Bataille Bleu du Ciel and Lazare as Agent 2162

Blue of Noon

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cover of the first edition
Author Georges Bataille
Original title Le Bleu du Ciel
Translator Harry Mathews
Country France
Publisher Jean-Jacques Pauvert
Publication date 1957
Published in English 1978
Media type Print
Pages 155


Blue of Noon (French: Le Bleu du Ciel) is an erotic novella by Georges Bataille. Although Bataille completed the work in 1935, it was not published until Jean-Jacques Pauvert did so in 1957. (Pauvert previously published the writings of the Marquis de Sade.) Urizen Books published Harry Mathews' English-language translation in 1978. The book deals with both incest and necrophilia.[1]
Plot summary[edit]

Henri Troppmann goes from his sick-bed in Paris to Barcelona during the Spanish Civil War in time to witness the first Catalan General Strike. He is torn between three different women, all of whom arrive in the city at that time. One of them, Lazare, is a Marxist Jew and political activist, who is preparing herself for prospective torture and martyrdom at the hand of General Francisco Franco's troops if she is captured. "Dirty" (or Dorothea) is an incontinent, unkempt alcoholic who repeatedly has sex with Troppmann. Xénie is a young woman who had previously nursed him to health during his violent fever in Paris.

The novel is introduced by a scene of extreme degeneracy in a London hotel room, followed by the narrator's description of a dreamlike encounter with 'the Commendatore' (English: "the Commander"), who in the Don Juan myth is the father of one of Don Juan's victims, and whose statue returns at the end of the story to drag Don Juan down to hell for his sins. Troppmann has to choose between the abject Dirty and her associations of sex, disease, excrement and decay, the politically engaged Lazare, and her ethical values of commitment, resistance and endurance, and Xénie, who has outlived her usefulness. While looking at Lazare beneath a tree, Troppmann realises that he respects her for her social conscience, but also sees her as a rat, and chooses Dirty instead, whilst sending Xénie off with a friend, who is subsequently killed in the street. He travels with Dirty to Treves, the home-town of Karl Marx, where the two copulate in the mud on a cliff overlooking a candle-lit graveyard. They see a Hitler Youth group, lending Dirty a vision of the war to come and their probable deaths. Troppmann leaves her to return to Paris.

Auden's Spain1937

La Maleta Mexicana Rediscovered Spanish Civil War negatives

The Mexican Suitcase: Rediscovered Spanish Civil War negatives by Capa, Chim, and Taro

SEPTEMBER 24–MAY 8, 2011

The Mexican Suitcase will for the first time give the public an opportunity to experience images drawn from this famous collection of recovered negatives. In December 2007, three boxes filled with rolls of film, containing 4,500 35mm negatives of the Spanish Civil War by Robert Capa, Gerda Taro, and Chim (David Seymour)—which had been considered lost since 1939—arrived at the International Center of Photography. These three photographers, who lived in Paris, worked in Spain, and published internationally, laid the foundation for modern war photography. Their work has long been considered some of the most innovative and passionate coverage of the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939). Many of the contact sheets made from the negatives will be on view as part of the exhibition, which will look closely at some of the major stories by Capa, Taro, and Chim as interpreted through the individual frames. These images will be seen alongside the magazines of the period in which they were published and with the photographers' own contact notebooks. The exhibition is organized by ICP assistant curator Cynthia Young.

Simone Weil es, sin duda, Lazare, el personaje que Georges Bataille describió, entre fascinado y asqueado, en El azul del cielo, en una de sus monstruosas anomalías. Bataille la había conocido en París y luego en Barcelona. "Tenía unos 25 años. Era rara y hasta ridícula. Llevaba trajes negros, desangelados y manchados. Parecía no ver lo que tenía delante, y a menudo chocaba con las mesas al pasar. Sin sombrero, el pelo corto, tieso y despeinado, creaba unas alas de cuervo en tomo a su cara. Tenía una gran nariz de judía flaca, cutis amarillento, que asomaba bajo aquellas alas y tras las gafas de montura de acero... Infundía malestar: la enfermedad, el cansancio, la miseria o la muerte nada importaban a sus ojos... Ejercía una fascinación por su lucidez y por sus ideas de alucinada... Y yo me reía rumiando una cualquiera de sus lentas frases. La idea de que quizá yo amara a Lazare me arrancó un grito, que se perdió en la confusión y el ruido". 
MARIA ANTONIETTA MACCIOCCHI

Traducción: Esther Benítez.

* Este artículo apareció en la edición impresa del Miércoles, 15 de junio de 1988

source:https://elpais.com/diario/1988/06/15/cultura/582328802_850215.html

Long Live The Internationalist Spirit ............................

A flag of the International Brigades used during the Spanish Civil War.

The flags of the International Brigades featured the colours of the Spanish Republic: Red, Yellow and Purple, often along with Communist symbols (Red flags, hammer and sickle, fist). The emblem of the brigades themselves was the three-pointed red star, which is often featured.

Nearly 60,000 anti-fascist volunteers from 55 countries joined International Brigades to fight for the Republican cause. The first of these, the International Column, marched into Madrid on 8 November. Included in their ranks were the New Zealanders Griff Maclaurin and Steve Yates. While organised by the Communist Party, the International Column included a range of left-wing anti-fascist volunteers of diverse political persuasions.

Casualties

• Killed in action: 9,935 (16%)^{[citation needed]}
• Wounded in action: 7,686 (12.9%)^{[citation needed]}
• Missing in Action: unknown
• Prisoners-of War: unknown

[edit]Non-Spanish battalions

Spanish Civil War Medal awarded to the International Brigades

• Abraham Lincoln Battalion: from the United States, Canada and Irish Free State, with some British, Cypriots and Chileans who lived in New York and were members of the Chilean worker club of New York.
  • Connolly Column: This mostly Irish republican group fought as a section of the Lincoln Battalion
• Mickiewicz Battalion: predominantly Polish.
• André Marty Battalion: predominantly French and Belgian, named after André Marty.
• British Battalion: Mainly British but with many from the Irish Free State, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Cyprus and other Commonwealth countries.
• Checo-Balcánico Battalion: Czechoslovakian and Balkan.
• Commune de Paris Battalion: predominantly French.
• Deba Blagoiev Battalion: predominantly Bulgarian, later merged into the Djakovic Battalion.
• Dimitrov Battalion: Greek, Yugoslavian, Bulgarian, Czechoslovakian, Hungarian and Romanian. Named after Georgi Dimitrov.
• Djuro Djakovic Battalion: Yugoslav, Bulgarian, anarchist, named for former Yugoslav communist party secretary Đuro Đaković.
• Dabrowski Battalion: mostly Polish and Hungarian. Also Czechoslovakian, Ukrainian, Bulgarian and Palestinian Jews. See also Dąbrowszczacy.
• Edgar André Battalion: mostly German. Also Austrian, Yugoslavian, Bulgarian, Albanian, Romanian, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian and Dutch.
• Español Battalion: Mexican, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Chilean, Argentinian and Bolivian.
• Figlio Battalion: mostly Italian; later merged with the Garibaldi Battalion.
• Garibaldi Battalion: Raised as the Italoespañol Battalion and renamed. Mostly Italian and Spanish, but contained some Albanians.
• George Washington Battalion: the second U.S. battalion. Later merged with the Lincoln Battalion, to form the Lincoln-Washington Battalion.
• Hans Beimler Battalion: mostly German; later merged with the Thälmann Battalion.
• Henri Barbusse Battalion: predominantly French.
• Henri Vuilleman Battalion: predominantly French.
• Louise Michel Battalions: French-speaking, later merged with the Henri Vuillemin Battalion.
• Mackenzie–Papineau Battalion: the "Mac-Paps", predominantly Canadian.
• Marseillaise Battalion: predominantly French-commanded by George Nathan.
  • Incorporated one separate British company.
• Palafox Battalion: Yugoslavian, Polish, Czechoslovakian, Hungarian, Jewish and French.
  • Naftali Botwin Company: a Jewish unit formed within the Palafox Battalion in December 1937.
• Pierre Brachet Battalion: mostly French.
• Rakosi Battalion: mainly Hungarian, also Czechoslovakians, Ukrainians, Poles, Chinese, Mongolians and Palestinian Jews.
• Nine Nations Battalion (also known as the Sans nons and Neuf Nationalités: French, Belgian, Italian, German, Austrian, Dutch, Danish, Swiss and Polish.
• Six Février Battalion ("Sixth of February"): French, Belgian, Moroccan, Algerian, Libyan, Syrian, Iranian, Iraqi, Chinese, Japanese, Indian and Palestinian Jewish.
• Thälmann Battalion: predominantly German, named after German communist leader Ernst Thälmann.
  • Tom Mann Centuria: A small, mostly British, group who operated as a section of the Thälmann Battalion.
• Thomas Masaryk Battalion: mostly Czechoslovakian.
• Chapaev Battalion: composed of 21 nationalities (Ukrainian, Polish, Czechoslovakian, Bulgarian, Yugoslavian, Turkish, Italian, German, Austrian, Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Belgian, French, Greek, Albanian, Dutch, Swiss and Baltic).^[22]
• Vaillant-Couturier Battalion: French, Belgian, Czechoslovakian, Bulgarian, Swedish, Norwegian and Danish.
• Veinte Battalion: American, British, Italian, Yugoslavian and Bulgarian.
• Zwölfte Februar Battalion: mostly Austrian.
• Battalion De Zeven Provinciën:Dutch