“Gracq was one of the writers the Surrealists wanted but they couldn’t get ”

What utter nonsense. Gracq was a personal friend of Breton’s. He attended Surrealist meetings in cafes during the ’50’s, as well as group retreats at Breton’s residence in the south of France, and was always a sympathetic fellow traveller. He was simply not a joiner of any kind.

As for Roussel and de Chirico, once they realized the former’s bourgeois naïveté, they kept their distance personally, although they never lost their regard for his work. As to de Chirico, he courted Breton’s favor as much as Breton did his, but the Surrealists are the ones who kicked him to the curb as soon as he began his reactionary “return to the craft”.

Finally, Pushkin Press did not “reissue” an “out of print” edition of *A Dark Stranger*, although they likely should have. Instead, they commissioned a new and inferior translation. 

As to the silly political reading (or reading into) Gracq’s novel, I’ll just let that pass, as its absurdity will be parent to anyone who has read the book or has a deeper knowledge of Gracq.