manifesto of letterist poetry
by isidore isou
1942

MANIFESTO OF LETTERIST POETRY
A Commonplaces about Words

Pathetic I		The flourishing of bursts of energy dies beyond us.
	      	All delirium is expansive.
    		All impulses escape stereotyping.
Still I  		An intimate experience maintains curious specifics.
Pathetic II  	Discharges are transmitted by notions.
       		What a difference between our fluctuations and the
		brutality of words.
       		Transitions always arise between feeling and speech.
Still II      	The word is the first stereotype.
Pathetic III  	What a difference between the organism and the sources.
         		Notions - what an inherited dictionary.  Tarzan learns
		in his father's book to call tigers cats.
       		Naming the Unknown by the Forever.
Still III     	The translated word does not express.
Pathetic IV   	The rigidity of forms impedes their transmission.
       		These words are so heavy that the flow fails to carry
		them. Temperaments die before arriving at the goal
		(firing blanks).
		No word is capable of carrying the impulses one
		wants to send with it.
Still IV     	WORDS       allow psychic alterations to disappear.
       		Speech      resists effervescence.
       		Notions     require expansion to equivalent formulas.
   WORDS		Fracture our rhythm.
     by their	Assassinate sensitivity.
     mechanism,	Thoughtlessly uniform
     fossilization,	tortured inspiration.
     stability	Twist tensions.
     and aging	Reveal poetic exaltations as useless.
              	Create politeness.
              	Invent diplomats.
              	Promote the use of analogies
              	Substitute for true emissions.
Pathetic V    	If one economizes on the riches of the soul, one dries
		up the left-over along with the words.
Still V		Prevent the flow from molding itself on the cosmos.
       		Form species in sentiments.
		WORDS      Destroy sinuosities.
		Result from the need to determine things.
		Help the elderly remember by forcing the young to forget.
Pathetic VI	Every victory of the young has been a victory over words.
        		Every victory over words has been a fresh, young victory.
Still VI		Summarize without knowing how to receive.
		It is the tyranny of the simple over the long-winded.
     WORDS 	Discern too concretely to leave room for the mind.
	        	Forget the true measures of expression: suggestions.
	        	Let infrarealities disappear.
	        	Sift without restoring.
Pathetic VII    	One learns words as one learns good manners. 
        		Without words and manners it is impossible to appear in
		society.
        		It is by making progress in words that one makes progress
                     socially.
Still VII       	Kill fleeting evocations.
        		Slow down short-cuts and approximations.
SPEECH  		Is always vice-versa for not being identical.
        		Eliminates solitary individuals who would like to
        		rejoin society.
        		Forces men who would like to say "Otherwise" to say "Thus."
	        	Introduces stuttering.
Pathetic VIII 	The carpentry of the word built to last forever obliges men
		to construct according to patterns, like children.
	        	There is no appreciation of value in a word.
Still VIII    	Words are the great levellers.
Pathetic IX    	Notions limit opening onto depths by merely standing ajar.
Still IX 		Words are family garments.
        		Poets enlarge words every year.
        		Words already have been mended so much they are in stitches.
Pathetic X    	People think it is impossible to break words.
Still X		Unique feelings are so unique that they can not be
		popularized. Feelings without words in the dictionary disappear.
Pathetic XI     	Every year thousands of feelings disappear for lack
		of a concrete form.
Still XI 		Feelings demand living space.
        		How remarkable the poet's disheartened absorption in words.
        		Things and nothings to communicate become daily more imperious.
Pathetic XII	Efforts at destruction witness to the need to rebuild.
Still XII		How long will people hold out in the shrunken domain of
		words?
Pathetic XIII	The poet suffers indirectly:
		Words remain the work of the poet, his existence, his job.



B Innovation I 

Destruction of WORDS for LETTERS

ISIDORE ISOU    	Believes in the potential elevation beyond WORDS; wants
		the development of transmissions where nothing is
		lost in the process; offers a verb equal to a shock. By
		the overload of expansion the forms leap up by themselves.
ISIDORE ISOU	Begins the destruction of words for letters.
ISIDORE ISOU	Wants letters to pull in among themselves all desires.
ISIDORE ISOU	Makes people stop using foregone conclusions, words.
ISIDORE ISOU	Shows another way out between WORDS and RENUNCIATION:
		LETTERS. He will create emotions against language, for the
		pleasure of the tongue.
		It consists of teaching that letters have a destination
		other than words.
ISOU		Will unmake words into their letters.
		Each poet will integrate everything into Everything
		Everything must be revealed by letters.
POETRY CAN NO LONGER BE REMADE.

ISIDORE ISOU IS STARTING
     A NEW VEIN OF LYRICISM.
           Anyone who can not leave words behind can stay back with them!




C Innovation II: The Order of Letters 

This does not mean	destroying words for other words.
		Nor forging notions to specify their nuances.
		Nor mixing terms to make them hold more meaning.
But it does mean	TAKING ALL LETTERS AS A WHOLE; UNFOLDING BEFORE DAZZLED
		SPECTATORS MARVELS CREATED FROM LETTERS (DEBRIS FROM
		THE DESTRUCTION);
		CREATING AN ARCHITECTURE OF LETTRIC RHYTHMS;
		ACCUMULATING FLUCTUATING LETTERS IN A PRECISE FRAME;
		ELABORATING SPLENDIDLY THE CUSTOMARY COOING;
		COAGULATING THE CRUMBS OF LETTERS FOR A REAL MEAL;
		RESUSCITATING THE JUMBLE IN A DENSER ORDER;
		MAKING UNDERSTANDABLE AND TANGIBLE THE INCOMPREHENSIBLE
		AND VAGUE; CONCRETIZING SILENCE;
		WRITING THE NOTHINGNESS.
It is		the role of the poet to advance toward subversive sources.
		the obligation of the poet to advance in the black and
		burdened depths of the unknown.
		the craft of the poet to open one more treasure-room
		door for the common man.
There will be a poet's message in new signs.  The ordering of letters is called:
	            LETTERISM.
		It is not a poetic school, but a solitary attitude.
		AT THIS MOMENT: LETTERISM = ISIDORE ISOU.
		Isou is awaiting his successors in poetry!
		(Do they already exist somewhere, ready to burst forth
		into history through books?)
EXCUSES FOR WORDS INTRODUCED INTO LITERATURE
	There are things which are existent only in the strength of their name.
	there are others which exist, but lacking a name are unacknowledged.
	Every idea needs a calling card to make itself known.
	Ideas are known by the name of their creator.
	It is more objective to name them after themselves.
	LETTERISM IS AN IDEA THAT
	WILL BE LAMENTED BY ITS REPUTATION
	Letterics is a material that can always be demonstrated.
	Letterics seeds already existing:
	NONSENSE WORDS;
	WORDS WITH HIDDEN MEANINGS IN THEIR LETTERS;
	ONOMATOPOEIAS.
	If this material existed before, it didn't have a name to recognize it by.
	Letterics works will be those made entirely out of this element, but with
	suitable rules and genres!
	The word exists and has the right to perpetuate itself.
	ISOU IS CALLING ATTENTION TO ITS EXISTENCE.
	It is up to the Letterist to develop Letterism.
	Letterism is offering a DIFFERENT poetry.
	LETTERISM imposes a NEW POETRY.
	THE LETTERIC AVALANCHE IS ANNOUNCED.
		1942.