Customer Reviews

The Banquet Years: The Origins of the Avant-Garde in France - 1885 to World War I

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Around the turn of the last century there was an unsettled fringe to "Art". There was the mainstream - formal just-so predictable and safe. The framework and structure of being an artist was beginning to fray however - the idea that "Art" should continue to evolve into something else to grow beyond the rigid box that artists and society were so comfortable with.

It is hard to put into words exactly what these four artists attempted to do to their perspective fields, painting, music and writing - they strove to both make "Art" plastic (malleable) and new - to create "Art" beyond "Art" as it were. Even the knowledgeable at the time struggled to define as they themselves exactly what they were doing...

But from primitivism in art to ubu to monotonal music to surrealism to painted neckties, these artists redefined the role of artist to their art. It would be easier to say that Satie or especially Jarry were art themselves their very state of being being "Art". Art as life or life as art or a witch's brew of the two blurred the line between being and performance (Truman Capote, Andy Warhol would have fit right into these guys as well as Timothy Leary and his LSD visionaries).

Cubism and Dadaism - modern art as we understand it today - owes a great debt to these men. Destitute, literally either one step from starvation or madness (or both), their vision of their "Art" and their willingness to bear the cost of bring that "Art" out (there were riots at performances of Satie and Jarry, Apollinaire was jailed and Rousseau was delittled)paved the way for Picasso and Dali.

This book is not a particularly easy read, it wanders between the dryness of a college textbook and an almost lyrical prose at times. And the author seems to expect some knowledge of art and the period from the beginning, a little more background would have been helpful. But I learned a lot for the effort so I would recommend the book to the interested student of the period.

I first came across this book when assigned it in college, and I return to it every few years. I found this a bracing book when I first read it and still to this day. Anyone who thinks Andy Kaufman was the first person to cross the line of performance art into life should read the section on Alfred Jarry. Indeed at a certain point Jarry became irretrievably blurred with his creation Pere Ubu (whom he took to "impersonating" in real life to an extent that must have been quite a trial to his friends). Yet there is something very moving and affirming about the often tragic story presented here. Jarry lived in a half sized room and became a chronic drunk yet he retained an impeccable dignity despite feeling trapped in a savage and absurd world. His last words were for a request for a toothpick. Jarry returned the insult of life with perfect poise.

The other portraits are equally incisive, the Satie portrait particulary haunting (its hard to listen to his music without thinking of the tiny room he lived in and never let another sole visit during his lifetime).

Shattuck gives the historical background that gives you fascinating insight into the social/cultural conditions behind the emergence of what have to be considered highly idiosyncratic artists.

For anyone with bohemian inclinations or posturings this book is essential, perhaps making your own little room shine with a little solidarity for those who have trod before you...

I was worried at first, the first few pages read like an episode of "Lifestyles of the Rich And Famous" in its juicy overview of late 19th century. But then he started talking about avant garde art, and it became an astute exploration of the reasons behind avant garde art, how it works, and why it is valid.

I was looking for some info on Erik Satie and came away very satisfied.

Roger Shattuck's expressed intent in *The Banquet Years* was to explain the avante garde movement in the arts of the late 19th/early 20th century through the lives of four key figures: Henri Rousseau, Erik Satie, Alfred Jarry, and Guillaume Apollinaire. How well Shattuck succeeds is a matter open to debate between scholars of the period--but what seems undeniable is that he's given at least a credible and coherent account of this watershed era and in the process written a provocative, fascinating, and vastly entertaining book.

It's Shattuck's thesis that the heady, wildly inventive 30-year period from 1885 to the start of World War 1 marked an unprecedented seismic shift in the arts that led directly to modernism ((and all the other "artisms" afterwards))--the implications and challenges of which are still being worked out today. This is not a particularly revolutionary or even original observation but what Shattuck does in *The Banquet Years* is condense, illustrate, and bring to life the argument through his fourfold biographical study.

The strength--and the weakness--of *The Banquet Years* is a consequence of Shattuck's approach. There is probably not a lot that enthusiasts of either Rousseau, Satie, Jarry, or Apollinaire alone will find new in these sketches, but odds are you won't know everything Shattuck relates about all four. On the other hand, if you aren't interested in musical theory, for instance, or the "primitivism" of Rousseau, you'll find yourself tempted to skip 25 or even 50% of this book. It would be a mistake, though, to skip any of the dishes of *The Banquet Years,* for as Shattuck shows, each of these figures is representative of one crucial aspect of the age, each brought something important to the table. Of the four, I found the inclusion of Rousseau the most problematic, but as a "bridge" between the "old" painting and the "new," Shattuck makes a case for including him--and someone like Picasso would have been simply too enormous a figure to devoted only one-quarter of a book.

In the end, *The Banquet Years* is a spirited and intelligent book about a time, a place, and a cast of characters unique in the history of art--a 30-year "party" whose guests included some of the most eccentric, brilliant, and stupendously talented individuals of our time--or any time. Here are the ideas, the gossip, the friendships, the fallings-out and the story behind the stories, poems, paintings, and songs that recorded it all and inspired generations to come...and still to come. If you know nothing, little, or not enough about this incredibly fertile period, this book will be well worth your time.

Shattuck's book is astounding, lyrically written and effectively framed with detailed discussions of the Parisian political and social scene around the Belle Epoque to give perspective. All of the profiles are well crafted and "Death By Hallucination" is the most insightful discussion of monstre sacre Jarry that I have read.

Anyone who reads any portion of this book is instantly at least 10% more interesting and intelligent than they were the moment before. It will clear your skin, lift your spirit and make you more attractive. Read it. NOW.

I agree with other reviewers that the section on Alfred Jarry is especially strong, but the whole thing is great. Shattuck is a brilliant scholar, and a very lively writer. Presenting history from the viewpoint of a group of eccentrics results in surprises on every page. I bought this book as a fan of Shattuck's work on Proust (who gets only a brief mention in this book), and as a fan of Erik Satie (Contrary to the second-last reviewer, Satie's work is widely available, and it's well worth a listen), but now I think I'm a fan of Alfred Jarry as well; I've just placed an order for Jarry's Ubu Roi.

This book changed my life. The Banquet Years shows how the avant-garde movement shaped the entire 20th century -- even though it was in the 1950s, (I believe). It's a brilliant and lucid analysis of the most colorful time and place of this century.

Using the four artists as focal points, Shattuck delivers a stimulating book about the emergence of the avant-garde in pre WWI Paris. This is a very readable book, and the cast of characters includes many subsequent giants of the twentieth century. The section on Jarry, in particular, is brilliant, especially in the chronicle of his last strange years.

Along with "Alfred Jarry: The Man with the Axe", this book is a thorough look at the life of Pa Ubu in all his tragic splendor. The biographical information on Jarry is very comprehensive, though not quite as complete as "The Man with the Axe". Shattuck's analysis and conclusions are superb and insightful, giving a look at Jarry in a new light. Some editions also include rare photos and examples of Jarry's woodcuts. "The Banquet Years" is first-rate and contains invaluable information on all of its four gifted subjects. For Jarry fanatics it is a necessity.

Since encountering this wonderful and fascinating book during my first year in college, I have felt its influence in many parts of my life. My nickname shows the influence of Alfred Jarry and his Dr. Faustroll, even though I often identify more with the character Panmuphle. Just for introducing and explaining Jarry, Roger Shattuck's book is worth a good look. Yet another phenomenon that is more complex than its surface first suggests -- the painting of Henri Rousseau -- becomes better understood and more deeply appreciated through Shattuck's chapters on art in Paris at the turn of the 20th century. He certainly educated and influenced my own artistic preferences. And there is more, on poetry and music, but enough said. This is a book of enduring value.