[3][4][5] Known for his raw, surreal and transgressive work, his texts explored themes from the cosmologies of ancient cultures, philosophy, the occult, mysticism and indigenous Mexican and Balinese practices.

[11] Biographer David Shafer argues, however, that given the frequency of such misdiagnoses, coupled with the absence of a treatment (and consequent near-minimal survival rate) and the symptoms he had, it's unlikely that Artaud actually contracted it.

At school he began reading works by Arthur Rimbaud, Stéphane Mallarmé, and Edgar Allan Poe and founded a private literary magazine in collaboration with his friends.

[citation needed] Towards the end of his tenure at the Collège, Artaud noticeably withdrew from social life and "destroyed most of his written work and gave away his books".

[2]:29 In Paris, Artaud worked with a number of celebrated French "teacher-directors", including Jacques Copeau, André Antoine, Georges and Ludmilla Pitoëff, Charles Dullin, Firmin Gémier and Lugné-Poe.

[13]:351-2 Their final disagreement was over his performance as the Emperor Charlemagne in Alexandre Arnoux's Huon de Bordeaux; he left the troupe in 1923 after eighteen months as a member.

[5]:15-16 In 1923, Artaud submitted poems to La Nouvelle Revue Française (NRF), a prominent French literary journal.

[15] This included his performance as Jean-Paul Marat in Abel Gance's Napoléon (1927) and the monk Massieu in Carl Theodor Dreyer's The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928).

The Theatre was extremely short-lived, but was attended by an enormous range of European artists, including Arthur Adamov, André Gide, and Paul Valéry.

[5]:26 Adrian Curtin has noted the significance of the Balinese use of music and sound for Artaud, and particularlythe 'hypnotic' rhythms of the gamelan ensemble, its range of percussive effects, the variety of timbres that the musicians produced, and – most importantly, perhaps – the way in which the dancers' movements interacted dynamically with the musical elements instead of simply functioning as a type of background accompaniment.

[21]: 253 In 1935, Artaud staged an original adaptation of Percy Bysshe Shelley's The Cenci at the Théâtre des Folies-Wagram in Paris.

[5]:21 Artaud was concerned with conveying the menacing nature of the Cenci's presence and the reverberations of their incest relationship though physical discordance, as if an invisible "force-field" surrounded them.

He describes the opening scene as "suggestive of extreme atmospheric turbulence, with wind-blown drapes, waves of suddenly amplified sound, and crowds of figures engaged in "furious orgy", accompanied by "a chorus of church bells", as well as the presence of numerous large mannequins.

Scholar Jane Goodall writes of The Cenci,The predominance of action over reflection accelerates the development of events...the monologues...are cut in favor of sudden, jarring transitions...so that a spasmodic effect is created.

After arriving the following month, he "became something of a 'fixture' in the Mexican art scene", though he was often under the influence of opiates, and spent much of his time "seated and immobile, 'cual momia' [like a mummy]".

[citation needed] In 1943, when France was occupied by the Germans and Italians, Robert Desnos arranged to have Artaud transferred to the psychiatric hospital in Rodez, which was well inside Vichy territory.

[30]:194 The doctor believed that Artaud's habits of crafting magic spells, creating astrology charts, and drawing disturbing images were symptoms of mental illness.

[citation needed] He recorded Pour en Finir avec le Jugement de Dieu (To Have Done With the Judgment of God) on 22–29 November 1947.

[1]:62 This was partly for its scatological, anti-American, and anti-religious references and pronouncements, but also because of its general randomness, with a cacophony of xylophonic sounds mixed with various percussion elements, as well as cries, screams, grunts, onomatopoeia, and glossolalia.

[34]:1 The first French radio broadcast of Pour en Finir avec le Jugement de dieu occurred 20 years after its original production.

[34]:22-3 Poet Allen Ginsberg claimed Artaud's work, specifically "To Have Done with the Judgement of God", had a tremendous influence on his most famous poem "Howl".

[49]The sequel, L'Etoile de Mer (The Starfish), was published in November 2024, and continues the story of Artaud as he defies André Breton and forms the Theater Alfred Jarry with Roger Vitrac.

[52] Venezuelan rock band Zapato 3 included a song named "Antonin Artaud" on their album Ecos punzantes del ayer (1999).

[citation needed] Composer John Zorn has written many works inspired by and dedicated to Artaud, including seven CDs: "Astronome", "Moonchild: Songs Without Words", "Six Litanies for Heliogabalus", "The Crucible", "Ipsissimus", "Templars: In Sacred Blood" and "The Last Judgment", a monodrama for voice and orchestra inspired by Artaud's late drawings "La Machine de l'être" (2000), "Le Momo" (1999) for violin and piano, and "Suppots et Suppliciations" (2012) for full orchestra.

[citation needed] Filmmaker E. Elias Merhige, during an interview by writer Scott Nicolay, cited Artaud as a key influence for the experimental film Begotten.

[53] "La Véritable Histoire d'Artaud le Mômo",[54] par Gérard Mordillat et Jérôme Prieur, documentary Books Articles and chapters