But this new stucco-coated version, with the what one might be tempted to say is rather pretentious outside packaging, has focused my mind sympatheticly by actualizing some of the significant pataphysical concepts raised within the text itself. But lacking the kind of provocative packaging Atlas (in association with The London Institute of Pataphysics) has given this version, it made a rather minor impact on me at the time.
I had first encountered this slim but fascinating text, which Baudrillard wrote at the tender age 21, when it appeared unexpectedly in Baudrillard’s collection of art-related essays which Sylvère Lotringer’s Semiotext(e) released in 2005 called The Conspiracy of Art (it is a different translation, however). 7), followed soon after by talk of “fake universes” (p. 7)) this pairing made a peculiarly drôle sense, as immediately I started reading about “fake” “stucco” “self-infatuation” and “vast flatulence” (p. 8) and as “the mind’s loftiest temptation” (p. But as I gleefully plunged past the books sign-value packaging and into the distinguished Simon Watson Taylor’s English translation (his final) of this circa-1950 text (ostensibly on the subject of Pataphysics, which Baudrillard here defines as “the philosophy of gaseous states”, as “tautology” (the use of redundant language that adds no information) (p. Thus I was immediately struck by the nonsensical pairing of a distinguished looking façade that supposedly signified some kind of venerable “authenticity” with an interior teensy-weensy substantive content. The second remarkable thing about this book is its slim size: it is only 14 pages long. I say remarkable in that I still tend to identify Baudrillard with the small, slick black covers in which Semiotext(e) introduced him to America covers which implied more of a techno aesthetic than this solemn neo-gothic one. Unsurprisingly, the first remarkable thing about Jean Baudrillard’s limited edition text Pataphysics is its passé, handmade, deckle-edged, luxury cover.
We are nothing more than a state of virtual fart…
Antonin Artaud, Manifesto In Clear Languageįor Pataphysics all phenomena are totally gaseous. There is for me an evidence in the realm of flesh which has nothing to do with the evidence of reason. 177 numbered copies.Ĥ4 numbered copies, signed by the author, unavailable Book Review of Jean Baudrillard’s PataphysicsĪt The International Journal of Baudrillard Studies (IJBS)ġ4pp., 15 x 30.5 cm., deckle-edged handmade paper wrappers, Pédale 133
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