Acéphale

Derived from the Greek ἀκέφαλος (akephalos, literally "headless"), Acéphale is the name of a public review created by Georges Bataille (four issues appeared between 1936 and 1939) and a para-religious society of the College de sociologie formed by himself, Georges Ambrosino, Pierre Klossowski, Patrick Waldberg, Roger Caillois and Michel Leiris.

The cover of the magazine was illustrated by André Masson with a drawing inspired by da Vinci's Vitruvian Man. Masson's figure has its skull displaced to take the place of--or to cover--the genitals.

Acéphale number 2 contains (among other things) responses to right-wing political readings of Nietzsche, showing how the Nazis were misquoting him and misrepresenting his positions.

Apart from Bataille, who wrote most of the texts, Caillois (nos. 3 and 4), Klossowski (1, 2, 3-4), Masson, Jules Monnerot (3-4), Jean Rollin and Jean Wahl (2) also participated in the review.

Issues

Acéphale 1 (Jun 1936). PDF, PDF (8 MB).

Acéphale 2 (Jan 1937). PDF, PDF (42 MB).

Acéphale 3-4 (Jul 1937). PDF, PDF (47 MB).

Acéphale 5 (Jun 1939). PDF, PDF (12 MB).

The above PDFs are sourced and linked from Bibliotheque Kandinsky.

See also

• Georges Bataille, L'Apprenti Sorcier: du cercle communiste démocratique à Acéphale: textes, lettres et documents (1932-1939), ed., intro. & notes Marina Galletti, Paris: Editions de la Différence, 1999, 613 pp. (French)

Translations

• Brazilian Portuguese, 5 numbers, Cultura e Barbárie, 2013-14. [1]

See also

• Documents, a surrealist journal edited by Bataille from 1929 to 1930.

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