Surrealism Gallery

Dylan Thomas was born in Swansea, Wales, on October 27, 1914. After grammar school

Dylan Thomas was born in Swansea, Wales, on October 27, 1914. After grammar school he moved to London where, in 1934, his first book of poetry, Eighteen Poems, was published. At this early age, he revealed unusual power in the use of poetic diction and imagery; the volume won him immediate critical acclaim. Thematically, these poems and virtually all that followed seem obscure because they contain elements of surrealism and personal fantasy. But the freshness and vitality of Thomas's language draw the reader into the poems and reveal the universality of the experiences with which they are concerned. This introspective tendency is less apparent in Deaths and Entrances (1946) and In Country Sleep (1951), which are generally regarded as containing his finest writing. Thomas's other works include Twenty-five Poems (1936) and The Map of Love (1939), containing both poetry and prose. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog (1940) is a group of autobiographical sketches, and Adventures in the Skin Trade (published posthumously, 1954) contains an unfinished novel and other prose pieces. During World War II (1939-1945) Thomas wrote scripts for documentary motion pictures

© 2005 TopFoto

Surrealist exhibition at the New Burlington Galleries

The International Surrealist exhibition at the New Burlington Galleries. Photographs shows Andre Breton, the leader of the Surrealist movement, with this wife; also shown are Paul Nash and Leonor Fini, as well as a sculpture entitled 'Captain Cook's Last Voyage' by Roland Penrose and a painting of Lord Kitchener by Humphrey Jennings.
1936

© Illustrated London News Ltd/Mary Evans

Very surreal French pair below a hanging lantern

Very surreal French pair below a weird-floating hanging lantern. He appears to be an aesthete and writer, decadently draped in his velvet-upholstered chair, still wearing his pink pyjamas and thinking up his next romantic poem. She looks likes a real cheeky Parisian minx, possibly not ideal girlfriend material for this chap in particular. In all honesty your guess is as good as mine as to what is going on here... Date: circa 1910s

© Mary Evans / Grenville Collins Postcard Collection