SOURCE: Showalter, Jr., English. “Biographical Aspects of Eluard's Poetry.” PMLA 78, (1963): 280-86.

In the following essay, Showalter discusses Eluard's poetry in the context of three key events in his life: a trip around the world in 1924, the dissolution of his marriage in 1930, and his break with surrealism in 1938.

The life of Paul Eluard holds a remarkable number of mysteries for that of a man who became prominent rather young and whose friends frequently made a particular effort to have themselves talked about. Specifically, three crises from the first period of his career, when he was attached to the surrealist movement, are either avoided or barely mentioned by biographers: the strange disappearance from Paris in 1924 which turned out to be a trip around the world; the breakup of Eluard's first marriage in 1930; and the rupture with Breton and the surrealists in 1938. Our ignorance about these questions does not stem from...