Eros in the Cinema (1966) – Raymond Durgnat [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
In a 1977 interview Durgnat said about Kyrou: “I didn’t read very much film criticism until I started teaching film regularly around 1964! There wasn’t much to read. I was very fond of the Ado Kyrou books.” If Raymond Durgnat can be compared to some of the more exciting French film critics such as Ado Kyrou, his publishing house Calder and Boyars can be compared to that of Eric Losfeld’s. [Jan 2007]
Influences: There are various people whom I read with interest because, whether I agree with them or not, there’s a genuine person speaking from a calibre of experience, not an automatic scanning mechanism. I’m thinking of Pauline Kael, who I rarely agree with; of Robin Wood, who I sometimes agree with; of Manny Farber. And Parker Tyler. At the other extreme, I’m very interested in certain theorists, particularly Jean Mitry and Edgar Morin. –Raymond Durgnat in a 1977 interview.
Jan — There’s a marvelous, meaty celebration of Durgnat and his lifetime of work here at Senses of Cinema.
I occasionally help out in a Euro/Art DVD shop.
The boss there likes his Raymond Durgnat.
Durgnat’s book A Mirror for England has come up in some books I have been reading on Sixties British Cinema.
It is linked to at sensesofcinema http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/02/20/durgnat_murphy.html
Its John Hill’s Sex, Class and Realism which is intriguing me just now.
Another “Mirror” book I’d like to read is Martin Green’s A Mirror for Anglo Saxons.
To think it was probably Cocteau and his mirrors in Orphee which kickstarted my love of film.
Raymond, Girish,
Thanks for the pointers.
Jan
And I was very fond of the Durgnat books. This fondness started with my interest in Franju.
Durgnat on Judex: “They (Feuillade’s serials) first adumbrate the secret, shadowy power-structures which proliferate cancerously through Kafka, in ‘1984’ and William Burroughs, and are currently reaching some sort of climax on the entertainment level in the current multiplication of thrillers involving mysterious world-dominating and and world-protecting entities (UNCLE, SPECTRE, THRUSH and so on).”
Nice aside: he was also teaching film to the Quay Brothers.
I would say that Calder is more akin to Barney Rossett (Beckett, Burroughs, Miller, Pinter). He would maybe publish books on smut but no smut itself.
Hi Andrej,
Good to see you again, I’ve had quite some work with your enlightening comments, thanks a lot for them.
I knew I was making perhaps unwarrented assumptions by comparing Calder to Losfeld. But didn’t Rossett also publish Story of O and Emmanuelle; which could be counted as smut?
Another perhaps rash assumption is that Calder was Durgnat’s publisher. Is it?
I share your interest with Franju.
I tried finding out more about Andrej Maltar, could you tell me a bit more about yourself and where your vast knowledge of the topics that interest me comes from?
Jan
Hi Jan,
needless to say that I liked very much your piece on Schröder and his Maerz Verlag.
Of course, all these publishers share a similar sensibility and they all had their fights against literary censorship. But I would say, that Calder was more focused on “serious” literature than the others. Losfeld on the other side actually made a living as a smut peddler inbetween “Arcanes” and “Le Terrain Vague”.
Calder published indeed “Eros in the Cinema”.
As for me, I’m preparing a site on surrealist film criticism, which is virtually unknown in Germany, where I live. I’ll contact you when this takes more concrete forms. It was through my interest in comics and the german editions of “Pravda” and “Barbarella” that I first heard about Losfeld.