The author uses the word "flood" in line 22 to refer to

Surrealism was a movement in graphic art and literature that was founded in Paris, in 1924, by Andr Breton. Inspired by another movement in art called Dadaism, the Surrealist movement has been one of the most influential art movements in the 20th century. It eventually 5 had a worldwide audience, flourishing notably in the United States during World War II. Surrealism focused on the role of the unconscious in the creative process. In a nihilistic protest, it rejected all aspects of Western culture. Surrealist writers, such as Aragon and Soupalt, believed in directly transcribing onto paper anything their 10 unconscious mind wished them to. They never altered or revised what they wrote because that would have interfered with the purity of their creation. Surrealist painters, a group that included such famous names as Miro, Dali, and Ernst, displayed a wide variety of style and content. Though Breton was the founder of this movement, his 15 strong leadership style brought about dissent, which resulted in several of the painters officially breaking away from the movement.