I will explain everything concerning the Dutchman[1] to you: what Gerard [Lebovici] thought and I also think. You have already discerned that the project is quite compromised. Since 1980, the excellent intention of collecting the texts of Ascaso and Durruti has only known misfortune. First in Barcelona,[2] then in Amsterdam.[3] I fear that one must renounce it. Do not respond for the moment.
If the excessive Glou[4] still persecutes you, it seems to me that you can respond to him: it is quite unfortunate that poor Merlino needs 5,000 francs, but, considering that it is well-known that if in 1983 Gerard had to renounce his project of releasing a collection of recordings, it was exactly because Le Glou -- employed for several months by Merlino and richly paid according to the bases that he himself had fixed -- had not rigorously wanted to pursue it, causing the abandonment of the project, and thus that Le Glou, entirely responsible for Merlino's understandable disappointment, must have the decency to pay him himself.
It is not necessary that you have the proofs of [Gerard's] All About the Person, but rather the photographic documents from which to choose.
I believe that we do not have too much time to reexamine a complete press dossier and that we do not need one at this stage (this book must certainly have one or several subsequent editions). But provide the copies of possible articles that appear new or important to you.
Especially provide me with all the notes and information concerning the books that will figure in the publication of the [Champ Libre] catalogue for 1985, which we must complete this time.
I expect [to see] Ouldamer[5] soon, but I do not know when.
Congratulations to the boys on their different university victories: to Nicolas for his secondary-school guerrilla warfare and to Lorenzo for his more classical and expected victories.
I am in haste to see you and hope thus to see you on the 28th [of September] at the latest.
We embrace you.[1] Niko Jassies. [Translator's note: this would seem to be Nico Jassies, an archivist at the Institute of Social History in Amsterdam, collaborator with Els van Daele and much later the author of Marinus Van der Lubbe and the Burning of the Reichstag.]
[2] Translator's note: see letters dated 28 November 1980 (note 6) and 11 March 1981 (note 7).
[3] Translator's note: see letter 26 March 1982.
[4] See letter to Jacques Le Glou dated 15 April 1983.
[5] Translator's note: Mezioud Ouldamer, author of Offense to the President (Editions Gerard Lebovici, 1985).
(Published in Guy Debord Correspondance, Vol 5: Janvier 1979-Decembre 1987 by Librairie Artheme Fayard, 2006. Translated from the French by NOT BORED! May 2007. Footnotes by Alice Debord, except where noted.)