Author Guide · Surrealism · French Literature
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In the spring of 1919 two young poets in Paris, André Breton and Philippe Soupault, sat down and wrote as fast as they could, without stopping to correct anything. The result, Les Champs magnétiques, is usually counted as the first Surrealist book. Breton, born in Normandy in 1896, had studied medicine and spent the First World War working with traumatised soldiers in psychiatric units, where he read Freud. In 1924 he gave the method a name and a programme in the Manifesto of Surrealism, and for the next four decades he led, defined and policed the movement from Paris and, during the Second World War, from New York. This guide covers his 11 key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 11 key books · 1920–1952 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
André Breton’s best-known books are Nadja (1928), the Manifesto of Surrealism (1924), Communicating Vessels (1932) and Mad Love (1937). Start with Nadja, his account of ten days with a woman he met by chance in Paris, in Richard Howard’s 1960 translation or Mark Polizzotti’s of 2025. Read on for which books exist in English and who translated them.
Where to Start with André Breton
If you want his defining book
→ Nadja (1928) — a chance meeting in Paris, told with 44 photographs.
If you want the theory of Surrealism
→ Manifestoes of Surrealism (1924) — the 1924 and 1930 manifestos in one volume.
If you want his book about love
→ Mad Love (1937) — written for Jacqueline Lamba and their daughter.
If you want the movement in his own words
→ Conversations (1952) — the 1952 radio interviews.
11 André Breton Books, in Order
The Magnetic Fields
French original: Les Champs magnétiques. Written with Philippe Soupault in 1919 in rapid, uncorrected sessions to a fixed schedule, it is usually counted as the first Surrealist text, five years before the movement had a name. English: The Magnetic Fields, translated by Charlotte Mandell (New York Review Books, 2020).
Earthlight
French original: Clair de terre. His second collection of poems, published a year before the first manifesto. In 1966 the title was reused for a larger anthology of his poems from 1919 to 1936. English: Earthlight, translated by Bill Zavatsky and Zack Rogow.
The Lost Steps
French original: Les Pas perdus. A collection of his essays, prefaces and polemics from the Dada period, written while he and his friends were moving from Dada towards Surrealism. English: The Lost Steps, translated by Mark Polizzotti (University of Nebraska Press).
Manifestoes of Surrealism
French original: Manifeste du surréalisme, published in 1924 with the automatic prose of Poisson soluble. It defines Surrealism as “pure psychic automatism” and claims the dream and the unconscious for literature. The Second Manifesto (1929–1930) turned on former allies and contained his most notorious line, about firing a revolver into a crowd. English: Manifestoes of Surrealism, translated by Richard Seaver and Helen R. Lane (University of Michigan Press, 1969).
Nadja
Breton’s narrator meets a young woman in the street in Paris in October 1926 and follows her for about ten days. She was Léona Delcourt (1902–1941), who spent the rest of her life in psychiatric hospitals after the affair ended. The book opens with “Who am I?”, uses 44 photographs in place of description, and ends: “Beauty will be CONVULSIVE or will not be at all.” Breton revised it in 1963. English: translated by Richard Howard (1960) and by Mark Polizzotti (New York Review Books, 2025).
Surrealism and Painting
French original: Le Surréalisme et la peinture, expanded in 1965. It opens with “The eye exists in its savage state” and builds a case for Picasso, Miró, Tanguy and others as painters of Surrealism, with later essays on self-taught artists and the art of psychiatric patients. English: translated by Simon Watson Taylor (Harper & Row, 1972; reissued by MFA Publications in 2002).
Communicating Vessels
French original: Les Vases communicants. Breton analyses his own dreams and a low period in his life in Paris to argue that dream and waking life flow into each other, and that the Surrealist method can pull someone out of despair. It includes his exchange of letters with Freud. English: translated by Mary Ann Caws and Geoffrey T. Harris (University of Nebraska Press).
Mad Love
French original: L’Amour fou (Gallimard, 1937). It begins from his meeting in 1934 with the painter Jacqueline Lamba, who became his second wife, and reads the role of chance in their love. It has 20 photographs, by Man Ray, Brassaï, Dora Maar, Henri Cartier-Bresson and others, and ends with a letter to their daughter Aube, born in December 1935: “I want you to be madly loved.” English: translated by Mary Ann Caws (University of Nebraska Press).
Anthology of Black Humor
French original: Anthologie de l’humour noir. Breton chose 45 writers and artists, from Swift and Sade to Lewis Carroll, Kafka, Duchamp and Dalí, each with his own introduction. The Vichy government banned its distribution as soon as it appeared in 1940; it was reprinted in 1947, and Breton called the 1966 edition definitive. English: translated by Mark Polizzotti (City Lights, 1997).
Arcanum 17
French original: Arcane 17. Written in 1944 on the Gaspé Peninsula in Quebec, where Breton travelled with Elisa Bindhoff, later his third wife. A slowly eroding rock off the coast becomes the image for writing about love, war, women and the occult; the title is the 17th card of the tarot, the Star. English: Arcanum 17, translated by Zack Rogow (Green Integer, 2004).
Conversations
French original: Entretiens. Radio interviews with André Parinaud for French national radio in 1952, in which Breton tells the history of the movement from the first automatic writing in 1919 to the Surrealists’ quarrel with the Communist Party and their opposition to Stalin. English: translated by Mark Polizzotti (1993).
In What Order to Read André Breton
None of Breton’s books continues another, but Nadja, Communicating Vessels and Mad Love are often read as a loose trilogy: three prose books in which real encounters in Paris, dreams and photographs stand in for plot. Reading them in order shows him moving from the chase after a stranger to a book written for his own child.
The manifestos make more sense after Nadja, when you have seen what the method produces. Conversations, from 1952, works as a guide to everything else, because Breton tells the movement’s history himself, including the quarrels.
A reading path
1. Nadja (1928)
2. Manifestoes of Surrealism (1924)
3. Mad Love (1937)
4. Communicating Vessels (1932)
5. Conversations (1952)
Everything Else André Breton Published
Beyond the 11 key books: 13 more, grouped by kind.
Open a group with the + to see every book in it.
Poetry
5
5 books · 1919–1959
- 1919Mont de piétéhis first collection of poems; No English edition
- 1932Le Revolver à cheveux blancspoems; No English edition
- 1941Fata Morganaa long poem
- 1947Ode à Charles FourierEnglish: Ode to Charles Fourier
- 1959Constellationswith Joan Miró
Collaborations
2
2 books · 1930–1938
- 1930L’Immaculée Conceptionwith Paul Éluard; English: The Immaculate Conception
- 1938Pour un art révolutionnaire indépendantwritten with Leon Trotsky in Mexico and signed with Diego Rivera; English: Manifesto for an Independent Revolutionary Art
Essays and later prose
6
6 books · 1934–1970
- 1934Point du jourEnglish: Break of Day, translated by Mark Polizzotti and Mary Ann Caws
- 1934Qu’est-ce que le surréalisme?English: What Is Surrealism?
- 1935Position politique du surréalismepolitical essays; No English edition
- 1948Martinique, charmeuse de serpentswith André Masson; English: Martinique: Snake Charmer, translated by David W. Seaman
- 1953La Clé des champsEnglish: Free Rein, translated by Michel Parmentier and Jacqueline d’Amboise
- 1970Perspective cavalièrelast essays, 1952–1966, published after his death; English: Cavalier Perspective, translated by Austin Carder (City Lights, 2025)
The years · 1896–1966
Quick facts about André Breton
- Known for
- André Breton is known as the founder and leader of Surrealism, the movement he defined in his 1924 manifesto as “pure psychic automatism”.
- 1896
- Born in Tinchebray, Normandy
- 1919
- Founds Littérature with Aragon and Soupault
- 1928
- Nadja
- 1941
- Escapes Vichy France for New York
- 1966
- Dies in Paris, aged 70
- Born
- 19 February 1896, Tinchebray (Orne), Normandy
- Died
- 28 September 1966, Paris; buried in the Cimetière des Batignolles
- Training
- Medicine; during the First World War he worked in psychiatric units with traumatised soldiers
- Movement
- Co-founded the review Littérature (1919); published the Manifesto of Surrealism (1924)
- Politics
- Member of the French Communist Party 1927–1933; met Leon Trotsky in Mexico in 1938
- Married
- Simone Kahn (1921), Jacqueline Lamba (1934), Elisa Bindhoff (1945); one daughter, Aube
- Collection
- His collection of more than 5,300 items was auctioned at the Hôtel Drouot, Paris, in April 2003
The red mark is 1928: Nadja, his account of a chance meeting in Paris and his best-known book.
How André Breton Writes: Chance, Dreams and Photographs
Breton started from a technique, not a style. In The Magnetic Fields he and Soupault wrote as fast as they could without correcting, and the 1924 manifesto turned that into a rule: write what the mind produces before reason or taste can interfere. His medical training and his reading of Freud gave him the vocabulary; the dream, the slip and the chance encounter are his raw material.
His prose books are built around real events rather than plot: a woman met in the street, a meeting with a painter in 1934, a rock off the coast of Quebec. He called these coincidences “objective chance” and documented them with photographs instead of description. Nadja uses 44 of them, Mad Love 20, by Man Ray, Brassaï and others.
He was also a polemicist. The manifestos, prefaces and open letters name friends and enemies, expel members and defend positions, and his long sentences can move from a love story to a political argument in a page. Reading Conversations alongside the manifestos shows how much of Surrealism he wrote, and rewrote, himself.
Frequently asked questions about André Breton’s books
How many books has André Breton written?
More than 40 titles, counting poetry, essays, collaborations and collections published after his death. This page lists his 11 key books, from The Magnetic Fields (1920) to Conversations (1952), and his other poetry, collaborations and essays below them.
What are André Breton’s books in order?
The Magnetic Fields (1920, with Philippe Soupault), Earthlight (1923), The Lost Steps (1924), Manifesto of Surrealism (1924), Nadja (1928), Surrealism and Painting (1928), Communicating Vessels (1932), Mad Love (1937), Anthology of Black Humor (1940), Arcanum 17 (1944) and Conversations (1952).
Where should I start with André Breton?
With Nadja (1928). It is short, it shows the Surrealist method at work in a real story, and it is easy to find in English in Richard Howard’s 1960 translation or Mark Polizzotti’s of 2025. Read the Manifesto of Surrealism next.
What is André Breton’s most famous book?
Nadja (1928), his account of ten days with Léona Delcourt in Paris. The Manifesto of Surrealism (1924) is his most famous text, because it founded the movement.
Is Nadja a true story?
It is based on one. Nadja was Léona Delcourt (1902–1941), a young woman from Lille whom Breton met in the street in Paris in October 1926. After their affair ended she was institutionalised and spent the rest of her life in psychiatric hospitals. Critics have since asked whether Breton exploited her illness as material for the book.
What did André Breton mean by Surrealism?
In the 1924 manifesto he defined it as “pure psychic automatism”: expressing the real functioning of thought without control by reason or by aesthetic or moral concerns. In practice that meant automatic writing, the recording of dreams, and close attention to chance encounters.
Why is André Breton controversial?
Mainly for one sentence and for how he ran the movement. The Second Manifesto of Surrealism (1929–1930) says that “the simplest surrealist act consists of dashing down into the street, revolver in hand, and firing blindly into the crowd”; critics including Albert Camus condemned it, and Breton later added a note saying he was not recommending it. He also expelled members repeatedly, which led former Surrealists to attack him in the pamphlet Un cadavre (1930), and in 1935 he struck the Soviet writer Ilya Ehrenburg, after which the Surrealists were excluded from a writers’ congress in Paris.
Which translation of Nadja should I read?
Richard Howard’s translation of 1960 was made from the 1928 first edition and has long been the standard one. Mark Polizzotti’s translation for New York Review Books (2025) is the newer alternative. Breton revised the French text in 1963.
Did André Breton know Freud and Trotsky?
Yes. He met Freud, and Communicating Vessels (1932) includes their exchange of letters. In Mexico in 1938 he met Leon Trotsky, and the two wrote the Manifesto for an Independent Revolutionary Art, signed by Breton and Diego Rivera.
When did André Breton die?
On 28 September 1966 in Paris, aged 70. He is buried in the Cimetière des Batignolles. His collection of art and objects was auctioned at the Hôtel Drouot in April 2003.
Footnotes
- André Breton — Wikipedia
- Nadja (novel) — Wikipedia
- Anthology of Black Humor — Wikipedia
- André Breton — Poets.org (Academy of American Poets)
- Nadja: Léona Delcourt et André Breton — Mélusine
- Surrealism and Painting — Rain Taxi
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“Beauty will be CONVULSIVE or will not be at all.”
— André Breton, Nadja (1928), the last line, translated by Richard Howard
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