In By Surprise, Henri Michaux recounts in vivid detail the dislocations or déplacements of a psychedelic sojourn, where the vicissitudes of the mind are wrested in a kaleidoscopic “paraphysics”. Across bursts of observation as dizzying as the trip itself, Michaux probes the affectations of the real and the exaltations of the as-yet unknown. With a preface by Allen Ginsberg on Michaux as humble “genius,” a keeper of visions and dreams, By Surprise is steeped in the thrillingly protean.

Leaving behind a corpus of nearly 10,000 drawings and over 30 volumes of poetry, the Belgian-born French avant-garde figure Henri Michaux (1899-1984) was described by John Ashbery as “hardly a painter, hardly even a writer, but a conscience—the most sensitive substance yet discovered for registering the fluctuating anguish of day-to-day, minute-to-minute living.” With close ties to surrealist and existentialist circles, Michaux modelled his own distinct artistry through a commitment to the revelatory power of a chosen medium, whether literary or artistic. Notable works in English translation include his Plume cycle, a dialogue with a Chaplinesque personification of the errant pen, as well as the travel memoir A Barbarian in Asia, the illustrated volume Stroke by Stroke, and the compilation, Darkness Moves.