I respond summarily and quickly to your letter of 18 June, received on Monday, and also to the questions that you added via telephone call to Alice [Becker-Ho] today.
1) There is only a preface for The Society of the Spectacle: a brief but striking "Foreword," because a long theoretical preface would unbalance this book that I have had no need to change, twenty five years later, in a world that itself has hardly changed. I do not desire four covers for the book. Let us seek out the most classical form (as much as time permits): "N.R.F. . . . " you know the formula even better than I do.
2) Concerning the second book, I have always been sure than one need not arrange it in chronological order, but the order of importance, indicated through the typography of the respective titles. I visual it this way:
3) I believe that an extract from the "Foreword" could be placed on the "fourth cover" of Comments and the Italian Preface.
4) I do not understand the editorial problems with Gallimard's bulletin. . . . They need to show us what they propose [to say]: to avoid the temptation for them to say stupid things.
5) I am agreed concerning O.C.C.[2] Yes, I can provide copies of the shots, but this will, no doubt, be contingent on the use that is envisioned. (See the next response.)
6) I would be in complete agreement with a simultaneous renunciation -- by Valentine (aka Valentin) and the damaged [Nicolas] Lebovici, on the one side, and me, on the other -- of all claims concerning properties and past damages. But I would like to see such a proposition and if one could trust its formulations. You know that I do not share the confidence that Madame Deluc has in her colleague, Baudelot.
I also believe that the now-disappeared film production company Simar, which produced three of my films, was in my case an artistic affair tied to the long-defunct Editions Champ Libre. Floriana [Lebovici] kept the rights to my films when she sold the rest of her cinematographical assets. Valentine and his damaged brother must have inherited them from her. It is no longer necessary that these people keep such trifles in their possession.
I am happy to have met Antoine.[3] I indeed believe that he is a strategist and that we understand each other well. It is also true that, in his offices, there exist people who attempt to be enervating, which today has much less importance to me than it once did.
In haste. With our best wishes,[1] Handwritten in the margin: "Perhaps these two dates only figure in the inside pages?"
[2] Complete Cinematographical Works.
[3] Antoine Gallimard, in Champot.
(Published in Guy Debord Correspondance, Vol 7: Janvier 1988-Novembre 1994 by Librairie Artheme Fayard, 2008. Translated from the French by NOT BORED! June 2009. Footnotes by the publisher, except where noted.)