Bifur – 1929 Avant-Garde Journal edited by Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes

Bifur. ed. Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes. No. 3, (Sept. 30, 1929). Editions de Carrefour: Paris. Softcover Octavo, 191 pp. No. 749 of Limited Edition of 3,000.

The influential and eclectic avant-garde journal Bifur, one of the main vehicles of avant-garde activity outside the Surrealist hegemony, was edited by the poet & playwright Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes, who had been among the most strident of the dadaists and was associated at this time with the Grand Jeu group; in this issue he is represented by a short story, "Mariage d'Élisa" ('Elisa's Marriage'). Other contributions include an article on Paul Hindemith by the composer Darius Milhaud, an array of texts ranging from poetry and stories to articles on the political situation and essays on society that explore similar anthropological territory as Bataille's Collège du Sociologie and their Documents journal – a connection supported by the inclusion of stark, documentary-style photographs of disparate and uncontextualized photographs including industrial machinery, film stills, ethnographic scenes, avant-garde paintings, etc. All this is rounded out by works by Hölderlin, James Joyce and Ernest Hemmingway in translation (Joyce from the English and the latter 'from the American').