The Difficulty of Being

by Cocteau, Jean; Sprigge, Elizabeth

• ISBN13: 9780306806339
• ISBN10: 0306806339
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1995-03-01
• Publisher: Perseus Books

Summary

Writer, filmmaker, visual artist, and celebrated leader of the French avant-garde, Jean Cocteau (18891963) once announced, "One must know how to go too far." The astounding scope of his work stands as a testament to that revolutionary spirit. Throughout his life he boldly experimented in almost every medium and achieved enduring success in them all: novels likeLes Enfants Terribles; films such asThe Blood of a Poet,Beauty and the Beast, andOrphee; as well as plays, ballets, drawings, poems, and even an opera ofOedipus Rex(written with Stravinsky). Cocteau regardedThe Difficulty of Beingas the key to his oeuvre and as a daring act of self-revelation. With terse skill he explores the innermost frontiers of his personality, from childhood memories to his creative wrestlings, from incisive portraits of Proust, Gide, Nijinsky, Picasso, and Stravinsky to reflections on death, friendship, dreams, youth, pain, beauty, haunted houses, and of course, on being without being. But no matter what he is writing about, he goes straight to the mark, illuminating a thought, subject, or personal reminiscence with precision and vitality. A magazine once asked Cocteau, If his house were burning and he could take only one thing, what would it be? "I'd take the fire," he answered. InThe Difficulty of BeingCocteau does just that.