I'm currently reading a reminder letter from Specsavers saying my eye test is overdue. I hate that. It just reminds me of how the mighty fall as they age. Still, they may have a point. This bad eyesight isn't
entirely down to copious amounts of masturbation.
More germane to the thread, I'm reading "Jacques Vaché and the Roots of Surrealism including Vaché's War Letters & Other Writings" by Franklin Rosemont.
Well, I'm trying to read it. I got Covid last October and I've found it hard to concentrate on reading, and now I've lost the habit. I'll read a couple of paragraphs and then just blank when I try to recall what I read. Not really helpful when reading.
Anyway, Vaché served in WWI with the French Army, was wounded, and while in hospital met a medical orderly by the name of André Breton. Breton was so fascinated by this character that he became his acolyte--until death by an opium overdose became his thing (intentional or unintentional, no one can be really sure). Breton later founded the the Surrealism movement.
What is fascinating to me, is the parallels between this and the Beat movement. Both were founded by people and what they wrote (and the way they wrote it, i.e. André Breton and Jack Kerouac), but both writers were influenced by individuals (Vaché and Neal Cassady) that were recognised, not by what they wrote (minuscule in comparison), but how they acted in life, their attitude to life, and their attitude to art. Fascinating stuff for some--well, it beats pants-pissing
TL;DR
(a) Don't get me started on books,

and
(b) I'm off to Specsavers