The Exquisite Cadaver Shall Drink the New Wine

At your next get together or party, instead of playing a game of Cranium or Loaded Questions, why not try a surrealist game instead? Most of the games are fun, easy and creative.

For those of you who may not know, the surrealist movement was an art movement that began in Paris in the early 1920s. The movement’s founder, Andre Breton, believed that the unconscious was the true source of genius. He also believed that the dream world and the real world could be joined together to form “an absolute reality, a surreality.”

Because of that theory, the paintings, films and photography of the surrealists often juxtaposed ordinary objects such as butter knives with the extraordinary; sometimes religious iconography was used or archetypal dream sequences. A couple of famous surrealists include: Salvador Dali; Man Ray; Max Ernst; Luis Brunel; Jean Cocteau; Rene Magritte; Marcel Duchamp and Hans Arp.

So, back to the game. Here’s a fun one. I imagine playing this drunk would be even better, though. It’s called: The exquisite cadaver shall drink the new wine. I found the instructions to this game online.

To play:

* Gather a group of friends.
* Give each person a piece of paper and a pencil or pen.
* Decide on a sentence structure (Article/Adjective/Noun/Verb/ Adjective/Noun similar to the name of the game.)
* Each person then writes a word fitting the outlined sentence structure. Please note, that you only write the first two words of the sentences (The exquisite or Article/Adjective.)
* Fold the paper over to conceal the written word and pass it to the next person.
* The next person writes a word, conceals it, and passes the paper to the next person.
* Etc. Etc. etc. etc. Got it?
* When a round of sentences has been completed open the paper and read the sentences out loud.
* Contemplate what you have done. Kind of like a poem or joke, isn’t it?
* Kiss the person next to you on the cheek then turn immediately to the other side.