2026.10.11
Duchamp, Encyclopede
Philippe Duboy, Lequeu: A Architectural Enigma (1986), p. 78.
Philippe Duboy, Lequeu: A Architectural Enigma (1986), p. 79.
2025.10.11
Marshall Walter "Major" Taylor on the front of the November 1, 1898, edition of the French sports magazine La Vie au grand air. Marcel Duchamp was 11 years old at the time.
During the first few years as a professional in the United States (1896 to 1900), Taylor aroused an intense hatred among some white riders as he began to challenge them for the best prizes--hefty purses of gold coins.
. . .
The editor of the New York Morning Telegraph, under the headline "The boycott against Taylor was too long delayed," was "pleased to see this emphatic assertion of the superiority of the Caucasian over the Ethiopian," although he wished that the white riders had boycotted Taylor before "the black whirlwind" had defeated them all. "It is, of course, a degradation for a white man to contest any points with a negro," he thought. "It is worse than that, and becomes an absolute grief and social disaster when a negro persistently wins in the competition."
Andrew Ritchie in David K. Wiggins, editor, Out of the Shadows: A Biographical History of African American Athletes (2006), pp. 25-7.
Marshall "Major" Taylor standing next to manager Victor Breyer in a 1901 photograph in Paris. This was at the height of Taylor's fame. Marcel Duchamp was 14 years old at the time.
In March 1901, when Taylor crossed the Atlantic for the first time, he was, according to the Worcester Spy, "the most universally admired passenger on the big ocean lines." In France, wrote Robert Coquelle (one of Taylor's French managers) in the cycling daily, Le Vélo, Taylor was awaited like the Messiah."
When he arrived in Paris, Taylor was a celebrity and was instantly transformed into an athletic superstar. The exhausting and triumphant tour of the summer of 1901 established him as black America's unofficial ambassador to Europe. His fame was consolidated and sustained by extensive coverage in the sporting and general interest press and by the publicity machine of the promoters. It was a press generated fame of a totally modern kind, with sport as the selling point, and a dramatic, and idiosyncratic personality to give it spice and meaning. The press met Taylor at Boulogne and followed him everywhere. In hundreds of daily reports, they wrote about what he looked like, how he dressed, what he did, what he said, what he ate, and how his training and racing were progressing. The sporting establishment, the newly prominent automobile manufacturers, and the Parisian aristocracy competed to entertain him. Letters from America addressed simply to "Major Taylor, Paris, France" arrived safely at his hotel. People followed him in the street just to touch him and paid entry fees to the tracks just to watch him train.
For probably the first time in modern sport history, a black athlete was marketed as a star and seen by thousands of people in a short space of time, in France, Germany, Italy, Austria, Denmark, and Holland.
Andrew Ritchie in David K. Wiggins, editor, Out of the Shadows: A Biographical History of African American Athletes (2006), pp. 30-1.
The Passion Considered as an Uphill Bicycle Race
Alfred Jarry
Translated by Roger Shattuck Original title: La passion considérée comme course de côte Le Canard Sauvage 11-17 avril 1903 Text source: Selected Works of Alfred Jarry, edited by Roger Shattuck & Simon Watson Taylor, New York, Grove Press (1965, 1980).
Barabbas, slated to race, was scratched.
Pilate, the starter, pulling out his clepsydra or water clock, an operation which wet his hands unless he had merely spit on them. Pilate gave the send-off.
Jesus got away to a good start. In those days, according to the excellent sports commentator St Mathew, it was customary to flagellate the sprinters at the start the way a coachman whips his horses. The whip both stimulates and gives a hygienic massage. Jesus, then, got off in good form, but he had a flat right away. A bed of thorns punctured the whole circumference of his front tyre.
Today in the shop windows of bicycle dealers you see a reproduction of this veritable crown of thorns as an ad for puncture-proof tyres. But Jesus’s was an ordinary singletube racing tyre.
The two thieves, obviously in cahoots and therefore 'thick as thieves', took the lead.
It is not true that there were any nails. The three objects usually shown in the ads belong to a rapid-change tyre tool called the
'Jiffy'.
We had better begin by telling about the spills; but before that the machine itself must be described.
The bicycle frame in use today is of relatively recent invention. It appeared around 1890. Previous to that time the body of the machine was constructed of two tubes soldered together at right angles. It was generally called the right-angle or cross bicycle. Jesus, after his puncture, climbed the slope on foot, carrying on his shoulder the bike frame, or, if you will, the cross.
Contemporary engravings reproduce this scene from photographs. But it appears that the sport of cycling, as a result of the well-known accident which put a grievous end to the Passion race and which was brought up to date almost on its anniversary by the similar accident of Count Zborowski on the Turbie slope--the sport of cycling was for a time prohibited by state ordinance. That explains why the illustrated magazines, in reproducing this celebrated scene, show bicycles of a rather imaginary design. They confuse the machine's cross frame with that other cross, the straight handlebar. They represent Jesus with his hands spread on the handlebars, and it is worth mentioning in this connection that Jesus rode lying flat on his back in order to reduce his air resistance.
Note also that the frame or cross was made of wood, just as wheels are to this day.
A few people have insinuated falsely that Jesus's machine was a draisienne, an unlikely mount for a hill-climbing contest. According to the old cyclophile hagiographers, St. Briget, St. Gregory of Tours, and St. Irene, the cross was equipped with a device which they name suppendaneum. There is no need to be a great scholar to translate this as 'pedal'.
Lipsius, Justinian, Bosius, and Erycius Puteanus describe another accessory which one still finds, according to Cornelius Curtius in 1643, on Japanese crosses; a protuberance of leather or wood on the shaft which the rider sits astride--manifestly the seat or
saddle.
This general description, furthermore, suits the definition of a bicycle current among the Chinese: "A little mule which is led by the ears and urged along by showering it with kicks."
We shall abridge the story of the race itself, for it has been narrated in detail by specialized works and illustrated by sculpture and painting visible in monuments built to house such art.
There are fourteen turns in the difficult Golgotha course. Jesus took his first spill at the third turn. His mother, who was in the
stands, became alarmed.
His excellent trainer, Simon the Cyrenian, who but for the thorn accident would have been riding out in front to cut the wind, carried the machine.
Jesus, though carrying nothing, perspired heavily. It is not certain whether a female spectator wiped his brown, but we know that Veronica, a girl reporter, got a good shot of him with her Kodak.
The second spill came at the seventh turn on some slippery pavement. Jesus went down for the third time at the eleventh turn, skidding on a rail.
The Israelite deminondaines waved their handkerchiefs at the eighth.
The deplorable accident familiar to us all took place at the twelfth turn. Jesus was in a dead heat at the time with the thieves.
We know that he continued the race airborne, but that is another story.
www.patakosmos.com
Arturo Schwarz The Complete Works of Marcel Duchamp 2000 p. 588.
Marcel Duchamp To Have the Apprentice in the Sun January 1914 Rouen
The image [To Have the Apprentice in the Sun] was most probably suggested by an Alfred Jarry prose poem, "The Passion as an Uphill Bicycle Race," which had been reprinted a few years before. Duchamp's drawing is one of elements of The Box of 1914, 1913-14, where, like all the other contents, it is reproduced photographically. The original drawing was presented to Louise and Walter Arensberg around 1921.
Arturo Schwarz, The Complete Works of Marcel Duchamp (2000), p. 598.
Reproduction of a historic photograph of Marshall "Major" Taylor circa 1898, purchased by Stephen Lauf from Brewerytown Paperboy 2025.07.27 (coincidentally the day before the 138th anniversary of Marcel Duchamp's birth).
Unbekannt ...wonders if this is the first time these two images have been photographed together 2025.07.27
So far, I have found no reference connecting Marshall "Major" Taylor with the work of either Alfred Jarry or Marcel Duchamp, yet, at this point, the connection appears explicitly obvious. Moreover, the now obvious connection begs the question, why has this connection never been noted before? And ultimately, do Jarry's and Duchamp's covert references to Marshall "Major" Taylor have anything to do with race and/or racism, or were Jarry and/or Duchamp simply covetous of Taylor's unprecedented modern fame?
Stephen Lauf acquisitions of another spree 2025.10.11
2005.10.11
The most beautiful definition I've ever read...
Saint Pope Celestine V : Unfitted for the papal office in ever respect except for his holiness.
The Penguin Dictionary of Saints
2002
Denis Diderot "Encyclopedia"
Diderot, Denis. "Encyclopedia." The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project. Translated by Philip Stewart. Ann Arbor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2002. http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.did2222.0000.004 (accessed 11 October 2026). Originally published as "Encyclopédie," Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, 5:635–648A (Paris, 1755).
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Encyclopedia. This word signifies chain of knowledge ; it is composed of the Greek preposition ??, in, and the nouns ??????, circle, and pa?de?a, knowledge .
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Indeed, the purpose of an encyclopedia is to collect knowledge disseminated around the globe; to set forth its general system to the men with whom we live, and transmit it to those who will come after us, so that the work of preceding centuries will not become useless to the centuries to come; and so that our offspring, becoming better instructed, will at the same time become more virtuous and happy, and that we should not die without having rendered a service to the human race.
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It would have been difficult to propose a more extensive object than covering everything related to human curiosity, duty, needs, and pleasures. For this reason some persons accustomed to judge the possibilities of an enterprise by the limited resources they recognize in themselves have pronounced that we will never bring ours to completion. See the most recent edition of the Dictionnaire de Trévoux , article Encyclopedia. They shall have as sole reply this passage from Chancellor Bacon, which seems to address them specifically: De impossibilitate itá flatuo; et omnia possibilia et praestabilia esse censenda quae ab aliquibus perfici possunt, licét non á quibusvis; et quae á multis conjunctim, licét non ab uno; et quae in successione saeculorum, licét non eodem aevo; et denique quae multorum curâ et sumptf, licét non opibus et industriâ singulorum. (Bac. lib. II. De augment. scient. cap. j. pag. 103 .)
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When one considers the immense material for an encyclopedia, the only thing one perceives distinctly is that it cannot be the work of a single man. How could a single man, in the short span of his life, manage to comprehend and develop the universal system of nature and art? Whereas the numerous scientific community of La Crusca spent forty years constituting its vocabulary, and whereas our French Academicians had labored for sixty years on their dictionary, before producing its first editon! Yet what is the dictionary of a language? What is a lexicon, even executed as well as it can be? A precise collection of the articles to be filled in by an encyclopedic and analytical dictionary.
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It will be said that a single man is master of all that exists, and will dispose as he wishes of all the riches that other men have accumulated. I cannot agree to this principle: I do not believe it is given to a single man to know all that can be known, to make use of all there is, to see all that can be seen, to understand all that is intelligible. Were an analytical dictionary of the sciences and arts nothing more than a methodical combination of their elements, I would still ask whom it behooves to fabricate good elements; whether the elementary exposition of the fundamental principles of a science or an art is the first attempt of a pupil or the masterpiece of a master. See the article Elements of the Sciences.
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But to demonstrate quite convincingly how difficult it is for a single man ever to execute an analytical dictionary of science in general, it suffices to insist upon the mere difficulties of a simple dictionary.
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A universal dictionary is an opus which proposes to fix the meaning of the terms of a language, by defining those which can be defined, through a short, meticulous, clear, and precise enumeration or the qualities of ideas attached to them. The only good definitions are those that group the essential attributes of the thing designated by the word. But is just anyone capable of knowing and exposing these attributes? Is the art of defining as common as that? Are we not all, more or less, in the same situation as children who apply, with the greatest precision, innumerable terms in the place of which they would be utterly incapable of substituting the correct collection of qualities of ideas they represent? Whence, how many unforeseen difficulties, when it comes to setting down the meaning of the commonest expressions? We constantly experience the fact that the ones we least understand are also those we use the most. What is the reason for this strange phenomenon? It is that we are forever in the situation of pronouncing that a thing is such; almost never in the necessity of determining what it is to be such. Our most frequent judgments fall on specific objects, and the general usage of the language and experience suffices to guide us. We merely repeat what we have heard all our lives. Such is not the case when we need to form general notions which include, without exception, a certain number of individuals. Only the deepest contemplation and the most surprising breadth of knowledge can guide us surely. Let me clarify these principles with an example: we say of a great many objects of every kind, without any of us ever getting it wrong, that they are luxury items ; but what is this luxury which we attach so unmistakably to so many objects? That is a question one can satisfy with any precision only after a discussion which the persons who demonstrate the greatest accuracy in the application of the word luxury have not held, and are perhaps not prepared to hold.
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All the terms must be defined, except for radicals, that is to say those which designate simple sensations or the most general abstract ideas. See article Dictionary. Should any be omitted, the dictionary is incomplete. Should you wish to exclude none, who will exactly define the word conjugate, if not a geometrician; the word conjugation, if not a grammarian; the word azimuth, if not an astronomer; the word epic, if not a man of letters; the word exchange , if not a merchant; the word vice, if not a moralist; the word hypostasis, if not a theologian; the word metaphysics, if not a philosopher; the word gouge, if not a man versed in the arts? Whence I conclude that, if the French Academy did not bring together in its assemblies the fully gamut of knowledge and talents, it would be certain to overlook many expressions that will be sought in its dictionary, or let through false, incomplete, absurd, or even ridiculous definitions.
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I am not unaware that this opinion is not that of those men who talk about everything and know nothing; who are not members of our academies; who will never be, because they are not worthy to be; who nevertheless make it their business to pick the candidates for vacant seats; who, daring to set the limits of the French Academy's purpose, were almost indignant to see the likes of Mairans, Maupertuis, and D'alembert received in its company, and who are not unaware that the first time any of them spoke up there, it was to rectify the definition of the term noon. To listen to them, one would think that they presume to confine the knowledge of the language and the dictionary of the Academy to a very small number of terms familiar to them. Even then, should they look closer, among these terms they would find quite a few, such as tree, animal, plant, flower, vice, virtue, truth, force, law, which if they wished to define them rigorously would leave them no choice but to call on the philosopher, the jurist, the historian, the naturalist; in a word, the man who knows the real or abstract qualities that constitute such an entity, and that specify or individualize it, according to whether there are other entities like it or it is unique.
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Let us then conclude that one will never bring a good dictionary into being without the help of a large number of different talents, because the definitions of names are not different from the definitions of things (see article Definition), and because things can only be well defined or described by those who have long studied them. But if that is the case, what will not be required in order to carry out an opus in which, far from merely attempting to define a word, we shall attempt to describe in detail all of its properties?
1999.10.11
pieces/palimpsest 27
1958.10.11
1958. Saturday, New York City
Replies to Robert Lebel's letter that he received in the morning explaining the three different works superimposed on the canvas entitled Réseaux de Stoppages [19.5.1914]. The pencil tracing "is that of the Large Glass, 'complete' (invisible or almost, with many omissions)," writes Duchamp. "It is rather a sketch for the overall dimensions (to half the scale), the opposite way round from Printemps."
Duchamp has sent Arnold Fawcus about 20 examples of Autoportrait de Profil, the profiles [25.3.1957] torn by hand and signed "Marcel dechiravit" for copies of the book in the category "hors commerce", and remarks to Lebel that the next stage will be the printing of the text: "Only after that, will we be able to glimpse the end of the tunnel."
Ephemerides
1941.10.11
1941. Saturday, New Haven
At a meeting, the trustees of Yale University agree to accept the donation of the Collection of the Société Anonyme, Inc. (Museum of Modern Art) made by its trustees, Marcel Duchamp and Katherine Dreier [1.9.1936]. Duchamp gave his approval to the donation by telegram from France on 9 August.
Ephemerides
1912.10.11
1912. Friday, Paris
A staunch defender of the artists exhibiting in the "Section d'Or", which opened on Wednesday, Guillaume Apollinaire gives the first lecture at 64 Rue La Boétie, which he entitles "L'Ecartèlement du Cubisme" [the Quartering of Cubism]. Using ideas he is developing for the book he is writing, Méditations esthétiques, Apollinaire divides Cubism into four categories: scientific, physical, instinctive and orphic.
Apollinaire wrote to Duchamp in Munich to ask him for a portrait photograph to publish in his forthcoming book, and the document was made by the young photographer Hans [sic Heinrich] Hoffmann, who had taken Franz Marc's old studio at 33 Schellingstrasse, not far from Duchamp's lodgings in Schwabing [1.7.1912]. If Duchamp and Apollinaire had not met previously [10.6.1912], the "Section d'Or" on Duchamp's return from Germany (whenever that may have been [26.9.1912]) was the occasion for them to do so.
Ephemerides
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