Reflection on How Einstein’s Relativity & Quantum Physics have Decrypted or Helped Understand the Mysteries of Surrealist Poetry

Quantum physics and relativity are two epistemic fields that study the laws of nature at the level of the subatomic particles (electrons, protons, quarks, neutrons, etc…) and that of gigantic objects (galaxies, solar systems, quasars, black holes, wormholes, gravity, etc…) respectively. Both are eminently revolutionary theories because they have achieved two epistemological breaks. As a matter of fact, they have managed to cause us to decrypt hidden aspects of the universe and reality by enabling us to understand them very differently and optimally. In Newtonian/classical physics for instance, time is the same everywhere and irreversible, relativity shows us that it is flexible and can even vary and dilate based on the speed of a device being used (the case of the twins’ paradox); gravity is a force in Newton, but in Einstein’s general relativity, it is a geometrical curvature that creates the distortion in the fabric of the space-time continuum and even provides a theoretical framework for time travel (Riemannian differential geometry). With respect to quantum physics, it has helped us to comprehend that everything can be connected to everything in the universe, principle pertinently summarized by Dr. Erwin Schrödinger’s aphorism as follows: the total number of minds in the universe is one. In fact, consciousness is a singularity phasing with all beings.” This principle explains what is known as quantum entanglement demonstrating that two subatomic particles distant from millions of miles apart in space can be connected instantaneously. It follows that when we activate one, the other reacts instantaneously because this activation affects the other immediately regardless of the distance. Precisely, the principle of quantum entanglement or interconnectedness and the distortion of spacetime continuum by gravity share important similarities with surrealist poetry. One of the most salient of these similarities is the esthetic canon of the collage or brutal connection of two realities aprioristically unrelated in space and time but cryptically linked. André Breton, scientist and founder of the Surrealist School of poetry and author of Vases Communicants and Nadja consistently illustrated those similarities in these two works and several others. It follows that quantum physics and relativity have contributed to shape the very matrix of surrealist poetry and surrealism. The goal of our study is to analyze how these two epistemic fields have enlightened the mystery of surrealist poetry and find the hermeneutic rationale behind such illumination. We will use a transdisciplinary approach to knowledge showing that there are hidden connections between most epistemic fields by virtue of which findings in some can explain or solve problems inherently associated with others.