Leonora Carrington, Surrealism, and Initiation: Symbolic Death and Rebirth in Little Francis and Down Below

In 1940, the surrealist artist and writer Leonora Carrington (1917–2011) was incarcerated in a Spanish mental asylum, having been pronounced “incurably insane.” Down Below, an account of the incident first published in the surrealist journal VVV in 1944, acted as an important part in her recovery fr...

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Autor principal:	Kristoffer Noheden
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	Aren Roukema 2014
Materias:	pierre mabille alchemy myth andré breton esotericism psychosis Philosophy. Psychology. Religion B
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/99276de76d0f43debf04d904c94a5937
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:99276de76d0f43debf04d904c94a59372021-11-15T11:54:29ZLeonora Carrington, Surrealism, and Initiation: Symbolic Death and Rebirth in Little Francis and Down Below2053-7158https://doaj.org/article/99276de76d0f43debf04d904c94a59372014-06-01T00:00:00Zhttps://correspondencesjournal.com/12303-2/https://doaj.org/toc/2053-7158In 1940, the surrealist artist and writer Leonora Carrington (1917–2011) was incarcerated in a Spanish mental asylum, having been pronounced “incurably insane.” Down Below, an account of the incident first published in the surrealist journal VVV in 1944, acted as an important part in her recovery from mental illness. In it, she works through her experience in the light of her reading of Pierre Mabille’s (1908–1952) book Mirror of the Marvelous (1940). This work let Carrington interpret the intricate correspondences she perceived during her illness through the imagery of alchemy, and allowed her to find a similarity between her experience and the trials depicted in many myths, thus infusing her harrowing experiences with symbolic meaning. This article discusses the significance of Mabille and his work for Carrington’s sense of regained health. This is further emphasised through a comparison of the motif of symbolic death in Down Below with its depiction in Carrington’s earlier, partly autobiographical, novella “Little Francis” (1937–38). The depiction of a loss of self in this work prefigures the ordeals in Down Below, but it is only in the latter text that Carrington also effects a form of rebirth. The article proposes that the enactment of a symbolic rebirth means that Down Below can be considered a form of initiation into the surrealist marvellous, and that Carrington’s experiences both parallel and prefigure surrealism’s concerns with esotericism, myth, and initiation, during and after the Second World War.Kristoffer NohedenAren Roukemaarticlepierre mabillealchemymythandré bretonesotericismpsychosisPhilosophy. Psychology. ReligionBENCorrespondences, Vol 2, Iss 1, Pp 35-65 (2014)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	pierre mabille alchemy myth andré breton esotericism psychosis Philosophy. Psychology. Religion B
spellingShingle	pierre mabille alchemy myth andré breton esotericism psychosis Philosophy. Psychology. Religion B Kristoffer Noheden Leonora Carrington, Surrealism, and Initiation: Symbolic Death and Rebirth in Little Francis and Down Below
description	In 1940, the surrealist artist and writer Leonora Carrington (1917–2011) was incarcerated in a Spanish mental asylum, having been pronounced “incurably insane.” Down Below, an account of the incident first published in the surrealist journal VVV in 1944, acted as an important part in her recovery from mental illness. In it, she works through her experience in the light of her reading of Pierre Mabille’s (1908–1952) book Mirror of the Marvelous (1940). This work let Carrington interpret the intricate correspondences she perceived during her illness through the imagery of alchemy, and allowed her to find a similarity between her experience and the trials depicted in many myths, thus infusing her harrowing experiences with symbolic meaning. This article discusses the significance of Mabille and his work for Carrington’s sense of regained health. This is further emphasised through a comparison of the motif of symbolic death in Down Below with its depiction in Carrington’s earlier, partly autobiographical, novella “Little Francis” (1937–38). The depiction of a loss of self in this work prefigures the ordeals in Down Below, but it is only in the latter text that Carrington also effects a form of rebirth. The article proposes that the enactment of a symbolic rebirth means that Down Below can be considered a form of initiation into the surrealist marvellous, and that Carrington’s experiences both parallel and prefigure surrealism’s concerns with esotericism, myth, and initiation, during and after the Second World War.
format	article
author	Kristoffer Noheden
author_facet	Kristoffer Noheden
author_sort	Kristoffer Noheden
title	Leonora Carrington, Surrealism, and Initiation: Symbolic Death and Rebirth in Little Francis and Down Below
title_short	Leonora Carrington, Surrealism, and Initiation: Symbolic Death and Rebirth in Little Francis and Down Below
title_full	Leonora Carrington, Surrealism, and Initiation: Symbolic Death and Rebirth in Little Francis and Down Below
title_fullStr	Leonora Carrington, Surrealism, and Initiation: Symbolic Death and Rebirth in Little Francis and Down Below
title_full_unstemmed	Leonora Carrington, Surrealism, and Initiation: Symbolic Death and Rebirth in Little Francis and Down Below
title_sort	leonora carrington, surrealism, and initiation: symbolic death and rebirth in little francis and down below
publisher	Aren Roukema
publishDate	2014
url	https://doaj.org/article/99276de76d0f43debf04d904c94a5937
work_keys_str_mv	AT kristoffernoheden leonoracarringtonsurrealismandinitiationsymbolicdeathandrebirthinlittlefrancisanddownbelow
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Leonora Carrington, Surrealism, and Initiation: Symbolic Death and Rebirth in Little Francis and Down Below

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