To understand more of the Surrealists it helps to know more about some of their Inspirations and precursers: - * Agrippa (1486 - 1534) * Alphonse Allais -> (1854 - 1905) French author of humourous tales. * Guillaume Apollinaire (1880-1918); (French) Cubist poet, playwright and art critic who championed the Cubists and invented the term surrealism. * Achim von Arnim ->; (1781 - 1834); German author of fantasy tales. (Contes bizarres). * Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1527 - 1593) painter. * Baudelaire; (1821 - 1867); late Romantic and decadent who first read Poe in 1847 and translated a volume of his tales (1852); he also translated Thomas De Quincey. His Flowers of Evil (1857, 1861) was banned. His art criticism was among the first written; his most notable prose work was Artificial Paradises. Infamous for his abuse of alcohol, hashish, opium and other substances. His work influenced the Parnassians, Symbolists, Impressionists, Imagists and Surrealists. * Georges Berkley ->; (1685 - 1753); Irish Bishop and Philosopher. * Aloysius Bertrand ->; (1807 - 1841); french Poet. Author of Gaspard de la nuit. * William Blake; (1757 - 1827 English Mystic, Poet and Painter. * Petrus Borel ->; (1809 - 1859); French romantic storyteller; Translated Defoe ->. Author of Madame Putifar. * Hieronymus Bosch (c1450 - 1516) Painter see -> and wiki ->. * Giodorno Bruno ->; (1548-1600); and the Hermetic-alchemical tradition. * Giorgio de Chirico. * Nicholas Flamel ->; (c. 1330-1417); French alchemist. * Xavier Forneret; (1809 - 1884); French writer; Humourist. * Freud -> (1856-1939). * Johann Fussli Painter. * Hegel -> (1770-1831); German transcendental-idealist philosopher who popularized the dialectic; * Pierre Janet -> (1859-1947); pioneer psychologist who opposed Freudianism and inspired Andre Breton as a medical student, but dismissed Surrealism. * Alfred Jarry (1873 - 1907); author and playwrite famous for Ubu Roi (1896) and also his invention of Pataphysics. * Lautreamont; author of Les Chants de Maldoror. * Eliphas Levi; latterday magician. * Ramon Llull (1232 - 1315); Medieval mystic and philosopher. * Stephanie Mallarme (1842 - 1898) Symbolist poet exemplar. * Henri Matisse - Painter. * Gustave Moreau -> (1826 – 1898) French Symbolist painter. * Paracelsus -> (1493-1541) Alchemical genius. * Poe (1809 - 1849); Writer; a prophet to the Symbolists and was termed by Andre Breton a "Surrealist in adventure." * Pierre Reverdy (1889 - 1960) wrote poems, prose poems and notes on poetic theory, beginning just before the formation of the surrealist group and continuing to influence it from a distance. * Rimbaud (1854 - 18910 called Baudelaire "the first seer, king of poets, a true God!". * Saint-Pol Roux -> (1861 - 1940) Symbolist poet to whom Andre Breton dedicated his first volume of Poems and whom he called "the Master of the Image." * Marquis de Sade (1740 - 1814); prized for his atheism and his extreme open mindedness concerning the definition of love. * Helene Smith (1861 - 1932) - The medium from Mars. * Paul Valery (1871 - 1945); last of the Symbolist poets, inspired the surrealists as much by his 20-year silence as by his poetry and the story Evening with Mr. Teste. * Edward Young whose Night Thoughts -> was described by Andre Breton as Surrealist from beginning to end. * Horace Walpole in 1764 published The Castle of Otranto Many of these Inspirations are mentioned by Andre Breton in his Surrealism and Painting ->.