines” replace human performers, just as Louise’s painting machine subsequently replaces the “hand” of the artist. Roussel provides an even more direct commentary on traditional notions of artistic creation in the episode purportedly fiom the life of 27 Wid, p40. 29%hid, 224, 28 mid pa 30 Bid... 154Linda Dalrymple Henderson Handel, which was one of the tableaux vivants to be staged on the emperor Talou’s coronation day: Here, Duchamp would have found an example of the use of chance in musical composition, an exercise that he would carry out in one of the two versions of his Erratum ‘Musical of 1913." As an old man, already blind for four years, Handel had responded to the assertion by one of his guests that “an ordinary theme treated by the most inspired mind must inevitably remain heavy and clumsy” by claiming that he could write “a whole oratorio worthy to be included in the list of his works, on a theme that had been mechanically construeted by accidental procedure." Handel then proceeded to establish the theme of the oratorio by choosing from a group of seven holly sprigs, to each of which a note had been assigned, at each step as he descended a staircase. He thereby determined the sequence of pitches in the theme, whose length was determined by the twenty-three steps of the balustrade; as Roussel says, the phrase “had been worked out with no direction but that of chance.” Chance was a theme that would increasingly interest Duchamp, and it appears as well in another of Roussel’s comments on the notion of skill and expertise. This is manifested in the fencing machine of La Billaudigre-Maisonnial, a machine resembling a knife-grinder, to which was attached an “articulated arm.” During the course of a fencing match with a human, the Frenchman is able to adjust a rod in his machine, making it possible to “produc{e] an infinite number of accidental results.” Another of Roussel’s human-machine hybrids is Louise, with her surgically implanted metal lung tubes. Nearly everything about this character would have intrigued Duchamp. As the scientist sister of an artist, she is the intellectual who conceives the plans for the moving sculptures that must be created to satisfy the emperor Talou and gain the prisoners” freedom.™ Her artist brother, who possessed a “very real talent” but “lacked intelligence,” simply 3 i, 0. 253-36, 23 Rowe npn, 351d 35-37 pp. 233-34 32 On dese works, se Henderon, Duchamp in Context, 34 Tid, 236 pp. 0-61 ‘36 On Louise Nomtlenot, see Roussel pressions, pp. 34-23, snd chs, 9,19. 37 i 288 155impressions d'Afrique and The Large Glass carried out her plans for the figures such as the whalebone Helot. As the scientific intellect behind an artist as well as the enginecr of a painting machine, Louise represents a challenge to the primacy of the artist's touch. As such, she extends Roussel’s discussions of musical virtuosity and chance to the realm of art, highlighting issues that were central to Duchamp’s thinking in this period. Like Roussel’s characters Bex and Fuxier, Louise, the chemist, also performs the “‘riturations” that Duchamp would mention in his notes for the Large Glass.” Her past chemical experiments had led to a hg tumor and required the implanting of an “artificial escape” for her breath in the form of “sounding tubes,” which she disguises in the shoulder braid of the military uniform she adopts as her attire. Determined to create a painting machine, in which “by photographic ‘means, a motor force sufficiently precise to guide a pencil or brush with certainty” would be generated, Louise had traveled to Africa in search of an obscure plant, whose oil she needed for the machine After Talou’s capture of Louise and her brother, the successful creation of the painting machine becomes imperative as another of the means by which the pair will gain their freedom, Roussel’s description of Louise’s painting machine provides further evidence of his awareness of electromagnetism and contemporary interest in the transmission of visual images. The machine stands on a three-legged support and consists of a photosensitive brown plate “endowed by Louise with strange, photo-mechanical properties”: ‘The brown plate alone set the whole process in motion, by means of a system based on the principle of clectro- ‘magnetisation. In spite of the absence of any lens, the polished surface, owing to its extreme sensitivity, received enormously powerfl light-impressions, which it transmitted by means of the countless wires inserted in 238 Seid, pp. 224,300, 311.39 Rousse, Impressions, p. 245, See alo Dacha’ Desthumously published notes ig 40 Bid, p. 282. Marel Duchamp, Notes,ed. Pall AU Ibid, p14 Matisse (Horton: @. K Hal, 1983), notes $8, 60, 12,114; and Henderson, Duchamp in Contes, ald, 156Linda Dalrymple Henderson the back to activate the whole mechanism contained within the sphere, whose circumference must have measured more than a yard. From the sphere projected a hinged arm holding ten brushes radiating ina circle, and when the sensitive plate was exposed to a landscape view, these brushes produced an “automatic reproduction ™* Roussel’s use of a photosensitive plate at the heart of the painting machine surely derives from contemporary coucern with the recording of electromagnetic waves —whether visible or invisible ight—on sensitive plates. Morcover, as an extension of telegrapty and telephony (with wires), a number of inventors were exploring the possiblity of transmitting images—whether photographs or drawings and handwriting to be reproduced by a receiving “crayon” or registered “telephotographically.” Of particular interest for Roussel’s system are articles such as that on “La Vision a distance,” published in L'Titustration in December 1909, which illustrates a transmitting plate with its back covered by wire in the manner of Louise’s construction.“ Beyond Louise's painting machine, the theme of recording images on light-sensitive surfaces and projecting them is a recurring one in Impressions d'Afrique, and early filmmaking was certainly important for Roussel.” However, in the case of the “photographic plants” of Fogar, the emperor's son, Roussel invents an organic, light-sensitive plant, which records images by means of “molecular actions” and on which those images can then be “replayed” without | film or projectors intervening. As Roussel describes the process of changing from one scene to another, “the atoms [of the plant] all vibrated at once, as if endeavoring to rearrange themselves according to some other inevitable grouping.”” Having found the mysterious i plants at the bottom of a river, as well as other magical objects in the 42 Ii p. 146 Gindrale des Sciences Poseet 45 For example, in th episode 43 bid. p34 Appliquées, 00.16 Noveriber_—_dacased at nate 35 below 15,1905), np, $24.25. Gradenwi aso publibes 46 Roussel, Impressions, p25; fonthissbjectin La Nanes: on Fog’ magical plant 92 Dae a eae panes Pa‘ teciaope Soin sean fedora Goma sam 6 i re | soto Rue i 157 |émpressions dAjrique and Lhe Large Glass ‘ocean, Fogar performs along with the shipwrecked travelers; he even demonstrates the self-induced “artificial catalepsy” that he had Jearned from the witch doctor, which had allowed him to achieve his underwater exploring. Fogar lies on a bed with the “photographic Plant” above like a canopy, and there he projects images that he has “filmed” from an illustrated volume of oriental tales and an album of animal prints. To this organic arrangement are added various electric lights by which “the changing views could be made alternately dazzling or obscure at the obedient caprice of a current tumed on or off.” Electricity, electromagnetism, and magnetism all figure in Impressions d Afrique, including in the “lightning-rod bed” on which Djizmé is executed during a thunderstorm.” Bex’s second. performance had been a remarkable demonstration of the magnetic attraction of various metals (including Duchamp favorites, platinum and nickel) for giant pencil-like projectiles. The leads of these pencils were made from another of Bex’s creations, magnetine, whose force could be counteracted only by the intervention of his other discovery, “impervium.”™ Breton later referred to Roussel as “the greatest ‘magnetizer of modem times,” a statement that overestimates Roussel’s involvement with magnetismy/hypnotistn.” Nonetheless, Roussel was certainly acquainted with the practice, which had attracted new interest during this period at the hands of Albert de Rochas and others, who emphasized its links to electromagnetism. ‘Thus, beyond Fogar’s self-induced “artificial catalepsy,” the hypnotist Darriand heals his patient Seil-Kor by means of hypnosis induced by “rare and valuable plants” that “possessed magnetic qualities of extraordinary power.” According to Roussel, “A subject placed beneath the scented roof would feel disturbing emanations penetrate 48 Tid, pp. 130, 244-45, se, eg, Olver Lodge, Lighming 52 Soe And Breton, Anholog. 49 id, p 267. Conductors and Lightning Guarde de humour noi (Pats: Ptoes I London: Whitaker and Co, da Sagitaie, 1950p. 232, I S0For this episode, so bid, 1892). i 1p. 100-3, 179-87 Tens on 53 De Roches book lecrciy andelectomagnetism $1 Roussel, Inpresstons, LBatrirsation del enable H inthis period included a andané pp. 46-54 (Pus: Chamel, 1895) for i & seton on atmosphere example, included Geen i lect, ani he tpl was sppendices, including he ist : ‘covered as Wellin Za Narre; on ‘wntings of physicist Sir Oliver lightning contactors of the peri, Lodge. 158Linda Dalrymple Henderson his being, immediately plunging him into a true hypnotic trance."** Combining the organic and the mechanical, as he so often does, Roussel then has Darriand heal Seil-Kor with the aid of “a system of electric projections,” showing Seil-Kor a series of events from his life, which Darriand had arranged to have painted on transparent strips of film.* Roussel was obviously well aware of trends in contemporary science, technology, and occultism (often linked to science in this period), and they served as sources for his fantastic imagination. Yet, as Duchamp noted later, Roussel’s attitude toward machines was “not at all admiring, but ironic,” and that same irony is present in his approach to much of science as well. Although previous scholarship has often contrasted Roussel to Jarry as a naive believer in science and technology, Duchamp correctly perceived the irony present in Roussel’s works.” Rather than creating an alternative to bourgeois science in a complex “Pataphysics” based on recent British physics, as Jarry had done, Roussel parodied the language of the science known to the average Frenchman and utilized “scientific methods” for absurd, comical ends. In his pursuit of “completely imaginary combinations,”* however, Roussel did profit from aspects of the most recent science, which seemed tailor-made for science fiction writers: for example, radioactivity, new notions of the atom, electromagnetic waves, and even the possibility of transmitting visual images, as in Louise’s painting machine, Roussel, like Jarry, demonstrated for Duchamp the humorous possibilities of science and technology, as well as the fertile realm of human-machine hybrids and analogies. Far more than Jarry, Roussel had functioned as an inventor of fantastic machines of the kind that Duchamp was subsequently to design in the Large Glass. Also critical for Duchamp at this moment was Roussel’s interest in mechanical replacements for the hand of the virtuoso musician or artist as well as 54 Roussel, Impressions, p. 105. $6,Dachamp, a6 quoted in 57 Se, fr example, Oeavo Paz, Schustet, "Marcel Duchamp, ‘Maree! Duchamp: Appearance 55 Ibid, pp 105, 308-9 ‘yitn” Le Sordaliome, mdm, Sopp Bara tse. Rachel o.2(Spriag 1957),p. 144." Philips and Donald Gardner (eo Yor: Ving Press, 1979), pp IS36 58 See aot 13. 159Impressions d'Afrique and The Large Glass the role of chance in the creative process. That included the new techniques of “touchless” image creation, such as photography and film, which were amply covered in La Nature and that obviously intrigued both Duchamp and Roussel.” Duchamp gave the names “Cinematic Blossoming” and “Top Inscription” to the cloud-like shape extending to the right of the Bride of the Large Glass. Functioning, in part, as a manifestation of her imagined orgasm, the Top Inscription is also a communications vehicle by which the Bride transmits her coded, wireless telegraphy-like messages to the Bachelors below. But the analogies to the projection space of Fogar’s cinematic “photographic plant” are also strong here. Thus, this element of the Bride may well stand as yet another of Duchamp’s multiple debts to Roussel, who, as we can now see, responded extremely creatively to science and technology. How much richer is our understanding of modernism when works of art and literature are restored to their cultural context, so that they can once again resonate as they did at the time of their making.* 59.On Duchamp end This exey initially ch. 4,andisreprinnd ere polography, see, forexample, appears. D. ‘wih end permssion of Henderson, Duchamp in Cowext. Hendeen, Dchamp it Prinecion Univer rest, Contest: Science and Technology inthe “Large (Gace am Related Works Crineton: Princeton Univerity Pres, 198), 160 sseeucanme