Rigaut, Jacques-Georges (1898-1929). A founder-member of the Paris Dada group, Rigaut was the specialist of verbal revolt, a master of elegant paradox and acid cynicism. His personal manifesto, ‘Je serai sérieux comme le plaisir’ (1920), was a characteristic provocation in its advocacy of despair and suicide; and his ‘Pensées’ comprise stunning aphorisms about the moral code of the nihilist and dandy. Incapable of adjusting to Surrealism, Rigaut left Paris for New York in 1924 and led a wastrel's life till he shot himself in 1929. His collected writings, nearly all posthumous, appeared as Écrits in 1970.
[Roger Cardinal]
