Surrealism Was a Major Literary

Surrealism was a major literary mark of the budding twentieth century. Moving away from typical strategies emulating reality, surrealism took a much different route, and allowed authors and readers alike to better embrace their own imaginations, the very functioning of their minds. This is then a key feature of surrealism for both Andre Benton and Salvador Dali -- allowing the mind to free itself from the chains of reality.

Andre Benton was one of the pioneers of the surrealism movement as it began in France in the 1920s. His ideas helped formulate the later tendencies of the movement itself. He believed that there is still excitement and freedom still encapsulated by the imagination, whereas they have seemingly been lost outside of the author's mind

We should therefore embrace our imagination, and let it run wild -- because it is the only rue freedom we have left in this mundane modern world. Even those whom society deems mad are somewhat profound in that they allow their imaginations to run free, without the restrictions of society. These individuals are able to do so without care for judgment, and thus are commendable to Benton in many ways. Realism is, in many ways, much too restrictive for Benton, which is why he does enjoy surrealism so much. He believes that surrealism still allows us to live within the boundaries of reason, but just not be crushed by them. Here, Benton writes, "What reason, I ask, a reason so much vaster than the other, makes dreams so natural and allow me to welcome unreservedly a welter of episodes so strange that they would confound me now as I write?" (Benton 450). Surrealism, Benton believes, best represents our thoughts, as they themselves are often not restricted by the larger consequences of reason. Surrealism allows the written word to better address the true nature of our thoughts and imaginations.

Salvador Dali's "The Stinking Ass" also provides interesting commentary on realism and how surrealism will help formulate a revolution that will free the minds of both authors and readers alike. In his short piece, he describes the nature of how we think, as stemming from our own paranoiac tendencies.. He believes that in our current modern states of paranoia caused by the restrictions of reality, we tend to want to abolish it entirely. The power of the unconscious does not agree with the restrictions of pure reality, with no allowances for fantasy or paranoiac states of mind. Still, in this state of paranoia, we adjust how we view our own realities. Here, Dali states that "the reality of the external world is used for illustration and proof, and so comes to serve the reality of our mind," (Dali 487). Dali believes that it is the paranoiac mechanism which is at the very foundation of how we view images. In this, there is a sort of inherent surrealism in all of us, even if we do not know it entirely. Embracing this through acceptance and love of surrealism will help release some of the pressure built up because of this tension between the paranoiac mind and the restrictions of reality. Through this release, a revolution can be strengthened. Dali believed that surrealism was the movement that would forever change the literary world, but also how we think in general.