Surrealism in the Imperfect

Inspired by Walter Benjamin’s encounters with surrealism in Paris during the late 1920s and early 1930s, “Surrealism in the Imperfect” proceeds from a reflection on browsing for books as a formative period of research. The article focuses on the history of post-WWII surrealist publishing and the turn-of-the-millennium remainder market as terrain for reconsidering Benjamin’s notion of “profane illumination” as consistent with the surrealist movement’s project of revaluing the concept of value.