ABSTRACT
The author argues that Breton's essay may be considered to be one constituent of Celan's so-called imaginary library. He examines apparently fortuitous correspondences between individuals and between events, arguing that these connections are the result of the principle of objective chance. Breton explores the relationships between the individual and others and between the poet and the revolutionary, in order to show how subjective desire can transform objective reality. He explains description and analysis of Jen's lithographs in the light of the essay's introductory discussion. Breton ultimately argues that it is only through the fusion of the objective knowledge of reality with subjective desire, a synthesis that he advocates throughout his essay, that this passage from the singular to the universal, and therefore from dream to action, may be realized. Breton also challenges what he views as Freud's one-sided understanding of the relationship between the spheres of dream and waking reality, according to which the Unconscious takes a wholly passive role.
