La Langue Verte Et La Cuite. Etude Gastrophonique sur la marmythologie musiculinaire

Turin: Jean-Jacques Pauvert Editeur, 1968. Heavy 4to. Publishers cloth, dustjacket well preserved. Complete with original slipcase. 343 pages. Only light wear to jacket and overall an exceptional fine copy

First edition of “Den rå og den kogte tunge”

The full title of this artists book: “La langue verte et la cuite. Etude gastrophonique sur la marmythologie musculinaire, linguophilée par Asger Jorn, Directeur de l’Institut Scandinave de Vandalisme Comparé, linguophagée et postpharyngée par Noël Arnaud, Régent de ‘Pataphysique Générale et de Clinique de Rhétoriconose au Collège de ‘Pataphysique.”. Bon etat

Published as the third volume of the Bibliotheque d’Alexandrie (Library of Alexandria), La Langue verte et la cuite is the result of a collaboration between Noel Arnaud from the College de Pataphysique and visual artist Asger Jorn. The work is spectacular in many respects. First, its sheer physicality: the book is almost 5 cm thick and weighs over 2 kilograms. Next, its rich production: La Langue verte includes 315 color illustrations and a luxuriously printed dust jacket. Last but not least, its many ambitions – including the articulation of a new (half-serious) art / science (“la cuisine des langues”) and a parody of structuralism, which was then all the rage in France. In many ways, La langue verte can be read as a situationist detournement of Claude Levi Strauss’ Le Cru et le Cuit (The Raw and the Cooked, 1964), which investigated the role of cooking in the transition from nature to culture.

For additional insights about La Langue verte et la cuite and its rich meaning, see: HARRIS, STEVEN. “How Language Looks: On Asger Jorn and Noël Arnaud’s La Langue Verte.” October 141 (2012): 111–32. https://tinyurl.com/thufnvzd