ISBN 0-947757-63-5 (UK pbk)

Introduction by Alastair Brotchie

1. "Visiting Manette" by Alfred Jarry

2. "Visiting Manon" by Alfred Jarry

3. "Visiting the Old Lady" by Alfred Jarry
("'The Old Lady' was the nickname given to Berthe de Courrière by the writers associated with the Mercure de France ; she was Remy de Gourmont's mistress/companion." --Alastair Brotchie.)

4. "Visiting the Grande Dame" by Alfred Jarry

5. "Visiting the Young Cousin" by Alfred Jarry

6. "Visiting the Fiancée" by Alfred Jarry

7. "Visiting the Doctor" by Alfred Jarry

8. "Fear Visits Love" by Rachilde?
(first published in La Revue Blanche edited by Felix Fénéon, April 1898, under Jarry's name... "[Rachilde] insisted, according to Maurice Saillet, that she was the author of Fear Visits Love , the result of a bet between her and Jarry that she could write in his manner." --Alastair Brotchie.)

X. "Visiting Death or The Other Alcestis" by Alfred Jarry
(first published in La Revue Blanche edited by Felix Fénéon, October 1896... this chapter was edited out of the original French publication of Visits of Love )

9. "Visiting the Muse" by Alfred Jarry

10. "Towards Paradise or The Old Man of the Mountain" by Alfred Jarry
(first published in La Revue Blanche edited by Felix Fénéon, April? 1896)

11. "Visiting Madame Ubu" by Alfred Jarry
("originally constituted a section of Guignol titled Art and Science which was part of Jarry's collection Minutes de Sable Mémorial ." --Alastair Brotchie.)

Translator's notes by Iain White

Sources and Bibliography

"Alfred Jarry is chiefly known as the creator of UBU, the anti-hero of what is acknowledged as the first 'absurd' drama, but this was only one facet of a writer now seen as one of the most vital (and peculiar) influences on the French literature of this century.

"Visits of Love was Jarry's second novel, originally written for a publisher specialising in erotica (who must have been perplexed by the result). The 'visits' consist of a remarkable series of tableaux, dialogues and assignations which deviously undermine the dreary situations of conventional erotic writing. They become more and more extravagant, transcending the everyday, passing beyond death, returning to bizarre versions of historical myths, or to the lavatorial trysts of Madame Ubu. Jarry's intricate style is pushed to its furthest limits, from crude buffoonery to ornate Symbolist texts of earnest intensity.

"Certain chapters are unique in his writing: Raymond Queneau described The Old Man of the Mountain as Jarry's most perfect work, and the episode Fear Visits Love is among his most often reprinted works in France. Despite its curious origins, the novel is an essential part of Jarry's oeuvre ." -- [jacket blurb, UK pbk, 1993]

"Visits of Love is in fact a work of anti-erotica, in which repugnance takes the place of prurience, and a mordant and embittered sarcasm stands in for gallantry." --Alastair Brotchie (in the Introduction, UK pbk, 1993).

"Jarry's precocious writing prefigures surrealism and foreshadows postmodernism. This 'mad' work is full of wordplay, satirical references, convoluted ideas, and layers of symbolism." --Henry W.Targowski (in Mark/Space , 1997).