STRARAM, Patrick. “L’Année dernière à Marienbad à Montréal” (in Situations Vol. 4, no.2). Montreal: Situations, July 1962. 68 p. [but only pp. 41-68 present]; ill.; 16 x 20 cm.; ill. Cover with collage by Patrick Straram. Very good; pages 1-40 have been torn out by Straram so that Alain Resnais would only receive the relevant section of the periodical

Patick Straram was the editor of this periodical. Two of the three articles written by Straram (those relevant to Resnais’ film) are present:

• “Sérénité délirante d’une tentative tentation” (p.50-57), an elegy of Alain Resnais’ “L’Année dernière à Marienbad“, released in 1961
• “Lettre de Montreal” (p.58-64), Staram’s take on the climate in Quebec and around the world in 1962

Straram argued that Resnais’ non-linear editing in Marienbad broke the “passive consumption” of traditional cinema. He was fascinated by the “maze-like topography” of the setting, and critiqued the film as a study of how the ruling class (the characters in the luxury hotel) is imprisoned by its own refusal to acknowledge the past, turning memory into a “malaise” or a “destructive obsession”.

This copy is exceptionally signed by Patrick Straram to the celebrated French filmmaker: “cette tentative pour l’expression d’une réciprocité, bien amicalement a vous , Alain – Patrick Straram” (trans: “This attempt to express reciprocity, with kind regards to you, Alain”)