Speaking East
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€33.99
Isidore Isou was a young Jew in war-time Bucharest, and barely survived the Romanian Holocaust. He made his way to Paris where in 1945 he founded the avant-garde movement Lettrism, described as the missing link between Dada, Surrealism, Situationism and May ’68.
In Speaking East Andrew Hussey presents a colourful picture of the post-war Left Bank, where Lettrist fists flew in avant-garde punch-ups in Jazz clubs and cafés and Isou, as sexy and as charismatic as the young Elvis, gathered around him a group of hooligan disciples who argued, drank and had sex with the Parisian intellectual élite.
This is a vibrant account of the life and times of a pivotal figure in the history of the avant-garde.
Andrew Hussey was formerly Dean and Professor at the University of London in Paris. He has written for the New Statesman, the Observer and The New York Times, and his books include Paris, The Secret History which has been translated into a dozen languages and The French Intifada (2015) which was Sunday Times Book of the Week. He lives in Paris.