The Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades 9781487595517

Citation preview

ÚRSULA FRANKI.J N i s a membe r o f th e Departmen t of Foreign Languages at Grand Valley State Colleges, Allendale , Michigan, and autho r o f An Anatomy of Poesis: The Prose Poems of Stéphane Mallarmé. While Paul Valéry's lyric poetry, a s well as his dialogues, dramatic work, and critica l prose, hav e preoccupied his crides, his prose poem s have been virtuall y ignored and hi s position i n th e tradition of the genre has remained unacknowledged. This study demonstrates th e significance o f Valéry as a prose poe t and o f the for m an d it s evolution i n the poet's oeuvre. The cióse textual reading and analysi s concéntrate on Valéry's prose aubades - th e prose poems , poeti c pros e fragments, an d sequence s celebrating the emergence of the sel f an d it s world at dawn. The theme of dawn pervade s Valéry's poetry from th e openin g chord o f Charmes t o those Notebook s whic h h e kept for almost half a century and whic h are the sourc e of so much o f his poetry. This book shows ho w th e moment and them e of dawn hav e also inspired th e greater part of Valéry's prose poem s an d poeti c prose fragments . Critics have begun t o show interes t in the break-up of traditional genres and i n the emergenc e of the fragmen t a s a new literar y form. But Valéry's position i n this development ha s so far escaped critica l inquiry, as have his prose poems in general. Professor Franklin redresses th e balance with rigor , poise, an d elegance. She shows how Valéry's artistic progression fro m th e traditional prose poem t o the fragment, th e evolutio n o f the recueil t o the sequence , represent s a development ver y similar to that manifest in another ne w prose form , the ne w nouveau román. It is a brilliant analysis of a neglected aspect of Valéry's work and a thoughtful interpretatio n of Valéry's thought and poetic s as a whole.

This page intentionally left blank

ÚRSULA FRANKLI N

The Rhetoric of Valéry's

Prose Aubades

UNIVERSITY O F TORONTO PRESS Toronto Buffal o Londo n

© Universit y of Toronto Pres s 197 9 Toronto Buffal o Londo n Printed i n Canad á

Library o f Congress Cataloging i n Publication Data Franklin, Úrsula. The rhetori c of Valéry's prose aubades . Bibliography: p. Includes Índex. 1. Valéry, Paul, 1871-1945 -Style . 2 . Prose Poems , French — History and criticism . 3 . Dawn i n literature. I. Title. PQ2643.A26Z613 841'.9'1 2 78-1304 4 ISBN 0-8020-5427- 7

For J.A.Y .

This page intentionally left blank

Contents

PREFACE I

X

1 Introductio n 3 2 TursDrames ' 1 0 3 Fragment s 2 0 4 Th e Trilogy' A BC ' 3 2 5 'Troi s Réveils' 4 3 6 Thre e 'Matins' 5 2 7 'Reprise ' 6 2 8 'Note s d'Aurore ' 7 2 9 'Moments ' 7 8 10 Petit s Poémes abstrait s 8 7 11 'Méditatio n avant pensée' 10 7 12 'L a Considération matinale ' 11 2 13 'AGrasse ' 11 4 14 Conclusió n 12 2 NOTES 13

3

RIBLIOCRAPHY 14 ÍNDEX 15

2

8

Preface

This study, which deal s with a long-neglected área of the poetic uni verse o f Paul Valéry , is a detaile d analysi s of a group o f prose poems, undertaken with the intent of showing the significance of the genre to the poet, a s well as his leading role in its evolution. In my exploration of Valéry's poetry, I have been greatly indebted t o the work of James R. Lawler. And I owe much to the poet's other commentators, to Ned Bastet, NicoleCeleyrette-Pietri, ChristineCrow, Jean Levaillant, Huguette Laurenti, Octave Nadal, Judith Robinson , and many who mus t remain unnamed. Rober t Greer Cohn ha s my special gratitude for reading th e manuscript, for his invaluable suggestion s and encouragement . I thank th e editor s o f Th e Centennial Revieiv, the Kentucky Romance Quarterly, an d Th e Michigan Academician fo r their kind permission t o use material which firs t appeared i n their journals. This book ha s bee n published wit h th e hel p of grants fro m th e Canadian Federation fo r the Humanities, using fund s provide d b y the Social Sciences and Humanitie s Researc h Council of Canadá, an d from th e Andre w W . Mellon Foundation t o the Universit y of Toronto Press. M y thanks go to D r R.M . Schoeffel o f University of Toronto Press for all hi s help. I have quoted extensivel y from th e poetr y an d prose of Valéry by kind permission o f the copyrigh t holders , Editions Gallimard, París. Finally, this study could not hav e been complete d withou t the un tiring advice of my frien d an d teacher , John A. Yunck, to whom i t is appropriately dedicated . UF

This page intentionally left blank

THE RHETORI C O F VALÉRY' S PROSE AUBADE S

'J'étais fait pou r chante r Matines' Paul Valéry, Lettres á quelques-uns

1 Introductio n

While Paul Valéry's lyric poetry, as well as his dialogues, dramatic work, and critica l prose, have continuously preoccupied his critics, the poet's prose poems have received littl e attention.1 Valéry's major position i n the traditio n of the genre has s o far been overlooked ; Su zanne Bernard in he r monumenta l L e Poéme en prose de Baudelaire jusqu'á nos jours, for example, mentions the poe t merel y in passing. 2 In this study I propose to demónstrate the significanc e o f Valéry th e prose poet, as well as that of the prose poem and it s evolution in hi s poetic universe. My reading will concéntrate on Valéry's aubades ; the prose poems, poetic fragments, and sequence s celebratin g the emergence of the sel f an d it s world a t dawn. Dawn i s Valéry's privileged moment , a moment between nigh t an d day when th e sel f an d th e world are puré imminence, puré essence, puré virtuality: Au réveil , si douce la lumiére ... le mot "Pur" ouvre mes lévres. Le jour qui jamái s encoré ne fut , les pensées, le tout en germe consideré sans obstacle - l e Tout qui s'ébauche dan s l'or et que nulle chose particuliér e ne corrompt encoré. L e Tout est commencement. En germe l e plus haut degré universel. 3

'L'Aurore' become s th e golden an d mythic Edén 'au commencement, ' at the beginning o f a world whos e word s and figures, whose reality, is but a fallin g of f fro m tha t former state . The theme of dawn, therefore , pervades Valéry' s poetry fro m th e opening chor d of the Charmes t o some of the great dialogues. Daybreak , moreover, is the momen t of Valéry's Cahiers, those notebook s which were Narcissus' constan t mirror for half a century, an d whic h ar e the spring and inexhaustible source of so much of his poetry . Both the momen t and th e them e of

4 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

dawn have also inspired the greater part of Valéry's prose poems, for it is this Ursprache o í poetry, this 'poésie brute/ anteceden t to formula tion and regulatio n in traditional rhyme and meter , which is suited to sing most ardently the beginning - 'A u commencement.' The prose poem as a literary genre was firml y establishe d by Valéry's nineteenth-century predecessors, and the autonomy of both the poéme en prose an d it s frame, th e recueil, was consecrated with th e posthumous publicatio n in 186 9 o f Baudelaire's Spleen d e París. From this point on , many poet s venture into the new genre which, according to Baudelaire, introduces a modern accen t into lyricism: Quel est celui de nous qui n'a pas, dans ses jours d'ambition, revé le miracle d'une prose poétique, musicale sans rythme et sans rime, assez souple et assez heurtée pour s'adapter aux mouvements lyriques de l'áme, aux ondulations de la réverie, aux soubresauts de la conscience? 4 My reading o f Valéry's morning prose poems reveái s a poetic prose language of the greatest musicalit y and suppleness , a n instrument rendering harmoniousl y both the 'mouvements lyriques de l'áme' and th e 'soubresaut s de la conscience.' The lyric movements of the matutinal moi 's soul and consciousness i n fact constitut e these poems' major them e and melody . The young Valéry's maitre, Mallarmé, inherited and expande d th e 'poéme en prose' to include the 'poém e critique,' manifest, for example, in the earl y 'Symphonie Littéraire,' one o f whose pieces is a tribute to Baudelaire. The prose poem preoccupied Mallarmé throughout hi s creative life, from th e early pieces of 1864 to 1893. He published his prose poem s firs t separatel y in various reviews from 186 4 to 1887 , then together i n Pages o f 1891, an d finall y incorporate d the m into a cycle of thirteen prose poems under the title 'Anecdotes ou poémes' in Divagations (1897). 5 Between April and Jun e 1880 Rimbaud's Tlluminations' appeared, firs t i n fiv e issue s o f La Vague, the n i n book form , presented by Verlaine, in 1886. And these dizzying 'coloured plates, ' defying bot h traditiona l visión and form , create d a new kin d of puré poetry that impetuously revolutionized th e still young prose poem.6 It was the almost simultaneous encounte r wit h Mallarmé's and Rimbaud's prose poem s tha t decisively influenced Valéry' s firs t attempts in the genre. In 188 9 Valéry had rea d Huysmans ' A Rebours, which immediatel y became his Tivre de chevet.' No t merely did A Rebours sing th e praises of the prose poem - 'd e toutes les formes de la littérature, celle du poéme en pros e était la forme préférée de

Introduction 5 des Esseintes' - but it drew attention to Mallarmé's poetry, and especially his early prose poems. 7 The youthful Valér y sums up his impression o f A Rebours: 'E n somme c'est pou r moi , et je me sers sou vent de ce livre, une suit e de tres beaux poémes e n prose tre s nerveux.'8 He paid a fitting tribut e to Huysmans by means of one o f his own earliest prose poems, the posthumously published 'Le s Vieilles Ruelles/ whic h he wrote in 1889, when h e was eighteen years oíd. Shortly thereafter, h e published 'Pur s Drames, ' a prose poem which he republished i n 1931, an d which he retrospectively considered a n important event of 1892. With 'Purs Drames' the Valéryan prose poe m comes into its own; the piece already foreshadows, moreover, the aubades which will make up th e largest group of these poems. From 189 8 on , Valéry mentions i n his letters to Gide a 'conté' he was planning t o write about th e gradual alterations of the mind as it falls int o sleep and dream . But he predicts even the n tha t this tale, which he entitled 'Agathe,' woul d never be finished. The piece is soon afterwards envisage d a s a fragment, whic h Valéry thinks of incorporating in th e Test e cycle as Tintérieur de la nuit de M. Teste.' The text, published posthumously i n 1956 , longe r tha n an y othe r Valéry an prose poem , i s neither a conté, ñor an 'histoir e brisée,' as it lacks both fictio n an d characters in the traditional sense; 'Agathe' is a poetic text, a prose poe m which alread y points to the furthe r evolutio n of that genre an d its breaking u p into the poetic prose fragment. 9 Critics have begun t o show interes t i n the emergence of the 'frag ment/ but Valéry's position i n this development - an evolution which paradoxically appears to be a dissolution o f form, fro m poe m or conté t o an almost archaeologically obscure literar y shard - ha s so far escaped critica l inquiry, as have his prose poem s i n general.'0 There is a marked morphological change from th e anecdotal or narrative form of prose poem, situate d in a structured, or a t least unified, recueil o r cycle, to the shard-like , fragmented qualit y of the Valérya n prose po ems, some of them centred o n a mere moment i n time, which are dispersed throughou t hi s work. The break-up of the genre, moreover , from a diachronic point of view i s reflected no t merel y in th e pros e poem itself , but als o in th e disappearanc e of its frame, th e 'recueil. ' Valéry never groupe d hi s prose poem s togethe r int o a recueil; h e frequently place d the m into sequences o r series, and individua l pieces as well as some o f the sequences appea r unde r suc h heading s a s 'Mélange,' 'Poési e brute/ Tel Quel/ and 'Morceaux choisis/ along with fre e verse , sketches , observation s an d epigrams , o r dreams. Th e form o f the Valérya n prose poem is , besides, muc h mor e varied tha n that of any o f his predecessors.

6 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

In almost every one of Mallarmé's 'Anécdotas ou poémes ' a short narrative or 'récit' constitutes the vehicle for the poem's symboli c meaning. On th e contrary, though some of Valéry's prose poem s are narrative in this sense (a s for example the well-known 'Enfanc e aux cygnes'), mos t of them have a momentary, 'broken' qualit y about them, indicated by such title s as 'Instants' and 'Histoire s brisées. ' I shall be using the terms 'broken/ 'momentary / or 'instantaneous' frequently to denote this characteristic of Valéry's prose poems : th e quality which isolates and freeze s into poetry the single, detached mo ment, somewhat i n the manner tha t a still camera, its shutter ope n only fo r a fragment o f a second, isolate s the visió n o f that instant an d records it on film . Most of Valéry's prose poem s ar e sparkling fragments of an interio r mono-dialogue, brilliant verbal reflections o f th e poet's momentary states of mind, or o f his visió n o f the phenomen a surrounding him. If w e should very roughly group Valéry' s prose poem s int o narrative pieces, descriptiv e poems, an d thos e celebrating a state of mind - befor e considering a thematic grouping such as 'water pros e poems/ 'poem s of the city/ and 'morning pieces ' - we would fin d the majority o f the poems fallin g unde r th e last group, tha t is the pros e poems objectifyin g a n 'éta t d'esprit. ' Most of the pros e poems celebratin g the awakenin g of the sel f an d of the world at dawn - the largest thematic group - combine the 'descriptive/ th e painting o f dawn, with th e objectificatio n o f the per sona's 'état d'esprit/ Baudelaire' s 'soubresauts d e la conscience.' These poems ar e a dialectic of the sel f wit h th e self , je t o moi, as it rediscovers its body and the world, and they capture the moment when 'mo n corps, mo n esprit' an d 'mon monde' - Valéry' s 'trois points cardinaux de connaissance' ( c i, p 1142) - com e togethe r t o form th e beginning of a new day . The fac t tha t the earl y mornin g hours, devoted t o the Cahiers, were Valéry's privileged tim e of day accounts not merely for the surprising volume of the aubades, but also for thei r persistence i n th e oeuvre throughou t the poet' s life, fro m 'Purs Drames' (1892 ) t o the yea r of his death. Many of these morning prose poems were published posthumously , and a large number of them wer e foun d in the Cahiers; Valér y himself published man y of his prose aubade s i n the twenties, at the time when th e theme of 'aurore' is also prominent i n Charmes an d i n some o f the dialogues . While 'Purs Drames/ al l its uniqueness an d originalit y o f visión notwithstanding, stil l represents structurall y the traditional pros e poem, some o f the late r aubades reveal a new form . The prose poe m 'Matin' which Valér y published i n 192 7 in Autres Rhumbs (OH ,

Introduction 7

pp 658-9), for example, consists o f three parts and open s with three lines of free verse . The firs t sectio n render s th e self's awakening to th e privileged momen t of 'Purs Drames': Au réveil , si douce la lumiére et beau c e bleu vivant! Le mot "Pur" ouvre me s lévres.

The second par t presents th e persona's reflection s at this moment: Que n e puis-je retarder d'étr e moi.. . Pourquoi, c e matin, me choisirais-je?

And th e thir d section celébrales the stat e of imminence of the sel f an d of th e worl d wit h its rising sun : L'áme boit au x sources une gorgé e d e liberté e t de commencement sans conditions. Cet azur es t une Certitude . C e Soleil qu i parait... s'annonce et mont e comme un juge...

The poem's thre e fragments make up th e whole . But a slightly different versió n o f the poem' s first part , combined with a fragment o f its second part , had alread y appeared i n on e o f the 191 3 Cahiers ( c u, p p 1261-2). This recombining of various fragments of a given prosepoem to form anothe r i s frequent i n Valér y and characteristi c of his creative technique. It i s the phenomeno n t o which I will frequently refe r by the ter m 'mobil e fragment.' On e i s reminded that the openin g an d closing poems of Charmes, 'Aurore' and 'Palme / were one at one stage of thei r growth, an d tha t 'L a Jeune Parque' gradually grew out o f its constituent fragments, not unlike the 'Fragment s du Narcisse.' 11 In 1925 , Valér y published i n Commerce th e pros e poem s ' A B C,' indicating on the title-page: 'troi s lettre s extraites d'un alphabe t á paraítre.' This 'alphabet' was never completed, and th e three prose poems, 'extracted ' fro m a projected larger whole , constitut e a trilogy, a series of three pieces, eac h one complete, but al l sequentially related in developing a single theme: i n 'A' the min d find s it s body upo n awakening at dawn; i n 'B ' min d an d bod y unite as the sel f arise s t o a new day ; an d i n 'C ' the unite d sel f take s possession o f the worl d un folding befor e it . But subsequent t o their publication in Commerce, Valéry separated th e poem's 'fragments.' A modified versión o f 'A' appears i n a free-verse rendition i n th e 'Poémes ' section of Histoires brisées, and h e republished 'C' under th e titl e 'Comme le Temps est

8 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

calme' separately in 193 0 in Morceaux choisis. The fragments , 'A , B/ and 'C, ' then, form on e prose poem of three parts, but the parts also exist as mobile fragments, eac h a sepárate prose poem, but eac h potentially a part of a new pattern, like glittering stones which can be used repeatedly in various mosaics.12 In 1932 , Valéry published i n L a Revue de France a series o f fou r prose poems: 'i. Avant toute Chose,' 'u. L'Unique,' 'm. Accueil du jour/ 'iv. La Rentrée'; and i n 193 9 th e three-par t prose poe m 'Méditatio n avant pensée' (oí , pp 351-2 ) appeare d i n Mélange. 'i . Avant toute Chose' and 'Méditatio n i ' are the same piece, the fragmen t servin g in both sequence s a s the opening . Fro m the same period date s a six-part prose poe m sequenc e entitled 'Moments' (oí , pp 311-13), whose firs t fragment comprise s a six-line free-verse section. This poem's secon d fragment, alread y composed i n it s final for m i n a 1920-1 Cahier ( c n, p 1272), is a characteristic example of the Valéryan prose poem , th e poetic prose fragmen t whic h captures the fleeting momen t - th e title of the sequence is 'Moments' - betwee n nigh t and dawn when the moi meets its world: Aube - Ce n'est pas l'aube. Mais le déclin de la lune, perle rongée, glace fondante, e t une lueu r mourant e á qui le jour naissant se substitue peu á peu - J'aim e ce moment si pur, final, initial . Mélange de calme, de renoncement, de négation... The same moment, painted with the same images, is objectified i n th e third part of the ' A B C' poem(s): Quelque oranger respire la dans l'ombre. I I subsiste tres haut pe u de fines étoile s á l'extréme de l'aigu. La lune est ce fragment d e glace fondante.. . These fragments then , and even part s of them - phrase s and images - ar e mobile within the oeuvre which contains them. The 'fragment' by definition affirm s th e principie of unity on which it depends; and thi s unity is Valéry's total poetic universe. In the Ego Scriptor, h e says, 'o r cett e oeuvre toute mienne se réduit á des poémes, á des fragments...' ( c i, p 306) , and abou t th e Cahiers, 'si je prends de s frag ments dans ees cahiers ... l'ensemble fer a quelque chose. Le lecteur - et méme moi-méme - e n formera un e unité' ( c i, p 10). Valéry's poetic prose fragments , like the 'Fragment s du Narcisse/ the recitativos of 'La Jeune Parque,' or th e stanzas of 'Le Cimetiére marin' are interna! mono-dialogues - ' á la base, l e dialogue intérieur,' says the ego scrip-

Introducción 9

tor ( c \, p 300) - poeti c explorations of a moi bot h subjective and uni versal. And th e pros e poems, poetic fragments, and sequence s of dawn - the aubades - celébrat e the génesis of both the subject and the universe. The study whic h follows i s essentially a cióse reading of Valéry's major mornin g prose fragments an d sequences , in the context of his oeuvre. I have not attempted t o be exhaustive, but hav e analyzed i n detail those aubade s whic h bes t reflec t th e essential aspects o f the poet's visión of dawn, an d whic h are most characteristic of the poet in their architectonics. In regard t o their context, I have demonstrated at some length how thes e representative fragments are related to the major theme s and motif s of Valéry's other prose an d verse .

2 'Pur s Drames'

Valéry published hi s first pros e aubade, 'Purs Drames' ( o i, p p 1597-9), in 1892 , and i n a letter of the sam e year he thanks Gide for 'des mots délicieux sur me s Drames.'1 This prose poem remaine d im portant t o the poet , fo r he republished i t in 1931, when h e was at th e height of his fame . 'Pur s Drames' was republished i n 195 7 by Octave Nadal, who view s i t as Valéry's first characteristi c expression i n th e genre: Purs drames annonce , en effet , de s 1892 , l'écriture proprement valéryenne du poém e en prose, reconnaissable , en dehors d e ses caracteres intrinséques, á l'accord du nouvea u moti f d'ordr e universel (celu i d'une pensé e remonté e á ses Índices) ave c la plénitude d'une form e rythmiqu e épurée jusqu'á la transparence. II est le premier d'un ensemble de poémes plus achevés sans doute , mais apparentés entre eux par l'invention structurale - symétrie des figure s d u rythm e et de la syntaxe, continuité musicale, couleur particuliére des timbres.2

During the previous year Valéry had me t Mallarmé, and tha t poet's verse i s repeatedly the subject of his correspondence, whic h also mentions Rimbau d - who had died in November 1891 - and Poe. But i t is especially the pros e poems of the tw o latter writers that fasci nated Valéry . In a letter to Gide of March 1892, the sam e month in which 'Pur s Drames' appeared, Valér y writes: 'Je suis au fon d d'Eureka e t des Illuminations.' 3 And i t is this background o f Mallarméan verse and Rimbaud' s Illuminations which provide s th e poetic setting o f 'Purs Drames.' 'Pur' i s a key term of Valéry's poetic and metapoetic , a s well as his discursive language . From 1892 on he uses the word s o frequently to

'Purs Drames' 1

1

desígnate his aspirations - 'l e moi pur,' 'la poésie puré ' - tha t it has come to denote hi s distinctive characteristic. Books have been writte n about 'l a puret é d e Valéry/ a notion a s obvious a s 'the idealis m of Plato' o r 'th e hermeticism of Mallarmé.'4 Because the wor d i s so multivalent in Valéry , it behooves us to examine its specific inten t in th e title of our poem , where 'pur' has again several meanings, designating a puré visión of an innocent , puré world, objectifie d i n puré poetry. But the n th e notion of poetic visión objectifie d - implyin g stasis - is followed b y the kinetic term 'drame, ' emphasizing movement an d change, rather than immutability. 'Purs Drames' celebrates becoming , the de-venir o f a world - b e it of the imagination , of reality, or of surreality - se t forth i n the imagery of sight. 'Un oei l pur' is the protagonist of the 'drame' about to unfold. And the eye is the poem's hero in a twofold sens e since the piec e both is , and i s about, a visión; a visión which we recréate, moreover, b y our eye , as we behold it s écriture. The opening phras e 'le s sites sont orne s de pudiques bijoux , qui scintillent' in using the term 'site' - a Renaissance painting ter m designating 'un paysag e consideré d u point de vue de l'esthétique, d u pittoresque' (Robert ) - place s the emphasis o n the eye by alluding to the visual art. And like the painter, th e poet will compose, rathe r than describe, hi s tableau. In a much late r prose poem , 'Compositio n d'u n port,' Valér y says: 'u n langage ... conviendra pou r célébre r (no n décrire, qui est une trist e besogne) tou t ce qui encombre la vue...' (on , p860). Our 'site s adorned wit h chaste gems gleaming' evoke the symbolist garden, th e 'paysag e d'áme/ and favourit e settin g of symbolist poetry. We encounter i t in some of Valéry's verse poems of that time: i n the 'jardi n mélodieux' o f 'La Fileuse ' (1891) ; i n 'Féerie ' (1890 ) with its 'lys et des roses neigeuses ' amon g the marble of lunar fountains; in 'Les Vaines Danseuses' (1891 ) with 'd e mauves et d'iris et de mourantes roses.' I n a letter to Gide of March 1891 , Valér y writes: 'L e jardin symbolique s'ouvre á nos pas, fleuri , parfumé . O n n'e n sor t plus.'5 But in our poem' s garden, th e flowers hav e become chast e gems, an d thei r transformatio n into mineral purity brings to mind Rimbaud's 'herbages d'acie r e t d'émeraude' o f 'Mystique' or th e 'piéces d'o r jaun e semées sur l'agate , de s piliers d'acajou supportan t un dom e d'émeraudes ' of 'Fleurs' i n th e Illuminations. 6 But then , i n th e followin g sentence-paragraph , th e garden i s transcended, a s the eye moves to a cosmic visión o f the world turning in its vast sleep . And th e earth's rhythmi c rotation is stylistically suggested by th e regularit y of the iambi c and anapesti c rhythm s in the inverte d

12 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

sentence: a u silence , au solen , a 1 ombre, si le Monde se retourne dáns son vaste somméil...' The strong rhyth m emphasizes th e repeti tion of the three parallel prepositional phrase s precedin g th e subject , the world, which we are thus beholding a s from a distance. Then, immediately afterward, th e dar k vowels of the phrase , evocative of cosmic night, are 'illuminated ' by flashes of light vowels, stil l ph'rased in tha t fre e an d fluen t combinatio n of anapests and iambs : 'l'e'clai r ,, u U X V,, " . X o u u X , ,, ,, . . ,, , d un e parwr e i Ilumine ce geste obscwr. L eclaír d un e parur e echoes th e 'bijou x qu i scintillent,' and thi s visión of the earth throwing of f a mysteriou s gleam as it revolves in th e dar k immensity of the universe is reminiscent of Mallarmé's '...au lointai n de cette nuit, la Terre/Jette d'un gran d éclat l'insolite mystére.' 7 Then th e visión contracts from th e cosmic to the terrestrial, to focus on the phenomena graduall y revealed b y the break o f dawn. Clouds, dew-drops, th e rush, calixe s of flowers - 'et pierreries' - weeds' tall stems, and 'l a douce figure humaine ' ar e caught in the movement of awakening to the first day of the world. For everything in this garden, which is Edén, stirs with lif e and desire: ' - Ecumes, - aventureuse s núes qu'effleure un e plume, avec des gouttes .. . - main s ailées ... dont le désir d'abeilles ou d'astres á chiper, entreouvre et referme les cálices ... la douce figure humaine , errante ...' The young world i s emerging like Venus from th e se a foam; i t is the beginnin g o f all things, the birt h of love and life , o f physis, out o f the Urelement, Teau qui le s mire.' This Edenic visión recall s Rimbaud's 'Aprés l e Déluge,' a world purified an d renewe d b y and ou t o f water: '...un liévr e s'arréte dans les sainfoins e t les clochettes mouvantes, et dit s a priére á travers la toile d'araignée. 8 And our dawn's 'pierreries' echo the Illumination's 'Aube, ' where 'les pierreries regardérent, e t les ailes se levérent sans bruit.' 9 In 'Purs Drames/ th e symbolist garden, th e theme of dawn - heraldin g Valéry's aubades - and the visión of Paradise ar e superimposed, t o elabórate the myt h of the return t o the source.10 Finally the poet-persona introduce s himself as 'un oeil pur' an d evokes and foresees the Fall - 'tou s ee s beaux débris d'une vérité tót disparue pa r la foudre' - whic h is, at the same time, the death sentence o f this dawn. Paradise will be lost, paradise is lost; and th e persona point s to the resurrective function o f 'le Poete,' evoker of visión and creato r of Fable, of the sublime li e which Mallarmé called Texplication Orphique de la terre.'11 More than onc e Valéry insists AU COMMENCEMEN T ETAI T L A FABL E

'Purs Drames' 1

3

Nécessairement... Done, si tu imagines remonter vers le "commencement," tu ne peux l'imaginer qu'e n t e dépouillant, á chaqué recul un pe u plus, de ce que tu sais par expérience, ou du moin s par de s témoignages qui se font d e plus en plus rares. Et tu es obligé pour concevoi r ees tableaux de plus en plus éloignés, de les compléter de plus en plu s pa r ta production propre de personnages, d'événement s et de théátres. A l a limite, il n'y a plus qu e d u toi. C'est tout du toi: fabl e pur é (oí , p394). 12

The poet's matutinal eye, projecting its 'lueur lústrale' upon the world's debris, see s in these fragment s reminiscences o f the origina l unity of the universe . The underlying cosmogon y her e is a combination of Platonism - t o which the poem will allude later on - o f Poe's Eureka, and tha t transformation of both whic h Baudelaire effected i n his 'Correspondances'-complex. The Poet's 'lustra l eye' is one purified as by baptismal water, that is an eye spiritually reborn; and i n th e following sentence-paragraph , entirely devoted t o the eye, the per sona explain s its sacramental ritual. The eye's 'vert u d'enfance [th e innocent visión] serait éphémére, s'i l ne ruisselait chaqué aurore sur so n miroir, á cause de quelque souriant mensonge , une eau discréte de Larme.' This baptism by lacrimal water introduces th e Valéryan theme of 'la larme,' taken up repeatedl y in both hi s pros e and verse . Th e poet devote d a whole lyric paragraph o f 'La Jeune Parque' to its exploration: Larme qui fai s tremble r á mes regards humains Une variété de fúnebre s chemins ; Tu procedes de l'áme, orgueil du labyrinthe. D'oü nais-tu ? Quel travail toujours triste et nouveau Te tire avec retard, Larme, de l'ombr e amere? (oí, p 104)

What is the tear? Al l tears, says Valéry, 'montent toujour s d'un manque. Mais il en est d'une espéce divine, qu i naissent du manqu e de la forcé de soutenir u n obje t divin d e l'áme, d'en égale r et épuiser l'essence ' ( o i, p 339). 13 In the Cahiers Valér y says about th e tears that come at dawn: Le matin est mon séjour. II s'y trouv e pour mo i une tristess e sobre et transparente. ... Je suis

14 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades toujours á ce point de la journée, á demi percé quant au coeu r d e je ne sais quel trai t qui me ferait veni r les Larmes sans cause - á demi fou d e lucidité sans objet - e t d'une froid e e t implacable "tensión de compréhension" (ci , p 110).

In 'Pur s Drames' th e tears come 'á caus e de quelque souriant men songe/ whic h must b e Mallarmé's sublime lie , the poetic fiction o f an intelligible universe. The eye is then represented a s a mirror, a motif taken up i n the following section, in which the poet-persona almost despairs o f reviving the paradisia c visión: 'Ancienn e vanité!' But one must capture it surprised 'dan s une flaqu e celeste, dont l a glace minee imite l'éther absolu , ou lucidemen t le pense.' This celestial pool whose fin e mirro r imitates, that is reflects, the absolute ether the sky in its physical as well as metaphysical and metaphorical sense - thi s celestial pool whic h thinks it s images lucidly, is the Poet's eye as mirror, reflecting bot h a n oute r and a n inne r world. 'Un oeil pur/ we have said, is the hero of 'Purs Drames.'14 In the fina l sectio n of the poem's italicized prelude, the poet persona invite s us to 'indulge' in the visión - the poem - 'puisqu'i l n'y a plus, pou r amuse r les ombres, de Théátre, - et, pour paraitr e au seuil de cette platonicienne cáveme, personne, sous le luminaire deja presque ideal.' Our falle n world , represented b y the conventional image of the Cav e of Plato's simile, is contrasted with the on e created by the poem. In a world where myth and religió n have died, 'i l n'y a plus de Théátre,' except for 'le spectacle angélique' of 'Purs Drames.' No one but th e Poet appears on the threshold of the Cave to tell of the sun, which is rising. And the n th e poem's scene unfold s as 'sous le luminaire deja presque ideal': d'une touff e d e jones sensibles, chevelure végétale oü vibrent des insectes, jaillit dans les atomes d'or, joya u anonyme, énigmatique et seul, un bras de rose, fleuri d'une réveus e main, dont á peine les doigts blancs s'agitent, d'un plaisi r sous les verdures, ou d'un voeu, ou pa r l a brise.

The 'luminaire deja presqu e ideal' is both th e morning sun an d th e poet's visionary eye, illuminating and animatin g the world fro m o n high (th e persona i s looking down a t his garden fro m a window), giving lif e and movement - 'vibrer, ' 'jaillir / 's'agiter ' - to its forms. And thes e forms are seen a s for the firs t tim e by an ey e that is at once

'Purs Drames' 1

5

passive and active , that both receive s and create s them. Valéry frequently describes this process in the Cahiers: II est de m a natur e mental e de m e trouver tou t á coup devant le s choses comme tout inconnues - e t comme de mesurer du regard toute la distance entre elles et c e moi qui doit les subir o u accomplir, sans le secours d e l'habitude, des conventions, des moyens deja connus (ci , p 135).

The artist must 'wash' his eye, 'il doit... faire effor t pou r nettoyer son oeil, et voir a u lie u de lire' ( c i, p 447) . A tuft o f rushes becomes a 'chevelure végétale/ an d th e flowe r i s a nameless jewel. Its stern i s a 'bras de rose/ it s blossom 'un e réveuse main/ it s petáis are white fingers stirring in the breeze, or from a secret desire. Thus mineral , floral, and huma n shapes blend freely i n the original garden, where the world was one. The first couple' s 'pur é Feet' graze the lips of 'speechless' flowers in this impressionistic tableau, whose elements appear i n the orde r of their perception: Sur le s bouches sans parole d'une foule ros e de corolles, pas émue de cette indifférent e course , des Pieds purs, ornements inférieur s d'u n simple couple inaperfu, don t l'un fui t l'autre , féminin.

The poet-persona love s the grace of the moving line, 'je desire le profil de s fleurs et des membres tres rapide,' th e natura l line sublimated to the ornamental: T'orteil figur é vaguemen t en volute.' An d in his temporal médium of language he captures the movemen t of forms more readily than the painter, for not onl y does each sentence - eac h brushstroke, or stroke of the pen - reproduc e it , but the whole poem gradually unfold s the garden as it comes into being at dawn : 'Une main d'eau .. . s'allonge/ .. . Textréme papillon bat des ailes,'... 's'évapore a u cálice du ciel , une nue/ .. . 'Et voici! L'aube des formes.'15 The transitional moment in its evanescence is imaged and symbo lized by the divine glow-worms, 'ees phalénes divines , indifférente s bientót á chacune des joyeuses touffes.' Thes e little stars which bring back reminiscences of childhood - 'l a saisir, la couver dans le creux de mains pueriles, courir, et rire de la teñir captive - une Etoile!' -are the ideal and rea l pierreries of the young garden. Only now does the persona revea l his 'point o f view,' looking down from hi s window obliquel y upon a world 'sou s la figure de la

16 Th

e Rhetori c of Valéry's Prose Aubades

croisée/ a world stirring to Uf e and alread y threatened by death: 'on dirait que le jardin tremblant s'envole.' Fo r its forms are not immutable, but i n perpetual becoming : 'si les fleurs d'une minute jouent des ailes pour fuir , o ú irons-nous Idees ? ...' Finally the persona abandon s th e visión, as he turns his glance away from th e garden outsid e th e window t o reflect o n it . And her e the poe m becomes self-consciou s an d self-reflective , poetr y about poetry, as its persona become s its critic inside the poem itself . The images of 'Pur s Drames' ar e not yet puré enough, fo r they are 'corrompue s encoré par l a certitude de leurs éléments.' I n a kind of ecstasy an d ivresse - Táme ivre d'elle-méme' - the poet want s to reduce them, lead them back, restore them to simpler, tha t is purer, origins. 'Impur! qui désire une grimace ou la brutalité de cris; il n'importe que de deviner, et de mourir.' And Mallarmé's young disciple flirts dangerously here with the temptation o f 'la pureté du Non-étre ' whic h haunted hi s master all his life . Image is reduced t o line, for 'il n'y a que les lignes simples pour fair e pleurer le dur artiste , sans remords.' Bu t at the same time, this ideal reduction alludes to the poem itself , 'le s lignes simples' to its lines upon th e white page. The twenty-two-year-old Mallarmé had similarly objectified tha t drama in creating 'un jeune paysage,' whic h a mere 'ligne d'azur minee et palé' saves fro m nothingness : Irniter le Chinois au coeu r limpide et fin De qui l'extas e puré est de peindre l a fin Sur ses tasses de neige á la lune ravie D'une bizarre fleur qu i parfum e s a vie Transparente, la fleur qu'il a sentie, enfant, Au filigran e bleu de l'áme se greffant . Et, la mort telle avec le seul revé du sage , Serein, je vais choisir un jeun e paysage Que je peindrais encor sur le s tasses, distrait . Une ligne d'azur mine e et palé serait Un lac, parmi le ciel de porcelaine nue, Un clair croissant perdu pa r une blanche nue Trempe sa come calme en l a glace des eaux, Non loi n de trois grands cils d'émeraude, roseaux. 16

The prose poem's concluding paragraph begin s with a short apo strophe reducing th e entire poem - th e reminiscence of Edén and the symbolic morning garde n - t o the line of dawn risin g on the night sky: 'Aime done le Drame pur d'un e ligne sur l'espac e d e couleur

'Purs Drames' 1

7

celeste ou vitale.'17 And this line is puré movement - 'ell e n'existe qu'en mouvemen t beau ' - an d the ornament of Ufe itself, Tornement de toutes le s vies.' The poet n o longe r paints the attributes, or images, of dawn, bu t 'divines/ predicts and retraces , its essence ('i l n'importe qu e de deviner .. . Devine!'). For the ending - both the end and the telos - of the poem i s that essential puré line itself, traced out i n the space of the page and th e time of the period : elle se penche ensuite avec mélancolie, se noue, se concentre en spire - o u songe; file , e t se laisse enfuir dan s la joie d'une direction supérieure, se recourbe, habitude ou souvenir, puis rencontre au-delá de tous les astres, un e Autr e que d'inconnus destins distraient vers le méme Occident, et ne terminera plus de fleurir, d e disparaltre dans la merveille du jeu, - éprise, diverse , monotone, minee et noire.

'Slim and black ' the écriture of this sentence flow s an d rhythmicall y (re)traces the movemen t which i t signifies. It brings t o mind a Faun's sublimation of love to 'Une sonore, calme, et monotone ligne.' 18 In 'Pur s Drames/ Valéry' s first aubade , whic h is almost contempo rary with three other o f his early prose poems, we have seen th e Valéryan prose poem com e into its own. 19 But in its very newnes s and resplenden t originalit y it yet reflects the sources which nourished it: on the one hand, th e renewed visió n and for m of Rimbaud's Illuminations, and, o n the other, an d eve n mor e decisively, the Symbolist verse - and uni-verse - of Mallarmé. In discussing thi s prose poem, I have frequently referre d t o Valéry's correspondence wit h Gide. The two young poet s - i t was Gide's perio d of André Walter - ha d been correspondin g onl y since December 1890 , and s o these letters still belong t o the arden t perio d o f a correspon dence whose main , indeed unique , them e is literature. The letters , moreover, ar e not merel y about literature: some of them are themselves intende d a s essais d'écriture. In January 1890, Gid e writes t o Valéry about thei r correspondence : comme il me semble vous me le proposez, chacun e de ees lettres serait quelque subti l paysag e d'áme, plein de frissonnantes demiteinte s et de délicates analogies s'éveillant comme des échos aux vibrations des harmoniques; - quelque spécieuse visión, que suivraient, doucement découlées, le s déductions de nos revés. E t ees sortes d e confidences nou s révéleraient bizarrement et délicieusement l'un á

18 Th

e Rhetori c of Valéry's Prose Aubades l'autre, en apprenant á l'un comment chez l'autre s'associent ee s fréles image s ... Dites-moi, je vous en prie, et bien vite - est-c e cela que vous désirez - dites ? ou si c'est autr e chose? Toujour s se pourrait-il que ees sortes de confidences n e soient qu'une parti e de nos lettres et le reste se pourrait remplir de quelque futilité plaisant e - de quelque récit ad libitum, de quelque songerie critique sur quelqu e récente lecture - nou s pourrions méme, si vous m'en priez fort , parler de littérature... 20

When Gide, later i n the letter , says 'Comprenez bien , je vous en prie, que je ne classe point sous rubrique "littérature" nos propres pro ductions et nos projets et nos revés/ his very words, 'no s propre s productions et nos projets/ beli e him. Both writers, moreover, are deeply engage d i n literary production; Gid e has just published Le s Cahiers d'André Walter, and som e of Valéry's poems, above all th e 'Narcisse/ are beginning to attract critical attention. The écriture o í this correspondence, then , expresses no t merel y the early stages o f a friendship, bu t als o the beginning s o f two literary careers. Valéry writes letters overflowing wit h lyri c prose : il y avait des artisans amis de la Mort qui lissaien t avec je ne sais quelle éternelle résignation , des pierres tambales , a u déclin palé d'un beau jou r d'hiver. La terre était maternelle et me faisai t songe r á d'idéales, profondes , et solennelles fosse s - des fosses d'ámes, au déclin palé d'un bea u jou r d'hiver... 21

And Gide responds wit h equally exalted verse : Mon ame sommeillait, ou peut-étre en priére , Voguait sur le s lacs bleus de nocturne lumiére Car j'avais joint mes mains en geste de priére Avant de m'endormir - afi n d e mieux prier.22

These sample s ar e hardly typical, to say the least , of their authors ' characteristic manner, an d whe n Valér y writes t o Gide in March of that year, 'Mo i pour qu i la poésie serai t l e supréme sacerdoc e d'un e religión exquise, ' we recognize i n this stance Paul-Ambroise , the young discipl e o f Mallarmé, and no t th e mature Valéry. 23 I have dwelt on the epistolary backgroun d o f 'Purs Drames' becaus e the prose poem grew directl y out o f it. For in one o f these letters, which contain s also the germs o f the early prose poem Tage s Iné-

'Purs Drames' 1

9

dites/ w e fin d alread y a ful l developmen t o f the Symbolis t garden, a s well as one o f the majo r image s o f 'Purs Drames': Venez done réveiller le s antiques roses et les lis penchés, comme un ange de jadis , u n ang e terrible et fréle , d e jadis dont u n souffl e aurai t de corolles suscité l'éveil rose dans des jardins, et qui des gestes de ses mains aurait fai t obéissant s les parfums pale s et les feuilles confuses, dan s l'Eden? Une étoile se posa sur un cálice, et brille a travers la soie le'ge're des pétales, et palpite. Ah! que de nuil! La saisir! La couver dans ¡e creux des mains pueriles et rire de la teñir captive, - un e Étoile [m y italics]. 24

Thus, whil e reflecting th e Symbolist backgroun d o f Valéry's youth, and especiall y th e influenc e o f Mallarmé and Rimbaud , 'Purs Drames' already point s to the matur e prose poems and t o one of their marked structura l characteristics, which I have called 'th e mobile fragment.' Fo r here a fragment has move d fro m a 'poetic' correspon dente into th e oeuvre, where i t becomes, i n almos t unchange d form , one o f the majo r symbols o f a prose poem. 25

3 Fragment s

The prose aubades ar e essentially , I have said, mono-dialogues of the self wit h the self a s it first discover s itself - its selves - and then its world upon awakening . The most minute, and a t the same time most elementary, of Valéryan dialogues, th e miniature , fragmentary 'Dialogue de Nuit/ fro m Mauvaises Pensées et autres, echoes thi s first moment of consciousness, o f selves-consciousness : Qui est la? Moi! Qui, Moi? Toi. Et c'est le réveil. Le Toi et l e Moi (OH , p 880) .

At th e ver y root o f thought is that dédoublement whic h alone makes it possible: 'L a pensée exig e une divisió n interne ' ( c i, p 1029), for thought depends on language, and 'pense r es t se parler' ( c i, p 979); so that the individual mind is not single but double : 'L'individ u es t un dialogue' ( c i, p 440). Valéry knew that 'psychology' an d languag e ar e inextricably intertwined: Tout langage pose ou suppose Deux membres .. . il y a deux personnes en Moi - en un Moi - ; on dirait aussi : Un Moi est ce qui est en deux Personnes - mai s ce sont deux fonctions don t l'indivisibilite' fait u n Moi (ci,p467). 1

II

Another fragment , 'Réveil,' fro m Mélange d e prose et de poe'sie, reflect s the exuberance of the fresh , awakenin g min d a s it is overwhelmed b y

Fragments 2

1

the almost simultaneous illuminations of ideas in its vast plain: Au réveil : trois, quatre foyer s d'idées s'allument e n des point s éloignés d u cham p de l'esprit . On n e sai t oú couri r ( o i, p 338) .

This fragment an d th e instant it objectifies recall s 'Aurore' and th e excitement of those throngs of ideas - 'Maítresse s de l'áme' - tha t arise with the awakening poet: Ne seras-tu pa s de joie Ivre! á voir d e l'ombre issu s Cent mill e soleils de soi e Sur te s énigmes tissus ? (oí , p 112 )

Our text' s emphasized 'on' stresse s a still impersonal self, on e that is puré virtuality, a self tha t is not ye t fixed, no t determine d by the person and personalit y which it must late r assume. This joy at the pureness of a self as yet unlimited by that individuality with its history inherited from yesterday , becomes a constant theme of Valéry's aubades. In a late notation of the Cahiers (1944) , the poet stil l expresses the same excitement at this first privilege d moment of a puré, impersonal mol: Réveil.

II n'est pas de phénoméne plu s excitan t pour mo i qu e l e réveil. Rien n e tend a donner un e ide e plus extraordinair e de .. . tout, que cette autogenése - Ce commencement d e ce qui fut - qui a, lui aussi , son commencement - C e qui est, - et ceci n'est que choc, stupeur , contraste. Par la , se place un éta t d'équidifférence comm e si .. . il y eüt u n moment (des plus frágiles) pendan t lequel o n n'es t pas encor é la personne qu'on est, et l'o n pourrait redevenir un e autre\ Un e autr e mé moire se développerait. D'oú , d u fantastique - l'individ u extern e et demeurant, e t tout le psychique substitué... ! (cu , p 198 ) ni

While the two preceding fragments deal with th e awakening of the self, the followin g short piec e from 'Poési e Perdue' o f Autres Rhumbs (1927) i s about the awakening of the world:

22 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades Les oiseaux

Oiseaux premiers. Naissent enfin ee s petits cris. Vie et pluralité vivante au plus haut des cieux! Petits cris d'oiseaux, menus coups de ciseaux, petits bruits de ciseaux dans la paix! Mais quel silence á découdre! (o n, p 657)

There are several othe r prose aubade s i n 'Poésie Perdue/ a s well as the three-part sequence 'Matin, ' and a longer prose poem, 'Oiseau x Chanteurs.' Valér y wrote severa l animal prose poems, most of which are about birds, for they, like the matutinal poet, sing the rise of dawn. What fascinate s Valéry in the bir d is its freedom of movement and, above all, its song: 'L'oisea u seu l et l'homme ont l e chant. ... Chant et mobilité, un pe u moins étroitement ordonnés pa r l a circonstance qu'ils ne l e sont chez la plupart des vivants' (OH , p 660). The 'firs t birds ' are as it were born ane w - 'naissent ' - each daw n with their cries, and thei r concert is made up o f so many tiny voices that the y are a 'living plurality' and lif e itsel f 'i n th e highes t of skies.' The poet render s these littl e cries with the highly original soundimage of 'menus coups de ciseaux/ echoing 'oiseaux.' Nothing could depict these earl y morning voices more faithfully tha n th e 'petits bruits de ciseaux,' a simile which is then beautifull y extende d to capture the transitional moment, 'quel silence á découdre!' The bird becomes the ver y symbol of renewed lif e elsewhere i n Valéry's poetry. In 'Anne, ' a s the nigh t of loveless love turns into dawn, the bird of reconciliation begins it s song whic h 'quell s th e dead': Mais suave, de l'arbr e extérieur, la palme Vaporeuse remue au déla du remords , Et dans le feu, parmi trois feuilles, l'oisea u calme Commence le chant seul qui reprime les morts (oí , p 91)

and as the Jeune Parque meditates on death, the bird's 'infant cries' announcing spring and mornin g recal l her bac k to life : ...L'oiseau perce de cris d'enfance Inouis ... l'ombre méme oú se serré mon coeur (oí , p 103).

In the ' A B C' prose aubades, th e poet's very soul soars high , like a bird, to meet the rising sun :

Fragments 2

3

...L'áme s'abreuve á la source du temps , boit un pe u d e ténébres , un pe u d'aurore , .. . et s'enfuit sou s form e d'oisea u jusqu' á la cime á demi nu e don t le roe perce, chai r et or, le plein azur nocturne. IV

In all the above fragments the poet welcomes th e dawn whic h renew s him and hi s world. In a contrasting text from th e 'Cahier B 1910/ which Valér y first publishe d in the twentie s and agai n in 1930 , an anguished sel f whos e wakefulnes s precedes daybrea k refuses the ne w beginning; it s light appears 'darke r tha n all night/ and Tesprit ' fall s victim to the anguis h whose defeat i s its very raison d'étre: L'angoisse - revanch e des pensées inútile s et stationnaires, et des va-et-vient que j'a i tant méprisés . Angoisse, mon véritabl e métier.

If Teste and hi s idol - 'j e confesse que j'ai fait u n idol e de mon esprit, mais je n'en a i pas trouvé d'autre' ( o u, p 37) - constitut e the exorcism of this anguish, w e know tha t he i s himself but a fragment : 'Teste ... est un personnag e obten u pa r l e fractionnement d'un étr e réel dont o n extrairai t les moments le s plus intellectuel s pour en composer l e tout de la vie d'un personnag e imaginaire ' ( o u, p 1381); he is but a fragment o f a much riche r self, whose suffering , whos e victories and whos e defeat s inspire that very min d which create s the song. Ligh t is imperceptible withou t darkness , an d eac h su n rise s ou t of and presage s th e night. Et á la moindre lueur, je rebatís la hauteur d'oú j e tomberai ensuite. ...Le jour commence par un e lumiér e plus obscure que toute nuit - j e le ressens d e mon li t méme . I I commence dans ma tete par un calm e laissant voir toutes pensées á travers un éta t pur, encoré simples, assoupies, distincts : d'abord, résignation , lucidité, bienétre, comme dans u n bai n primitif. Le matin premier existe comme un uniform e son .

Throughout the text, the poet develop s tha t play of opposites 'hauteur-tomber/ 'jour-nuit, ' 'lumiére-obscure / 'angoisserésignation,' 'réve-veille, ' -which characterizes the moment whic h is both nigh t an d day, darkness an d light , and whic h make s up th e tensión o f the fragment.

24 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

Man i s condemned, lik e Sisyphus, to existence and hi s days, to emerge fro m th e primeval waters - 'bai n primiti f - and embryonic well-being into a painful an d unwante d birth and awakening : Bientót, tout ce que j e n'ai pas fai t e t que j e ne fera i jamáis , se dresse et me retourne dans mes regrets sur m a couche. Cela est fort, tenace comme un revé , et c'est clai r comme la veille. Je sens terriblement le béte et le vrai de ees mouvements. Inútiles, véridiques, sont ees démonstrations fatigantes. I I fau t s e mettre debout et dehors, dissiper encoré une heure dans les rúes oü s'ébranlent les ordures. Laisser méme le supplice inachevé (o u, pp 588- 9 and ci , p 50).

Finally the narrator mus t physically escape the torture which he cannot conquer mentally . This fragment, then, reflect s a moment of defeat, and th e 'aube refusée' has found expression elsewher e in Valéry's poetry. It has inspired th e poem 'A 1'Aurore': J'ai vu se feindre tan t de songe s Sur me s ténébres sans sommeil Que je range entre les mensonges Méme la forcé d u soleil , Et que j e doute si j'accueille Par l e dégoüt, par l e désir, Ce jour tres jeune sur l a feuill e Dont l'or vierge se peut saisi r ( o i, p 159).

Here the persona remains tor n between th e alternatives of acceptance or refusal o f the young day , 'unable to cióse his eyes t o an inevitabl e beauty, yet bound t o the suffering h e bears in his heart.' 2 This poem is from th e mid-thirties , as are th e firs t draft s o f 'L'Oiseau cruel / a son net which also has for its subject the refusa l o f the morning: L'aube dans l'ombr e ébauche le visage D'un jour tres beau qui deja n e m'est ríen: Un jour de plus n'est qu'un vai n paysage, Qu'est-ce qu'u n jou r sans le visage tien? Non! ... Vers la nuit mon ame retournée Refuse l'aub e et l a jeune journée (o i, p 158) .

In this sonnet, a s in the traditional albe, the lover rejects the rising day and it s beauties which threate n to end th e night of love. The same

Fragments 2

5

motif i s taken up , moreover, i n the 'Fragments du Narcisse / whos e lovers 'curse' the sun: Mais leurs esprits perdu s courent ce labyrinthe Oú s'égare celu i qui maudit le soleil! lis se sentent des pleurs défendre leurs ténébre s Plus chéres á jamáis que tou s les feux d u jou r (o i, p 128) ! v

But most of the time the poet welcomes daybreak - 'e t á la moindre lueur, je rebatís la hauteur' - and its regenerative forcé. Yet, the moment remains ever equivoca l in its enchantment and a t the same time sadness, in its 'lucidité presque douloureuse / which w e find i n the following fragment of the 'Lettr e (d u temps de Charmes)/ which Valéry published severa l times, as well as in many of the prose aubades disperse d throughou t th e oeuvre. Je descendáis l e matin dans ce pare, avant l'aurore. J'allais pieds ñu s dans l'herbe glacée. Le tout premier momen t du jou r exerce sur me s nerfs un e puissanc e singuliére. II s'y mel é de la tristesse, d e l'enchantement, de l'émotion et une sorte de lucidité presque dou loureuse. A peine se colorait le ciel, je rentrais assez ivr e de fraicheu r et de volonté. Tu n e peux imaginar quelles matinées j'ai passées pendan t ees deux ou trois mois d'été, dans cette riche región oú le grand arbre pousse comme l'herbe, o ü l'herbe est d'une forcé et d'une facilit é incroyables, oú la puissance végétale est inépuisable (oí, p 1645).

The letter, dated 1918 , is from tha t summer o f the last war yea r which Valéry had spen t wit h M. Lebey on l'Isle-Maniére in the Channel. 3 It is the tim e of imminent victory, and fo r the poet one o f the mos t fruitful period s o f his productive life . In 191 7 'L a Jeune Parque' ha d appeared an d magnificentl y marked Valéry's retur n t o poetry, whil e almost immediately distinguishing hi m a s the greatest French poet of his time. After th e patient and passionat e year s of hard work o n hi s major poem , all the 'Charmes' burst fort h wit h somethin g lik e the 'forcé et d'une facilité incroyables' of the vegetativ e growth depicte d in our fragment . From the 192 6 edition on , Charmes open s with 'Aurore.'

26 Th

e Rhetori c of Valéry's Prose Aubades

The fragment reflects some of the poet' s latent strength and re newed vitality , which are in harmony wit h those of the mornin g garden h e goes out to greet. For a privileged moment - 'l e tout premier moment d u jour' - ther e seems to be no distance between th e self and the world, that luxurious edenic natur e pulsating wit h life' s inexhaustible energy. But as the Un e of dawn barel y colours the early sky, the poet's enchantment is tinged with sadness, his lucidity touched by pain: Lucifer , th e brightest of morning stars, will be extinguished by the very sunrise which it announces . vi

A similar feeling of vital forcé an d almos t anima l strength emanate s from anothe r text from Tropo s me concernant/ in whose preface Valéry explains: 4 Le texte de ees "Propos" assemble quelques notes et fragment s pré levés sans ordre n i systéme dans un e quantité de cahiers oü i l est question de bien d'autres choses que de l'Auteur en personne. Peut étre est-ce dans ce reste que son moi l e plus nettemen t se dessine? Ce ne sont ici que de s moment s saisis et fixé s tel s quels, ca et la, au cours d'une quarantain e d'années...(ou, pp 1505-6).

One o f these 'moments' where Valéry' s 'moi l e plus nettement s e dessine' is again reflecte d i n a dawn fragment : II est des instants (vers l'aube) oú mo n esprit (c e personnage tre s important et capricieux) se sent cet appétit essentiel et universel qu'il oppose au Tout comme un tigr e á un troupeau ; mai s aussi une sort e de malaise: celui de ne savoir á quoi s'en prendr e et quelle proie particuliére saisir et attaquer. Chaqué objet particulier lui parait devoir diminuer, s'il s'y attache , la sensation divine de son groupe de puissances éveillé , et il pressent dan s tou t le jour qui v a suivre un e incarnation, et done une réductio n de cette ¡Ilusión de pouvoir a l'état pur; que mon sens intim e place au-dessus de tout...(on, p 1532).

The aubade recall s the second fragmen t discussed i n this chapter , where th e refreshed morning mind does not know whic h of the many ideas lighting up withi n it to attack first. I n the present text , which summarizes man y dawn s - 'il est des moments ver s l'aube' - the protagonist i s again 'mo n esprit ce personnage tre s important,' objectified b y the first-perso n narrato r i n th e familiar dédoublement whic h

Fragments 2

7

permits hi m to observe hi s own menta l 'fonctionnement.' A s he compares his 'esprit/ i n its hunger t o take possession o f the world , to a tiger about t o attack a herd, th e simile reduces th e whole world, the Tout/ to the mind's passiv e prey. In its 'sensation divin e de son groupe d e puissances éveillé / th e sel f feel s tha t th e worl d offers i t no resistance ; i t is virtually its victim, and th e all-powerful, divin e moi is solitary like a god. It is, then, paradoxically separated fro m th e world whic h i t owns . But again the mind' s divine instant is equivocal in it s very transience, like dawn itself , which is already coloured by the day which will absorb it . Even at its privileged moment th e moi's divine , that is immortal, power i s but an illusio n - ' ü pressen t dan s tou t l e jour qui va suivre ... une réduction de cette illusion de pouvoir á l'état pur' like that of the 'aurore' which merely suggests in their sheer virtualit y those forms tha t the rising da y will reduce to their concrete and fixe d limitations, their 'incarnation' an d thu s mortality. Did not God himself 'dissipate ' his divine 'Principie' in th e creation and realizatio n o f the world an d it s mutable and morta l forms? : Dieu lui-mém e a rompu l'obstacl e De sa parfait e éternité ; II s e fi t Celui qui dissip e En conséquences, son Principe , En étoiles, son Unité . Cieux, son erreur! Temps, sa ruine ('Ebauche d'un serpent/ oí, p 139). But this is, of course, Lucifer , 'MO I .. . Des astres l e plus superbe,' speak ing. The mental 'pouvoi r á l'état pur,' that of a silent Teste, which the poet's most intímate self place s 'au-dessus d e tout' is power un realized, not in fact , but in puré potentiality - tha t of the tiger before the attack. VII

One o f Valéry's most accomplished aubade s i s the pros e fragment 'Laure,' ( o u, pp 857-8) , whic h firs t appeared i n D'Ariane áZoé: Alphabetgalant e t sentimental in 1930 , an d the n agai n a s the centr e piece of 'Trois Portraits ' i n L a Nouvelle Revue Francflise i n 1931. 5 The title , rich in múltiple connotations, evoke s an autobiographical figure as well as one of Western, and specificall y Italian, poetic tradition , whil e at th e same tim e constituting a phonetic echo of both th e moment th e prose

28 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubade s

poem objectifies, Taurore / and one of its two dominant colours, Tor.' 'Laure' moreove r recall s the 'laurier' dedicate d to Apollo, whos e leaves traditionally crowned th e poet lauréate, and Valér y was pro bably the last to function i n tha t capacity for his country in moder n times. Laura de Grassi, Valéry's maternal aunt, had died i n 184 8 of cholera at the ag e of sixteen, so that the poe t kne w he r onl y in absenc e and a s a memory venerated i n the Grassi family. 6 Laur a had die d al most exactly five hundre d years after th e deat h of Laure de Noves , Petrarch's inspiration, who becam e her poet's Muse after he r death (6 April 1348) muc h mor e than she had ever been i n life . Valér y certainly associated the two Italian women, melancholy and tristes inspirations of poetry, in his mind, linking them to their prototype, Dante' s immortal Beatrice. In two passage s o f the 'Eros ' sectio n of the Cahiers, the poe t join s the ñame s of Beatrice, which wa s also that of a woman he had loved , with that of Laure, the etherea l muse: 'Seúl e t seule font Un - étr e seul á deux. Laure - Be'atrice' ( c u, p 431); i n the other notation Valér y reflects on th e mediaeva l origin of love as inspiration of art: 'L'amou r comme création artistique est dü a u moye n age qui d'une part l'a revétu d'une espéce d e sainteté (Laure , Beatrice) - e t de l'autre l'a paré de la sombre couleur du peché' ( c n, p 459). Our two-par t fragment is divided int o four segments , th e firs t of which, its opening sentence , is the poem's prologue; th e second, th e long paragraph of the first part, furnishes the (stage) setting, or frame , for Laura' s entrée, whic h makes up th e third and central paragraph ; the las t one i s the poem' s dénouement , it s 'falling off' a s it were. This fragment, then , i s carefully structure d and buil t around th e figure which it celebrates. 'Laure' is a precursor o f Valéry's meticulously structured pros e sequences , whos e sometime s mobil e fragments are assembled lik e building blocks to form an architecturally harmonious configuration o r form . The poem's brief an d tightl y condensed openin g introduce s its dramatis personae, 'Laur e ... avec moi,' its moment o r time, 'des l'aube,' and it s space and lieu, 'dans une sphére uniqu e au monde.' It identifies itself a s an aubade, th e firs t among those I nave discussed i n which the self i s not alone but appears t o admit another presenc e into its privileged space and time. 'Laure' and 'l'aube' not merely echo but suggest th e second term' s synonym, Taurore, ' thus further tightenin g the cohesión o f the concise sentence . Its predominan! /o/ sounds - the open /o / of 'Laure,' the closed /o / of Taube,' repeated wit h 'au,' an d

Fragments 2

9

the nasal lo/ o f 'monde' - a s well as its semantic and syntactic concentration evoke the figur e of the sphere signified b y its conclusión: the tightly drawn construc t and circl e of 'une sphere unique au monde/ in which the moi an d 'Laure ' and Taube' are enclosed. In this aubade, then, the self, n o longer alone, doe s not open ou t toward the world revealed by dawn, but, on the contrary, rather endoses itself, shuts itself an d 'Laure ' of f i n isolation fro m th e outside , 'l e monde.' We encounter the 'sphere unique au monde' elsewhere in Valéry's prose poetry; in the prose poem 'Agathe,' one of whose altérnate titles had been 'Manuscri t trouvé dans un e cervelle/ th e persona explore s her mind and it s transformations during a fragment o f a night, and '[sa] sphere singuliére/ 'c e clos unique' (on , p 1390 ) emerge s as a figure fo r that mind, while on the physical level evoking the 'cerveau' alluded t o in the altérnate title.7 Our poem' s 'sphere unique' similarly symbolizes the awakening mind itself , 'cett e forme fermé e o ü toutes choses sont vivantes.' And the persona's room , 'les murs de ma chambre me semblent le s parois d'une constructio n de ma volonté,' becomes bu t a n extensión o f that mind. 'Le pur feuille t qu i est devant moi' is Narcissus's mirror ; Laura's apparition will be reflected i n it: our poem, 'Laure, ' written on the page. I nave said tha t in this aubade the persona i s not alone, and ye t his solitude is everywhere stressed: 'J'appell e Solitude cett e forme fermée...' Tour que Laure paraisse, i l faut qu e ... je sois idéalement seul.' That other presence which requires this 'Solitude .. . fermée' i n order t o appear i s but a secret, and usuall y hidden, aspect of the moi itself; 'Laure ' is the personificatio n of its anima, 'ame,' which sometimes visits the mind at moments of its supreme attention and 'at tente.' The mysterious feminine presence is the soul, which comes to share the mind' s idea l solitude; i t is an aspec t o f the sel f whic h is, in turn, a puré 'regard,' a glance whose 'puissanc e precise ' and 'pro fonde fixité' pierc e and penétrat e the introspective mind. The soul i s present i n other aubades, bu t onl y in 'Laure' is it personified a s and identifie d wit h the virgina l and inaccessibl e Laura. In some dawn pieces , th e unión o f 'esprit' and 'ame ' is threatened b y the approaching day: II est temps que vienne le jour avec son epée qui divise l'espri t d e l'áme et découpe aujourd rhui...(c\\, p 1290) .

and i n a dawn fragmen t fro m th e period o f 'Laure,' the poet addresse s his soul as a rising mornin g star:

30 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades C'est au réveil, au mati n que 1''ame s e sent étrang e - entr e passé et avenir. Elle se leve comme un astre - ... Peut-étre, n'es-t u que ce t instant, cet effet, cett e ¡Ilusión de Mo i pur, et la tristesse enorme d'exister - .. . Tu ne viendras pas á bout de tout ce que tu éclaires, Ame. Toute ta prostitution diurne aux chose s et aux actes ne peut rie n contre ta terrible virginité - .. . Miroir (c u, p 1295).

While Valéry the analyst condemns suc h term s as 'soul' or 'love' as termes imprécis - 'm e suis interdi t d'employer aucu n mo t que je n'y puisse attacher un sens finí - conscien t - Jamáis user d e ce qui trouve dans l a pénombre d u langag e des résonances, de s reíais indistincts. Le mot ame proscrit. Etc.' ( c i, p 114) - thes e sam e words reawake n infinitely enriche d i n hi s poetry and especiall y i n his mornin g songs . The firs t par t o f 'Laure' i s a careful preparatio n fo r the secre t meet ing of animus an d anim a ' á cette heure premiére que je ne place ni dans me s jours ni dans mes nuits.' I t is a moment of puré expectation; for Valér y love is most intense i n its 'attente/ be it that of the beloved, the 'Idee maitresse/ o r his muse : Ne háte pas cet acte tendré, Car j'ai vécu de vous attendre ('Les Pas,' oí, p 121)

This 'attente' and imminence , th e moment o f puré expectation, cha racterizes Valéry's aubades; it s heightened intensit y is celebrated again and again , as dawn follow s dawn : Est-il espoir plu s pur , plus délié du monde , affranch i d e moiméme - et toutefois possessio n plu s entiére - que je n'en trouv e avant l e jour, dans un momen t premier d e proposition e t d'unité de mes forces, quan d l e seul désir d e l'esprit, qui en preced e toute s les pensées particuliéres , semble préférer d e les surprendre et d'étre amou r de ce qui aime? L'áme jouit de sa lumiére sans objets . ( o i, p 351 )

In our poem' s centre, in the persona's solitude an d 'c e silence tou t armé d'attentes,' Laura' s presence i s manifest as an all-seeing glance as bright a s the sun - 'Laure-1'or ' - so that the mind's ey e can hardly bear it , but whic h it cannot escape . No t even th e moi's innermos t voice, the most obscur e whispering s 'entr e mon désir et mon dé-

Fragments 3

1

mon,' can escape Laura' s eyes, thei r 'puissance precise/ thei r 'pouvoir interrogateur.' As the poem move s to its conclusión, their bright, burning intensity fades lik e the sta r in the mornin g sky. The most spiritual of senses, sight, is replaced by the mos t sensual, the olfac tory - 'odoratm impedit cogitationem' Valér y quotes Saint Bernard in the pros e poe m 'L a Chambre hantée' ( o i, p 308) - an d Laura's eyes fade away as the perfume of her dresses, her hands , and he r hair rise s out of the 'néant,' a past lon g dead. In the poem's - and dawn's dénouement, Laura' s intense spiritual presence i s reduced t o the recollection of 'la Laur e qui fu t de chair/ an d he r blindin g glance to a fragrance lingerin g in th e mind and i n the room, 'le parfum tro p délicieux des anciennes robes de Laure/ a s the morning poem turn s into one o f mourning of 'la véritable Laure.'8 As Laura's fragrance evoke s the smell of dead leave s burned i n late autumn days, the poet evokes the traditional analogy between th e dying year and huma n mortality. 9 Our poem , encompassing both birth and death , dawn an d fall , suggest s agai n the dialectic of darkness and light which make s up th e tensió n o f the aubades , an d o f the moment of daw n itself . Though M . Teste scorns emotions suc h as sadness - 'considére r ses émotions comme sottises .. . quelque chose en mo i se révolte contre la puissance inventiv e de l'áme sur l'esprit ' ( o u, p 70) - an d thoug h Valéry himself i n Tropos me concernant' says 'quoi d e plus sot que la tristesse?' ( o u, p 1523) , i n his poetry, and especiall y the aubades , 'l'áme' frequently take s its revenge. For even that intellectual 'ivresse' and exultatio n of 'lucidité' characteristic of the daw n poems is a powerful emotion , and i n our fragmen t Laura' s visit leaves the persona literall y 'overwhelmed ' b y that other emotion we have encountered i n the aubades, 'une tristesse magique/ int o which he fall s 'de tout [son ] coeur.' 10

4 Th e Trilogy ' A B C 7

In 192 5 Valéry published i n Commerce th e three prose poems 'ABC / indicating on the title-page: 'trois lettre s extraites d'un alphabe t á paraitre á la librairie du San s Pareil.' 1 This 'alphabet' was never completed; a modified versió n o f V appear s under 'Poémes ' i n Histoires brisées ( o u, pp 461-2) , and th e prose poe m 'c' wa s republished b y th e poet in Morceaux choisis i n 1930 , under th e titl e 'Comme le Temps est calme.'2 Though each on e o f the 'ABC ' poems constitute s a self-contained whole, as their sepárate publication bears out, the underlying unity of these fragments makes up the integrity of the sequence's tripartite configuration. For these pieces constitute a series of three dramas, each one complete and characterized by the opposing force s of its inner tensión, but al l sequentially related in the progressive development of a single theme. In 'A' the mind finds its body upon awakening at dawn; in V min d and body unite as the self arises to the new day; and in 'c' the united self takes possession o f the world, the morning unfolding before it. The first poe m begin s 'Au commencement / lik e Génesis, and thi s beginning implies also the vocative 'ó commencement,' invoking the aleph and alph a o f the worl d and th e wor d a s if by incantation. This incantatory and prophetic , rathe r than narrative , tone o f the openin g chord is accentuated by the futur e o f the verb: 'A u commencement sera le Sommeil.' 3 In the beginning is sleep and absence, and th e predominance in this opening o f the materna l /m's/ evocative of the origi n of both th e indi vidual and of the race - 'mére-mer ' - as well as the round /o's / suggestive of the womb and o f feminine night, sound a vague remembrance of an embryoni c past:4 Au commencement sera l e Sommeil. Animal profondément endormi; tiéde et tranquille masse mystérieusement isolée.

The Trilogy 'A B c

3

As upon awakenin g of consciousness th e sel f separate s itsel f fro m the universal manifol d an d the T emerges fro m th e world - whic h it at the same time posits - tha t moi itself becomes divided into body and mind. An d s o the three basic Valéryan 'points cardinau x de connaissance' upo n whic h reality is founded, and whic h he designates by the sign 'CEM ' in th e Cahiers - ' c E M l e mon-corps, le mon-esprit, le monmonde ce sont trois directions qui s e dessinent toujours ' ( c i, p 1148 ) - thes e three points constitute themselves. That is, they are constituted by the language which they in turn créate, as the world and th e word are bor n simultaneously . It is no coincidence that our fragment' s titl e is the firs t lette r of the alphabet . The thre e 'cardinal points of orientation/ tha t is the divided self separate d fro m th e world, are the verb's '!,' its 'thou,' and its third term in the mind's soliloquy, which is consciousness. Bu t the interna l monologue, th e ac t of thinking, is again the familia r dialogue : 'pense r c'est communique r ave c soi-méme' ( c i, p 440). In ou r fragment' s opening i t is the moi's dialogue of esprit an d corps a s they arise in and wit h the world: 'j e me réveille.'5 The awakening min d - 'mo n esprit ' - contemplates its still sleeping body - 'mo n corps' - which has carried it through the archetypal waters of night and unconsciousnes s lik e an ark, and whic h preserve s it: arche cióse de vie qui transportes ver s le jour mon histoir e et mes chances ... tu es ma permanenc e inexprimabl e ... 6 ma form e fermée, j e laisse toute pensée pour t e contempler de tou t mon coeur .

The Parque's consciousness awok e to contémplate her body - 'Arch e toute secrete , et pourtant si prochaine' - similarly , and we find the same división o f mind and bod y in Eupalinos's morning 'oraison/ his supplication t o his body's perfect for m t o inspire him and his art: 'O mon corp s .. . Mon intelligence mieux inspirée ne cessera, che r corps , de vous appeler .. . Mais ce corps et cet esprit... il fau t á présent qu'ils s'unissent dans un e constructio n bien ordonnée ' ( o u, pp 99-100). As the insular self of consciousness - self-consciousness - rise s from th e Urelement, it s material form, it s body, appear s t o it like an 'island o f time ... detached fro m th e enormous Time, ' while our poe m itself measure s ou t it s form an d duratio n fro m th e eternal flux:6 Tu t'es fai t un e lie de temps, tu es un temp s qu i s'est détaché d e l'énorme Temps o ü t a durée ... subsiste et s'éternise...

34 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

The circular images of the closed are , the island , and th e 'form e fermée' evoke the feminin e not merel y as origin supportive of the birth motil , but als o as an end , as object of desire. Lik e Narcissus bending over th e image which he loves, our mind-person a embrace s the for m whic h gives him lif e and sustain s him: 'J e me penche sur toi qui es moi'; and th e waking lover of our aubad e sings hi s sleeping beloved wh o holds him enchained: II n'es t pas de plus étrange, de plus pieuse pensée; i l n'est pa s d e merveille plus proche. Mon amour devan t toi est inépuisable ... Tu m'attends sans me connaitre et je te fais défau t pou r m e désirer.

Nowhere is Valéry's love poetry more passionate than i n this morning song : Je suis le hasard, l a rupture et l e signe! Je suis ton émanation et to n ange. I I n' y a qu'un abime entre nous, qui n e sommes rien l'un san s l'autre. Ma vigueur en toi est éparse, mais en mo i tout l'espoir d e l'espoir.

In this ideal rape and hymen - an d the sharp and viril lu'sl and /i's/ of 'rupture' and 'signe' accentuate its male aggressiveness - th e mind will take possession o f its body lik e an ánge l o f light, like a flamin g knight: J'apparaitrai á mes membres comme un prodige , je chasserai l'impuissance de ma terre , j'occuperai mon empire jusqu'aux ongles, tes extrémités m'obéiront et nous entrerons hardiment dans le royaume de nos yeux.

We recall that Valéry has rendere d thi s act of love in whic h th e self comes into self-possession wit h the same vigorous eroticism in 'Aurore.'7 But before animating the beloved form , th e min d want s t o prolong the sweetness of anticipation, that state of being and non-being 'Douceur d'étr e et de n'étre pas' ( o i, p 121) - want s to contémplat e still the sleepin g bod y and liste n to the beating of its heart, behold it s features and it s absent eyes : Au traver s de ce masque abandonné t u exhales le murmure de l'existence stationnaire. J'écoute ma fragilité , e t ma stupidité est devant moi...

The Trilog y 'A B C 3

5

Come no t ye t back to life , ' 6 repose encoré , repose moi...' Fo r here , a s in the traditiona l albe, the love r lament s the end o f the nigh t as he greets the day. But the sun i s rising, and a s the min d beholds with tenderness - 'm a tendresse anxieus e est sur toi' - its sleeping for m cette Chose s'agite ... et il y a un appel, une amour, une demande suppliante, un babil iscles dans l'univers... It is a gentle birth fro m a n embryoni c past into 'des essais d e lumiére/ and finally : 'l e miracle, les corps solides ... mes projets et lejour!' 'B' begins wit h the sel f 'bouleversan t le s ombres'; no w i t is no longe r a mo i speaking, but a narrator beholding Tétre ' - a body an d a mind united -emerge from th e vague shrouds o f bed and night : divisant, rejetant le s flots d u linceu l vague, l'étre enfin s e défait d e leur désordre tendré. La vertu d'étre Soi le parcourt. As 'connaitre' passes into 'étre,' and meditatio n into action, the intimacy of the moi's monologu e is broken, and th e sel f step s back now , out o f itself a s it were, t o observe itsel f a s an objec t o r event, th e phe nomenon Man: 8 l'unité s'empare des membres, et de la nuque jusqu'aux pieds un événement se fait homme . The characteristic dédoublement, tha t heightened stat e of consciousness which allows the self to behold itsel f objectively, is here no longer the mind beholding it s body, a s in 'A, ' but the mo i observing th e 'fonc tionnement' o f the tota l self, it s body and it s own thinking . The Parque awakens saying 'j e me voyais me voir' ( o i, p 97), and Test e goes to sleep murmuring 'je suis étant , et me voyant; me voyant me voir, e t ainsi de suite' ( o u, p 25) . This self-objectificatio n i s carried t o its extreme point i n the prose poem 'Su r l a Place publique,' whose protagonist explains: 'je m'observ e qu i observe ' ( o n, pp 688-9) . Only after th e lucid awakening of the whole being - 'étr e Soi' does the actual dialogue begin, th e 'colloqu e dan s u n étre ' of body and mind : 'Deboutl cri e tout mo n corps, i l faut rompre avec l'impossiblel .. . Debout!' I n another mornin g poem , 'Chan t de l'idé e maítresse,' the master notio n summon s it s 'étre' into being wit h the same vigor: 'Allons ! Debout! Surgís . Ecoute!/... Eveille-toi, brise tes chaines, sois' (oí , p 357). And while that 'Chant' is a matutinal mono-

36 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

logue, the Idea's supplication ('Mo i qui t'appelle. Moi qui ne puis ríen sans toi./Moi, l'Idée') t o the body to sustain it , the morning exchange of esprit e t corps ha s als o become one o f Valéry's formal Dialogues , the 'Colloque dans un étre,' where, a s in our prose poem, th e mind calis its reticent body into life: 'Allon s ... Sors de l'instant... Compose tes puissances ... /Renais!' (o i, pp 360-1) . And afte r th e resistanc e of matter has been overeóme by mind, the two selves become oneself: '¡e suis debout! ' Our fragment's persona, the whole person - lik e the poet who never tired of poetizing it - i s filled wit h wonder at the miracle which renews itself eac h dawn, that autogénesis, th e re-creation of the self : Le miracle d'étre debout s'accomplit. Quoi de plus simple, quoi de plus inexplicable que ce prodige, Equilibre?

And s o the self take s possession o f space, time , and number - 'rejoin s tes dessins dans l'espace ... penetre, ave c des pas que l'on peu t compter, dans la sphére des lumiéres' - takes , that is, possession of the worl d of man. But in th e very act of recreating his universe, of entering 'la sphére de s lumiéres,' Man regrets the passing o f the night - 'rendr e l a lumiére/Suppose d'ombre une morne moitié' (Le Cimetiére marin,' o i, p 148) . The nostalgia for the origin ('j e t'abandonne quelque temps, Douceur de n'étre pas!') , its 'charme invincible,' and als o its threats, 'effrayante impuissanc e inconnue,' make up th e tensión o f the remainder of the V fragment , th e moment between nigh t and day . For while the newly risen self rejects , throws off, th e creature s of the underworld , that other side o f itself, i t doe s not forge t them : A ce soir, jeux obscurs, monstres, scénes impures, et vous, vaines amours!

Every awakening is a return from tha t descent 'dan s les ténébres de toi,' 'tes abímes' (oí , p 112). As dawn arouse d Semirarmis , 'Existe! ... Sois enfin toi-méme!' , her Appollonian lover , TAurore,' summoned he r t o arise again from th e world of the shades: Tire-to i de tes ombres,/Et débarasse-toi d'u n désordr e d e drames/... les monstres de ton sang ' ( o i, p 91). The fulles t developmen t o f the them e of th e return fro m th e underworl d i n Valéry's poetry is that of 'La Jeune Parque,' her struggle with the dark forces of the night, the monster , the 'che r serpent, ' whic h both repulses an d entices her, tempts her to

TheTrilogy'ABC' 3

7

descend eve r deeper , befor e the fina l victor y of dawn: 'Fuis-moi ! du noir retour reprends l e fil visqueux!/.. . Moi, je veille' ( o i, p 98) . How daré one, asks our fragment' s moi, cross tha t perilous night : 'comment se peut-il que Ton ose s'endormir?' And in V th e nocturnal voyage is again, as in 'A / image d as the crossin g o f a dangerous sea : O qui me dirá comment au traver s de l'inexistenc e ma personne tou t entiére s'est conservée , et quelle chose m' a port é inerte, plein de vie et chargé d'esprit, d'un bor d á l'autre du néant?

In the 'Colloqu e dan s u n étre/ th e morning's ne w self look s back on the crossing o f the night with th e same wonderment: 'N'est-c e pas une merveill e supérieure qu e de penser qu e l'on posséde en soi de quoi disparaítre á soi-méme...? Tout s'efface á la fois . Est-ce beau? Quan d l e navire sombre, l e ciel s'évanouit e t la mer s'éva pore...' ( o i, pp 365-6) . And th e same imag e of the grea t ship pushing steadily through th e night of sleep has inspired Valéry' s prose frag ment 'Final': Comme le grand navire s'enfonce et sombre lentement gardant ses ressources, ses machines, ses lumiéres, ses instruments... Ainsi dans la nuit et dans le dessous de soi-méme l'esprit descen d au sommei l avec tous ses appareils et ses possibles . Le Sommeil est plu s respectable que l a mort ( o i, p p 354-5) .

Our middl e fragment conclude s with the mo i arisen and read y for the new day, but rememberin g it s night. The third piece, 'c/ opens out upon th e world, like the windo w from whic h the persona i s beholding it , and capture s th e transient moment between aube and aurore, death of night and birth of day, that fragment o f time in its purity, calm, and imminence , which Valéry elsewhere salutes : ' O moment, diamant du temps ' ( o i, p 351)! Ou r persona a t the mornin g windo w figure s the self o n th e threshold of the possible, an d a t that privileged moment , an idea l present, the world becomes a puré reflection i n the self; as the universal self it thus becomes one with the universe, it becomes it s consciousness, its conscience, and it s witness: 9 Comme le temps est calme, et l a jeune fin de la nuit délicieusement coloree! ... il fai t pur , il fai t vierge, i l fai t dou x et divin.

38 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

It is the whole moi, both body and mind - and soul - whic h takes pos session o f the world : Les volets repoussés á droite et á gauche par u n act e vif de nageur, je penetre dans l'extas e de l'espace .

The image of the swimmer and th e 'j e penetre dan s l'extase ' suggest again the virile eroticism of 'Aurore,' while the mind's ideal rape - 'te s idéales rapiñes ' - o f the world is , as always in Valéry, that of the eye: Je vous salue, granduer offerte á tous les actes d'un regard.. . Quel événement pour l'espri t qu'une telle étendue!

This 'commencement d e la parfaite transparence/ when corps, esprit, and monde fus e i n an idea l imminence and purity , inspired 'Pur s Drames/ whose person a w e saw behold dawn risin g fro m hi s window, as the firs t hou r becam e the firs t da y o f the world. As the person a o f 'c' steps ou t o n hi s balcony, it is with a feeling of adoration and 'un e amour infinie ' tha t he approaches 'le s choses' which are coming to life lik e him, which impinge on his senses and construct themselve s fo r and i n hi s consciousness: Je voudrais vous bénir, ó toutes choses, s i je savais!...

But Man ha s forgotte n the language of worship an d th e supernatural of a former age , of his childhoo d a s well as that of the race . Like the moi-esprit o f 'A,' who i n awakening turned t o his moi-corps, like the sel f o f 'B/ wh o i n arising t o the day glanced back on th e night from whic h i t had emerged, lik e the very hour whic h surrounds him , so the her o o f 'C' is composed o f an inne r tensió n o f opposites whic h makes up his essence : Sur l e balcón qui se propose au-dessu s de s feuilles , su r l e seuil de la premiére heure et de tout ce qui est possible, j e dors et je veille, je suis jour et nuit, j'offre longtemp s une amour infinie, un e crainte sans mesure. L'áme s'abreuve á la source d u temps , boit un pe u d e ténébres, u n pe u d'aurore, se sent femm e endormie, ange fai t d e lumiére, se recueille, s'attriste, et s'enfuit sou s form e d'oisea u jusqu'á la cime á demi nue don t le roe perce, chair et or, le plein azur nocturne .

The Trilogy 'A B e 3

9

The familiar imag e of the bird, that of the peak, or isle, and th e colour s 'chair e t or' constitute the tonalit y of many of Valéry's prose aubades and als o of the aurores of some of his great lyric poems. Waking and sleeping, da y an d night , infinite lov e and fea r withou t measure, make up the self whos e soul drinks in this morning hour, a few shades, a little dawn. As the exultation of the beginning and of birth - ' ó commencement' - contain s the nostalgia for a return to the source and non-being - 'douceu r d e n'étre pas' - so the self, collected for future actio n but saddene d b y past weariness , i s at once an ánge l of light and a woman sleeping , 'esprit ' and 'ame / animus an d anima. It is this total and androgynous huma n soul, a universal self , which soars like a morning bir d t o mee t and sin g a world and life . An d this song, whic h is the poem greeting the day, the aubade, arises new with every dawn : Mille fois, j'a i deja ressent i l'Unique.. . Mille fois, plu s d e mille fois, c e dont l'essenc e es t d'étre unique ... Chaqué auror e est premiére. L'idé e qui vient cree un homm e nouveau.10

Valéry has sung th e profound melancholy of this hour, a s well as its joy, again and again , each time uniquely. The ascending movemen t of the thir d part of our trilogy , the elevation o f the self , induced by the images of the bird, the pea k and th e tree, is heightened t o 'the most extreme point' a s the persona behold s the sky: 'il subsiste tres haut peu de fines étoiles á l'extréme de l'aigu.' An d th e words o f the phrase by their sound-look, the repetition o f hard consonants , sharp /i's/, and th e fina l 'aigu, ' sugges t what they signify, the cold, piercing sharpness of the sparkling on high - an image and reflectio n o f 'la premiére lucidité.' But these stars are dying, like the moon - 'l a lune est ce fragment d e glace fondante' - and the same image of the melting moon accentuate s the lifedeath tensió n o f other aubades . The poem's matutinal moi partake s of the abundanc e of this hour of becoming, whic h contains both birth and dissolution , th e initial and the final : Je sais tro p (tou t á coup) qu'u n enfan t au x cheveu x gris contempl e d'anciennes tristesse s á demi mortes , á demi divinisées, dan s cet objet celeste d e substanc e étincelante et mourante, tendré et froid e qui v a se dissoudre insensiblement .

40 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

The 'gray-haired child/ lik e the moment of twilight, comprises both past and future , i s a self bot h melancholy with reminiscence and exuberant with promise. Valér y once said: 'c e qui me frappe l e plus dans la mémoire, ce n'est pas qu'elle redi t le passé - c'es t qu'elle aliment e le présent' ( c i, p 1221) . Both the moí an d it s privileged momen t ar e expanded i n the contemplation of past sorrows, half dead, half deified, like the moon. Again, at this point of heightened consciousness, th e self step s out of itself t o observe its own dédoublement - 'comm e si je n'étais poin t dans mo n coeur' - and it beholds two selves: it s youth and it s oíd age meeting at this hour of dawn: Ma jeunesse jadis a langui et senti la montee des larmes, vers la méme heure, et sous le méme enchantement de la lune évanouissante. Ma jeunesse a vu c e méme matin, et je me vois á cote de ma jeunesse...

The poet's reminiscence of the dawn s of his youth and thei r tears recalls those of 'Purs Drames' and it s transparent sadness . I n recalling the past and presaging the future, ou r fragment reflects the moi's total possession of the présen t an d o f the self , a self whic h has reache d it s extreme limit of puré lucidity, both cold and tender, a s it contemplates and knows its mystery - lif e - withou t understanding. It is the moment of the Angel' s tears. After reachin g its extreme point - Textrém e de l'aigu' - 'con naitre,' lik e the 'étre' which sustains it, must come back to itself, like oíd age to its childhood, an d puré lucidity - 'lucidit é sans objet' - to the moi whic h it cannot transcend. The circle always closes, lik e the uroboros which swallows its tail.n Yet there arises in the self , as inexplicably as those tears, a yearning for transcendence , a yearning to surpass all possible experience and even knowledge ; no t to know, but to glorify and praise - 'j e voudrais vous bénir, 6 toutes choses, s i je savais! ...' Prayer, we said, is a vague memory of the past, come back perhaps wit h th e child in th e self an d th e innocenc e of the hou r of dawn. Elsewhere in on e of his morning fragments Valéry says: Petit matin, petit jour, heure, peut-étre, de la plus fort e présenc e des hérédités. ... Dieu n'est pas invraisemblable , á cette heure-ci. Le souvenir d'une création n'est pa s tres loin. Le Fiat lux est une chose toute simple et qu'on a vue e t entendue (cu , p 1271) .

The Trilogy' A BC ' 4

1

The self i s both chil d and man ; ho w ca n the one pray without the other listening ? Divisé, comment prier? Commen t prier quan d u n autr e soi-méme écouterait la priére? The orison risin g from tha t mysterious part oí the self - the soul which escapes understanding , to that which transcends it - 'énigme , mystére' - mus t therefore be a prayer in 'tongues/ an unknown language - 'i l ne faut prie r qu'en paroles inconnues ' - myster y for mystery. Valéry, like Mallarmé, also admired the liturgica l language of the Church, and th e 'c' fragment closin g the sequence conclude s with an exhortatio n in th e ton e of the sursum corda o f the Mass: 12 Elevez ce qui est mystér e en vou s á ce qui es t mystére en soi. The poet's morning prayer is the aubade, the poem glorifying an d praising the ne w da y and th e ne w self: 'C'es t la premiére oraison! ' In m y discussion o f the ' A B c' poems as a sequence of three dramas, I have traced i n them a complex play of opposites - sleeping-waking, absence-presence, corps-esprit, étre-connaítre, moi-monde - which makes up th e dramati c tensión o f each individual poem a s well as of the whol e trilogy. All of these antitheses may be subsumed unde r th e general dialectic of darkness and light. 13 But as one element in this antithetical movement passe s into its opposite, i t is not cancelled , but fulfilled an d preserved . Fo r the notion of the world is meaningful onl y in and fo r a mind, and esprit rise s out o f the body by which it must be sustained - 'CEM. ' And th e privilege d hou r o f dawn itsel f i s also both on e an d tri partite - like the tnoi, and like our prose poem sequenc e - containing the past an d carryin g the future. Lik e Saint Augustine's unique present - praesens de pmeteritis, praesens de presentibus, praesens de futuris - th e 'aube' i s also both th e night from whic h it rises, and the day whic h it becomes. I n a 'Matin' prose poem o f Valéry's later years, he says : 'd u ble u frai s pein t sur or , or et nuit, or sur nuit... . la nuit se fait voi r á l a lumiére, comme l'esprit a u révei l fait voi r la naissance, l'inexistence ... á la premiére lucidité' (o i, p 355), and i n a fragmen t from 'Chose s tues/ la conscience sort des ténébres, en vit, s'en alimente, et enfin le s regenere, et plus épaisses, par les questions mémes qu'elle se pose, en vertu et en raiso n directe de sa lucidité ( o u, p 497).

42 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry' s Prose Aubade s

It is according to the same dialectic, then, that i n the concluding an d culminating fragment o f our trilogy, where the self reaches its extreme wakefulness and lucidity - 'l a premiér e lucidité' - that lucidity is set off agains t the moi's mystery - 'c e qui est mystére en vous' - a mystery which is not merel y preserved a t this moment of clarity and 'lumiére/ but whic h is all the more profound for it. In th e aubades , as in this whole poetic universe, 'lumiére' is a symbol for 'esprit/ an d s o each mornin g poem celebrates a twofold birth. The theme of light in Valéry's poetry has been brilliantly discussed by J.L. Faivre, who see s its origin in the poet's childhood. 14 But the sunlit enfance i n the tow n surrounde d b y the sea inspired no t merel y the them e of 'lumiére' in the Apollonia n poet, bu t als o that o f the 'commencement.' An d the cióse interrelationship o f the two themes , in both th e ' A B c' sequenc e and i n Valéry's poetry i n general, mani fests itsel f i n tw o o f its beginnings: 'A u commencemen t sera le Soleil - Au commencement sera le Sommeil.' The themes of the origin and o f light combine to form th e aubades, the single largest group of Valéry's prose poem s and fragments , for at each ne w dawn th e awakening moi need s th e world in order to exist - as the rising sun needs human consciousness t o reflect it.

5 Troi s Réveils'

Since Valéry so frequently publishe d hi s prose poems and fragment s in sequences suc h as ' A B c,' some of the poet' s prose texts were presented i n th e for m o f similar series after hi s death. Several of these 'posthumous sequences ' combine inédits, poetic fragments from th e Cahiers, and text s that were already published during Valéry's lifetime. 'Trois Réveils' is a posthumous sequenc e joinin g three prose aubades, the firs t o f which dates from 1889 , when Valér y was eighteen years oíd, and th e othe r two, taken from th e 194 4 Cahiers, fro m the en d o f his life. 1 Thus , like the 'c' fragment of the ' A B c' sequence, it links the poet's youth and hi s oíd age. There is no indication, however, that this editorial ordering reflects the intention of the poet. The first 'réveil, ' entitle d 'Nuit á la cáseme' and signe d '1 7 no vembre 1889 au matin, ' was written during the firs t day s of Valéry's military service at Montpellier and represent s th e poetic expression of this new experience. 2 Valéry had written many poems tha t year and read widely. In September he had discovered A Rebours, a book which became, as I have mentioned, th e young poet's 'livr e de chevet/ re vealing to him not merely the decadents and th e poet he was later to choose as his mattre, but a genre in which tw o great predecessors, Baudelaire and Mallarmé , had excelled : the prose poem. Des Esseintes treasured 'un e anthologie du poéme en prose' including Mallarmé's seven earl y prose poems, fro m 'L e Phénoméne futur ' to 'Un Spectacle interrompu,' whic h for him 'étaien t le s chefsd'oeuvre d e Mallarmé et comptaient également parmi les chefsd'oeuvre d u poém e en prose.' 3 And we recall that Valéry wrote and dedicated to Huysmans on e of his ow n earlies t prose poems, 'Les Vieilles Ruelles,' in the same year in which he wrote the poem unde r discussion.

44 Th

e Rhetori c of Valéry's Prose Aubade s

In 'Nui t á la cáseme/ Valér y attempts, a s he had i n 'Le s Vieilles Ruelles/ a certain realism and 'écritur e artiste' reminiscen t of the Goncourts, who ha d als o been revealed to him by A Rebours. It is thus a descriptive piece, somewhat i n the manne r o f Mallarmé's early prose poem 'L a Pipe/ and lacks that fragmentary, instantaneous quality, as well as the intensity , of the late r aubades. Moreover, the 'time ' of 'Nui t á la cáseme/ as the author indicates , i s from te n o'cloc k at night until daybreak, so that only the last third of the prose poem is in fact abou t dawn. But what differentiate s thi s early prose poe m mos t significantly fro m th e characteristic morning fragments i s its persona's extroversive stance. Not merely does h e concéntrate his regará on 'outer' phenomena rathe r than thos e o f his own mind , but thi s outer worl d does not appea r as a composition o f the poet's mind, like the world of 'Purs Drames/ written only a few years later; instead th e narrator here 'objectively' registers the elements that make up his environment, which he renders thu s in a more or less 'realistic' fashion . 'Nuit á la cáseme/ like some of Valéry's other earl y prose poems, is also formally mor e traditional in it s title, which states the 'subject ' of the piec e in the manne r of 'Les Vieilles Ruelles' or 'Une Chambre conjecturale.'4 Thus, in thes e early prose poem s ther e is still a wider gap between forme an d fond tha n i n the later fragments, which are not so much 'about' anything, as they are themselves th e direct verbal reflections - celebrations - of the moment they objectify . The poem's titl e and elliptica l opening statemen t fix its place and exact time, the definite article universalizing, and thu s rendering even more oppressive, th e lieu which confines the first-person narrator introduced i n the second sentence. Th e first paragraph establishe s th e poem's cadre a s well as the persona's frame o f mind: hi s twofold imprisonment, in the stony, black courtyard and i n his loathing, is accentuated by the repetition of the preposition 'dans. ' 'J'erre dan s mon dégoüt' suggest s 'égout' in line with 'la cour rugueuse et noire/ and late r in the paragraph evoked with Tabreuvoir.' The 'je' is further confine d by the very night whose 'immens e splendeur / while it occasions a simile stressing th e contrast between th e narrator's sor did prison and the beauty 'outside/ consoles hi m but little. 'La tablette de velours sombre o ú le bijoutier jett e ses riviéres de diamants' i s opposed to 'd'importunes lanterne s troubles sous les voútes/ an d 'riviéres de diamants' further contrast s with Téclai r d'une bayonnette.' Th e 'lointains' of 'les roulements lointains de roues' again underlines th e notion o f confinement, picked up in the following sentence-paragraph by 'ce bruit extérieur m e rejette dans l a douleur d e

Trois Réveils' 4

5

l'emprisonnement parmi l a sottise, la brutalité, et les tetes carrees sous le képi' [m y italics].5 So far I have concentrated o n th e signifié; a n examinatio n of th e signifiant(s) o f the text' s opening passage s reveáis its refined 'écri ture.' Almos t all of the paragraphs of the piece open, like the firs t one , with brief, sometimes verbless , phrase s whic h i n their telegraphi c terseness establis h a tone of reportage conducive to realism: '1 0 heures.', 'Dans l a chambre.', 'On ronfle.', 'U n froi d agréable.' , 'C'est le réveil.', 'Tumulte dans l'escalier.' The poem's second sentenc e i s carefully balanced , literall y situating the persona betwee n th e confining courtyard and th e immense night; the unconsoled moi, constricted by his own unhappiness , i s flanked by the two prepositional phrases, 'dan s la cour...' and 'pa r l'immense splendeur...' From th e third t o the fina l sentenc e o f the opening paragraph , al l sentences be gin with th e indefinite article, 'Une nuit..., 'Un calme frais.../ 'U n file t d'eau...,' thus constituting an enumeration o f the elements that make up th e opening scene , in which the narrator appears t o be a stranger as much as the reader. Interna! echoes of dark vowels and nasal s in the text reflect the dark yard and th e night : 'dans l a cour/ 'dans mon dégoüt/ 'consolé, ' 'immense splendeuT,' 'velours sombre oú le bij'owtier,' 'troublé ... /««ternes troubles sous les voütes,' 'roulements de roues.' Light vowels suggest the sparkling of the stars on the background of the night sky and o f the jewelry on th e blac k velvet, '/mmense splendeur de la nuit,' 'bijoutier... ses rivieres de d/amants, ' '/'éclai r d'une bayonnette,' 'un filet d'eau. ' The 'jette' o f the firs t paragrap h is echoed by 'rejette ' of the second, which spells ou t th e them e of 'emprisonnement,' an d i n which 'dans la douleur' recalls the earlier 'dans mon dégoüt.' The prepositional phrase 'parmi la sottise, la brutalité, et les tetes carrees sous le képi/ a n enumeration of aesthetic dissonances, i s appropriately rendered b y an accumulation of sharp vowels and har d consonants . In th e third paragraph, where the narrator has returned to the barracks and gone t o bed, hi s imprisonment literally reaches an almost suffocating constraint : 'dans l a chambre ... entre la capote et la couverture.' Confined inside, behind 'le s croix noires des barreaux,' h e is even mor e estranged fro m tha t environment, whose phenomen a h e records in the most impersonal and distan t manner. This distance is achieved by the us e of indefinite articles, or even the complete absence of articles: 'des voix ... chuchottent.' 'Baillements, tremblotement de la maigre lampe unique.' The individuáis about him, whom the darkness renders even more anonymous, are referred to by the impersonal pro -

46 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

noun: 'O n l'éteint. ' 'O n s e remue en des draps.' 'O n jure. ' Some of the sentences are verbless: 'Dans l a Chambre. Sur une couchette, sans drap.../ an d i n some the verbs are nominalized: 'tremblotement de la lampe'; some are inverted: 'Des voix, au fond , chuchottent. ' Again, a network of alliteration and interna ! rhyme makes up th e tightlywoven textur e of our text : 'Dans l a chambre. Sur un e couchette ... entre la capote e t l a couverture. Des voix , a u fond, chuchottent. Baillemenf , tremblotement de la lampe uniqu e pendue a u plafond.... c e n'est plus qu'on point bleu ... qui s e balance ... rythmiquement. Une ciart e ... tremble au x éíroites fenétres. A u plafond parfois s e projettent... le s croix noires des barreau x et toute l'image tourne sur les poutres...' As in the beginning 'les roulements lointains/ 'c e bruit extérieur,' called to the imprisone d self fro m th e 'outside/ s o toward the end of the night he is visited from th e 'inside' as it were, by his memory. And though he cannot savour the poetry in his mind, it occasions the poem's most melodious Une: '...des sonnets d e Heredia, des vers de Mallarmé.' But they are submerged in another rhythm, the 'mystérieus e mesure' of the anonymous snoring roundabout , as inescapable as the pervasive 'odeur lourde ' whic h surrounds th e waking narrator. It is this paroxysm of confinement, now oppressin g al l the senses, which finally provoke s the liberation, as the persona goes out t o meet th e dawn and our nocturne turns aubade. The breathtaking excitement of approaching day i s reflected i n th e series of brief, taut sentences preliminary to the first , sudden flicke r of light toward the east, 'un clignotement d'oeil clair/ 'u n cri de lumiére.' Metaphor and synesthesia celébrat e the advent and event of dawn, th e sunrise greeted by the vigilant bugle cali which tears the silence and th e night with its sharp notes. 'C'est le réveil,' and everything stirs to Ufe in a passage abounding i n verbs - 'de s bras se tordent... un souffl e d e lueur entre ... pique ... allume' - and culminating in th e turbulan t agitatio n o f feet an d múltipl e confusión of voices: 'Tumulte dans le s escaliers.' Water begins to flow, and th e wind is rising, both night and poem coming to an end as the persona turns toward the renewal and refresh ment o f 'le vent salutaire du matin. ' In its conclusión thi s early pros e poem thu s alread y presages some o f Valéry's great lyric poems of imprisonment an d liberation . The Parque, escaping th e deadly temptations of her night , goes ou t t o greet the salutar y breath of morning. L'étre contre le vent, dans le plus vif de l'air, Recevant au visage un appel de la mer.

"Trois Réveils' 4

7

And th e moi o f the 'Cimetiér e Marín' saves himself from th e entice ment of 'la pureté d u Non-étre ' b y resolutely turning toward life : Le vent se leve! ... II fau t tente r de vivre!

Nothing could more acutely illustrate the contrast between Valéry' s early prose poems and his mature prose aubades than the juxtaposition of 'Nui t á la cáseme' with the tw o lat e 'réveils' of our sequence . Th e first o f the tw o untitle d pieces, date d 'janvie r 1944/ is made up o f two principal parts or fragments, the second o f which i s reproduced, wit h very minor punctuation variants, in th e Eg o section o f the Robinso n edition.6 As in th e characteristi c Valéryan aubade, the sel f o f this 'réveil' is by, and with , himself; it is still before dawn, and th e awakening moi is separated an d isolate d fro m th e world o f this last hard occupatio n winter by the walls of his chamber, the surrounding night, and by the very hour of his wakefulness in the sleeping city . His glance, moreover, is turned inward . Inside his mind is the stage on which opposing forces play and ar e momentarily interlocked in a precarious equilibrium. 7 The dramatic conflict between th e mind's wakin g and it s sleep, between tha t which thinks and that which is thought - the mind and it s ideas - present s itsel f a s suspense, as a balance of forces, and thi s equipoise i s reflected stylisticall y in the symmetricall y balanced structure of the opening sentences : ...je ne sais si je suis plus éveillé qu'endormi ou plus endormi qu'éveillé? II y a conflit parfoi s entre Ce qui pense e t qu i veu t ne plu s penser , mais dormir, et ce qui est pense' et qui veut se développer - voi r son avenir. II y a done deux suites possibles á cet instant.

In the second paragraph , the persona return s to 'ce Cahier/ and the text here becomes self-reflective , reminiscen t o f Gide's 'composition en abyme,' for the morning fragment i s about writing the fragment i n the mornin g Cahier: 'I I y a des matins ... qu'á mo n réveil et retou r devant ce Cahier je ne me reconnais pa s tout á fait. ' I noted i n th e introductio n o f this discussion tha t the Cahiers wer e Narcissus' constan t mirror for half a century. Are they not then - bot h the Notebooks and the fragments taken from the m - simpl y abou t Valéry the man, writin g his 'diary' fo r and t o himself? O n th e con trary, I must insist tha t the protagonist o f the aubades i s a 'persona,' is

48 Th

e Rhetoric oí Valéry's Prose Aubades

'the sel f o f the fragment o r poem/ for , a s the Valérya n myth o f Narcissus and th e imag e of the fountai n suggest , th e introspective glance objectified transform s a 'self int o image and object . The image of a self reflected an d retrace d in the for m o f the written word i s stylized by the médium which transforms it.8 This is an important Valéryan notion: the poet repeatedly reminds us that such a stylizing process is basic to any for m of literature. Whether the 'writer ' o f a notebook o r journal addresses himsel f o r others, or both, he writes, and 'o n écrit pour se rendre plus beau, plus aigu, plus puissant - o n écrit pour se recréer, pour choisi r en soi - pour élimine r certaines choses de soi - pour additionne r ses meilleurs aspects - on écrit pour s'enten dre, pour s e trouver un ech o flatteur, pou r éliminer ' (cu , p 1151) . The 'je' projected and reflecte d i n the Cahiers i s one to be read, and i n the aubades as elsewhere i n the oeuvre, Valéry thus creates a 'writerpersona/ as he creates a 'reader-persona/ whose interaction produces the living work. As our persona greet s his matutinal reflection, h e encounters a n unfamiliar imag e of himself. While the sel f o f the 'c ' fragment o f ' A B c' beheld himself 'á cote de [sa] jeunesse/ in our aubad e the moi comes face to face with its oíd age and th e 'dégradation ' reveale d by other Notebook entries of that period.9 The confrontation o f the self with its decline is both threatenin g and liberating , for as the body becomes progressively more petrified - 'plu s dur, plus pétré que nature' - i n anticipation of its approaching death , the mind, in its greatest maturity, attains moments o f a lucidity projecting the sel f beyond , and a s it were 'above/ th e reality of the living things and thought s which have made up its world. From such a vantage point, the momentary commanding perspective of life seen fro m th e solitar y summit of its culmination, 'reality' sinks into insignificance, into th e inconsequential, in the Olympian visión of one already passing ove r and ou t o f life . Valéry has objectifie d tha t visión i n th e las t 'ébauche' o f his Faust (published th e same year as this aubade), in the Solitary's mountain, 'un lieu tres haut... roches, neige, glaciers.' 10 As Faust ascends t o this 'solitude essentielle, l'extréme de la raréfaction de s étres/ h e find s 'personne d'abord; et puis, moins que personne. Pa s un bri n d'herbe... La nature terrestre, á bout d e forces, s'arréte épuisée u n pe u plus bas. Ce n'est plus ici que pierre, neige...' (o n, p 381). Approaching the Solitary, the personification of puré Nothingness, Faus t asks him self 'pourquo i suis-j e monté jusqu'á ce point critique?' The Solitary, like the luci d self o f our aubad e 'sans pitié pour toute s chose s men tales,' ruthlessly breaks the idols of a lifetime and hurl s their frag -

Trois Réveils' 4

9

ments at Faust: 'A quoi te sert ton esprit? ... Le parfait n' a pa s d'esprit. J'étais plus intelligent qu'il ne fau t l'étr e pour adore r l'idol e Esprit... Oui, Ordure, l e ciel et la mort ont rendu les hommes pensants plus stupides que me s porceaux' ( o u, pp 385-7) . And a s the Solitary demolishes that other human pride, language , Faust despairs: 'Ici ? ... Qu'y trouve-t-on , que d e la glace et vous?' I t is this same solitary mountain to p o f deadly lucidity which inspires the closin g line of the first par t of our fragment : 'Car , sache-le, la marque du réel, c'est l'insignifiance absolue. u But the persona canno t remain in th e irrespirably thin air o f this exalted plañe, and i n the second par t of these morning notes, he simply re-enters the lif e o f another day, 'je me leve.' As he prepares 'ce café initial rituel,' he reflects wit h scientific detachmen t about th e threé possible causes of its effect o n hi s organism, the paragraph stressing th e doubl e nature of the moi, its specific physica l activity ('je vais faire ce café') o n th e one hand, an d it s general mental function ing on th e othe r ('o n peut fair e ees trois hypothéses'). The familia r dédoublement - whic h actually creates three selves: th e beholder, and its visión of a 'mon-corps/ a s well as a 'mon-esprit' - i s continued in the followin g sentence-paragraph: Done je vais, et d'une part, je sens les Idees (tre s diverses) m'en vahir, se disputer l a vie, etc. ... etc. ... mais d'autre part je me percois allant et agissant en plein automatisme et somnambulisme. As is characteristic of Valéry's 'aurores,' this awakening self i s 'invaded' by a thron g of ideas fighting fo r their lives in hi s mind , 'monesprit/ whil e the 'mon-corps' integrales itself i n 'mon-monde' - ' C E M le mon-corps, le mon-esprit, le mon-monde ce sont trois directions qui se dessinent toujours ' - wit h the mechanical regularity of physical laws. The Leitmotif o f the reflected imag e - 'J e ne me reconnais pas tout á fait/ 'j e m e trouve plus dur,' 'j e me vois vieillard,' 'je m e percois allant et agissant' - recur s in the penultimate paragraph which is itself a mirror, for its spontaneous alliteration s - ther e is no rature i n the original entry - and balanced rhythm, its interna! echoes, reflect the signified. Forme et fond ar e inextricabl y interwoven i n th e text: Je me percois mon propre fantóme, mo n revenant regulier . Tout ce que j e fai s fu t dej a fait . Tou s me s pa s e t me s gestes peuvent se passer de moi, comme les actes insensibles et essentiels de la vie végétative se passent de nous.

50 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

The aubades are variations on a single theme, like the dawns they objectify, lik e the 're-venant regulier' wh o 'come s back' from tha t other worl d of absence and nigh t with each new day . And a s the moi is integrated into the flo w o f life , i t becomes part of the genera l circuit of natur e and it s mechanism, suggested abov e with 'ma chimie/ 'l a modification moléculair e de ma composition/ an d 'repris e chro nonomique.' Paradoxically, the moi's ver y 'lucidité' which permit s it to perceive its 'nature mécanique' is itself par t of the great mechanism. For it is this matutinal clearness of mind, rested and refreshed from th e night' s sleep, that usually leads it to the discovery of the unforeseen. Ou r aubade's concluding statement, with its momentary balance of opposing forces - Thabitude'/Timprévu' - carrie s and conveys the energy, the concentrated intensity , and tensió n o f the privileged momen t of dawn. Thus even towar d the end o f Valéry's life, hi s aubades preserv e their youthful freshnes s and forcé . Th e already quoted fina l 'réveil ' of ou r sequenc e (cu , p 198) , written a little over a year before th e poet's death, again expresses the same wonder and excitemen t of yet another awakening, miraculous 'reprise chrononomique' : Réveil. - I I n'est pas de phénoméne plus excitant pour mo i que le réveil.

For this first momen t of coming into being, 'ce commencement,' th e regular return o f the self an d it s world, 'ce commencement de ce qui fut,' appear s once more as an 'autogénesis. ' Creation seems t o origínate within and ou t o f the moi, independent o f external influences, as both the universe and the language which defines it - 'tout' - aris e with th e awakening self: 'Tout l'univers chancell e et tremble sur ma tige.' But by the very use of the scientific ter m 'autogenése/ Valér y suggests the parado x o f an endogenous creatio n o f the worl d i n a self which i s in th e world, or tha t of the formatio n o f language in a moi, which find s and define s itself i n language . Once more , then, the poe t suggests th e precariou s equilibrium of a moment when th e mo i feel s itself both creato r and creatur e of 'ce qui est - e t ceci n'est que choc, stupeur, contraste. ' 'Par la,' at this critical point, 'se place un éta t d'équidifférenc e comme si... il y eüt un momen t (de s plus frágiles ) pendan t leque l o n n'est pa s encoré la personne qu'on est, et l'o n pourrait re-devenir une autrel' A t this 'fragüe' poin t i n time, the transient momen t betwee n night and day , the mo i is in a state of equidistance between absenc e

Trois Réveils' 5

1

and presence , is a puré virtuality like the surrounding world, whose forms are coming into existence but ar e not ye t imprisoned in it. Valéry frequently likene d this 'Moi pur' - pur é of those traits which will compose and fix and limit it - t o the 'Zéro mathématique / an ideal state of total absence and neutralit y which is, however, of a virtuality without limits: La meilleur e image du MO I est bien l e Zéro, qui, d'une part, exprime le sans-attribut, n i image, ni valeur du "mo i pur" qu i s'obtient pa r exhaustion, puisque tout c e qui se propose á la conscience est u n Aniego pa r l a méme; et d'autre part , le zéro multipli e par 1 0 le nombre donn é - comm e la perception qu'u n fai t quelconqu e nou s intéresse en personne e t doit étre décrit en employant moi, mon, me etc . luí communique une valeu r aussitót incomparable... Ainsi, ce qui se connaít comme ríen en soi est cependant un excitan t de valeur incomparable (cu , p 327).

Because this ideal self, 'le Moi pur/ meet s its privileged moment at dawn, it haunts the poet's aubades and man y a morning note. In another Cahier o f 1944, Valéry, then the mos t famous livin g poet of his language, says: Age, dégradation.. . Le nouveau, c'es t qu e je me trouve par-ci par-lá en présenc e d u seigneur Yo-Mismo - Non de ce "moi pur, " mo n éternel agent Mais d'un personnag e Mo i - Auteu r de telles oeuvres, - situé , definí - don e le plus Antégo possible, ca r toute définition m'a toujours été insupportable.. . Or, je me trouve á présent u n état civil et des attributs - toute s les impuretés possibles, tou s ees produits d e hasards.. . Je me dis, ave c mon serpent , qu e l'étr e est un défau t dan s la pureté du Non-étr e (ci , pp 222-3).

6 Thre e 'Matins'

The three morning prose poems to be discussed i n this chapter, two sequences and one sepárate fragment , eac h entitled 'Matin/ wer e written in the twenties; al l have their origins in the Cahiers. I

The first three-par t 'Matin' sequence (o n, pp 658-9 ) was firs t pub lished in 192 6 in L a Revue de France, where it bore the titl e 'Réveil' and wa s part of another, longe r prose sequence, 'Revés.' 1 Valéry then incorporate d it, with variants in blocking and punctuation , into 'Poésie perdue' of Autres Rhumbs, which first appeare d i n 1927 . It is this versión whic h we are examining. Here the prose poem is entitled 'Matin,' its first fragmen t retainin g the subtitle 'Réveil.' But part of the sequence (it s first tw o fragments ) ha d alread y been se t down i n a 1913 Cahier entry, under th e title 'Réveil' (cu , pp 1261-2) . Thus 'Matin,' from whic h I quoted i n the introduction , strikingly demonstrates the structura l characteristic of the 'mobil e fragment'; fo r her e the poet adde d a paragraph (whic h was to become our poem's third part) t o one Cahier fragment , insertin g the two into the long pros e sequence 'Revés, ' where they constitute the seventh an d fina l sec tion. Subsequently h e removed thi s two-part 'Réveil' section fro m that sequence an d divide d it into the three fragments o f the fina l 'Matin.'2 Like the jeweler, the poet, havin g cut the diamond, keep s it patiently in store - the vast storehouse o f the Cahiers - fo r years, until the opportune moment , when h e polishes an d freel y combine s i t with others i n various settings t o sell in the literary market-place.3 But while the jeweler can only insert his precious stones into one mount-

Three 'Matins' 5

3

ing at a time, the poet's fragments can sparkle in various settings or sequences simultaneously . 'Réveil' opens wit h the opening o f the eyes to dawn's illumination, Au réveil , si douce l a lumiére et beau ce bleu vivant! 4 the openin g of the lip s to a kiss, Le mot "Pur" ouvre mes lévres, and th e salutation of the morning by the Adamic word: Tel est le nom que j e te donne.

Each line is set of f a s a sepárate moment of consciousness whic h gradually discovers and recover s its point i n time, 'Ici...' The first sen tence rhythmically reflects th e event of awakening, 'au réveil / th e pause of recognition marked by the comma, and the n the gentle merging of perceiving with the perceived i n an alexandrin e whose caesura divides it into two hemistiches , one o f two symmetrica l three-syllable units, and th e second o f three rising iambic feet: si douce - la lumiére - et beau ce bleu vivant!

At the same time this opening phrase , rising fro m 'réveil ' to 'vivant/ phonetically constitutes a combination of tones blending harmo niously through the juxtaposition of dark and ligh t vowels I oí, luí, leí, /yI, an d /i/ , as well as múltiple alliterations, that of the r' s (réveil lumiére), the l's (l a /umiére bleu), th e labia l fricativ e v' s (réueil , inuant), and th e gentle labial b's (beau , bleu) wit h which the lips are beginning to shape th e kiss. This 'matin/ which th e poet ñame s Tur/ recalls Turs Drames,' th e transposition o f the sam e moment into a Symbolist poem some thirty years before ou r aubade . Now both th e traditional fable and it s style have been transcended , a s the prose poem ha s evolved int o the poetic prose fragment. Tur/ simple and immaculate, are both the moment before day, tha t fragmen t of time, and th e poetic fragment , purified now o f any fabulation , which reflects it. At this awakening, th e poet's mind appears harmoniousl y inte grated i n the world, its 'perfect thoughts' linked to the day in one and

54 Th

e Rhetori c of Valéry's Prose Aubade s

the same imminence. The absence of the verb 'étre' in the present , though it appears in both past and futur e tenses, stresses the virtuality of both thought s and day , the min d and th e universe, neither as yet limited by any particula r reality , their being not i n (f)act , but i n potentiality: Ici, unies au jou r qui jamáis ne fu t encoré, les parfaites pensées qui jamáis ne seront [m y italics].

Again the sentence's symmetricall y balanced structure and rhythm, reaching both backward and forwar d i n time, as well as its interna! echoes, accentuate the perfec t equilibriu m of the momen t and o f the moi i n its world.5 The poet the n metamorphoses, and thu s fixes , th e moment's essence , its virtuality and promise, into the metaphor of the seed which contains a universe i n germ: 'En germe, éternellemen t germe, le plus haut degré universel d'existence et d'action.' Virtualit y is again suggested b y the omission o f the verb 'étre/ while the para dox of the 'eterna l seed' points t o the fixin g o f the fleetin g an d transi ent into the permanent - i f not eternal - by the poet: ars langa... 'Le Tout est un germe - le Tout ressenti san s parties - / as the universe awakens, sketched in gold upon blue , 'et que nulle affectio n particuliére ne corrompt encoré.' This universal unity and original oneness befor e day's divisions again brings to mind 'Purs Drames,' whose diverse images, 'corrumpues encoré,par la certitude de leurs éléments/ the poetic visión finally reduce d t o its essence, 'un e ligne sur l'espac e celeste ou vítale.' The self, I have said, feels no t ye t sepa rated fro m th e Al l in and wit h which it is reborn: 'J e nais de toutes parts, au loi n de ce Méme, en tout point oü étincelle la lumiére, ' the ligh t which i s everywhere: sur c e bord, su r c e pli, sur c e fil d e c e fi l dans ce bleu d'eau limpide .

'La lumiére/ th e Tout ' in which everything rises to view, is, as I have said, a symbol for the mind in this poetic universe, tha t huma n consciousness withou t whic h th e world would be devoid of meaning. It is in this sense, then, that corps, esprit, and monde ar e born together . The above 'a u loi n de ce Méme' read 'au loin d e ce Moi' in the Cahier versión, whic h pointed mor e explicitly to the moi's integratio n i n its monde, adding: 'j e suis analogue de ce qui est.'

Three 'Matins' 5

5

In th e conclusión , as in the opening, the person a apostrophize s th e morning, the 'matin ' pronounced fo r the firs t tim e in th e fragment's last word. In this apostrophe, th e poet turns away from th e self an d toward the mornin g world of which he is nevertheless a n essentia l part, its consciousness. Fo r a moment, then, the sel f i s not self-reflec tive, but becomes th e eye and voic e reflecting th e shapes an d tones , the puré surfaces of a world emerging : un effe t délicieu x de lumiére et de rumeur, merveille de feu, de soie, de vapeur et d'ardoise, ensemble de bruits simples confondus, dorure et murmures, matin. 6

And as Valéry here approaches an almost three-dimensional celebration of colours and texture s in praise of the shee r appearanc e of things, he at the same time realizes Baudelaire's dream of 'le miracle d'une prose poétique, musical e ... assez souple et assez heurtée pou r s'adapter au x mouvement s lyriques de l'áme.' The Cahier versió n had insisted, again more explicitly and thu s less suggestively, on the musicality of both th e moment and th e poem: Tensemble de feu, de soie, d'ardoise, de vapeur et de musique brute simultanee - .' The 'Réveil' fragment o f this 'Matin,' then, is the reciproca l reflection of the 'Moi pur' a s it is born into a renewed worl d and th e birth of that world in the moi. Its second section reflects the passing of daybreak into day, and day's first reduction - 'l e jour avec son epée qui divise l'esprit de l'áme et découpe aujourd'hui' - o f the Universal into the particular(s). The self hesitates on 'today's' threshold beforeentering its confining limits ; it wishes to refuse the burden o f a particular past an d future, a personal history , as well as the constrictin g limitations of a specific person(ality). We find thi s regret repeatedly in Valéry's poetry, and especially in his prose poetry and th e aubades, which are haunted b y the ideal 'Moi pur/ th e potentially powerfu l 'Moi-Zéro. ' Elsewhere in th e Cahiers Valér y says: 'I I y a quelque chose de terrible á étre ce que l'on est. Si moi est quelque chose, il est rien. L'orgueil véritable est une résistanc e toute vivante, essentielle á l'individu' ( c u, p 293). The second movement of our poem intones this nostalgia in a minor key; almost the entire section i s made up of a series of rhetorical questions in the manne r of the traditiona l ubi sunt complaint: Que ne puis-je retarder d'étre moi, paresser dan s l'état universel? Pourquoi ce matin me choisirais-je ? Qu'est-c e qui m'oblig e á reprendre me s biens et mes maux?

56 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

The longing for the pureness o f a new beginning , personified here by the man who abandon s his personal belongings on the seashore, had appeared already in the early (1898 ) prose fragment 'Agathe / whose persona muses : A cette heur e qui n e compte pa s qu'importe tout e mon histoire ? Je la méprise comme un livre . Mais c'est ici l'occasion puré : défaire du souvenir l'ordr e mortel, annule r mo n expérience .. . et par u n simpl e songe nocturne, m e déprendre tou t á fait, y méconnaítre m a propre forme (on, p 1390) .

Our poem' s person a similarly finds in the present moment 'l'occasion puré': le matin, n'est-il le moment e t le conseil impérieu x d e ne point res sembler á soi-méme? L e sommeil a brouillé l e jeu, battu le s cartes; et les songes ont tou t melé , tout remis en question.. .

This' Awakening/ then, is a reciprocal reflection of a twofold birth, that of th e sel f i n the world, and tha t of the world i n the self; th e secon d section ends: 'A u révei l il y a ... une naissanc e de toutes choses.' The final fragmen t encompasse s bot h sea and sun, female and male , 'ame' and 'esprit/ and so again demonstrates the cióse interrelationship of the theme s of the origi n and o f light in the aubades: L'áme boit au x sources une gorgée de liberté et de commencement sans conditions... Ce Soleil qui parait... il s'annonce et monte comm e u n juge .

As the god-like sun, 'rising like a judge' from th e maternal horizon of water and earth , begins its trajectory towar d the high stillpoint of noon - 'mid i le juste' - it convokes that land and water to a festive salute. It summons vague night-thoughts - 'les monstres de ton sang' - t o the tribunal of Puré Reason, in a passage abounding in legal terms: dreams will be condemned, terror's judgments will be broken, and th e mind's errors in procedure nullified. Th e spirit is illuminated and matte r fecundated by the Apollonian god. II

Our secon d 'Matin ' (OH , p 661), a sepárate fragment, dates from 1927 , when Valér y published it in Toésie perdue' o f Autres Rhumbs. 7 This,

Three 'Matins' 5

7

like the preceding piece , had als o been ready , with some variants, in the for m o f a 1921 Cahier entry, awaiting its time and plac e to appear . This aubade reflects, again , the outer mornin g world - its sky, and sea, and land - rathe r tha n the inner phenomeno n o f the mind's awakening. It is, in fact , a fragment o f múltiple mirror reflections. Th e matutinal eye mirrors - and 'toute m a peau' feel s - the 'pluie d'une aurore mélée/ th e world i n which sea and land , i n turn, reflect th e sky's changin g moods: 'Pa r le moyen de s núes, le caprice du ven t change en deux ou trois minutes la face du cham p de la mer.' Here th e metaphor o f the 'fac e of the ocean' s field ' combine s both lan d and sea and th e notio n o f these a s a beholding an d reflectin g eye . This big mirror of the sky and it s rapid changes, water an d land , une parti e de l a cote ... nette et sombre; l'autr e toute fondue e t vaguement écrasée dans l'humide substance de la vue,

then becomes itsel f reflectiv e o f a paysage d'áme an d it s fluctuatin g impressions fro m smil e to sadness : Tout ce regard me peint les fluctuations, le s invasions et désertions de l'áme par le s lumiéres et les ombres des idees .

Finally, these rapi d inne r mutations , which are reflected i n the outer ones - wher e the y are rendered visibl e in the morning sk y and its swiftly drive n clouds , whic h are in turn mirrore d in the tones an d textures of sea and land - coul d well be reflected in a musical development, that i s in art: La vitesse de ees changements visibles est de l'ordre de grandeur de celle de l'áme. Le mouvement d'un développemen t musica l pourrait suivre celle-ci tres exactement [my italics] .

Throughout the fragment, th e poet stresses seeing ('j e regarde.../ 'c'est ma peau qu i voit,' 'tou t ce regard m e peint.../ 'ees changement visi bles...'), for the dominant mode of perception i s again 'avant tout e chose, celle de voir.' At the same time , the rain and th e sea, 'cett e pluie rapide/ th e 'champ de la mer/ the landscape which is 'la cote/ and finall y 'l'humide substance de la vue/ relate this aubade to the second larges t group of Valéry's prose poems, those celebratin g the sea. This is further suggested b y the solé other notation o n the original Cahier page, which reads : 'L a mer , la plus intact e et ancienne chose du globe. Tout

58 Th

e Rhetori c of Valéry's Prose Aubades

ce qu'elle touch e est ruine; tout ce qu'elle abandonn e est nouveauté.' 8 What i s once more apparent i n th e juxtaposition on the same page of these entries - the one a dawn, the other a marine fragment - is the cióse interrelationship of the theme s of light and o f the beginning , not merel y in the aubades themselves, but in this entire poetic universe. Its creator, while speaking o f his 'Inspirations/ onc e said: 'Je m'accuse ... d'avoir connu un e véritabl e folie de lumiére, combinée avec la foli e d e l'eau' ( o i, p 1090). 9 in

The third 'Matin' (oí , p p 355-6), a two-part sequence, als o originated in the 192 1 Cahier ( c u, pp 1272-3) , where it still shows some of th e poet's hesitations in the choice of certain words, a s well as certain variants in punctuation and blocking . The final versió n did no t appear unti l 1939, when Valéry placed it in Toésie brute' of Melange.w Thi s 'Mixture/ according to its author's 'Avis,' is 'une sorte d'album que j'ai formé naguére de fragments tres divers' (oí , p p 285-6); for, as he continúes in the little opening poem , MELANCE C'EST I/ESPRI T

Ce qui vint du sommeil, ce qui vint des amours, Ce que donnent les dieux comme des circonstances S'assemble en cet Álbum de fragments d e mes jours.

Toésie brute/ whic h als o includes fre e verse like the beautiful morn ing poem 'Chan t d e l'idée maitresse/ as well as the matutinal prose sequence 'Méditation avant pensée/ moreove r constitutes one of Valéry's own definition s of the poetic prose fragment. An d th e ideal setting for this 'poetry i n the rough' is precisely 'ce mélange/Duquel, á chaqué instant, se démele l e MOI.' In all of Valéry's poetry, i t is in the poetic morning fragments , the prose aubades , tha t we most intimately witness this Moi 'disengag e itself / eac h dawn anew, out of the 'mélange' o f the mind . 'Matin' opens with a general statement about a specific persona l self: 'Ríen ne me touche plus que le matin de l'été/ echoing 'i l n'est pas de phénoméne pou r mo i plus excitant que le réveil.' Again , as we proceed int o the unique dawn o f this particular aubade, 'cette paix.../ 'cette pudeur... ' th e poem' s mo i becomes impersonal, 'on dirait.../ 'on sent... / 'on salue... ' This shift shows again both the fami liar splitting an d distancin g of the sel f fro m th e self , as well as its

Three 'Matins' 5

9

pureness, or freedom fro m persona l traits : 'on n'es t pas encoré la personne qu'on est. ' As dawn's first line s appear upo n th e summer night , night, paradoxically, appears painte d agains t dawn, 'cett e paix du ble u frai s peinte sur or/ in the poem which capture s - black on white - the precarious moment balancing the antithetical forces of night and day : 'on dirait que l a nuit se fait voi r á la lumiére.' Day against night, night against day - 'o r et nuit, or sur nuit' - reflec t the universal dialectic of light and darkness, of being - 'la naissance ' - and nothingness Tinexistence' - th e very duality of Man, homo dúplex. And this dialectic underlies the whole poem . The central sentence o f the second paragrap h constitutes an equa tion which explicitl y states the equivalenc e of 'lumiére' and 'luci dité,' or , as we have said, ligh t as symbolic of the mind : II y a un instan t oú l'o n dirai t qu e l a nui t se fai t voi r á la lumiére, comme l'esprit au révei l fai t voi r l a naissance, l'inexistence, et les revés, á la premiére lucidité. At the same time , in this equation th e paradoxical inversión - in which i t is not ligh t that is seen in the dark but, conversely, night that becomes visible in the light - i s extended t o the right side, or second segment, o f the figure: it is the mind' s non-existenc e that becomes exposed in its first lucidity . What the text insists on - a s does the very form o f the equation itsel f - i s the basically binary nature of the phenomena o f perception, tha t is the binar y structure of the perceiving mind, a s well as that of its language. Light is meaningful onl y against th e night, 'réveil ' against 'sommeil/ i n both th e mind and th e language whic h are inextricably intertwined in the psyche and i n the logos, the psychology, which , since the Greeks, has been th e controlling principie of the huma n universe. 11 But the philosophica l import , th e 'meaning ' of the text, is at th e same time dressed i n the stuf f whic h makes it a poetic texture . For poetry itself - be it verse or prose - rests , a s Valéry frequently reminds us , on th e harmonious fusió n o f an underlyin g duality, that of forme and fond: La poésie (art) est un discour s marqué par l a valeur comparable et continué du son et du sens - pa r l'art de faire concourir au méme objet ees excitations tres différentes .

60 Th

e Rhetori c of Valéry's Prose Aubades II en résulterait un e définition d e ce méme objet - qu i est ce qui peut étre aussi bien creé et accru par ees deux moyens á condition qu'ils soient employés simultanément (cu , p 1114) .

The second paragraph's vocabulary cluster, its synesthesias an d tropes which render the abstract concrete, visible, and palpable , confer o n it s underlying thought a tonality which poetizes th e moment, for tender is the night, as is this dawn: Nudité de l a nuit pas encoré bien habillée . La substance du cie l est d'une tendresse étrange.

The new world appears child-like in its modesty and nake d still, like the night, as it emerges in and b y means of the sun which draws fort h a universal birth, the birth of the universe - 'l a naissanc e de toutes choses.' Th e moment is felt as a present pregnant with the future: 'O n sent jusqu'á l'intime cette fraicheur divine , qui sera chaleur tout á l'heure.' While the firs t paragrap h of the fragmen t concentrate d on th e monde, the second centre s around the esprit which , like the world, is divided between antithetica l forces: 'lassitude-travail, ' 'tristesse espoir,' 'promesse-vanité de la promesse.' Thes e opposing tendencies of the min d agai n suggest an analog y with art, this time painting, in harmony with the poem's tone - 'cett e paix du bleu frai s peint e sur or' - fo r all of these moods appear simultaneously, 'peint comme un tableau nal f o ü les actes divers d'un personnag e sont rapprochés, ' against dawn's blu e background of 'calme et pureté.' Th e self, like the world , is new-born, but ye t older by another day, full o f potential power, but hesitatin g on the threshold between passivit y and action. Lassitude, melancholy weariness, and even despair are characteristic of the momen t which, we found, is almost always equivocal in its concurrent enchantment and sadness, and these qualities mark it with what Valéry elsewhere calis a 'lucidité douloureuse.' I n our aubade , the persona's despair is brought to consonance and harmony with the calm and purity; and thus world and mind are rendered s o transparent that his sadness becomes th e 'tristesse dorée, et d'un dieu ' which lucidly sees 'toute la pauvre vie dans un cristal. ' But (and this is the miracle which the aubades celébrate) the eternally returning moment is new, puré, naked, tender, and o f a 'fraicheur divine, ' like the primitive painting, 'un tableau naif,' and th e self bot h virginal and wise , divine and innocent , as it hesitates on the shore. The essence of both the poem and the moment, the tensión o f its stammerings and its pro-

Three 'Matins' 6

1

mise, supported throughou t by the birth metaphor whic h itself culminates in the fina l imag e of the Annunciation , is contained in a figur e tense with virtua l energy, th e frisson préalabl e á la mer.

This ellipsis, whic h contain s both symbo l and metaphor - th e sea standing fo r both da y and life - harmonize s stylisticall y with the context of surrounding sentences , whic h al l lac k the finit e verb , 'peu r d'entrer dan s l e jour/ 'tristess e dorée, e t d'un dieu / 'désespoi r pai sible de ne plus croire/ 'avan t toute s choses/ 'invocatio n muett e á ce qui v a étre.' 'Avant toutes Choses' later became th e titl e of another mornin g fragment; an d man y of these fragment s are, lik e the present one , in vocatory: 'invocation ... á ce qui va étre.' As the sel f an d th e worl d are still cióse to the source - Tám e boit aux sources' - and to the origin, they are still in proximity with th e divine. Valéry has called the morning poem 'l a premiér e oraison/ an d i n our 'Matin ' we fin d a whole vocabulary cluster modulating thi s tonality - 'fraicheu r divine/ 'tristess e d'un dieu, ' 'invocation' -and leadin g up to the culminating 'salutation d e Tange qui annonce qu'o n es t fécondé, gros d'un jou r nouveau. ' The final Tartage ' marks the divide between daybrea k and day , as well as that between th e tw o part s of the sequence. I n its short secon d fragment w e follo w th e body's gropin g retur n fro m inerti a to alertness. An d the bilateral form o f that body - s o secretly and intimately linked t o the binary structure of its mind - i s reflected i n the stirrings which brin g it back to life : le corps s'étire, se tourne et se retourne, cherche une torsió n et un e tensión qu i lu i fassen t reconnaitr e sa place dans lui-méme .

As body and mind - Tespri t aussi se feuillette' - hav e finally com e together i n a single readiness, an d th e persona enter s the day, 'Dieu se cache peu á peu... '

7 'Repris e

In 192 7 Valéry published 'Reprise ' (on , pp 661-2) , a sequence o f tw o fragments, i n 'Poésie perdue' o f Autres Rhumbs, where i t appear s immediately after on e o f the 'Matins ' whic h we have discussed. 1 'Reprise' celébrales the renewal of three different world s at dawn; in i, the visión sweeps ove r the sea and landscap e unfoldin g gradually in the firs t mornin g light; then i t contracts to concéntrate on the poet's page itself , o n which the poem, like the day outside, i s being born . From the worktabl e we move, in n , to the working s o f the creative mind itself; th e entire second fragmen t is devoted t o 'Esprit. ' The title, whose múltipl e connotations th e poem wil l develop, sug gests i n the openin g passag e th e 'repetition ' o f a musical fragment, as the text modulates, yet once more, the firs t note s o f dawn. The long initial sentence read s like vers libre, for its rhythms fall into successiv e cadenees which gradually compose th e elements of a dawn, whos e phenomena are , one after another , emerging i n the morning light . Each rhythmic phrase - thei r unity stressed b y internal rhyme or alliteration - constitute s als o a sense image , and all but the first are tied, as it were, to the preposition 'de / whose repetitions for m th e links which chain the sepárate sound , sense, and imag e segments to gether, bot h syntactically in the sentence o n the page, an d als o in and to the persona's glance : De l'horizon fumé e t doré, / la mer pe u á peu s e démele; / et des montagne s rougissantes, / des cieu x doux et déserts, / de l a confusión de s feuillages , / des murs , des toit s et des vapeurs, / et d e ce monde enfi n qu i s e réchauffe / et se resume d'un regard , golfe, cam pagne, aurore, feux charmants , / mes yeux á regret se retirent et re deviennent les escalves de la table [my slashes].

'Reprise' 6

3

How cióse Valéry's prose poetr y comes to vers libre - ho w it even becomes tha t at times and especially at dawn - i s ülustrated by another mornin g fragment, als o entitled 'Reprise.' Here the poem' s rhythm becomes steadil y stronger and mor e regular, so that it develops rapidly from pros e int o verse, whose line s are made up o f the notes we know fro m th e prose aubades : Reprise.

Roulements des roues premieres. Des revenants laborieux toussent et causent dans l a rué probable. II doit y avoir du solei l frais su r les ordures. O vie, ó peinture sur ténébres ! Belle matinée, tu es peinte sur l a nuit. Matin délicieux, qui t e peins sur l a nuit. Ces hirondelles se meuvent comme un so n meurt . Si haut volé l'oiseau que le regard s'éléve á la source des larmes (o u, p p 657-8) .

While the opening o f the poe m suggests the tempora l nature of its médium and thu s the kinship of poetry with music, it also intimates, again, the analogy with painting. For the visual is stressed - 'c e monde ... se resume d'un regard / 'me s yeux á regret se retirent' - in a tex t painting the shapes an d tones , th e textures of dawn. As in th e first o f the thre e 'Matin' fragments, Valér y here again approaches a three-dimensional tableau, some of whose components, Thorizo n fumé e t doré,' 'toits et vapeurs,' 'feu x charmants / recal l those of the other poem, 'u n effe t délicieu x de lumiére,' 'merveille de feu ... de vapeur e t d'ardoise,' 'dorure.' Bu t the miracl e of the poem is that it reflects both appearanc e and appearing , th e golden surface s of a world, and thei r surfacing o r emerging fro m th e night. The poet abandon s thi s young world regretfully, a s his eye turns to 'tout un autr e monde, u n tou t autre monde .. . le monde des signes sur la table!' From tableau to table - worktable, writing tablet, slab of the tomb - i t is upon a two-dimensional plañe surface that life, be it that of th e min d or of the body, is recorded i n signs and symbols , fro m poem t o epitaph, a s a lasting trace and vestig e of the fleeting . Th e poem her e celebrates its own écriture, which transforms the shiftin g hues and shapes of both th e 'inner' and 'outer ' moment into the black-on-white signs, th e fixed signifier s which preserve an d enslav e the signifié. Thi s celebration is at the same time, however, a lament of a self n o longe r free ; th e ego scriptor ha s sold his innocenc e an d purity - Faust-like - to the daemon o f Logos, to the compromises, the

64 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

falsity, an d th e powerfu l magi c of language. The saints alone are puré - Teste neithe r reads ñor writes - and the fallen Ánge l weeps. I n the prose poe m 'Londo n Bridge / th e poet-persona says : 'Voyez-vou s ce monde d e fleche s e t de lettres ? .. . In eo vivimus et movemur' ( o u, p 514) .2 The uncommitted beginning, 'commencemen t san s conditions/ is one o f dawn's mirages , like that of an Edé n before the Fall . For, as Derrida reminds us , écriture i n its deepest sens e i s a 'trace' which i s both vestige and origi n of a meaningful, a human, world. 3 As the persona's eyes leave the world outside t o become again 'les escalves de la table/ 'Reprise ' signifie s the resumption o f the daily labour: 'Qu e le travail soit avec nous!' Valéry frequently refers to his daily morning work , the early hours devoted to the Cahiers, which he considered hi s 'real' task: 'Joie - excitatio n de surgir á 5 h. et de se jeter á noter un e foul e d'idées comme simultanees .. . c'est l a scintillation de la mer sous le soleil' ( c i, p 8). And in a less poetic and mor e humorous vain , the sixty-five-year-old poe t says: 'Lev é avant 5 h. - i l me semble á 8, avoir deja véc u toute une journé e par l'esprit , e t gagné le droit d'étre béte jusqu'au soir' ( c i, p 10) . He even wrot e a prose poem, 'Travail,' which celebrates the ideal and rea l work of an artist both possessor and possessed, master and slave , of his art: Je t'aime, mon Travail , quand t u es véritablement le mien. Toi, que je reconnais sous toute s tes formes. Toi seul, en somme, es vraiment moi, que je maitrise le systéme vivant des nerfs ou des puissance s pensantes, qu e je me senté pénétrant entre mes durées pa r l e plus rapide. Je me posséde s i tu m e possédes, j e suis l e maítre si je suis to n escalve et ton instrument. Comme le corps du cavalie r mont é par son ide e monte la béte et se fai t u n seu l étr e avec elle, Comme la barque entre la barre et la toile, contre le vent, pa r l e vent. Oh! ne te laisse pa s emporter (comm e tant le célébrent) par la seule forcé qu i n'es t pa s tienn e (o i, p 1699). 4

The written page i s an insertio n o f a world i n the universe ('quell e parenthése dan s l'espace' ) wit h its own interna! time: 'j' y voi s l'infini de s approximations successives.' I t is a world conquere d an d created - 'cett e page toute attaquée d'écriture brouillé e d e barres et de surcharges' - ou t of the contingency of an ever-shifting indetermi nate manifold bot h withou t an d within , the contingency o f matter

'Reprise' 6

5

and o f mind, a s well as of language itself, b y its maker, its author, th e poietes. In th e Cours de Poétique, in whic h Valér y discusses th e creative process mos t fully , h e says: Le fon d d e l a pensée est toujours désordre, chaos d'images, de mots, d'impulsions, de schémes qui se forment e t se déforment. Mettr e sa pensée en un langage , c'est sortir du désordre intérieur pour entrer dan s un mond e relativement pur, homogéne, uniquemen t composé de mots . I I y a progrés vers la pureté. Ainsi l a forme s e separe du fond , comm e un produi t pur s e separe d'un mélange.5 In this creative evolution of cosmos out of chaos - Tinfin i de s approximations successives' - th e creative spirit is, like God who both creates and sustain s th e universe, chained to his creation, to that act of making - 'c'es t ici que l'esprit á soi-méme s'enchame' - in which he is both possesso r and possessed : 'j e me posséde s i tu m e pos sédes.' 'L'infini de s approximations successives' reaches out beyon d th e page t o all the others, from th e poem before us to all the other prose aubades. I t describes, i n fact , th e poetic s o f a poet for whom perfection is 'le travail qui consiste en une suite interminable de substitutions, toujours en trai n de se faire, jamái s finí, jamái s parfait/ a poetics i n which Tachévement , indéfiniment ajourné , n'est plus qu'un bu t délibérément plac e dans l'infini.' 6 The prose aubades are themselves successive approximations , 'reprises' arrested onl y by death; they are what Valéry himself once likened to musical variations on a theme: je serais tenté (s i je suivais mon sentiment) d'engage r le s poetes á produire, á la mode des musiciens, un e diversit é de variantes ou de solutions du mém e sujet. Rie n n e me semblerait plus conforme á l'idée que j'aime á me faire d'u n poete et de l a poésie (oí , p 1501) . Valéry was always more fascinated b y the creative process tha n by the product , and s o in the Cours de Poétique h e concéntrales on poetizing, rather than poetry : le mot Poétique n'éveille guére plus que l'idée de prescriptions génantes et surannées. ... c'est enfin l a notion tou t simple de FAIR E que j e voulais exprimer .. . Le Faire, Le poí'ei'n, dont je veux parler, est celui qui s'achéve en quelque oeuvre. 7

66 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

In th e 'Poétique ' sectio n of the Cahiers he likewis e insists that 'c'est le faire qui es t l'ouvrage, l'objet, á mes yeux capital, puisque la chos e faite n'es t plu s que l'acte de l'autrui,' adding significantly 'cel a est du Narcisse tout pur' ( c u, p 1022) . The poem exists for the reader, wh o recréales it in th e ac t of reading, but fo r the poe t i t remains primarily the reflectio n o f his own creativ e act. Narcissus is fascinated by hi s image, that of the eg o scriptor, whic h so many pages of the Cahiers reflect; i n their 'Ego scriptor' section Valéry again explains: 'le travail du poete , le poéme m'intéresse moins que les subtilités et les lumiéres acquises dans ce travail. Et c'est pourquo i i l faut travailler son poéme, - c'est-á-dir e se travailler. Le poéme ser a pour les autres - .. . - cependan t que le travail sera pour moi ' ( c i, p 243). It is this 'travail,' both wor k and torture- inpaliare -actio n and passion , in which the self i s indeed bot h maste r and slave , which th e closin g lines of 'Reprise i' celébrate: Les dons, les fautes, le s repentirs, les rechutes, n'est-ce point sur ce feuillet vou é aux flamme s tou t l'homme moral qui apparaít? II s'es t essayé, i l s'est énivré , il s'est déchargé , il s'est fait horreur , il s'est mutilé, il se reprend, il se chérit, et il s'adore .

Here the tensión between opposin g forces , the good and th e bad, remorse and relapse , constitutes the struggle of a purely intellectual ethic in which virtue and excellence are those o f the mind - 'presqu e toute ma morale fut intellectuelle' (ci , p 182) . Tout l'homrne moral' is the eg o scriptor engage d i n hi s unceasin g 'combat avec l'ange' ( c i, p 280), a combat of the self wit h itsel f - as is any moral struggle - in which the mo i conquers and reconstruct s itself : 'le travail sacre de l'homme: se reconstruiré - c'es t l a définition de la vie intellectuelle vraie' ( c u, p 1386). This interna! conflict i s stylistically accentuated in our passag e by the accumulation of reflexive verbs, whose accelerating rhythm, passing fro m pas t perfect to present tense , suggests th e secret kinship of this creative ergon with the generative energy o f Eros. The act of writing in which the writer 'works' bot h th e poem an d himself, in which h e has passed from self-tria l throug h self-intoxica tion, self-release, self-loathing , and self-mutilation t o the renewal 'reprise' - of himself, to self-preservation and self-love, is the sublimation of the libidinal to the intellectual which is the origin and end , th e source and telos , of art. From the creative process, i n which Tesprit á soi-méme s'en chaíne,' w e proceed i n 'Reprise u' to the creative mind itself : 'Esprit.'

'Reprise' 6

7

Valéry deplored th e imprecisión of this term, whose meanin g he frequently redefined in th e Cahiers: L'esprit est une puissanc e de préter á une circonstanc e actuelle les ressources du pass é et les énergies du deveni r (ci , p 1322).

Though it is in purely intellectual terms that 'esprit' must be understood i n Valéry, its power o f generating energy fro m th e past t o transmit to the present an d thu s to 'charge' i t for the future , for becoming, make s 'esprit' analogous to the life-creativ e force s of the universe. The human min d i s potentially creative, generative, for it is essentially energy: L'esprit est impossible au repos . Tout au plus se compare-t-il parfoi s á un equilibr e stationnaire. C'est u n obje t étrange qui a pour form e et essence cett e impossibilité (c n, p 624).

In our prose poem , these abstract notions are rendered concret e through th e experience of a persona wh o explore s and figuratively expresses the privileged moment - 'un equilibre stationnaire' - whe n the imminence of the world coincides with that of his mind: Esprit. Áltente puré, Eternel suspens, menace de tout ce que je désire. Epée qui peut jaillir d'un nuage , combien je ressens \'imminence\

As yet another daw n becomes th e first , th e unique moment out of time - 'Eterne l suspens' - in the eternal return and turning of the world, the mind i s again puré, universal potentiality, sheer expectation of the 'circonstance actuelle' which will bind i t to the temporal, to the world, and t o a moi. It is (in) suspense, like Damocles under th e sword suspende d b y a hair, its puré universality threatened immmence-imminere - by the particular event tha t will strike and transform it . Valéry objectified thi s moment of expectation elsewhere in bot h prose and verse ; ther e is a little-known prose poe m entitle d 'Attente, esquisse d'u n poéme, ' that reads like a sketch to 'Les Pas' ( o i, p p 120-1) which , be it about the beloved, inspiration, or both, celebrate s above all imminence and 'attent e puré': 8 Ne háte pas cet acte tendré, Douceur d'étre et de n'étre pas,

68 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubade s Car j'a i vécu de vous attendre , Et mon coeur n'étai t qu e vos pas .

In 'L'Am e et l a danse,' Eryximaqu e exclaims: 'Je n'aime ríen tant que ce qui va se produire; et jusque dans l'amour, je ne trouve rien qui l'emporte en volupté sur le s tout premiers sentiments. De toutes les heures du jour , l'aube est ma préférée' (o u, p 159). The persona o f 'Reprise/ 'encoré distinct de toute pensée; également éloigné de tous les mots, de toutes les formes qui sont en moi/ is still in that ideal state of mind which we have seen figured by the mathematica l 'Zéro'; th e perfec t neutra l circle, both imag e of and figure fo r that absence and purit y which is at the same time pregnant with undetermined but limitles s virtuality. Not merely the mind, but huma n sensibility, too, from whic h the poet also draws and t o which he must above all appeal, is rich in unrealized possibilities. In the Cours de Poétique lectur e devoted to 'le domaine de la sensibilité' Valéry says: C'est un fai t presqu e tragiqu e de songer, en regardant u n étr e humain, á ce qu'il peut conteni r d e possibilités sensorielles : toute s les douleurs, tous les plaisirs et toutes le s pensées qui sont possible s en luí. L'instantané n'es t rien. L'étre humain , dans un instan t bie n court, n'est rien. Tout étre humain doit étre considere contme un e immense virtualité.

In 'L'Idée fixe / wher e Valéry's persona discusse s this immense virtuality of both mind and body - 'm a pensée .. . dans la pénombre de mon esprit du moment, ' 'tout e la jouissance, toute la souffranc e qu'[on] transport e avec soi, á l'état virtuel' - h e develops his own term for it : -J'appelle tout c e virtuel dont nou s parlions, UIMPLEX E ... j'entends pa r l'Implexe, c e en quoi et par quo i nous sommes éventuel s ( o u, p p 232-4).

Valéry frequently define d this key concept in the Cahiers: L'implexe est ce que nous savon s (ave c une probabilit é enorme ) qu e tirera de nous tell e excitation ou atteinte ... Implexe, c'est au fon d ce qui est impliqué dans la nature de l'homme ou de moi et qui n'est pas actuel (ci , pp 1080-1) .

'Reprise' 6

9

As in our aubad e the virtual form s of the outer world are waiting for th e risin g su n t o draw them forth an d revea l them in their actuality, so is its morning min d 'expecting/ that is pregnant with a still hidden thought. Like the persona o f 'L'Idée fixe / wh o bor e 'une pensée ... dans la pénombre d e [son ] esprit / ou r matutina l moi feel s 'une idee inconnue .. . encoré dans l e pli et le souci de [son] front. ' This 'état d'esprit ' o f potential energy an d forcé , Timplexe, ' whic h Valéry celebrated in so many aubades, neve r cease d fascinatin g him. It constitutes the climax, moreover, o f 'Agathe,' which I touched upo n in discussing 'Laure. ' I n 'Agathe,' which deal s with the gradua l alterations of the min d durin g th e fragmen t o f a night, the person a arrives, toward th e end o f her nocturna l voyage, at the same stat e of 'atiente puré': 'j e sens sur l e front d u temp s fuir l e vague, l'évé nement venir... ' And like our moi, who feel s a still unknown ide a hidden i n the furro w o f his brow, Agathe , too, know s herself ciós e to a yet unknown idea : 'un e perle abstraite roulerait, futur e dan s le repli de la pensée ordinaire' ( o n, pp 1390-1) . A t this point of readiness , both protagonist s ar e in that 'Zéro' state of mind, the 'equilibre stationnaire' of puré absence and neutralit y charged with possibility. For Agathe: l'ensemble de connaissances diverses, égalemen t ¡inminentes qui me constitue ... forme maintenan t un systéme nu l ou indifféren t á ce qu'il vient produire ou approfondir, quand l'ombr e imaginaire doucement cede á toute naissance, et c'est l'espri t ( p 1392).

This moment, whe n th e mind i s a virtual system, 'u n systéme nul/ independent o f its content as well as of any particular existence, is that of the mo i in 'Reprise,' equidistant still from th e world and fro m itself : Je suis encoré distinct de toute pensée; également éloigné de tous les mots, de toutes le s formes qui son t en moi . Mon oeil fix é reflét e un obje t san s vie; mon oreille n'entend poin t ce qu'elle entend. O ma présence san s visage, quel regard que ton regard sans choses et sans personne, quelle puissance que cette puissance indéfinissable comm e la puissance qui est dans l'air avant l'orage! .. . il n'y a point d'homm e dans l'homme , et point de mo i dans l e moi.'

The 'faceless présence/ th e gaze with neithe r subjec t ñor object, that 'indefinable power/ are those of a god, o r of an Ángel , 'Espri t pur. '

70 Th

e Rhetori c of Valéry's Prose Aubades

But in its supreme expectation, the 'Esprit pur/ charged with energy awaiting the spark that will ignite it, is, paradoxically, infinitely mor e than purely spirit: Je suis amour, et soif, et point de nom. For at the privileged moment whic h we know, the moi is both intellect and affect , pur é spirit unite d t o its soul, animus to anima. The golden hour - 'o r sur nuit' - i s that of Laura's visit: 'Laure ... habite ce silence tout armé d'attentes oú je deviens parfoi s c e que j'attends.' What is the objec t of this 'attente,' the event tha t has neither for m ñor duration? Its expectation is likened t o 'la puissance qu i est dans l'air avant l'orage,' and th e analog y o f the even t itsel f wit h a stroke of lightning - 'epé e qui peut jailli r d'un nuage ' - is never state d but implied throughout : L'événement qui n'a de figure n i de durée, attaque toute figure et toute durée. I I fai t visible s les invisibles et rend invisible s les visibles. II consume ce qui l'attire , il ¡Ilumine ce qu'il brise. Me voici, je suis prét. Frappe. 9 That which wil l transform the potential into the kinetic, the igniting spark, the acciden t which is the substance o f the self , i s an idea , a thought, the 'master notion. ' A s the 'idee inconnue' strike s the virtual system o f the mind whic h gives it life , thi s 'idee maitresse/ i n turn, créales the sel f i n the fulguran t encounter : C'est la qu'un événement essentiel quelquefois éclat e et me cree. The shared an d reciproca l participaron, the copulation, of the ide a and th e min d i n the creative act is stylistically reflected i n our passage in the binary structure and equilibrium , i n the dynamic balance, of the chiasmati c sentence: 'L'événement qui n' a de figure n i d e durée/ attaque toute figure et toute durée. II fait visibles les invisibles/et rend invisibles les visibles. II consume ce qui l'attire/il ¿Ilumine ce qu'il brise.' Valéry also celebrated thi s chance meeting - 'u n effe t san s cause, un accident qui est ma substance' - o f the mind with its master notio n in 'Chan t d e l'idée-maitresse/ where i t is the master notio n tha t sings its ideal unión wit h th e min d whic h gave it birth: Je suis la seule idee qui soit conforme á ton étre , et toi L'homme qui me convient.

'Reprise'

71

Je suis venue comme un hasar d Quel miracle qui m e fit étre! O circonstance, Humain , Seule chance! Maintenant, nous nou s appartenons. On se confond On s'aime (oí , pp 358-9) .

From time immemorial poets hav e celebrated Love - withou t under standing it s mystery. Both this 'Chant' and ou r pros e poe m 'Reprise / th e aubade o f and to 'monde' and 'esprit / are poetic reflections o f what Valér y has frequently expressed i n the Cahiers: 'I I ne fau t jamái s oublier qu e no s pensées sont uniquemen t portee s e t dévéloppées par le s occasions. L'accident es t ce qu'il y a de plus constant/ and 'tout e puissanc e spirituelle est fondee sur le s innombrables hasard s d e l a pensée' ( c i, pp 251 , 924).

8 'Note s d'aurore'

'Notes d'aurore' ( o n, pp 859-60 ) was first publishe d by the poe t a s a two-part sequence in 194 1 in Mauvaises Pensées et autres; it originated from a shorter prose poem, entitled 'Matin / in a 1916 Cahier ( c u, pp 1266-7). 1 The short opening fragment, a n exordium to the aubade, acclaim s and proclaim s the rising sun and the waking voice, the light and lan guage of another dawn and poem . Still another dawn becomes th e first, an d i s the unique, advent-ure and celebratio n of hoc die: SAUJT ... Choses visibles! Je vous écoute, notre Aujourd'hui don t l'Exorde est si beau...

L'Exorde/ a classical rhetorical term, introduces the dominant vocabulary cluster of grammar and rhetoric - 'édition / 'texte / 'verbe/ 'conjugaison/ 'commenter, ' 'proposition / 'discours ' - which is interwoven with the sun-light motif - 'chose s visibles/ 'Jour/ 'SOLEIL / 'couleur/ 'lumiére / 'ombre. ' The resulting texture stresses th e Ínter dependence o f perception an d languag e i n experience, as well as that of image and wor d i n the text , the objectificatio n an d re-creatio n of experience in the language of the poem: Voici la plus récent e éditio n d u vieu x text e du Jour : le verbe SOLEI L (ce verbe ETR E par excellence ) développ e les conjugaisons d e couleur qui lu i appartiennent; i l commente toute s ees propositions variées d e lumiére et d'ombre dont s e fait l e discours du temps et du lieu...

The morning's emergin g spac e and tim e become those of the poem's page, the space and tim e of the discourse, whic h i s 'le discours d u temps et du lieu. ' And lik e each sunrise , ever y new aubade is 'la plu s

'Notes d'Aurore' 7

3

récente édition du vieux texte du Jour.' The intímate intercourse of world and wor d create s the meaning and Bedeutung, the cosmos an d uni-verse o f an aube and aubad e from whic h the familiar , introspec tive moi appears , paradoxically , absent. In our poe m this moi become s extroverted, reflective o f external things, 'Chose s visibles! ' The only 'je' of the entire text - 'j e vous écoute, notre Aujourd'hui' - is immediately absorbed b y a collective, impersonal 'notre/ and th e sel f becomes Táme,' as universal and objectiv e as 'le soleil ' with whic h it engages in a matutinal dialogue. Just as the world's stil l dormant form s are already latent 'a cette heure/ whe n the sun begins to ¡Ilumínate them 'sous l'éclairage presque horizontal / s o is the language that arises to greet and utte r them, and whic h precedes and survive s the awakening mind and matter. It both prescribe s an d describes , guide s and traces , the encounter o f corps, esprit, and monde, their hesitations and uncertainty , their ultímate unión whic h marks the beginning of another day of the self an d it s world, o r of the world and it s consciousness. Fo r these ar e at once identical and different , an d 'Note s d'aurore' celebrare s the latter, the world , mor e than th e former , the self , as self-consciousness is absorbed an d it s identity submerged i n 'world-consciousness.' The 'Choses visibles!' of the opening i s recovered i n the secon d paragraph wit h 'Voir s e suffit.' T o be, 'ETRE / i s light and it s percep tion by th e eye of the body and o f the mind . Like the eye-hero of 'Purs Drames' - 'l a glace minee [qui] imite l'éther absolu , o u lucidement le pense' - so the protagonist o f our poem, Táme / both reflects and think s the world. And again , the 'fonctionnement' i s more significant tha n the product: 'c e qui est vu vau t moin s que le voir méme' - as the poie'ín i s more important to the poet tha n the poem. The world cali s on the mind throug h th e body's eye and ear, as the poem reflectin g thes e sight s and sounds - 'Chose s visibles! Je vous écoute/ 'l e verbe SOLEIL / 'le voir/ 'brui t si doux' -is itself bot h writ ten and spoken , not e and song. An d the conjunction of the visual and the auditor y i n a synesthesia o f singing gol d introduces th e Valéryan theme of the musi c of architecture, celebrated i n the poems 'Orphée' and th e mélodmme 'Amphion' : Des murs quelconques valent un Parthénon , chantent l'or aussi bien.

Every body emergin g fro m th e night 'sing s the gold/ worship s the god - 'or, aurore' - which it reflects, and renders thank s to him for its colour an d form , it s being:

74 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades Tout corps, miroir du dieu , reporte á lui son existence , rend gráce á lui d e sa nuance et de sa forme. 2

As the sun radiate s its heat and light , indifferently bestowin g energy and lif e upon indifferen t matter , both tha t god and hi s creation are reflected b y a soul and min d which spiritually anímate the sunlit dawn. An impassible world becomes a prayer - 'l a premiére oraison' - because its consciousness, 'Yame,' a s we know fro m othe r aubades, wants to worship at this hour: 'je voudrais vous bénir, ó toutes choses, si je savais...' Light is a metaphor for mind in this poetic universe because they are analogous i n that they are both creative, the one of the world , the othe r of the word , its meaning. We know this dawn's ritual offerings - the flaming tree, the glowing roof til e and gentle morning mists and murmurings - fro m othe r aubades. Our la, le pin brüle par l a tete; ici la tuile se fait chair . Une charmante fumée hesit e á s'éloigner du bruit si doux de fuit e qu e fai t un e ea u qui coule parmi l'ombre, sous des feuilles ,

echoes 'une merveille de feu, de soie, de vapeur et d'ardoise, ensembl e de bruits simples confondus, dorure et murmures/ Thorizo n fumé et doré ... des murs, des toits et des vapeurs' o f other 'Matins.' The secretive water hidden b y shade and leave s which makes 'so sweet a noise of flight/ an d o f which we see a mere mist rising in the sun, i s onomatopoetically reflected b y the f-alliterations and vocali c echoes - 'fumé e .. . bruit... fuite .. . fait... feuilles' - as well as stylistically in the embedded sentenc e which enfolds and conceals it. From this still hesitating morning's first appearances , the poe t turns, in the second fragment's long central paragraph, to the equally hesitant soul and it s first emotions: L'áme, saisie d'une fraícheur intime , d'une crainte, d'une tristesse, d'une tendresse qui l'opposent encoré á tant de puissance croissante, se tient un pe u á l'écart, dans une reserve inexprimable. Its innermost, intimate freshness, its fear, its sadness and tenderness , its chaste reserve on the threshold of the day, are familiar, too, fro m other awakenings: 'i l s'y melé de la tristesse, de l'enchantement, d e l'émotion et une sort e de lucidité presque douloureuse,' 'j e suis jour et nuit, j'offr e .. . une amou r infinie, une craint e sans mesure.' Befor e

'Notes d'Aurore' 7

5

surrendering to life , giving itself t o feeling the world and lettin g itsel f be submerged i n it s being, th e soul wavers, like dawn, between night and day . In the Cahier versión o f our poem , th e sadness an d tende r ness are still attributes of the world, and no t of the soul, showing ho w intimately this morning's moi identifie s with it: Des murs quelconques valent le Parthénon, sont les miroirs voulus, réfléchissent l'étre , sont. La fraicheur, l e charme et une crainte, tristesse tres puré - baignen t (c n, p 1266).

The contrapuntal movement of the poem's two melodies , of the ea r and the eye - 'les premieres rumeurs dans l'espace qui s'illumine' now culminate s in a harmonious parallel arrangement accentuating the dialectic of being an d nothingness : les premieres rumeurs ... s'établissent sur d u silence ... ees forme s colorees se posent su r des ténébres .

Corps, esprit, and monde a t birth ar e both th e night from whic h the y come and th e day which they become: 'or et nuit, or sur nuit. ' The 'choses visibles' are as yet unnamed, sheer surface s of palé pastel shapes an d shades, but already in harmony with the soul: th e azure is 'puré/ th e vermillion 'delicate/ the greens ar e 'emerald/ and the blues 'hyacinth/ the reds 'chaste. ' They are emerging fro m th e dark and a s if brushed lightl y upon absolut e night, just as the soul' s languors and reticence s are merely tentative still, appearing agains t the nothingness o f sleep. The long sentence wit h it s binary structure and equilibrium reflects that of the moment, the world and its appearance in accord with the soul and it s experience of it: cet azur si pur, ce vermeil délicat, ees masses d'émeraude et ees pans d'hyacinthe, ees transparences et ees pudeurs carminées sont placees et lavées sur d e la nuit absolue; ...cette langueur, ees reticences, ees ébauches d'étranges pensées, ees idees singuliéres ... sont encoré des tentatives, des fragments d e sa présence, d e précaires prémices apparues sur l e néant du sommeil...

The precarious beginnings o f both th e 'aube' and it s 'ame' could be swallowed u p again by absolute night, 'le soleil' sin k into 'le néant du sommeil... qui pourrait reprendre.' In the 1916 versión, th e poet

76 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

had hesitated between 'néant ' and 'sommeil' - 'peinte s sur le sommeil / néant / encoré chaud' - whic h in our poem have become synonymous. Again, at dawn in its fragility, th e matutinal moi i n its 'lucidité douloureuse' an d 'craint e sans mesure/ so cióse still to non-being at the moment of birth, knows, 'sent profondément / tha t their essence becoming - i s the synthesis of absence and presence, containin g and comprehending both lif e and death . Awakening in and to the young morning' s spac e and time - 'toute s ees propositions variées de lumiére et d'ombre dont s e fait l e discours du temp s et du lieu' - th e self i s no longer in a dream, 'mais les valeurs les plus voisines de ees valeurs premieres sont valeur s de revés...' For the distinctive quality of both the noumenal and th e phenomenal as they first sti r to life in consciousness, their evanescent transience and a t the same time vague intimations of immortality, are the stuf f tha t dreams are made of. Birth and th e light of the rising su n deceptively hide, 'pain t over / that underside o f decay and darknes s and death and thei r monsters whic h are banned fro m paradise . All but one ! And h e is ever-present als o in this poetic universe, the Serpent o f Knowledge, who tempte d Faust to the irrespirable heights of the Solitary, and who salutes the 'Great Sun' with his own aubade: Grand Soleil, qui sonnes l'éveil A l'étre, et de feu x l'accompagnes , Toi qui l'enfermes d'un sommeil Trompeusement peint de campagnes, Fauteur de s fantómes joyeu x Qui rendent sujette de s yeux La presence obscure de l'áme, Toujours l e mensonge m'a pl u Que tu répands sur l'absolu, O roi des ombres fait d e flamme! ('Ebauch e d'un serpent / o i, p 139 )

Our aubade's conclusión, finally, does not resolve the moment' s uncertainty, which in the original Cahier versión - whic h still lacks much of the poem's subsequent elaboration - is stressed als o non verbally, by underlining an d by double vertical Unes in the lef t mar gin. This early 'Matin' also more explicitly contrasts th e beginning (of the day) with the end (o f the night), and sunrise, metaphorically, with sunset: 'le jour ... la veille ... semblent plutót la fin de quelque chose - l e couchant de l'instable.' Bu t both fragments, the early and

'Notes d'Aurore' 7

the late, spanning ove r twenty-fiv e years, break off resonatin g an d reverberating a momentary 'equilibr e stationnaire/ dawn' s stat e of balance between 'l e réel' and 'l e rien': II n'est pa s encoré tout á fait sur qu e ce jour instant va se confirmer , se dégager du possible , s'impose r á ma varíete totale ... Le réel est encoré en equilibre reversible avec le rien de tous ses songes.

7

9 'Moments '

'Moments/ a sequence of six numbered fragments (o i, pp 311-13 ) is from Mélange (1941) , a book which I briefly discusse d i n connection with the las t of the three 'Matin' series o f Chapter 5. 1 Each of the six pieces reflects a different momen t of the poet's encounter wit h th e world, and th e second one , entitled 'Aube / existed long before publication, in identica l form, i n a 1920-1 Cahier entry (cu , p 1272) , as did the third, 'Grasse/ i n a Cahier entry of 1935-6 (cu , p 1299). I mentioned 'Moments' in my Introduction, for it is a characteristic example of th e Valérya n prose poem sequence, illustrating both th e mobil e fragment embedde d amon g others of a different period , as well as the truly instantaneous an d fragmentar y qualit y of each poem . The first, third, and fourt h moments , each named after th e cit y in which it occurs, recall moreover Valéry' s substantial group of prose poems celebrating cities he loved, such as Cannes, Genéve , Montpellier; but the y remind one above all of the beautiful sequenc e 'Genes' from 'A u Hasar d et au crayon ' of Rhumbs ( o n, pp 598ff.) . 'Nice ' is another of those poems that, like the fragment 'Reprise' (o u, pp 657-8) quoted in Chapter 6, passes fro m pros e into free verse. 2 In our poe m the development o f the text marks that of the texture of the night, for all is still dark in the beginning, except for the distant stars: 'Ciel avec peu d'astres, mais l'un splendide dan s le pur.' The sky is almost starless, excep t for that 'splendid' one in 'the puré/ tha t is the void; but at the same time the word her e already suggests tha t quality peculiar to dawn - 'le mot "Pur" ouvr e mes lévres.' For the night i s already preparing fo r its own extinction, heralded by the re fulgence o f that bright planet which the persona beholds , 'je ne sais pas qui est celui-ci.... Planéte sans doute.' It might well be Lucifer wandering in the late sky before sunrise, som e of whose reflections we have perceived before in the aubades .

'Moments' 7

9

The first vers libre spells out 'un e modification d e la nuit qui n'es t pas encoré l'aube,' an d in the second one, the pre-dawn landscape turns into a picture: Le tableau est beau, noble.

'Noble' points to the moment's sublimity and, in recalling noscere, also suggests an imag e well known, the familiar 'nudit é de la nuit.' The assonance, moreover, of the closed /o's/ - 'aube , tableau, beau' framed b y the tw o ope n /o's / o f 'encoré' and 'noble ' conveys some of its coolness and calm , the repetitio n o f the sof t /b's / th e tenderness of the night. The phrase, moreover, contains the anagram of aube: 'Le tableaw es t beau.' Th e stars are as though mirrore d on earth by les feux á eclipse, les lignes d e la ville marquées pa r le s point s de feu.

These intermittent lights of the port-town's distan t lighthouses wink and twinkle like the far-away stars, while 'á eclipse' further intimates lights gradually declining, both those marking the city's lines, and those in the morning sky. In the following lin e the persona becomes as universal as the setting and the moment, the point in time which he reflects: 'Man ' at the intersection between nigh t and d a y, between eart h and sky: L'homme pese c e qu'il voit et en es t pesé.

Here the poet explicitly paints the image of the balance with its two suspended scales, figuring that dynamic state of equilibrium of opposing forces which characterizes these aubades. We saw the preceding sequence, 'Note s d'aurore,' conclude on the momentary 'equilibre stationnaire' between 'l e réel' and 'l e néant.' The moi o f the 'ABC ' trilogy was - lik e the hour surrounding hi m - composed of an inner tensión o f opposites, 'j e dors et je veille, je suis jour et nuit... amour infinie, crainte sans mesure .. . femme endormie, ange fai t d e lumiére,' - a 'gray-haired child' and a moment of lucidity and mystery. But expressions of this balance and tensió n are almost ubiquitous in the prose poems. In the second of the 'Troi s Réveils/ we beheld th e persona's mind as a stage on which opposing force s were momentarily interlocked in a precarious equilibrium, reflected stylistically in the symmetrically balanced structure of the sentence: 'i l y a conflit parfoi s entre ce qui pense e t qui veut n e plu s penser, mais dormir, et c e qui est

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Pióse Aubade s

80 Th

pensé et qui veut se développer - voi r son avenir.' The symmetrically balancea sentence, wit h its syntactically parallel constructions, pecu liar to the dawn prose poems, was again elaborated - wit h a temporal dimensión - i n one of the 'Matins': 'ici, unies au jour qui jamáis ne fut encoré, les parfaites pensées qui jamáis ne seront.' Th e second of those two sequences , finally , mos t forcefully stresse d th e balance of night and day , the dialectic of darkness and light , in a statement which itself constitute s an equation, thus underlining the binary structure of both th e perceiving mind and it s language: 'il y a un in stant oü l'o n dirait que la nuit se fait voir á la lumiére, comme l'esprit au révei l fait voir la naissance, l'inexistence et les revés á la premiére lucidité.' And i n the secon d fragment o f these 'Moments/ a moment both 'final ' an d 'initial / thi s dialectic will be taken up again. Our firs t 'Moment / however , images thi s persistent motif , whic h gradually grows into a central theme of the aubades, in the balance, at once image and concept. Man, in his first encounter wit h the world and himself , both weighs and i s weighed b y what he perceives: Quand il ne peut égaler n i fui r c e qui est dans l'autre plateau, c'est beau.

'Plateau' is underlined, a s were 'pese, voit' and 'pesé' in the preceding line, to emphasize th e image and notio n o f the scale balancing its two trays, whose momentar y equilibrium is now depicted i n 'ne fuir .. . ni égaler,' as above in 'pes e ... pesé.' A secondary meanin g of 'plateau,' moreover, is 'a momentary phase of stability'; and how rich this is in virtual tensión w e know from othe r aubades . For at this privileged moment, when the self als o contains the world - 'Tou t l'univers chancelle et tremble sur ma tige' - by which it is contained, then 'le Tout est un germe - le Tout ressenti san s parties.' As dawn merel y suggests i n their virtuality those forms which th e oncoming day will then reduce to their concrete and morta l limitations, so the awakening moi, at this first moment, forgets his own mortality. When the world thus appears most 'beautiful,' the sel f seems most powerful , an d the poet dream s about the ideal poem: Je pense au poéme de l'Intellect .

The references to this 'poéme de l'Intellect' are numerous an d widely scattered throughout the oeuvre as well as the Cahiers, where it is at times conceived dramatically, at others lyrically, or again in a n

'Moments' 8

1

expository vein. A 1919 entry reads: 'j'a i vu une piéce terrible toute angoisses, hontes , intensité s et je me dis: Paire aussi fort qu e tout cela, aussi poignant et empoignant, mais dans l'ordre de l'intelligence' ( c i, p 241). Many years later, the poe t notes : 'c e que j'ai envisagé l'un des premiers, peut-étre , c'est l a "sensibilité de l'intellect" - c e qu'il y a d'amour, de jalousie, de piété, de désir, de jouissance, de courage, d'amertume, et méme d'avarice, de luxure ... dans les choses de l'intelligence' ( c i, p 623). How h e would draw fro m these very Cahiers t o créate this work celebrating the mind - a s we have seen hi m do repeatedly with the aubades - is evident fro m another note, in which he envisions a treatise on th e intellectua l life : 'traite de la vie intellectuelle - Mystiqu e intellectuelle á former de bien des remarques prises dans ees cahiers - Les malheurs de l'esprit. Ses joies. Sa place - Sa nullité - Ses exigences - Ses défenses' ( c n, p 1321). 'L'Homme et la coquille' opens with Vi l y eüt un e poési e des merveilles et des émotions de l'intellect (á quoi j'ai songé toute ma vie)...' ( o i, p 886), and i n th e 'Not e et digression,' Valér y tells us that he sees i n his imaginary Léonard - th e projection o f an ideal self - th e protagonist of the ideal poem: 'je vois en lui le personnage prin cipal de cette Comedie intellectuelle qui n'a pa s jusqu'ici rencontré son poete, et qui serait pour mo n goút bien plu s précieuse encoré que L a Comedie humaine, et mém e que L a Divine Comedie' ( o i, p!201). Finally, Maurice Toesca relates a conversation h e had wit h the poet in 1944 , in whic h Valéry mentioned to him tha t La Soirée avec Monsieur Teste wa s to become part o f the great work, that 'román d'u n cerveau,' some of the numerous allusions to which I have just recalled.3 Valéry's prose poe m 'Agathe, ' t o which I have referred sev eral times in discussing these aubades, wa s to become one of this oeuvre's chapters or fragments. I mentioned in 'Fragments ' that Valéry had create d Teste , a monster o f puré Intellect, to exorcise another part of himself, those émotions and th e anguish whic h threatened him , sometimes even at dawn - 'Angoisse , mo n véritable métier.' Teste , a character created 'par le fractionnement d'un étr e réel dont on extrairait les moments les plus intellectuel s pou r en composer l e tout de la vie d'un personnag e imaginaire / confesses to idealizing hi s mind, his intellect: 'je confesse que j'ai fait un e idol e de mon esprit , mai s je n'en a i pas trouvé d'autre.' I t is no surprise, then , that the poet, having create d tha t curious 'personnage' and hi s 'Cycle Teste,' some o f whose fragment s g o back as fa r a s 1896 (L a Soirée) while others were written some thirty years later, should als o muse about 'poetizing' this tendency o f himself. And this he does, of course,

82 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

all along. Both the temptations and th e threats of TEsprit pur' pervade his major poems , 'La Jeune Parque/ and th e Charmes fro m 'Aurore' to 'Le Cimetiére marin.'4 But nowhere is the theme of the Intellect as fully an d persistently elaborated as in the prose aubades, for their central theme is 'la sensibilité de l'intellect.' Thes e morning prose poems celébrate both Tintellect' and its feelings, the 'Esprit pur' in its attempts to transcend the world on which it depends, an d 'c e qu'il y a d'amour, de jalousie, de píete, de désir, de jouissance, de courage, d'amertume...' Th e prose aubades are not Teste's, bu t Valéry's 'poémes de l'intellect.' The second fragmen t o f the sequence i s again an aubade, and i t observes a 'moment' whic h both is and i s not, for it is be-coming. Just as the preceding piece opened upo n a 'not-yet dawn' with 'une modification de la nuit qui n'est pas encoré l'aube,' so this beginning dwells on the waning of the moon, which already is, and at the same time, paradoxically, is not yet the privileged moment we know: Aube - Ce n'est pas l'aube. Mais le déclin de la lune...

In this beginning - of a poem and of a day - the poet becomes his own antagonist, as he must objectify wha t he experiences in a language which cannot express tha t experience. This theme links our fragmen t to another Valérya n prose sequence, 'Magie / in whose opening pas sages the poet appears caught in similar contradictions, those impose d by his very médium: A ce moment, le coq chanta et ne chanta pas, et ce n'était pas u n coq - et peut-étre pas un moment. Le vent frakhit e t ne fraichi t pas - et le ciel tout blanc d'astres n'avait pas existe. On l'avait recusé á temps, et ainsi de toutes choses. Et á chaqué instant, ce qui fu t n'avait pas été (o» , p 858).

It is not surprising tha t both ou r 'Aube/ which is not an aube, as well as the opening momen t of 'Magie/ which perhaps was not a moment, should brin g to mind Rimbaud's Illuminations, - for example 'Veillées' - in which that poet attempts to remake the language to conform to his visión.5 Valéry frequently discusse s th e tensión betwee n visión an d expressio n i n the Cahiers: 'L e langage me subit et me fai t subir. Tantót je le plie á ma vue, tantót il transforme ma vue' ( c \, p 393). The dying moon of 'Moments/ announcin g th e day about to be born,

'Moments' 8

3

la lune , perle rongée, glace fondante, et une lueu r mourante á qui l e jour naissant s e substitue pe u á peu - [m y italics]

is the same as that of the las t piece of the 'ABC ' trilogy: 'la lune ce fragment d e glace fondante ... cet objet celeste de substance étincelante et mourante, tendré et froide qu i va se dissoudre insensiblement.' For that fragment , lik e ours, elabórales the 'je u de contrastes/ the antitheses whic h are the essence of the 'moment' : J'aime ce moment s i pur, final, initial. Mélange de calme, de renoncement, d e négatio n [m y italics].

This 'renoncement' and 'abandon, ' th e resignation and yielding, are those of both the night and th e consciousness which animates and personifies it . It i s a 'drowsy setting' of the nocturnal and th e soul, as the latter paradoxically awakens to 'tuck in' nigh t and sleep to rest, and dream s yield to the 'rea l dream' of a new day: Abandon - O n referme respectueusement l a nuit. On la replie, o n la borde. C'est le coucher e t l'assoupissement d u mo i le plus seul. Le sommeil va se reposer. Les songes le cédent a u rev é réel.

The hermetic moi of the nigh t is being put behin d now. As the body stirs to Ufe , the assonating and alliteratin g double subjects of the tw o sentences which describe it stress that body's bilateral structure: L'agitation et l'animation von t naítre . Les muscles, le s machines vont envahir le pays de l'étre. Le réel semble hésite r encoré .

Stylistically, the passage recalls a similar one fro m on e o f the 'Matin ' fragments rendering the same phenomenon: 'le corps s'étire, se tourne et se retourne, cherche une torsió n et une tensió n qu i luí fassent reconnaltre sa place dans lui-méme.' Finally the sun rises , lik e an oriflamm e unfurlin g a t the whistleblast: Le ZaTmph se déroule, et, au coup de sifflet, v a étre hissé aux vergues, aux arbres, aux toits , occuper le ciel. The Carthaginian word 'Za'ímph ' - 'voil e sacre de la Tanit de Carthage' (Larousse ) - remind s us that Valéry's is a Mediterranean

84 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

sun, which is further intimate d by 'hissé aux vergues/ th e mainyards of ship s recallin g th e sea. 'Zaímph' furthe r suggest s th e sun's role as giver of life - 'o n est fécondé, gros d'un jou r nouveau' - fo r the cult of th e Tani t of Carthage celebrated Astarte, the Phoenicia n goddess of fertility an d sexua l love.6 Our thir d 'Moment' is not dawn , but a fragment o f a morning, at Grasse, not fa r from Nice . It is, moreover, a puré picture and therefore entirely lacking in verbs. The poet himsel f tells us its manner: Grasse - Neig e peu dense sur le sol - pas sur les arbres - effe t á la Breughel. Le sol frott é e t no n couvert. Ce matin, soleil. Impression frileus e e t dorée - sensatio n d'enfance en moi. Mélange d'excitation et de mélancolie.

The rare and thin snow in the morning sun o f the southern city recalls childhood surprises an d th e excitement at snow fallen gently durin g the night. 7 The cold and golde n impression , 'impressio n frileus e et dorée/ echoing 'le sol frotté/ intimate s with the repetition o f the If'sl, Ir'sl an d /s's / th e somewha t granular texture of the scene, bot h the 'real' one - of the poem - and that of a Breughel painting. And as the child returns in the man, there mounts that melancholy which we know from othe r aubades: 'Ma jeunesse jadis a langui et sentí la montee des larmes, vers la méme heure, et sous le méme enchantement... je me vois á cote de ma jeunesse...' The fourth 'moment / a little later in the day and agai n at Grasse, reintroduces the morning bird, a motif discusse d earlier , when I noted the fascinatio n that birds held for Valéry because of their freedom of movement and thei r song: 'chan t et mobilité.' 8 In 'Reprise' w e saw the morning soul soaring on swallows' wings : Ces hirondelles se meuvent comme un son meurt .

Si haut volé l'oiseau qu e le regard s'éléve á la source de s larmes.

This fragment als o celébrales the swallow, and th e melodious 'belle \\irondelle bleue et or' [m y italics] renders th e sweepin g curve s of its flight wit h th e sound look of its signifiers: Grasse. - Six heures et quart - Tout á coup une belle hirondelle bleue et or brusquement se jette dans ma chambre, fait troi s tours, retrouve la petite fenétre carree et fuit, comm e crevant l'image du pays , par ce trou de lumiére oú elle s'était précipitée en tant que trou

'Moments' 8

5

d'ombre, et qu'il luí a suffi d e virer de bord pour l a changer en lumiére, en autre monde... Peut-étre ne l'a-t-elle pas reconnu?

In our sequence , th e episode o f the swallow divin g into, circling, and soaring ou t o f the poet's room serves onc e again to play on th e dialectical tensión betwee n night and day , darkness an d light . In balancing 'tro u d e lumiére' with 'tro u d'ombre / even changin g the one into the other, and at the same time placing in equilibrium the 'inside'-'outside' dichotomy, the text stresses th e dependente of one side upon th e other, and agai n the imag e of the balance comes before th e mind's eye, with 'esprit' an d 'monde ' suspended, a s are night and day at dawn. Th e 'inside' is meaningless without , thus depends on , the 'outside/ an d th e min d i s as much in the world as the world i s in the mind. I have commented several times on the fragmentar y and instanta neous qualit y of many of Valéry's prose poems . This characteristic is notably evident in the fift h o f the 'Moments' : II y a des arbres , des fleurs , u n chien , des chévres , le soleil, le paysan et moi, et la mer au loin ; et nous tous ensemble convenons que le passé n'exist e plus.

This is a 'pur regard / thoug h a n artisti c one, a t a world o f which the beholding ey e is a part, i n a puré present, excludin g both pas t an d future, a n instan t now. At the same time this 'Moment' prepares th e next, for it establishes the 'pastoral' mood, a Theocritus's charming illusion o f the innocenc e of youth and o f nature, appropriate to th e beginning o f a day. The kinship of fragments v and v i is borne out, moreover, by the fac t that they were originally one, in inverted order, s o that our v was th e concluding paragrap h of vi, the tw o togethe r forming on e piece in a 1923 Cahier ( c i, pp 96-7) . Thus we have here again a perfect exampl e of th e mobilit y of the poetic prose fragmen t withi n the oeuvre. In the sixt h 'Moment' of the sequence , th e person a is , as he was in the first, a poet-persona, wh o speak s about 'singing' and paintin g what he sees : Je vois la nature á ma facón . Je pense á ceci en regardan t un e grande chévre dans les oliviers. Elle mordille, bondit. Virgile, pensai-je. Jamáis l'idée d e peindre o u chanter cette chévre ne me füt venue.

86 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades Virgile prouve que l'on peut en faire quelqu e chose. Je la regarde done. Elle cesse aussitót d'étre chévre - e t l'olivier cesse d'étre olivier. Ici commence mol - c'est-á-dir e un regard que je voudrais bien definir .

The text's only tw o italicize d words , 'Virgile' an d 'moi' underlin e the association o f the poet-person a with th e renowne d predecessor, to whom Valér y refer s frequentl y throughou t the oeuvre, and on e of whose works he had translated. I am referring t o the poet's 'vers blanc' translatio n o f Vergil's Bucolics, which occupied him fro m 194 2 to 1944, and whic h was published posthumously in 195 5 with Valéry's preface ( o \, pp 207-81) . In that preface, 'Variation s sur le s Bucoliques,' h e stresses, as he does in our prose poem, the divergence of taste between th e Mantuan and himself : 'j e confesse que les thémes bucoliques n'exciten t pa s furieusement mo n courage... . je suis né dans u n port' ( o i, pp 208-9) . And i n the pros e poem 'Nage/ whic h of course celebrates water, the poet again says: 'je ne connais rien aux moissons , aux vendanges . Rien pou r moi dan s les Géorgiques' ( o u, p 667). What Valéry and Vergi l do have in common, however, i s their métier: they are poets. And what fascinate s Valéry, as pointed ou t in detail i n Chapter 6 , is not s o much th e poem a s its making, 'la notio n tout simple de FAIR E ... Le Faire, le poi'eí'n .. . qui s'achév e e n quelqu e oeuvre.' As the poet-persona beholds the goat among the olive trees, the pastoral Vergi l comes to his mind, and th e challenge: 'Virgile prouve que l'on peut en faire quelqu e chose' [m y italics]. The poetic 'regard' - 'j e vois,' 'e n regardant / 'j e la regarde/ 'ici commence moi - c'est-á-dire un regard' - is puré as'Toeil pur' o f 'Purs Drames,' but i t is, as we have said, artistic. It transform s nature , and it s defini tion is the poem . As our firs t 'Moment ' closed with the persona musin g about a poem to be written - 'j e pense au poéme de l'Intellect' - so the final one ends similarly, with the poet-persona dreamin g about a poem, 'un regard que je voudrais bien definir. '

10 Petit s Poémes abstraits

In January 1932, Valéry published in L a Revue de France a sequence of four numbere d prose poems, entitled 'Avant toute Chose/ 'L'Unique/ 'Accueil du jour ' and 'L a Rentrée/'The first of these, again a mobile fragment, late r reappeared a s Part i of the sequenc e 'Méditation avant pensée.' 2 'Avant toute Chose' again observes the privilege d first momen t of the self and the day, its anteriority and priority to anything that might come after. Th e 'aurores' of this poetic universe, I have said repeat edly, are the golden and mythi c Edén 'au commencement / a t the beginning of a world whose words and figures , whose realization and reality are but a falling of f fro m tha t former state . Before all things and thoughts - pur é hope and desire and the love of loving fill the mind and soul, and for m the question which precedes the quest: Est-il espoir plu s pur , plus déli é du monde , affranch i d e moiméme - et toutefois possession plu s entiér e - que je n'en trouve avant le jour, dans u n moment premier d e proposition e t d'unité d e mes forces, quand l e seul désir d e l'esprit, qu i en precede toute s le s pensées particuliéres , sembl e préfére r de les suspendre et d'étre amour d e ce qui aime?

At this 'moment premier ... d'unité de mes forces/ min d and sou l are one, so that 'l'esprit' and Táme' are synonymous: L'áme jouit de sa lumiére sans objets. Son silence es t le total de sa parole, e t la somme de ses pouvoirs compose c e repos. Elle se sent également éloignée d e tous le s noms et de toutes le s formes. Nulle figure encoré n e l'altére n i ne la contraint. Le moindre jugemen t entachera sa perfection.

88 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

The 'esprit pur/ still free of 'toutes les pensées particuliéres,' is Táme' rejoicing i n its 'lumiére sans objets.' And i n this state of mind and soul, the moi, 'loosened from th e world' and 'freed from th e self/ equidistan t 'de tous les noms' (th e word) an d 'de toutes les formes' (th e world), recalls the matutina l moi of 'Reprise u' : 'je suis encoré distinct de toute pensée; également éloigné de tous les mots, de toutes les formes qu i sont en moi.' This is again the idea l 'Zéro' state and moment , 'qui... exprime le sans-attribut, ni image, ni valeur du Moi pur.' The moment 'avan t toute chose' i s pre-Edenic, when th e world is still immanent in the Divine, a beginning befare th e Word. The Creator, we recall, 'se fit Celui qui dissipe/En conséquences so n Prin cipe,/En étoiles, son Unité.' In a 1920 Cahier entry, Valéry muses , Vil y avait un Dieu , il n'y aurai t que lui, et pas de monde' ( c u, p 602). The moi 'avant le jour' aspires afte r tha t universality which refuse s any particula r proposition, b e it of perception o r thought, an d know s nothing bu t the potential, 'puissance': Par la vertu de mon corps reposé, j'ignor e ce qui n'est point puissance, et mon áltent e est un délic e qui se suffit; ell e suppose, mai s elle difiere, tou t ce qui peut se concevoir.

As in 'Repris e n' the mind suspended al l specific thoughts, an d th e soul all objects, so here the mo i defers all that can be perceived. Valéry fully develope d thi s notion, which grows int o a majo r theme of the aubades, in 'Note et digression/ whose occasion and pretext is the intellectual hero Léonard, 'un modele psychologique ' an d ideal projection of the self . In tha t text, we fin d th e sam e ideal reduction as in 'Avan t toute Chose': 'lliomme de l'esprit doi t se réduire sciemment á un refu s indéfini d'étre quoi que ce soit' ( o i, p 1225), and this anti-existentialist, anti-phenomenological progression - 'l a conscience est toujours conscience de quelque chose' - a progressiv e depersonalization, aspire s afte r a n idea l universal self: L'oeuvre capitale et cachee du plus grand esprit n'est-elle pas de soustraire cette attention substantielle á la lutte des vérités ordinaires? N e faut-il pa s qu'il arrive á se definir, contre toutes choses ... ce qui lui confér e un e généralité presque inconcevable, et le porte en quelque maniere, á la puissance de l'univers correspondant (oí , p 1228) ?

Our poem's persona rejoices :

Petits Poémes abstraits 8

9

Quelle merveille qu'un instant universal s'édifie au moyen d'u n homme, et que la vie d'une personne exhale ce peu d'éternel !

In this state of mystic detachment and ecstasy , which brings to mind a similar moment o f the 'ABC ' trilogy, Man invent s the most mysterious and th e most daring words of his language: 3 N'est-ce point dans un éta t si détaché que les hommes ont inventé les mots les plus mystérieux et les plus téméraires de leur langage?

And the y must be those of prayer. 'Elevez ce qui est mystére en vous á ce qui est mystére en soi/ th e poet ha d said in the 'c' fragment. Prayer was th e onl y phenomenon o f religión in a formal sense accessible to the agnostic Valéry: 'la priére est peut-étre ce qu'il y a uniquement de réel dan s une religión ' ( c n, p 605). 4 His reflection s about religión are numerous throughou t the Cahiers, spanning hi s entire mature Ufe (th e Théta enfrie s fro m 189 6 to 1945 , c u, p p 565-718), an d sinc e they consis t o f unresolved question s an d meditations rather than answers, it would be audacious to pronounce oneself on Valéry's religious beliefs or attitudes. At one point, however, h e expresses a 'loss' of God: 'j'a i perdu mo n Dieu il y a longtemps - au moment o ü je me suis apercu qu'i l était en moi, ce moi que j'ai toujours méprisé' ( c u, p 569); at another, he voices a certain nostalgia for this lost God: Vil y avait un Dieu , je ne vivrais que pou r lui - quell e curiosité, quelle passion m'inspirerai t un si grand étre, - quell e science autre que la sienne? Mai s s'il y en avait un, je le percevrais, je le sentirais en quelque maniere, et je ne sens rien' ( c u, p 601). He most consistently appears to believe that the Divine can never b e known, only felt, tha t it exists, like evil, within: 'La plu s grossiére de s hypothéses es t de croire que Dieu existe objectivement ... Oui! il existe et le Diable, mais en nous ! .. . En deux mots: Die u est notre ideal particulier. Satán ce qui ten d á nous en détourner' ( o u, p 1431). It is perhaps fo r this reason, then, that this 'mystére ' within is fel t most intensely at dawn, when the self attains the summit of being. For what is it that Man cali s Divine, if not this 'indefinable' power, which the poet recalls again and agai n i n the aubades?; O moment, diamant du Temps ! ... Je ne suis que détail et soins miserables hors de toi. Sur le plus haut de l'étre, je respire une puissanc e indéfinissable comme la puissance qui est dans l'ai r avant l'orage.

90 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubade s

Again 'Reprise u' comes to mind, because exactly the same words, the same phrase, appeared embedded in, and a s a fragment of , a paragraph of that poem: Je suis encoré distinc t de toute pensée ; également éloign é de tou s les mots, de toutes le s formes qui sont e n moi . ... O ma présence san s visage, quel regard que ton regard san s choses e t sans personne, quelle puissance qu e cette puissance indéfinissable comme l a puissance qui est dans l'air avant l'orage] .. . il n' y a point d'homme dan s l'homme ... [my italics].

Just as in prayers certain words and phrases become formulaic, so in these aubades, which become something like a ritual celebration of the poet's 'veille s matinales.' Valéry, who said, 'j'étais fait pou r chanter Matines/ himself suggest s that his morning poems are analogous to 'Matins/ the daily observance of the firs t canonical hour. There is in the Cahiers a little aubade, entitled 'Intellectual Morning Prayer/ which reflects the ideas and sentiments, the tonality, of 'Avant toute Chose': Friere intellectuelle du matin Avant le commencement Avant la Création La Puissance d'abord s e découvre Quelques éclairs disperses, divers - percen t l a nue et le sommeil Comme pour établi r le monde et l'espace oü l'on va se mouvoir e t choisir un chemin Froideur et simplicité de cette aurore - oraiso n ( c n, pp 1271 -2).

And a 'Psaume' of those years is, appropriately, about God: Psaume Tu n'adoreras pas les dieux des autres ; Tu connaítra s le Tien á sa simplicité, II ne te proposera pa s des énigmes vide s II sort de toi comme tu sors de ton sommei l Cache ton dieu. Que ce dieu soi t ton trésor - qu e ton trésor soi t ton dieu (cu , p 1284).

Petits Poéme s abstraits 9

1

Valéry's God is hidden i n the aubades, as he is in the moi whic h sings them. The first fragmen t close s with the mo i at it s highest point, 'sur le plus haut de l'étre/ feelin g th e promise of the world and itself , th e privileged moment whic h in one of the 'Matins' was objectified i n the metaphor of the seed: 'e n germe, éternellement germe, le plus haut degré universel d'existence. ' The world - lik e the self - is puré possibility: 'before all things' and their existence, soul and ey e rejoice in light without objects, seeing rather than th e seen: Je ressens l'imminence ... Je ne sais ce qui s e prepare; mais je sais bien c e qui s e fait : Rendre purement possible ce qui existe; recluiré ce qui se voit au purement visible - tell e est l'oeuvre profonde.

This 'oeuvre profonde' echoe s 'l'oeuvr e capitale' fro m 'Not e et digression/ quoted above : 'l'oeuvr e capitale et cachee du plu s grand esprit n'est-elle pas de soustraire cette attention á la lutte des vérités ordinaires? .. . á se definir contr e toutes choses?' I t also recalls the early 'Pur s Drames / an d the artist's exhortatio n to reduce the images (objects) o f his visión, 'corrompue s encor é par l a certitude de leurs éléments/ to simpler, purer origins : 'i l n'y a que les lignes simples.' In that firs t o f Valéry's aubades, we saw th e reminiscenc e of Edén ideally reduced t o a puré, harmonious line , 'une ligne sur l'espac e de couleur celeste ou vítale.' In the nex t fragment o f our sequence , 'L'Unique, ' the One without equal is again the firs t day rising paradoxically for a thousandth time: Mille fois, j'a i deja ressent i l'Unique.. . Mille fois, plu s de mill e fois , ce dont l'essenc e es t d'étre unique...

The bipolarity of 'mille fois' an d 'unique, ' stressed b y repetition, is then further elaborate d by the shif t fro m monologu e to dialogue, th e moi 's 'je ' t o its 'tu,' and tha t of cognizance from th e self t o the world , the 'unique' dawn : 'Tu le laisses toujours n e pas te reconnaitre!.. .

The sixty-year-old poet's persona i s again the 'enfant aux cheveux gris' of the 'c ' poem , for whom the mornin g rises both ne w an d lon g known, so that the light-darkness dichotomy which makes up th e

92 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubade s

tensión of the moment - 'c e moment si pur, final, initial' - parallels that of the self i n a reciproca! reflection o f 'inner' and 'outer / the soul reflecting th e world which mirrors it. Our tex t recalls the young Fate' s wearines s afte r to o many days of her life , Car l'oeil spirituel su r le s plages de soi e Avait deja v u luir é et pálir tro p de jours Dont j e m'étais prédi t les couleurs e t les cours ,

who is then, however, reborn t o salute the new, divin e dawn: Salut! Divinités par l a rose et le sel, Et le s premiers jouets d e la jeune lumiere, lies (oí , pp 101 , 106 ) [m y italics] !

It also brings to mind the oíd Faust, whom we followed in our discus sion o f another aubade (Troi s Réveils') to the arid nihilism of the Solitaire's mountai n top. Faust's wisdom is to live each on e of the uncountable breaths of his lif e uniquely, as for the firs t time: JE RESPIRE .. . J'ouvre profondément chaqué fois, toujours pour la premiere fois, ee s ailes intérieures qu i batten t l e temps vrai (OH , p 322 ) [m y italics].

In 'L'Homme e t la coquille/ wher e Valéry speaks abou t th e Urformen o f art an d o f artistic visión, he exhorts us to awaken th e chil d in us for a renewed visión o f the world : Nous refusons a chaqué instan t d'écoute r l'ingénu que nous portons en nous . Nous réprimon s l'enfant c\ui nous demeure e t qui veut toujours voir pour la premiere fois ( o i, p p 890-1 ) [m y italics] .

This renewed visió n i s the them e also of the 'Introductio n a la Méthode de Léonard de Vinci,' Valéry's ideal 'phenomenology o f perception,' i n which he says: Certains homme s ressentent, ave c une délicatess e spéciale , la volupté d e I'individuante de s objets. li s préférent ave c délices , dans une chose , cette qualite' d'étre unique - qu'elles ont toutes ( o i, p 1170 ) [las t italics mine].

Petits Poémes abstraits 9

3

Here he stresses th e same paradox as that of our poem , tha t uniqueness which all things have, like the uniqueness o f each one o f all th e uncountable dawns. Th e miracle of the 'firs t tim e for the thousandth time' which i s the essence of love and o f the privilege d golden mo ment of 'aurore/ is also that of artistic contemplation, that of the poe m rising again and again , and eac h time uniquely, from it s ashes: 'l e poéme ne meurt pas pour avoi r servi; i l est fai t expressémen t pou r renaitre de ses cendres et redevenir indéfinimen t ce qu'il vien t d'étre' ( o i, p 1373) . I t is the momen t create d by the 'ardent ' Athikt é in he r dance , which Phédre ('L'Am e et la danse') liken s to a rising fíame: 'O n croirai t que la danse lu í sort du corps comme une flamme! ' Sócrates then develop s th e simile into a metaphor fo r the privileged moment, th e fíame : O Flamme, toutefois! ... Chose vive et divine!... Mais qu'est-ce qu'une flamme, 6 mes amis, si ce n'est l e moment méme? - C e qu'il y a de fol, et de joyeux, et de formidable dan s l'instant méme! ... Flamme est l'acte de ce moment qui est entre la terre et le ciel. O mes amis, tout ce qui passe de l'état lourd á l'état subtil, passe par l e moment de feu et de lumiére...(oii, p 171). Thus, in a suggestion o f alchemical imagery, the soul upon awakening passes from 'l'éta t lourd' (o f night and sleep ) ' á l'éta t subtil' as it rises t o 'le moment d e feu et de lumiére.' I n our poem , th e poet apos trophizes the moment : O moment , diamant du Temps!... Valéry's aubades, disseminate d an d hidde n throughou t hi s poetic universe, ar e the diamonds: precious , crystallin e fragments, conden sations o f time, moments privilegies. It is the mind' s capacity to forget, to oblitérate, that enables it to recréate, and in this it imitates nature - the 'aurores' - in its eternal cycle of death and resurrection: 5 II y a done, dans la substance d'un homme, une vert u d'effacement , sans laquelle un seu l jour suffirait , épuiserait , consumerait l'attrai t du monde ; une seule pensée annulerait l'esprit? In th e followin g paragraph, th e poe t suggest s the imag e of the legendary phoenix risin g in renewed freshnes s fro m it s own ashes, which he elsewhere applie s to poetry, i n evoking th e matutinal soul's thirst and jo y as it arises fro m th e night o f its forgetfulness and extinction: 6

94 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades Mais une soi f d e connaítre, une joi e de se sentir venir quelque prochaine Idee - de sentir s'éclairer peu á peu un royaume d'intelligence - renaí t indéfiniment des cendres secretes de l'áme. Chaqué aurore est premiere. L'idée qui vient cree un homm e nouveau.

In this awakening, 'connaitre' an d 'sentir ' become one, as spirit an d soul, animus and anima , embrace. 'L'áme/ like a joyous bride, feels and 'thirst s for' the approaching Master Notion, 'quelque prochaine Idee - .. . l'idée qui vient.' The consummation of their unión wil l créate 'un homme nouveau.' Valéry never tire d of celebrating this moment of anticipation 'frisson préalabl e á la mer' - o f the creative copulation o f the soul , the 'esprit' and it s Idea. We saw the theme most fully elaborate d i n 'Reprise u,' where the expectation - 'attent e puré ' - was also a loving and a thirsting: 'je suis amour, et soif, et point de nom,' and th e sel f a readiness: 'm e voici, je suis prét. Frappe.' Our poem' s 'l'idé e qui vient cree un homm e nouveau' echoes th e 'un événement essentie l quelquefois éclate et me cree' of the other fragment . Again 'Agathe's' quest for the 'perle abstraite' comes to mind, and the 'Chan t de l'idée maitresse, ' th e epithalamion whic h sings the unión of mind and idea : 'Maintenant nous nou s appartenons. O n se confond/ On s'aime.' Traditionally , aubades wer e love poems: so are Valéry's. In the following section , the motif o f cyclical return - o r 'how can one always fall in , rise to, love again?' - i s taken up once more , thi s time couched i n the mystical language announced in the precedin g fragment. 'Le s mots les plus mystérieu x et les plus téméraires ' are : 'those mysterious altars,' 'our offere d Ufe,' 'th e idols,' 'spiritual acts, ' and 'extraordinar y prayers,' an d hyperboli c capitalization mark s the divinities adored: 'pur é Promise,' 'infinit e degrees o f Knowledge,' an d 'the Intellect.' Mais comment se peut-il qu e je m'ignore et m'abolisse á ce point qu e l'espoir redevienne , et redore toujours le s hauts frontons d e la puré Promesse, le s degrés infinis d e la Connaissance, et ees autels mystérieux oü notre vie offerte s e change en furné e a u pie d de s idoles d e l'Intellect, oú des actes spirituels et des priéres extraordinaires transforment notr e amour, notre sang, notr e temps, en oeuvres et en pensées ?

The text suggests a mystic's death - 'j e m'abolisse' - and resurrection, a dying in order to be reborn, a voluntary death for the sake of gaining

Petits Poémes abstrait s 9

5

a new existence . It is a literary theme and a spiritual experience as oíd as mythology; it s ritual observance by the matutina l moi celébrale s the Poet's participation in that Orphic descent and return. 7 For that legend tell s of a sacrifice, lik e ours in which 'our offere d lives ' ar e turned into 'votive smoke/ and 'our love - Eurydice - lifebloo d and duration' transforme d into art: 'en oeuvres et en pensées.' With its 'lofty pediments / 'endless staircases/ an d 'mysteriou s altars/ our tex t also suggests th e architectural Orpheus, a majo r Valéryan theme already touched upon i n 'Notes d'aurore.' The theme was firs t elaborate d in the early poetic prose essay 'Paradoxe sur l'architecte ' of 1891 and th e sonnet 'Orphée ' of the same year, later in th e Socrati c dialogue 'Eupalino s ou l'architecte ' of 1921, an d finally th e 'mélodrame ' 'Amphion ' of 1931. Fo r architecture was t o Valéry the realizatio n of creative thought i n oeuvre pa r excellence . This richly allusive passage, moreover , with 'ees autels mystérieux oú notre vie offerte s e change en fumée' recall s another builder of cities and o f temples, Sémiramis. In the 'Ai r de Sémiramis' of 1920, her Sun-go d cali s Sémiramis to lif e at dawn: '"Existe ! ... Sois enfi n toi-méme!" dit 1'Aurore' (oí , p 91). And later , in the 'mélodrame ' of 1934, Sémiramis' s extraordinary prayer - 'j e me coucherai sur la pierre de cet Autel, et je prierai le Soleil bientót dans toute sa forcé , qu'il me réduise en vapeur et en cendres' ( o i, p 196) - i s heard, an d her offere d lif e changed into votive smoke on that mysterious altar - 'L'Aute l vide brille au soleil.' In the following chiasmatic sentence, each of its two clauses stresses the tensión betwee n surprise and newness o n the one hand, and on the other, th e customary and 'dej a vu' : Ne suis-je pas accoutume á me surprendre, et l a nouveauté n'est-elle pas m a sensation la plus connuel

'What would you be/ the magic Fay asks the dreaming Faust, 'with out the unforeseen?': Que seriez-vous sans l a surprise ? L'esprit n e brille qu'il n e bris e La ressemblance d u passé...('Mo n Faust / OH , p 398) .

The remainder o f 'L'Unique' elabórales this paradox, which fasci nated Valéry , and whic h was also brought ou t i n th e last of the three 'Réveils/ where the new, th e unique ideas aróse in the morning mind, while the body resumed it s customary routine: 'done je vais, et

96 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

d'une part , je sens le s Idees (tre s diverses) m'envahir , se disputer la vie, etc. ... etc.... mais d'autre part je me percois allant et agissant en plein automatisme...' Tha t fragment als o stressed the dichotomy of mind an d bod y whic h the present poe m will develop nea r it s cióse in juxtaposing the moi's 'esprit' with the beating of its heart. One of the mind's laws, says the poet, i s that it does not know itself , fails to recognize it s own cyclica l functioning, par t of nature's cycle: C'est peut-étr e la loi de l'esprit qu'il doive méconnaítre la plus na'ive de ses lois. Elle exige que le désir n'ai t eu de pareil. Car le désir es t tout puissance; mais le souvenir d'une puissance est impuissance, et la forcé n'es t qu e ma présence au plus haut point.

'Ma présence au plus haut point' echoes 'l e plus haut de l'étre' of the preceding poe m o f the sequence; 'le désir es t tout puissance' recalls 'la puissance qui est dans l'air avant l'orage.' Their very intensity and virtua l energy are due t o the illusion of their uniqueness, thank s to the mind's forgetfulness . I t is in this that mind and body , 'con naitre' and 'étre/ are diametrically opposed. For the rhythmic repetition and return , th e universal heartbeat of all life, i s repugnant t o 'l'esprit' in its eternal quest fo r the new . It is for this reason that Valéry had n o taste for the Vergilia n bucolic, pastoral theme, as we saw in discussing 'Moments. ' Th e return o f the seasons 'bores' him: 'La vie pastorale m'est étrangére et me semble ennuyeuse.... Le retour des saisons et de leurs effets donn e l'idée de la sottise d e la nature et de la vie, laquelle ne sait que se répéter pou r subsister ' (oí, p 208). 'La vie/ say s Valéry in a Cahier entry, 's'oppose á l'intelligence par sa forme périodique, l'intelligence est du typ e "une foi s pou r toutes".' 'L"esprit" (le plus esprit de l'esprit) repugn e á la répétition. Resume - épuise - cherch e la loi pour s e débarrasser des faits, du nombre , d u prévu . C e qui est prévu l'accable . Tout ce qui recommence lui semble "bétise," done la "vie" .. . Je t'ai vue et vécue mille fois (Heure) , car trois fois valent mille et dix mille pour Moi , l'Esprit...'8 But Teste knows h e is deluding himself whe n h e prays: 'donne z ... donnez l a supréme pensée... ' ( o 11, p 37). He knows that h e canno t reach beyond time , that the very lif e of his min d i s made up o f its 'returns.' A Cahier entry, entitled 'RE / stresses the tensión betwee n th e mind's desire for uniqueness and it s cyclical nature: '...l'organisme est de cent facon s obligé á des retours - recharge s ou sommeils. Et ceci domine so n "temps." Et l'espéce se retrempe dan s la mort des indivi-

Petits Poémes abstraits 9

7

dus combiné e á la reproduction. Mais ceux qui ont l'esprit on t d e (\uoi ne pas comprendre, n i accepter cette condition de leur existence et de celle de l'esprit ' ( c i, p 1093) . And i n another, entitle d 'R E et SE-RE / Valéry says: 'tou t le fonctionnement mental dans le s 3 domaines c E M est dominé pa r la reprise, répétition, recommencement , identité ... Chaqué instant est une combinaiso n qu e l'o n peut toujours considérer unique e t que l'o n doit toujours reconnaitr e formée d e parties reconnues' (ci , p 1074) . In 'L'Unique' the tensión between th e spirit's aspiratio n fo r transcendence of, and it s vital dependence on , Time, i.e., Etre, culminates in th e fina l paragraph, which juxtaposes the mind's 'état s exceptionnels' with th e regular breathing and heartbeats that tie the self t o the world: Mais, tandis que l e moment méme de l'espri t aspire á ce qui lu i semble sans exemple, et que j'espére en des états exceptionnels, chaqué battement de mo n coeur redit , chaqué souffle d e m a bouche rappelle - qu e l a chose l a plus importante es t celle qui se répéte l e plus.

In the third fragment o f our sequence, 'Accueil du jour/ the person a finally step s ou t (o f his matutinal reflections) int o the rea l morning, Je fais u n pa s sur l a terrasse...

the terrac e serving a s the stage of this theatrum mundi. At the sam e time, the divided sel f - 'l e Toi et le Moi' - i s both actor in and spectator of th e performance: J'entre en scéne dans mo n regard.

The self is , then, both enclose d b y the scene i n whic h it performs and outside o f the action which it beholds. An d th e tensió n o f the whol e poem will be that between thes e two selves, or between thes e tw o tendencies o f oneself, of being a part, on th e on e hand, o f the world' s play - its opening ac t - and, on the other, of its transcendence: 'etre' and 'connaítre. ' So this third fragmen t is not merel y sequentially re lated to the preceding one - the sun has now risen - but it resumes the theme that had emerge d fro m 'L'Unique. ' The clash between mo i and monde, the persona's anxiety and fea r of being engulfed by and i n the world , o f being acted upon an d becom ing the passiv e object o f space and time , ie, matter, pervades th e sec ond momen t o f the mind :

98 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades Ma présente se sent l'égale et l'opposée d e tout ce monde lumineux qui veut la convaincre qu'il l'environne. Voici le choc entier de la terr e et du ciel . L'heure veut me saisir et l e lieu croit m'enclore...

Again the image of the balance comes to mind, with 'ma présence' o n the one side, and 'tou t ce monde' on the other, the former both 'equal ' and at the same time 'opposed' to the latter. We recall the same 'Moment/ whe n Man i n his firs t encounte r with the world both weighe d and was weighed by what he perceived: Thomm e pese ce qu'il voit et en est pesé.' Th e third of the 'Réveils ' suggested th e same precariou s equilibrium of a moment when th e moi fel t itsel f bot h creator an d creature of 'ce qui est - e t ceci n'est que choc, stupeur, contraste.' There also the clas h of moi and monde i s reflected b y 'le choc entier de la terre et du ciel. ' In 'Accueil du jour/ the persona i s defending himself against th e world's temptations , a world personified with it s progressive enticements: 'ce monde... qui veut [me ] convaincre qu'il [m'] environne,' Theure veut me saisir,' 'l e lieu croit m'enclore.' 'Convaincre ' suggest s 'vaincre/ while the verbs 'environner/ 'saisir / and 'enclore' threaten to confine and impriso n the self in that luminous morning scene it has just entered. We have encountered th e same anxiety, though less acute, before in these morning pieces. In 'Notes d'aurore/ th e soul, 'saisie d'une crainte, d'une tristesse, d'un e tendress e qui l'opposen t encoré á tant de puissance croissante, se tient un pe u á l'écart, dans une reserv e inexprimable. ' There, before giving in to life, giving itself to feeling th e world and lettin g itself b e submerged i n its being, the self wavered , lik e dawn, between night and day . Again, the gnawing worm, the Serpent of Knowledge hidden i n the garden of Edén, comes to mind, and hi s salute to Life: 'Gran d Soleil, qui sonnes l'éveil/A l'étre, et de feux l'accompagnes,/To i qui 1' enfermes d'u n sommeil / Trompeusement peint de campagnes ... Toujours le mensonge m' a plu/Que tu répand s sur l'absolu,/ O roi des ombres fai t d e flamme ( o i, p 139) [m y italics]! The canker is in the rose, and th e wor m feeds on the living, not on the dead: Le vrai rongeur, l e ver irrefutabl e N'est point pour vou s qui dormez sous la table, II vit de vie, il ne me quitte pas ('L e Cimetiére marin,' oí, p 150) .

For there are two temptations enticing the self and threatening i t with annihilation: the world's splendor, tha t is the flesh, an d tha t of the

Petits Poémes abstraits 9

9

very spirit, 'l a tentation de l'esprit.' All of Valéry's major poem s reflect thi s tensión betwee n 'étre ' an d 'connaitre / and Man tor n between thes e opposing forces , each one o f which ca n be deadly. The 'esprit' want s to transcend space and time , 'le site avec son heure/ that 'monde' into and with which its 'corps' awakens, an d which gives it life : Mais le site avec son heure, ce n'est pou r l'espri t qu'u n incident - un événement - u n démon comme un autre ... Tout ce jour, un démon de ma nuit personnelle.

The mind, however, cannot remain in its 'personal night' an d will , indeed, b e conquered b y the day. For 'c E M - l e mon-corps, le monesprit, le mon-monde/ we recall, 'sont 3 directions - qui se dessinent toujours...' ' c E M ... cette considération de s attributions est dan s le régime vie/connaissance - capitale . Ce régime opere continuelle ment entr e ee s membres qu i sont, en quelque sorte, se s "trois-dimensions'" (ci, pp 1147-8) . Vainly, says the persona, doe s the sun assaul t me, but vainly, also, does he try to escape tha t light which h e has entered, an d which has already extinguished hi s 'personal night': Vainement, le soleil m'obséde d'un e immens e image, merveilleusement coloree, et m e propose toute s les énigmes d u visibl e ... II y a bien d'autres offre s e n moi-méme, qui n e sont d e la terre ni de s cieux.

For, miraculously, it is the very beauty of the young mornin g whic h filis the mind an d soul and makes up the substance - 'l a matiére' - of the poem. None of those other profferings , 'qu i ne sont de la terre ni des cieux,' but precisely those of the earth an d th e sky arise with the aubade: Tout ce beau jour si net, orné, born e de tuiles et de palmes, et de qui tant d'azur, accomplissan t la plénitude, ferme dans l e zenith la forme auguste , ne m'est qu'un e bulle éphémére, plein e á demi d'objets indiíférents .

This 'beautiful day/ limited by tiles and palms and closed a t zenith 'le plus hau t de l'étre' - and horizon, thi s mortal and 'ephemera l bubble' of a day, i s life. I n the remainde r o f the poem , th e poet paint s its 'objets indifférents' wit h lov e and passion . Th e drama of the mor tal morning - 'on dirait que le jardin tremblant s'envole' (Tur s

100 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubade s

Drames') - is rendered permanen t in the poem's 'immens e image, merveilleusement coloree.' It is both a translucent bubble (viewed from without ) and a globe of august for m (fro m within) , whose brillian t and vibratin g luminosity, whose curved and flowin g lines , are evoked by both the poem's signifiers and signified : 'c e beau jour ... orné, borne de tuiles et de palmes ... Bel Aujourd'hui .. . tout ce qui brille et vibre.' Here rich Ínter nal rhymes and echoes , an d th e anagrammatic play of letters, fix the fleeting momen t and transfor m aube int o aubade, existence into th e essence o f image and song . The poem's person a vainl y tries to escape that day's - ho c diehodie - fata l finality : bel Aujourd'hui qu e tu es - Aujourd'hui qu i m'entoures - je suis Hier et Demain .. . Tu n'es qu e ce qui est, et je ne suis jamáis: je ne suis que ce qui peu t étr e .. . Ici, tout c e qui brill e et vibre n'est pas moi. 9

But 'entourer' resume s the closing-in movement of 'con-vaincre/ 'en vironner/ 'saisir/ an d 'enclore ' above . As dawn becomes day and its virtual forms realize themselves i n their actuality, in existence, the familiar matutina l moi yearns nostalgically for that state of virtuality of 'Avan t toute Chose.' In attempting to escape the here and now, th e self woul d project itsel f beyond th e existential, at once back into th e past an d forwar d into the future. Rememberin g dawns that have died and anticipatin g those yet to be born, it remains, of course, imprisoned i n Time, and th e plaything of Nature. In the 'Note et digression,' Valér y states what h e has expresse d poetically in 'Accueil du jour': 'chaqué personne étant un "je u de la nature" ... les neuf dixiémes de sa durée se passent dan s ce qui n'es t pas encoré, dans ce qui n'est plus , dan s ce qui ne peut pas étre; telle ment que notre véritable présent a neuf chances sur di x de n'étre jamáis' ( o i, pp 1227-8) . He further discusse s thi s paradox i n 'L a Poli tique de l'esprit,' wher e he points to the 'temporal,' ie, the 'human' experience of existence: une des plus extraordinaires invention s d e l'humanité .. . l'inventio n du passé et du futur.... l'homm e créant le temps, no n seulemen t con struit des perspectives en decá et au déla de ses intervalles de réaction, mais, bien plus , il n e vit qu e fort peu dans l'instant méme. Son établissement principal es t dans l e passé ou dans le futur. .. . On peut diré de lu i qu'il luí manque indéfiniment c e qui n'existe pa s (oí , pp 1024-5) .

Petits Poémes abstrait s 10

1

The invention of Time marks the 'esprit's ' differentiatio n from , an d opposition to, Nature. Man, in living in the 'past' and 'future / '...agi t done contre nature, et son actio n est de celles qui opposen t Yesprit á la vie.' Bu t in this 'opposition/ whic h we have encountered agai n an d again in the aubades - whic h celébrate the privileged moment out of time and existence 'Avant toute Chose' - th e mind's dependence on matter is repeatedly reaffirmed . In the fragment's second part , we behold the persona advancin g one step further int o life and o n the sunlit stage of the day: Je fais u n pa s de plus su r l a terrasse... Je m'avance, comm e u n étranger , dan s l a lumiére .. . Quoi de plus étranger qu e celu i qui se sent voir c e qu'il voit?

Here the day's brigh t splendour estrange s th e persona, wh o appears like an actor blinded by the stage lights. As he first 'goe s on/ he is not yet 'in' his role, but see s himself playing it. He is both th e 'persona' he plays, and a t the sam e time a moi beholding himsel f playing his role. This image perfectly figure s the familiar doubl e self - 'e t c'est le réveil. Le Toi et le Moi' - an d the selves-consciousness of every aube: 'j e me réveille/ 'j e me leve/ 'j e me vois/ 'j e me parle' - 'je m'écris. ' The strange phenomenon o f 'celui qui se sent voir ce qu'il voit' is the theme of the prose poem 'Sur la Place publique/ where the sub ject's successive retreats fro m itself , i n order to behold itsel f a s object, attain a limit beyond whic h it cannot recede. In that poem, th e per sona beholding a scene in the public square, a man feedin g pigeons , observes himself observing tha t scene, thus creating a second spectacle and a second spectator , and as he tries one farther remov e to make himself th e observer of the one who observe s himself , h e reaches the mind's limit: Je me moque des pigeons. Je m'observe qu i observe. J'écoute c e que me dit, o u ce que se dit, ce que je vois.... Et ceci fai t un secon d specta cle, qu i se fait u n secon d spectateur . I I m'engendre un témoi n d u second degré ; et celui-ci est le sumpreme. I I n'y a pas d e troisiém e degré, e t je ne suis pas capable de former quelque Quelqu'u n qui voi e en decfl, qu i voi e ce que fai t et ce que voi t celui qu i voit celui qui voit les pigeons. Je suis don e á l'extrémité d e quelque puissance ; et il n'y a plus de place dans mon esprit pour u n pe u plu s d'espri t (011 , pp 688-9) .

102 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

From the 'inside' (o f his mind) ou r person a i s now rejecte d and projected back to the 'outside/ into 'tout ce monde lumineux.' Its light now no longer merel y 'proposes/ o r offers th e visible to him as before - 'l e soleil... me propose toute s les énigmes du visible' - but 'imposes/ ie, forces, it s brilliance upon him . The moi is finally caught, 'fixed' an d transfixe d b y the puré earth burning in the sun which it reflects: Le sol ardent et pur m e fixe, et m'impose l'écla t de l'étendue d e sa nudité.

Again the poet paints the image of this morning with rich alliterations and assonances, where big-bellied urns are heavy 'panses d'ombre/ and le a ves sparkling i n the sun nervou s 'foyers de feuilles et de feux.' The silvery olive tree's vain attempts to brush of f th e pesterin g sparkles o f midi light an d hea t reflec t thos e of the self, imprisoned o n that ground lik e tree and plant: Quelques vases, panses d'ombre, sont des foyers de feuilles et de feux. L'olivier séchement se défend de s étincelles qui l'irritent.

Even the birds are immobilized, as the sun graduall y moves fro m morning t o noon, tha t still-point of the world. The spirit is calm finally, conquered b y the ligh t of the da y an d th e lov e of life: Sur un toi t rose et blond dorment quatre colombes: je songe vaguement á la sensation de leur chair dans la plume douce et chaude posee sur l'argile tiéde, ó Vie...

The perishable clay of which the world is made, and which will return to dust, i s illuminated into a living radiance by the sun: 'un toit rose et blond,' and th e sensation of the warm flesh o f the dove s sleeping i n their soft, ho t feathers on the baked clay, becomes that of all Life which the persona apostrophize s an d the poem so passionately cele brares. Elsewhere the poet exhorts the Spirit to strive not for immortal life, but to exhaust the realm of the living - an d of the mortal: Beau ciel, vrai ciel, regarde-moi qui change! Aprés tant d'orgueil, aprés tant d'étrange Oisiveté, mais pleine de pouvoir,

Petits Poémes abstraits 10

3

Je m'abandonne á ce brillant espace, Sur les maisons des mort s mon ombre pass e Qui m'apprivoise á son frél e mouvoir. ...('La Cimetiére marin,' o i, p 148) .

The remainder oí our fragmen t mark s the 'fallin g off / th e déchéance from tha t moment o f adoration an d integration , the state of grace which the moi no w rejects , and b y which it is rejected. The poem's down-curve traces the necessary Fal l after th e cyclical matutinal elevation of the self - 'e t á la moindre lueur, je rebatís la hauteur d'o ü je tomberai ensuite.' W e recall how, as the presence of Laure - Tor' turned into memory, that morning poe m became one of mourning. 'Le désir/ sai d the persona o f 'L'Unique/ 'es t tout e puissance; mai s le souvenir d'une puissance est impuissance. ' As another daw n turn s into day, the mo i disparages no t merel y all that Uves in the world, 'tou t c e pays' an d 'tout e la terre/ but also all that lives and die s in its mind: Que m'import e tout ce pays? Que m'import e toute la terre? Mais que m'importe aussi tou t ce qui vient á mon esprit , tout ce qui nai t et meurt dans mo n esprit?

This state recalls a similar one in one of the 'Réveils/ wher e the per sona sai d 'l a marqu e du réel , c'est l'insignifiance absolue.' And this attitude and exile , I remarked, is in this poetic universe depicted as the arid mountai n - 'roches , neige, glaciers' - of the Solitary who has not merely lef t Uf e behind him, but als o no longe r believes in Tidol e Esprit.' There are two forces courting the living: the worl d of matter and that o f the mind : 'ce que je vais, ce que je pense.' An d th e moi's oscillation between thes e two, this very movement, constitutes its life : Ce que je vois, ce que je pense - s e disputent ce que je suis. lis l'ignorent; il s l e conduisent: ils le traitent comme un e chose.. . Suis-j e la chose d'une idee , et le jouet de la spendeur d'u n jour ?

The 'Moi pur' i s but an Ideal fading away with th e privileged momen t of dawn ; i n 'rea l life/ th e mo i becomes a 'person,' and, as Valéry said in 'Note et digression,' 'chaqu é personne [est ] un "je u de la nature".' The fourth an d fina l o f the 'Petit s Poémes abstraits ' is not a n au bade, but, o n the contrary, a poem abou t nightfall . Valér y wrote few

104 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

evening pros e poems , and 'La Rentrée' appears as a fixed piec e closing of f thi s sequence, rathe r than a characteristic free an d mobil e fragment.10 It s tone o f appeasement contrast s with the tone of the pre ceding poems o f the sequence, and th e familia r singula r wjoí-person a is hidden here in an unfamilia r plura l voice: Revenons ... L'or se meurt, et toute chose peu á peu s e fonce et se degrade. Le sol fume. U n diamant deja perc e dans l'altitude.

The world's gentle death - 'Laur e se meurt' - is invoked in a tone of condolence and consolatio n and , therefore, evokes the presence of another. All the form s of life, which we have again and agai n see n emerge at dawn, gradually merge and are submerged - 's'amassent / 'se confondent' - in that 'profonde unité des ténébres' whic h decomposes the m like death: Les demeures et les domes de feuille s s'amassent et se confondent; et toute la varíete de la figure de la terre insensiblement s'assemble e t se compose en un seu l troupeau de formes vagues et obscures accablé de torpeur. Autour de nous, bientót, la profonde unité des ténébres sera. 11

The 'troupeau de formes vagues et obscures accabl é de torpeur/ evo cative of the shade s o f Hades rathe r than a world asleep, confound s the human an d the non-human, rendered equa l and inanimate all, by death. The purest - l a lumiére - has left th e earth and rises u p to form the starry universe. Thu s the divine divide s itsel f fro m th e human and its time, all of whose weigh t bows our silent heads : Le plus pur d e ce qui existe, le plus pur nous laisse et s'éléve. Le haut ciel lentement se declare univers. Quelque divinité se divise du temps, et tout le poids d'u n jou r de notre vi e nous fai t baisser la tete. Le silence nou s prend : i l nous separe, i l nous unit. Une es t l a lassitude [my italics].

While dawn's elevatio n i s always unique and tha t of an unequale d moi, the oncoming night' s weariness i s shared amon g men. Valéry also elaborated th e communal observation o f the end o f a day in th e prose poem 'Un Phénoméne' fro m th e sequence 'Mers / where h e describes th e effect s o f a sunset :

Petits Poémes abstrait s 10

5

Coucher d u soleil . Ciel pur, l e disque orange est tangent á l'horizon . Les personnages qu i sont su r l a plage se taisent sans savoi r pour quoi. Silence de trois minutes. Impression d e solennité de c e passage. I I y a une sensatio n d'exécution capital e dans l a profondeur implicite de cette durée. La tete de ce jour lentement tombe . Le disque es t bu. Quan d i l disparalt net, un enfan t crie : f a y est\ Chacun semble frapp é d'avoir v u l'un de ses jours decapité devant soi (o u, p 664). 12

In our sequence, morning's life-creative thought - Tidé e qui vient cree un homme nouveau' - has now become 'sad shadow s of thoughts/ the simplest, the grandest, the vain, and the bitter, confounded all , like 'la varíete de la figure de la terre/ i n the general night. And unde r the cover of darkness myths emerge, where once was lucidity and light : Les tristes ombres de s plus simples, de s plus grandes, de s plu s ameres et vaines ou náive s pensée s nous accompagnent. A la faveur du soir, le s mythes viennent, et se font plu s sensibles e t importantes qu e toutes choses .

In the followin g paragrap h 'Revenons' echoes the poem's opening , but now the collective 'nous' becomes a 'you and I, ' the persona an d his beloved, a silent presence to whom the remainder of the fragmen t is addressed. Fo r all the terrors of the hou r wil l henceforth b e projected into the other , the woman . In one o f the.'Aphorismes' of Mélange, Valéry said: 'La fi n du jou r est femme' (oí , p 303)." The persona beseeches his companion to return, to hurry back from all that threatens outside to the protective light and warmth inside: Revenons ... Recourons á la flamme e t aux lampes . Asseyez-vou s auprés d e moi. Vos mains froides, vo s pieds mouillé s tendu s a la braise, vos yeux songent de s étincelles. La vie et la mort dansent e t craquent devant vous .

The moi becomes her protector, and the witness - 'j e sais bien, toutefois,' 'j e sais, en toute certitude/ 'j e ... ressens comme si j'étais dans votre chair' - of her fears: Je sais bien, toutefois , que vous sente z e t présumez e n vous-méme la presenc e d e tou s le s ennemis d e notr e vie. C e qui ne sera plus, ce qui

106 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades sera, voilá l'un e et l'autr e puissance. Et c'est pourquoi vous frissone z devant la flamme furieuse , e t vous étes faible e t contrainte, toute réduite á votre coeur serré, muette et lamentable au sein des formes du bonheur.

Thus the weakness and constraint, the heavy-heartedness and th e pitifulness o f man alon e in the nigh t is rejected by the moi which attributes them to the other, or to that other part of the self - whic h is woman. In one of the 'Apercus ' of Mélange, Valéry says: Tout homme contient une femme . Mais jamáis sultane mieux cachee que celle-ci'(o i, p387). The fundamental oneness of these two sides of the self - th e male 'esprit' an d the female 'ame' of the aubades - is finally symbolized , on the narrative level, by the protective embrace which shields both lover and belove d fro m th e threats of night and death : Une personne est bien peu de chose auprés tan t de périls qui émanent d'elle, la nuit venue. Je le ressens comm e si j'étais dans votre chair. C'est pourquo i il faut se prendre dan s les bras l'un de l'autre, et les paupiéres fortemen t fermées , étreindr e une chos e vivante, et se cacher dans une existence.

11 'Méditatio n avant pensée'

Méditation avant pensée' is the firs t sequenc e ( o i, pp 351-2 ) of th e Toésie brute' sectio n of Mélange, an d th e firs t o f its three numbered pieces is, as mentioned i n the precedin g chapter, the opening , 'Avant toute Chose/ o f the Tetits Poémes abstraits. ' From it s appearance there in 193 2 to its reappearance here in 1939 , the mobil e fragmen t remained unchanged except for the omissio n of its title, which i n slightly altered form becam e that of the ne w sequence. 1 The two titles, moreover, are essentially synonymous, a s they both desígnate the same moment of the matutinal moi, when th e mind is in that ideal 'Zéro' state of puré potentiality, 'qui en precede toutes les pensées particuliéres/ and whe n th e soul 'jouit de sa lumiére sans objets' - before all things, and before all thoughts. The opening fragment o f our sequenc e is not merel y much longe r than the othe r two, but i t is also the only one which is a characteristic morning piece, while u an d n i constitute two brief , an d mor e general, meditations on the functionin g o f the mind and consciousness . We recall that 'Avant toute Chose' celebrated the firs t momen t of the self an d it s day, 'un moment premier de proposition/ when th e soul was still 'également éloigné de tous les noms et de toutes le s formes.' Th e aubade captured again, but uniquely , the transient moment before the world takes shape, befor e the universal self - 'su r le plus haut de l'étre' - becomes a person, a mere secular detail and congeries of miserable cares outside the privileged moment - ' ó moment, diamant du Temps... ' And the subsequent poem s of the preceding sequence the n developed th e spirit's attempts to transcend time, as well as its ultimate resignation to , and acceptanc e of, life an d Verganglichkeit, o f mortality. The second fragment o f 'Méditation avant pensée' likewise deplores th e fallin g of f fro m tha t former stat e of grace, of purity an d

108 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

absence, whic h Valéry elsewhere describe d a s 'le sans-attribut, ni image, ni valeur du "mo i pur"/ that of the 'Zér o mathématique ' of the mind which w e have discussed. Our persona apostrophize s con sciousness an d lament s its promiscuity: O conscience! A laquelle il fau t toujour s e t toujours de s événements! I I suffit qu e t u sois pour étre remplie.

This fragment, we have noted, is not strictly speaking an aubade, but a little meditation o n the min d i n general, no longe r i n its ideal state, but i n its ordinary and customar y everyday functioning, with al l its contingencies and inconstancies , it s impurity. The daily wretched mental prostitution an d debasemen t whic h our person a bemoan s recalls Diderot's Neveu d e Ramean, whose 'lui'-mo i dialoguin g with himself- 'je m'entretiens ave c moi-méme' -admits: 'j'abandonn e mon esprit á tout son libertinag e ... mes pensées sont me s catins.' 2 And th e awakening persona o f 'Aurore' scolds his ideas in no gentler terms: Quoi! c'est vous , mal déridées ! Que fítes-vous, cette nuit, Maítresses de l'áme, Idees, Courtisanes par ennui (oí , p 112)!

Valéry examines the functionin g of the mind , its cyclical progressions an d th e haphazard productio n an d destructio n o f its thoughts, throughout th e Cahiers, and als o as 'la matiére' o f some o f his prose poems. Her changin g states of mind and consciousness , fo r example, are the main theme of 'Agathe,' who beholds her ideas rise apparently 'sans commencement' an d disappea r jus t as mysteriously. W e recall, moreover, ho w 'L'Amateu r d e poémes' deplores th e fortuitous nature of thought, it s lack of order : Si je regarde tout á coup ma véritable pensée, je ne me consolé pa s de devoir subi r cette parole intérieure san s personn e e t sans origine ; ees figures éphéméres; et cette infinité d'entreprises interrom pues pa r leur propr e facilité , qu i se transformen! l'une dans l'autre , sans que rien ne change avec elles. Incoherente sans l e paraltre, nulle instantanément comme elle est spontanée, l a pensée, pa r sa nature manque de styl e ( o i, p 94).

'Méditation avant pensée' 10

9

The ideal 'vide' and 'l a pureté du Non-étre' are seen as opposed t o life, t o that life in which the sel f mus t immers e itself eac h day anew : Toujours, t u préféres le hasard au vide , et le chaos au rien . Tu es faite pour toute chose, et tu te fais n'importe quelle chose pour ta substitution infinie.

For Valéry the origi n of all thought, as noted i n the discussio n of 'Reprise/ is puré chance: 'il ne faut jamái s oublier que nos pensée s sont uniquemen t portees e t développées par le s occasions. L'accident est ce qu'il y a de plus constant.' 'Tout e puissance spirituell e est fondee sur le s innombrables hasards de la pensée' ( c i, pp 251 , 924). And th e infinit e substitution s of the mind , of consciousness, it s disorder and chaos - ou t of which the poet créale s order an d his poetic cosmos - wer e in part the subject matter of the Cours de poétique: 'l e fond d e la pensée est toujours désordre, chaos , d'images, de mots, d'impulsions, d e schémes qu i se forment et se déforment.' Consciousness i s fickle; i t will run of f wit h any o f its prevailing chimaeras or fabrications, its monsters o f the moment: Et quel monstre que tu fasses, tu n e veux pa s l'avoir vu en vain. Invinciblement aussi, tu te divises, et t'attaches á une d e tes parties: tel fantóm e sera le vainqueur des autres; telle parole, la plus puissante; telle idee plus étendue que son lieu, plus durable que son instant. Pourquoi? - Adieu.

The mind, then, foreve r questin g fo r adventure, will become the slave of it s current 'idee fixe/ it s Master Notion, which sings triumphantly: Je suis venue comme un hasar d dans l'agitation de ta tete. Mais toi, d'autres hasard s et une autre face des choses T'ont fai t comm e pour moi . En route! En chasse! Cours aprés qui t'anim e (oí, p 358)!

These love affairs o f the min d ar e lik e all others: eac h new adventur e and infatuatio n is unique. At the end o f her night , the person a of 'Agathe/ tha t 'poém e de Tintellect,' knows tha t the chance encounter of he r min d an d it s idea ca n become th e passing, but consuming , passion o f a moment:

110 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubade s Une [idee ] se leve d'elle-méme, et se met á la place d'une autre; nulle d'entre elles ne peut étr e plus importante que son heure. Elle s montent, originales ; dan s u n ordre insensé; mystérieusemen t mué s jusque vers l e midi admirable de m a présence , oúbrúle, telle qu'elle est, la seule chose qui existe; l'une quelconque (on , p 1392 ) [m y italics].

Since time immemorial poets hav e celebrated love without under standing its mystery. The mind's passion s ar e as inexplicable as any others; our fragment' s closin g 'Pourquoi?' remain s unanswered. The third fragment o f our sequenc e further develop s thi s meditation on the mind, its gourmandise at once destructive and constructive. The poet here ascribes to Tesprit' those natural impulses usually not associated with the mind, and th e most fundamental o f physical drives: hunger, Tinstinct de dévorer/ whic h is then furthe r stresse d with 'digérer' : L'instinct de dévorer, d'épuiser, de résumer, d'exprime r un e foi s pour toutes, d'e n finir , d e digérer définitivemen t les choses, le temps, les songes, de tout ruine r pa r l a previsión, d e chercher pa r la autre chose qu e les choses, le temps, e t les songes, c'est l a l'instinct extravagant et mystérieux d e l'esprit .

The mind feeds on the world as does the organism, consume s an d transforms its raw materia l into its own substance. This nutrition metaphor, moreover, recalls that other fragment , i n which the 'hun gry' mind was likened to the tiger about to attack his prey: II est des instants (ver s l'aube) o ú mon esprit... se sent ce t appéti t essentiel et universel qu'i l oppose au Tout comme un tigr e á un trou peau; mais aussi une sorte de malaise: celu i de ne savoir á quoi s'en prendre et quelle proie particuliére saisi r e t attaquer ( o u, p 1532) .

The mind in consuming th e world reduces it to its own matter ; it makes, in fact , a 'World' out o f the indeterminat e manifold which feeds it: Rien que le mot: Monde, en est un Índic e évident.

And like Caracalla, it wants to have done with it once and for all, 'une fois pour toutes, ' and all at once:

'Méditation avan t pensée' 11

1

C'est toujours Caracalla qui souhaitait une seul e tete á couper . Nihilisme laborieux, qu i ne jug e avoir bien détrui t qu e ce qu'il a penetré, nnais qui ne peut bie n comprendr e qu e dans la mesure o ú il a su construiré. Nihilism e bizarrement constructeur .. . Mais il s'agi t de refuser c e que l'on peut : mai s ce pouvoir doi t d'abord étre acqui s et vérifié .

In Meditations n and n i Valéry, in associatin g the menta l and th e libidinal, Tesprit' with hunger and sex, suggests again the fundamental interdependence o f corps, esprit an d monde, 'CEM. ' At th e sam e time, the tensión created by the hungry mind wanting both to feed on and transcen d it s body and it s world is again marked by its refusal : 'mais il s'agit de refuser ce que l'on peut. ' This hunger-strike of the spirit, its threatened an d threatenin g refusa l to eat, recalls 'Accueil du jour' and th e moi's refusa l t o enter th e day, that is life: 'i l y a bien d'autres offre s e n moi-méme, qui ne sont d e la terre ni des cieux.' That same renouncement was voiced in the 'tiger' fragment : chaqué obje t particulie r lui parait [ á l'esprit] devoir diminuer , s'il s'y attache , l a sensation divine d e son group e de puissance éveillé , e t il pressent dans tout le jour qui va suivre une incarnation, e t done une réduction d e cette ¡Ilusión du pouvoir á l'état pur; que so n sen s intime place au-dessus d e tout [m y italics].3

The 'Moi pur/ that 'divine' self, is paradoxically an ideal that is part as such of human reality: and th e mind must both transcend and fee d on the world which it at once destroys and reconstructs.

12 'La Considération matinale'

The short fragment , 'L a Considération matinale, ' i s again mobil e within the oeuvre, appearing twice, with very minor variants, in Mauvaises Pensées et autres ( o u, pp 808-9 , 879) of 1941. 1 It had alread y appeared, moreover , as part of the sequence 'Matines/ which Valér y published in 193 8 i n th e Cahiers du Sud. 2 This particular 'Considération' lacks the hig h intensit y of the unique, firs t person-persona's presence, a s well as the expansió n created by the co-naissance o f the worl d with and i n this consciousness, which w e know from othe r aubades. It is, rather, that o f an anonymous voice reflecting upo n the awakening mind in general: L'étre, au réveil, tout au percé du jour , est encoré tres peu ce qu'il va étre par so n no m et le reflux d e sa mémoire. Though th e hyperboli c 'MOI ' appears twic e in the fragment , i t is 'son MOI' and 'ce MOI ' and no t th e familia r 'My-Sel f a s the sou l of th e awakening world. It is, in fact , hardly a self a t all: II est á peine so/ ; mais son MO I naturel, universel , asse z simple encoré pour ressentir , pour traite r également, et méme équitablement, toutes choses. This self, whic h treats the world's 'choses ' equally and justly, appears, then, no t merel y 'before all things,' bu t 'outside ' tha t world and ha s the distance an d impersonalit y o f a God, as well as a 'judging' God' s justice: II est encoré avant so n inégalit é particuliére acquise et apprise; i l est encoré en dehors d u monde , no n engagé, no n partie , mais juge pur.

'La Considération matinale ' 11

3

The self her e no longer rises with and to the Sun, but wants to become that Sun itself - 'c e Soleil monte comme un juge' - but, unlike the Sun, it does not embrac e the worl d to give it life . It is another dimensión , that of suffering and , above all, that of desire - Toute l'áme s'appareille/A 1'extréme du désir...' - which raises th e human t o the divine and create s a God within the self . The matutinal moi's exultation, its 'lucidité douloureuse' an d it s 'amour et soif e t point de nom' make s poems out o f thoughts, aubade s of aubes, and psalm s ou t o f dawns. I n both Mauvaises Pensées et auires and th e 'Matines ' sequence o f the Cahiers du Sud ou r 'Considératio n matinale' is followed by a: Petit Psaume du Mati n Mon esprit pense á mon esprit. Mon histoire m'est étrangére. Mon no m m'étonn e e t mon corp s est idee. Ce que je fus est avec tous le s autres. Et je ne suis méme pas ce que je vais étre.

13 ' A Grasse'

'A Grasse,' a sequence of three numbered pieces, is from Mélange ( o i, pp 291-3) ; its first and secon d fragment s appeare d in a 1927 Cahier (c ii, pp 1285-6) , while the third fragmen t i n fre e verse had appeare d already in that form, though wit h minor variants in blocking, in a 1935 Cahier (cu , pp 1298-9). ' The opening poe m awakens to the sounds and scents of a dawn in which the worlds of nature and o f man ar e in harmony, as bells and birds and frog s sing in the morning, where human industry distills flowers into their perfumed quintessence : Cloches tintent; Grenouilles croassent et ciseaux gazouillent Croassements reguliers comme une scie, et sur c e fond, tou t le cisaillement pépié des oiseaux. Odeurs. On n e sait si ce sont les jardins qui les émanent ou les fabriques de parfums .

The piece thus reconciles town and countr y in one of the poet's oftpoetized cities, Grasse, whose anagram is hidden in the poem's second line, while its 'surface' celebrates croaking frogs an d warblin g birds: Grenouilles croassent et ciseaux gazouillent. 2

This line, with it s anagrammatic play of letters, its alliterations and interna! rhymes, demónstrales again Valéry's virtuosity as an accomplished composer of the sound-loo k of letters, of words, o f th e poetry of prose. I n this the line reflects, o f course, the fragmen t an d the entire sequence, th e whole of which it is an organic part.

'A Grasse' 11

5

I have mentioned tha t Valéry wrote a substantial group o f prose poems about cities he loved; and h e frequently painte d tnese in their awakening at dawn, as in the fragment 'Nice / discussed above . An essential par t of the world's diurna l rebirth is its morning birds , the 'oiseaux premiers / thei r 'pluralité vivante au plus haut des cieux.' In that fragment, as in the present one , their little cries become 'chips and chisels/ likene d to scissor cutting s - 'menu s coups de ciseaux/ 'l e cisaillement pépié des oiseaux' - in and of dawn's silence : 'quel silence á découdre!' 3 Th e sound-image of scissors cuttin g into silence is reinforced in our fragmen t with the frogs ' 'sawing' : 'croassements régulier s comme une scie.' From morning's sounds th e poem progresses to its scents, the smells of flowe r gardens an d o f the perfum e industr y of Grasse, to prepar e for th e second fragment , which celébrales the sense of sight: '¡e vois de ma fenétre au centr e de ma vue...' From 'on n e sait ' w e pass t o 'je vois, ' and thi s moi become s an eye, as in Turs Drames,' beholdin g th e mornin g world unfoldin g outside the window. But while the 'oei l pur' o f the early prose poe m reflecte d a Symbolist garden, whos e sol é human presenc e was the mythi c First Couple, the mature artistic visión perceive s and conceive s the 'real' world - 'cec i est France' - and at its centre a man who tills his field : Je vois de ma fenétre a u centre de ma vue un homm e qui pioche son champ. I I avance pas á pas dans sa tache, courbé, planté, par se s deux jambes en terre - chemis e blanche et pantalón bleu - i l pioche, et puis met les mains dans l a terre.

The matutinal moi -persona o f our aubad e i s no longer turne d in ward and self-reflective , bu t reflect s the young da y outside. He literally 'abandon s himsel f t o the world t o which he belongs b y his body and whic h he beholds throug h th e eye, a world which , in turn, becomes meaningful in and throug h thi s human consciousness . Thu s mon-corps, mon-esprit, and mon-monde ar e no w balance d in a harmonious equilibrium, as the mo i embraces life, and thus mortality, which it shares wit h all men. Both the cycl e of nature, with it s births an d deaths, an d Man' s participation in it, are mirrored i n the poem's im age of the ma n toilin g in the earth , 'planté par se s deux jambes en terre/ 'puis i l me t le s mains dans l a terre' [m y italics]. The motif o f human industr y which will grow int o one of th e poem's major themes , that of Homo-Faber evoke d above with 'le s fabriques,' is now take n up wit h 'il avance pas á pas dans sa tache, courbé/ to be developed furthe r o n with 'il travaille, il y a des

116 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

hommes qui ont besoi n d e ce qu'il fait la. ' And i t will culminate in the fragment's last paragraph, which celébrales Thomme - machine adaptée.' This is the only aubade con-centrating on Man at the centre of the world - 'a u centre de ma vue est un homme qui pioche/ 'i l est au centre du pays que je vois' - a world marked everywhere by his presence, fro m th e city's morning bells, the houses i n the countryside t o the olive trees, the very symbol of human agri-cultur e since antiquity: II est au centre du pay s que je vois qui s'élargit autour de luí, s'éléve de créte en créte jusqu'aux montagnes, de vague blonde en vague bleue, porteur de maisons claires toutes petites, d e troupes d'oliviers, de pointes noires qui sont des cyprés.

The image of the concentric waves of the landscap e rising around its human centre, 'autour de lui,' is reflected i n the harmonious rhythms, 's'éléve de créte en créte,' and th e gentle flow, 'de vague blonde en vague bleu' of the signifiers . And i n celebrating la ierre the poet thus suggests l a mer, land an d water , fons e t origo of all life . In embracing life and 'th e realm of the possible, ' the mo i shares it with all things mortal, and wit h his fellow man : Voici encoré un paysan qui épuce ses roses, cambr é en bras de chemise, au milie u d'oiseaux qui lui partent sous l e nez, et vont tomber sur l a cime ou sur l a branche avancée du cerisier.

The peasant tendin g hi s flowers cultivates matter to extract from i t an ideal essence, the fragrance and the form, the colour and the texture of the rose. In a like manner, th e awakening mind again and agai n creates an idea l order and cosmo s ou t o f chaos, an d th e poet i n weaving his text draws a poem out o f a dawn . In this aubade, dawn's familiar hue s celébrate human architectur e in the 'maiso n e n forme de temple fermé' amids t th e olive trees, wit h its gently sloped roof , its tiles lighting up in the sun, and its gables and shutters: Douceur de la couleur et de la figure de cette maison en forme de temple fermé au milieu des oliviers; cela est d'une chau x dédorée oü le rose de l'aurore, l'ocre, l e laiteux se mélent; le toit aux pentes douce s couvert de tuiles tachées de rouille et de tan, le triangle bas des pignons, les volets gris et bleuátres, les groupes d e trois cyprés massifs .

'AGrasse' 11

7

I have mentioned tha t for Valéry architecture is the realizatio n of creativa thought i n oeuvre pa r excellence . For it is characterized b y utility as well as beauty, by solidity and duration , those qualities which the Phédre of 'Eupalinos ou l'architecte ' calis 'les grands caracteres d'une oeuvre complete.' In that Dialogue, Sócrates affirms: 'l a seule architecture les exige, et les porte au plu s haut point/ whereupon Phédr e declares : 'j e la regarde comm e le plus complet des arts' (OH , p 130) . The harmonious architectura l lines revealed b y our poem's dawn are reflected i n the texture of the text, with its echoes and alliterations: 'douceur d e la couleur,' 'l a figur e d e cette maison en form e fermée au milieu de s oliviers/ 'tuile s tachée s de rouille et de tan.' Even the tree s surrounding th e edifice, 'le s groupes de trois cyprés massifs/ har monize wit h its lines, 'le triangle bas des pignons.' The celebration of the morning sun's gold awakening the house's 'forme fermée,' 'un e chaux dédorée' in the 'rose de l'aurore/ recalls Eupalinos's temple, 'c e temple [qui ] es t l'image mathématique d'une filie d e Corinthe, que j'a i heureusement aimée' ( o u, p 92), as well as the columns 'si froides e t dorées' of the 'Cantiqu e de s colonnes': Filies des nombres d'or , Fortes des lois du ciel , Sur nous tombe et s'endort Un dieu couleur de miel. The brief phrase : Naguére, elle était á Maeterlinck

connects th e house wit h its former owner, th e Belgian poet an d dra matist, thus linkin g architecture and poetry . For poetry, lik e the other art, constructs and composes . Agai n in 'Eupalinos,' Sócrates says : mais véritablement, la parole peut construiré comme elle peut creer, comm e elle peut corrompre ... je lui donnerais trois visages: l'un, presque informe , signifierai t l a parole commune: celle qui meurt á peine née ... mais le second visag e jetterait par s a bouche arrondie, un flo t cristalli n d'eau éternelle: il aurait les traits les plus nobles , l'oeil gran d e t enthousiaste; l e col puissant et gonflé, qu e les statuaires donnent au x Muses .

118 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades

Phédre: Et l e troisiéme? Socrate: II y faudrai t j e ne sais quelle physionomie inhumaine, avec des traits de cette rigueur et de cette subtilité qu'on di t que les Egyptiens ont su mettre sur l e visage de leurs dieux.

And h e continúes: nous bátissons, pareils á Orphée, au moye n de la parole, des temples de sagesse e t de science ... Ce grand art exige de nous un lan gage admirablement exact... Car, qu'est-ce, l a raison, sinon le discours lui-méme? .. . II fau t don e ajuster ee s paroles complexes comme des blocs irreguliers, spéculant sur le s chances et les surprises que les arrangements de cette sorte nou s réservent, et donner l e nom de "poetes" á ceux que l a fortun e favoris e dans c e travail (o u, pp 111-13) .

The middle fragment of our sequenc e already foreshadows, with its celebration o f architecture, the fina l one, which constitutes the perfec t poetic structure and constructio n o f a dawn rising , lik e the world, to Orpheus's lyre. Both architecture and poetry, however, are first onc e again linked to the peasant cultivatin g the earth, the founder of all civilization and it s arts: L'homme qui pioche - machin e adaptée - les pieds bie n plante s dans l'épaisseur d e la terre; mais il frappe, e t il y a le gros effort d e retirer le fer, puis de redresser l e corps et la tete, autour de la ceinture, hisser l a masse du torse , et encoré, et encoré. Le silence et le souffle d e cet homme qui peine. 4

The culminating fragment of 'A Grasse' i s in vers libre; we hav e already encountered thi s phenomenon of a prose poem passing int o this rhythmic form. 5 Though our stud y is limited to Valéry's prose aubades, it must includ e 'A Grasse ni ' as it constitutes a n integral even th e culminating - par t of this sequence, althoug h it had been written, a s noted, separately, an d alread y in free verse , in a 1935 Cahier. For this italicized vers libre aubade mark s the poem proper, tha t is the poet's 'product' in a sequence celebratin g huma n industry .

'AGrasse' 11

9

Valéry frequently referre d to poetry as a 'literary product' pro duced o r 'fabricated ' for a market of 'consumers/ thus linkin g literature to the other arts and artifact s and thei r economy. In th e Tremiere Lecon d u Cour s de Poétique/ fo r example, in undertaking Texploration du domaine de l'esprit créateur/ he borrows 'quelques mot s á l'Economie': il m e sera peut-étre commode d'assembler sous les seuls noms de production e t de producteur, les diverses activités et les diverses personnages dont nous aurons á nous occuper ... II ne sera pas moin s commode .. . que l'on parl e du lecteu r sous le nom économique de consommateur. ... Sans insister sur m a comparaison économique, il est clair qu e l'idée de travail, les idees de création et d'accumulation de richesse, d'offre e t de demande, s e présentent tres naturellement dans le domaine qui nous intéress e (oí , p 1344) .

And i n 'Poési e et pensée abstraite/ th e poet likens the poem to a machine: 'En vérité, un poém e est une sort e de machine á produire l'état poétique a u moye n des mots' ( o i, p 1337) . Valéry moreover stresses repeatedly ho w muc h his work, and ho w muc h of his work is the produc t o f demand. Th e ego scñptor says : TXailleur s le destín a voulu qu e je sois toute ma vie l'escalve du suje t imposé . (Toute ma prose! moins ee s notes.)' (ci , p 290). 6 In our culminatin g fragment, w e behold th e world rising towar d the sun, whic h is behind th e persona, a moi wh o becomes 'mes yeux.' His become our eyes , as his presence i s entirely effaced b y his dis course, thi s puré poem t o dawn: Au milieu de la campagne sombre encoré Une maison se dore et un amandier en fleurs, seul, S'illumine - démontrant le soleil a mes yeux Qui ne le voient pas directement;

As the persona's eyes see the morning sun no t directly, but reflecte d in the paysage, we see the golden springtime mornin g reflecte d in a text abounding, again , in internal echoes and alliterations . And th e aubade celebrating this aurore contains the latter's anagram in its first line, so that the poem's very opening i s literally - b y the letters embraced b y daybreak's doubl e gold /or/-/or/ : Au milie u de la campagne sombre encor é

120 Th

e Rhetoric o f Valéry's Pros e Aubades

This gold is then echoed i n 'une maison se dore/ 'un amandier ... s'illumine/ to be taken up again with 'un grand Arbre... s'enflamme'; Et un grand Arbre, d'entre les arbres et les plantes obscures, S'enflamme, secouant dans le vent froid du matin Toute une foule de groupes Tout un désordre de détails délicats, De sa masse lumineuse de verdure. Les oliviers á leur tour naissent á leur figure fine Etbrouillée d'argent; La Rose fade de I'Arbre de Judée se montre.

This aubade abounds in trees: the blossoming almond tree, th e 'grand Arbre d'entre les arbres/ th e olive trees, the Judas tree, and further o n 'le s masses de pins crépues.' The major Valérya n theme of the tree has been studied ; its presence in our poe m confers upon this dawn it s familiar doubl e tensión. 7 For the tree's roots sink as deeply into the dark earth as its golden crow n rises into the light, so that th e landscape's tree-tops glowing in the morning su n remin d u s of the obscur e underside o f this young world. But the tree represent s also another tensión: that of multiplicity in unity, the fragment's autonomy and, at the same time, its organic relationship to the whole of which i t constitutes an integral part. The big Tree's 'désordre de détails délicats' makes up its 'masse lumineuse de verdure.' And in this the Tree reflects this dawn mad e up o f its infinite fragments gradually revealed by the rising sun - 'Chaqu é partie se subdivise./ Chaqué fragment peu t vivre de sa forme.' - whic h come together to form on e world. The predominance of reflexive verbs in the text - 'se dore/ 's'illumine/ 's'enflamme/ Yaccusent / 's e precise/ 'se subdivise/ 'se fait' - culminatin g in the fivefold repetitio n of 'se montre/ stresses the seemingly independent autogénesis of each o f the fragments , the di verse phenomena o f dawn, and a t the same time recalls their role as passive reflectors of the life-giving light. As the sun rises higher on th e horizon, th e constituent components o f the world come into existence and int o view in an ascending rhythm created by the accumulation of very short sentences. Thi s acceleration reaches its highest intensity in a kind of litany: La Rose fade de VArbre de Judée se montre. Le toit rouge de tulles se montre.

'A Grasse' 12

1

Les masses de pins cre'pues se montrent. Les formes de collines se montrent. Tout se maniré, avec de fortes ombres qui s'accusent.

The progression is from th e smaller, the rose, to the larger, the roof , masses o f trees, hills , to the 'tou t se montre/ in a passage recallin g the dawn o f the 'Dialogu e de l'arbre': 'Tendremen t naít l'aurore , et toute chose se declare. Chacune dit son nom , car l e feu d u jour neuf la réveille á son tour ' ( o u, p 178). There, as in thi s poem and al l of these aubades, th e present tense of the verbs recréales a unique aube in all its immediacy, an immediac y further heightene d i n our poe m by the absence of the intermediary persona; he , as we have noted, is effaced b y the discourse. When he reappears in the text with 'je distingue chaqué feuille' an d 'je puis séparer chaqu é objet/ daw n ha s already risen an d accom plished itself : Les noms se sont pose's définitivement sur les chases.

Yet this aubade celebrating the reconciliatio n of the sel f wit h th e world, the moi's acceptance of life an d mortalit y ('il fau t tente r d e vivre!') which I have chosen a s the culminating sequence of our dis cussion, remains open-ended : Ce qui va étre se débrouille et se dégage...

The fragment, as well as the sequence, remains 'open ' in the manner of the entire cycle of dawn pros e poems, thes e 'reprises' and succes sive approximations, Tinfini de s approximations successives/ which are arrested o r 'closed' onl y by the poet's death.

14 Conclusió n

In my reading of Valéry's prose aubades, my immediate aim has no t been a study of the theme of dawn in the poet's work, though that has necessarily emerged fro m th e discussion. Rather , I have chosen primarily to examine the poet's artistic strategy in a representative group of pros e poems related in both subject and manner . Their characteristic manner, or form, i s that of the poeti c prose fragmen t which , as we have seen, is frequently a mobile structural element of the characteristic Valéryan 'sequence.' I have noted th e recent critica l interes t in th e break-up of traditional literary genres, and hav e remarked that Valéry's decisive position i n this development ha s so far been generally neglected. Yet we find i n Valéry's artistic progression fro m th e traditional prose poem to the fragment , th e evolution of the recudí to the sequence, a phenomenon ver y similar to that manifest i n another new prose form, th e new nouveau román, whic h Jea n Thibaudea u describes in terms that could well apply to our prose aubades : A mesure que le texte s'éloigne d u statut de brouillon, manuscrit, indéfini, pou r s e ranger á celui de publication, imprimée, fini e se s "fragments" deviennen t de s "séquences." Fragments: o ú la recherche d'une formulatio n définitive , e n chacun, tend á mettre á sa suite, á emporter dan s so n mouvemen t et á sa guise l'ensembl e de s fragments. Lesquels sont comme les vestiges d'un livre cependant futur, livr e qui serait un ailleurs mytholo giquement tangible, espace écrit-sonore , indéfinimen t riche et infiniment désirable , livre-futur-déjá-écrit á quoi se refere sans dout e le projet romanesque. Sequence: oú la recherche d'une formulatio n définitive tend á mettre chacune á une place relative, id, dan s l e cours de ce román en voie d'achévement.

Conclusión 12

3

Le fragment veu t étre le debut de toute parole et son éternité. La séquence devrait étre (s i elle est réussie) l'efficac e d u debut , á sa maniere, en tel point ou momen t d'un texte , écrit, qui san s cesse recommence.1

We have found, moreover, tha t these dawn fragment s and sequences, th e prose aubades , involve us in a great numbe r of Valéry's major themes , fro m anguis h t o art, fro m languag e to love, from birth to death. Fo r from bot h themati c and structura l points of view, an y one aspect is necessarily a part of the whole , one single theme but a fragment o f a universe in which all themes are dynamically and or ganically interrelated. It has been m y aim to show th e vita l interrelationship of these poetic prose fragment s with the corpu s of Valéry's poetry, as well as that of the theme of dawn wit h the others with which it forms an ideational and ideologica l cosmos. An d the interrelationship of forme an d fond, o f the them e and it s expression, i s such in this poetry that the one engaged u s necessarily and simultaneously in the other ; thus , for example, one of Valéry's brief reflection s o n the exchange between 'je ' and 'moi' upon awakenin g was shaped int o a miniature matutinal dialogue (cf . 'Fragments'); and 'Pur s Drames' (cf. chapter devoted t o that poem), a poem about a mythic Edén, took on th e languag e and th e for m o f a fable. 2 Before briefly retracin g some o f the majo r theme s encountered i n these aubades , I should lik e to recall certain features which almos t all of them share. I observed a t the outse t o f this study that these poems are almost all mono-dialogues of the self with itself as it rediscovers its body and min d and th e world, when mon-corps, mon-esprit, an d monmonde com e together t o form th e beginnin g o f a new day . Each aubade, therefore, has a first-person persona tha t frequently double s into T and 'me'; who sometimes i s a poet-persona; an d the poems are all in the present tense . Fo r as the self upo n awakenin g constitute s itself a s a thinking, ie, speaking, subject in its language, it needs tha t other self t o whom its discourse i s addressed. Emile Benveniste explains this fundamental psycho-linguistic mechanism as follows: C'est dans et par l e langage que l'homme se constitue comme sujet; parce que le langage seul fonde en réalité , dans sa réalité qui est celle de l'étre, le concept d'"ego." 3

And h e explains the 'dédoublement ' o f the thinking-speaking self: le "monologue" proced e bien de l'énonciation. II doit étre posé , malgré l'apparence, comme une variété du dialogue, structure

124 Th

e Rhetoric oí Valéry's Prose Aubades fondamentale. L e "monologue" es t un dialogu e intériorisé, formulé en "langage intérieur," entre un mo i locuteur et un mo i écouteur. Parfois l e moi locuteu r est seul á parler; le moi écouteur reste néanmoins présent; sa présence est nécessaire et suffisant e pour rendr e signifiante l'énonciatio n du mo i locuteur. 4

Long before the new linguistics, Valéry had observad this phenome non, namin g it 'bouchoreille/ and addin g 'un livre n'est aprés tout qu'un extrait du monologu e de son auteur. L'homme ou l'áme se parle' (OH , p479). The intensity and sens e of immediacy of the daw n fragments , as well as their moi's heightene d subjectivity, are expressed mor e densely by the verbal présent tense . Thus Benveniste links subjectivity and temporalit y in the self an d it s language: II est aisé de voir que l e domaine de la subjectivité s'agrandit encoré et doit s'annexer l'expressio n d e la temporalité. ... toujours la ligne de partage est une référenc e au "présent. " ... il n'y a pas d'autr e critére ni d'autre expression pour indique r le temps oü l'on est, que de le prendre comme "le temps oú l'on parle." C'est l a le moment éternellement "présent."

And a s each dawn rises uniquely, the language of each aubade creates a new hi c et nunc, for, as the linguis t explains, 'c e présent es t réinventé chaqué fois qu'un homm e parle parce que c'est, á la lettre, un momen t neuf , non encor é vécu.' 5 Valéry's prose aubades do not constitue a chronologically progres sive series, ñor do they reflect a n artistic evolution fro m earl y to mature to late poems. We have seen that th e very structure of the sequence o f mobile fragment s prohibits such a linear order , a s a 'late' sequence may frequently contain a n 'early' fragment as one of its constituent parts. Thus I have necessarily avoided forcin g these texts into a one-dimensional, chronological, scheme but, rather, have attempted to point t o their multidimensional co-existence, in their infinite variation and identity , within this poetic universe in which each aubade , like each aube, represents bot h renewa l and repetition . Fo r Valéry, whose creative life was closely bound to the early morning hours , dawn was clearly the most vivid manifestatio n of the ancient philosophical paradox of unity in variety, the One and th e Many. I opened this discussion, however, wit h an earl y prose poem, 'Purs Drames/ and note d anothe r suc h traditiona l piece in th e firs t o f the 'Trois Réveils.' But even th e derivative 'Purs Drames' was already

Conclusión 12

5

marked by the characteristic Valéryan manner, not merely in its theme, but als o structurally, as it already contained th e mobil e frag ment in germ. Despite the Mallarméan and Rimbaldia n influences which nourished it , it nevertheless showed a radical departure fro m its origins. In combining the them e of dawn wit h that of artistic visión, 'Purs Drames,' i n Valéry's characteristic manner, links the dawn poem to on e o f the vita l branches of the oeuvre of which it is a fragment. Fo r here the Symbolist Carden and th e Pable of Edén, tradition and myth , become an exercise in and a n exemplum of renewe d and purifie d visión , where the protagonist i s 'un oeil pur.' Tur s Drames' thus reaches out to another earl y Valéry text, the Introduction á la Méthode d e Léonard d e Vinci, th e poet' s treatise on th e phe nomenology of artistic perception, firs t published three years after ou r poem, a n essay which in later years gradually grew int o one of the principal supports o f his total ideological and poeti c edifice. In the chapter 'Fragments,' we examined several dawn prose poems not incorporate d into sequences an d fro m differen t period s of the poet's creative life. Thes e introduce d u s to some of the dominant motifs of all the aubades, suc h a s the emergenc e of a still impersonal self - 'o n n'est pas encoré la personne qu'o n est ' - at dawn, tha t self's freedom fro m thos e specific persona l trait s which will later fix and imprison it in a particular person an d day . We have seen thi s motif grow into a major them e of these poems; i t participates in Valéry's myth of the 'Moi pur,' predominant throughou t his poetry. Another characteristic motif encountere d here was the exultation-anguish tensión and th e theme of lucid sadness, o r sad lucidity, which reflects th e essential light-darkness polarity of the moment - 'l e jour commence par un e lumiér e plus obscure que toute nuit.' Finally , the prose poe m 'Laure' introduced an important actor of the matutinal drama, the soul, anima, with which the morning-moi i s united 'dan s une sphér e unique au monde' at the privileged golden momen t o f Taurore.' In th e ' A B c' poem s we encountere d thre e fragments, each of which constitutes a self-contained whole , while their underlying unity makes up th e integrity of the sequence's tripartite configuration. 'A/ in which the awakening min d find s it s still sleeping bod y at dawn, was the spirit's aubade, it s passionate lov e song t o the form whic h gave it life. The conscious mind and mal e spirit, animus, here was a n ángel of light wooing th e stil l unconscious body, hi s mysteriou s female 'other half.' 6 In 'B ' min d an d body , united , greeted th e ne w day, not without a nostalgia, however, fo r the origin, for a return t o the source and 'l a douceur de n'étre pas.'7 And as in 'c' the newly-risen self too k possession of the ne w world , it was a self compose d o f an

126 Th

e Rhetori c of Valéry's Prose Aubades

inner tensión o f opposing forces , a n 'enfan t au x cheveux gris' whos e soul 'se sent femm e endormie, ange fai t de lumiére / a self reflectin g the hour surrounding it, that moment which is both night and day. As the matutina l moi finall y steppe d ou t int o the world , it fel t a n adoration for all things emerging in and wit h the sunlight. Possessed an d enchanted by 'une amour infinie' th e renewed sel f wishe s to pray at this golden hou r - 'or-oraison. ' We have found thi s spiritual tonality again and again in these morning poems, the spirit's heightened lu cidity and, at the same time, its love: 'je me rappelle des matins si purs, si premiers, si ñus au sorti r de la nuit, si jeunes et si frais qu e c'était á en pleure r de désespoir e t d'amour' ( c u, p 1289) . The posthumous sequence Trois Réveils' juxtaposed an early prose poem with two late fragments. An d while 'Nuit á la cáseme' still showed the influenc e of A Rebours and o f the Goncourts' 'écri ture artiste/ which that book revealed to the young Valéry, the frag ments from th e en d o f his life again link the them e of 'réveil' t o dominant ones of the oeuvre. The centre piece, which deals with th e moi's reflection i n its écriture, as well as that of the text within the text, led us t o a discussion o f the 'persona ' of these fragments an d o f th e Cahiers fro m whic h so many of them were drawn. And w e noted that the ego scriptor i s a self stylize d by its médium, rendered objec t b y th e text which reflects it . This is one o f the meaning s of the Narcisse , a major myt h in Valéry's poetic universe. Narcisse is reflected i n th e mirror like the self i n its introspective glance, and like the writer in his text. And just as Narcisse is recreated in an image which he loves, 'on écrit pour s e rendre plus beau ... on écrit pour s e recréer.' The theme of the writer-reader interrelationship, that of the creation of the 'writer-persona' and o f the 'reader-persona ' i s diffused no t merely throughout th e Cahiers, but the essays and poetry as well. After a n ascent to the arid nihilism of the Solitaire, our second frag ment led us back into the general rhythm and 'automatisme ' o f all things living. And thi s double tensión o f the spirit's transcendenc e into puré essential nothingness o n the one hand, of its immersion and engulfment i n and b y existence on the other, pervades th e aubades and al l of Valéry's poetry. No theme is more fundamental t o him. When the poet i n our fragmen t says : 'j e me percois allant et agissant en plein automatisme/ he is, of course, including the very language in which h e exists as a self i n this 'automatisme.' No one was more aware than Valér y of the threatened disintegratio n of the thinking, ie, speaking, subject, the ominou s and anguishin g possibility of the 'death of Man' after th e 'deat h o f God.'8 'Qu i parle? ' is a constant Valéryan Leitmotif.

Conclusión 12

7

The sequence's final fragmen t reintroduce d the notio n o f the 'Mo i pur,' th e idea l 'Zéro mathématique ' as a privileged state of mind, in which nothing can be predicated of the moi except limitless virtuality. The three 'Matins' again demonstrated th e creative mechanism of the 'mobil e fragment. ' Th e first o f these morning fragments, a highly lyrical celebration o f the moment' s promis e and virtualit y culminating in the metaphor o f the seed - 'e n germe, éternellement en germe, le plus hau t degr é universel d'existence et d'action' - fixe d th e fleeting instant before day's divisions; th e separation of mind and soul, the self an d th e world with which i t is emerging, an d tha t of the world's mortal forms. Thi s first 'Matin ' also again marked the moi's hesitations on th e threshol d o f the day, and th e regrets of the universal self at having to become a personal one , a person - 'qu e ne puis-je retarder d'étre moi, paresser dan s l'état universel? ' I noted tha t this nostalgia linked ou r tex t not merel y to other aubades, but also, for example, to 'Agathe,' whose mo i -persona aspire s afte r th e same purity and uni versality. Our poe m ende d i n a hymn t o the sun an d it s light as symbol of Tesprit' and it s lucidity. The second 'Matin ' joined the celebration o f dawn an d th e sun wit h that of the sea, anothe r majo r elemen t of Valéry's world, thus emphasizing th e interrelationshi p of the themes of light and of the beginning - 6 commencement!' - in this poetry. Th e final 'Matin ' accentuated the dialectic of darkness an d light, night and day, being and nothingness, i n the stylistic refinement of it s sentences wit h their chiasmatic structure, a device encountered repeatedly i n these prose poems . Thus forme an d fond ar e interwove n in the tex t as the binary nature of the perceivin g mind i s reflected i n its language, whic h objectifies th e moment' s antithetica l tensión. It was a poetic logos, however, whic h made of this discourse an invocation ' á c e qui va étre,' culminatin g in th e imag e of the Annunciation, the 'salutatio n d e Tange qui annonce qu'on est fécondé, gros d'un jou r nouveau. ' 'Reprise' deal s with its own écriture, with the world o f letters and words upo n th e page, and s o from th e page befor e us the poe m reaches out beyond t o all the others, those 'successiv e approxima tions' an d variation s on the theme of dawn. In celebrating the poet' s work, of which th e poet i s both possessor and possessed , the aubad e introduced th e them e of the creative process, and I noted tha t the creation of a poem, the process, interested Valér y more than th e pro duct. According to his poetics, moreover, a poem i s never 'finished, ' and it s successive 'reprises ' toward perfection, as well as the ideal of 'une diversité d e variantes ou de solutions d u mém e sujet,' which the poet himsel f compared t o musical variations on a theme, perfectl y

128 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubade s

describe these very prose aubades. 'Reprise i' concluded on the 'moral' struggle in this process i n which the writer in creating the poem recreates himself. The second fragmen t o f the sequence dealt with the creative mind and reintroduce d Valéry's notion of the awakening mind as analogous to a physical system of potential energy, or to th e familiar 'Zér o mathématique.' In our poe m thi s notion wa s objectified i n the 'attent e puré' of the moi abou t to be struck by Damocles' sword, th e state of heightened expectancy of the min d about to be ignited by a stroke of lightning. The visión of this mental state an d moment led u s t o a discussion o f Valéry's notion of TImplexe/ 'ce en quoi et par quoi nous sommes éventuels/ 'c e qui est impliqué dans la nature de l'homme ou de moi, et qui n'est pas actuel/ a major them e of th e oeuvre. Thus this fragment, too , reached out to the poetic whole of which it is a part, to other texts , such as 'Agathe,' whos e protagonist arrives at this same state: the puré expectancy of an idea as yet unknown, tha t 'Idee maítresse' born o f puré chance, 'un effe t san s cause, un acciden t qui est ma substance.' And in our mornin g poe m again, this state belonged no t merel y to the mind, but to both intellect and affect , th e 'esprit pur ' an d it s 'ame,' a total self, ready for the igniting spark and fo r the day: 'j e suis amour et soif e t point de nom.' 'Notes ¿'aurore' celebrated languag e and th e interdependence of language and perception in experience - 'voic i la plus récente édition du vieu x texte du Jour.' Again, an impassiv e world became animated and th e morning meditation a prayer, and w e recognized this dawn's ritual offerings from other aubades; the burning tree-tops, the roof-tiles glowing in the sun, and th e morning mists among the leaves. Again, also, the soul in a mood of tenderness an d sadnes s hesitate d o n th e threshold o f this new worl d and day , before giving in to life. Thus th e familiar parallel of the aube's and its áme's precarious beginnings again revealed th e fleetin g moment' s fragility : 'c e réel est encoré en equilibre avec le ríen de tous ses songes.' And this precarious equilibrium of being and nothingness, this moment of becoming, was in the following sequence, 'Moments,' image d by the scale with its two pans in balance. 'Moments' wit h its six fragments, al l from differen t period s o f the poet's creative life an d eac h of a truly instantaneous nature, is a characteristic dawn sequence , though thre e of the fragment s ar e named after cities , reminding us of Valéry's substantial group of prose po ems celebrating cities he loved. 'Nice' introduced the image of the balance - 'l'homme pese ce qu'il voit et en est pesé' - thu s figuring the dynamic state of equilibrium of opposing force s which distinguishe s the aubades. Our poem's moi, moreover, was a poet-persona whos e

Conclusión 12

9

musings - 'j e pense au poéme de l'Intellect' - called to mind the very numerous references to a 'poem of the Intellect / scattered throughout the oeuvre. In discussing Valéry's notions of this ideal poem, we re cognized that the fines t realizatio n of its concepts were i n these very aubades themselves, one o f their central themes being 'la sensibilité de l'intellect.' The second fragment fixed a moment which somehow implie d both being and nothingness, fo r it was puré becoming ('Aub e - ce n'est pas l'aube') a moment both initia l and final , while the third piece was again the sketc h of a city: Grasse awakening at dawn unde r a miraculous light snow lef t b y the night. The fourth fragmen t recreate d the lovely image and movemen t of the swallow's sweeping flight , 'un e belle hirondelle bleue et or' visitin g the poet's room and thus interchanging darkness and light , inside and outside , an d pivoting on the moment's dichotomy. The last two fragments established th e pastoral mood appropriate for th e poet-persona's reflection s o n Vergil's bucolic mode, thus tying the ending of the sequence to its beginning with a poet's meditation on poetry: 'U n regar d que je voudrais bien definir. ' The firs t o f the fou r Tetit s Poémes abstraits,' on e o f Valéry's most accomplished morning sequences, capture d a pre-dawn, for 'Avant toute Chose' evoked th e moment before the reappearance of both outer and inne r worlds. Again , the one reflected th e other: while the outer universe was still contained i n its pre-Edenic futurity, th e mind was in a state 'qui precede toute s les pensées particuliéres,' and Táme jouit de sa lumiére sans objets.' The rich virtuality and charged imminence of the universa l moi an d it s monde a t their privileged moment again recalled the universal hero, Léonard, of the 'Note et digression/ an d th e idea l of 'l'homme d e l'esprit [qui ] doit se réduire sciemment a un refu s d'étr e quoi que ce soit.' Our poem' s Stimmung o f mystic detachment from th e world called for 'les mots les plus mystérieux et les plus téméraires/ th e languag e and Stimme of prayer familia r fro m othe r morning poems . We found i n the frag ment, in fact , some of the very images and phrase s fro m othe r au bades, for , as in prayer, these become formulaic in a ritual observance celebrated dail y by a poet who asserted 'j'étai s fait pour chanter Matines.' 'L'Unique' stressed th e parado x of the uniquenes s of each on e of these uncountable dawns , th e miracl e of the firs t tim e for a thousandth time , which is also that of art and love . This paradox links the text to many others in the oeuvre:

130 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubades Tout va done accomplir son acte solennel De toujours reparaitr e incomparable et chaste, Et de restituer la tombe enthousiast e Au gracieux état du rire universel ('L a Jeune Parque/ o i, p 106).

The innocent and renewe d visió n o f an oí d world is one of the majo r themes o f the Introduction á la Méthode, a s well as o f some of the Dia logues and lyri c poetry. It is the very secret o f poetry itself , for th e poem, like each dawn, rises, phoenix-like , again and agai n from it s own ashes . In celebrating renewal, 'L'Unique' pointe d t o one of the mind's basic , miraculous , saving laws: forgetfulness. Th e mol mus t oblitérate its past so that anticipation and expectation may be new and unique each time. And w e found this state of anticipation, when a virginal, refreshed morning-mind waits like a bride for its Master Notion, celebrated repeatedly not merely in Valéry's prose poetry , but in much of the lyri c poetry a s well. In the mysteriou s language announced in the preceding fragment , our poe m the n suggested th e descent (int o forgetfulness an d non-being ) an d retur n o f the self , its diurnal death and resurrection . The poem's images, moreover, recalled Sémiramis, 'reine-roi,' builde r of cities and temples , bor n into , rising toward , an d finall y dyin g i n th e Sun's embrace. For Sémiramis is one of Valéry's symbols for the spirit's aspiratio n to transcen d Time, while paradoxically utterly dependent o n it. 9 Our fragment' s chiasmatic sentences agai n stressed thi s pervading tensión . The tensión o f transcendence and imprisonment , o f a self bot h i n the world and beholdin g itsel f fro m th e 'outside/ as it were, was the theme of 'Accueil du jour. ' Here the moi-doubk wa s both actor an d spectator as it stepped into the new day: 'j'entre en scéne dans mo n regard.' Th e tensión o f the whole fragment wa s that of 'étre' an d 'connaítre,' of the moi's anxiou s fear o f being engulfed in th e world' s existence on the one hand, an d of its temptation to transcendence into puré no-thingness o n the other. Thus the poem objectifie d th e Valéryan theme o f the opposition o f 'esprit' and 'vie ' i n suggestin g the anguish and aspiration s of the transcending mind , while at the same time painting an d passionatel y celebratin g the beauty of the mortal world: 'sur un toi t rose et blond dorment quatr e colombes; j e songe vaguement á la sensation d e leur chair dans l a plume douce et chaude posee sur l'argil e tiéde, 6 Vie...' The closing fragment o f the sequence , 'L a Rentrée,' on e of Valéry's rare prose poems about nightfall , introduce d a feminine presence. An d we noted that , while dawn's elevation is always uniqu e and tha t of an unequaled, solitar y moi, the oncoming night's weari-

Conclusión 13

1

ness was shared: ou r persona addresse d hi s evening reflection s t o the beloved, and the hour's terrors were projected into her - 'l a fin du jour est femme.' Ye t the fundamenta l onenes s o f the 'male ' and o f the 'female' within th e self , one o f the theme s of the ' A BC' sequence, of 'Laure/ and o f other aubades, wa s symbolized in our fragment's ending by the protective embrace shielding both love r and belove d fro m the threats of darkness and death . In the firs t fragmen t o f 'Méditation avant pensée/ w e recognize d the opening, 'Avan t toute Chose/ o f 'Petits Poémes abstraits.' Thi s mobile fragment becam e the longest of the new sequence . The second fragment deplore d th e mind's promiscuity , its inconstancies, and its impurity: 'toujours, tu préfére s le hasard a u vide, et le chaos au rien/ a complaint familiar fro m th e Cahiers an d sometime s even voiced in poems, suc h as the prose poe m 'L'Amateu r de poémes.' The mind in its fickleness will run of f wit h any notio n me t by chance, become the slave of its current 'Idee maitresse'! Thi s complaint against the haphazar d activit y of the min d is the natura l obverse of Valéry's repeated celebratio n of the self's poised virtualit y at dawn, before the day' s demands hav e forced th e moi int o the finalit y o f a chosen identity , and chose n actions . Our thir d Méditation lamented the mind's gourmandise, at once destructive and constructive , its 'instinct de dévorer .. . de digérer définitivement le s choses.' For the 'esprit/ like the organism, feeds on th e world, transforming its raw material into its own substance. 10 In thus associating the mental with the libidinal, Tesprit' with hunger and sex, our tex t pointed agai n to the fundamenta l interdependence o f corps, esprit, an d monde: C E M . And, again, the mo i was torn between refusa l an d acceptance , fastin g and feasting , aspirin g after a n idea l transcendence of the world on which it must, however, fee d t o live. The brief 'Considération matinale, ' another mobile fragment , again presented th e 'moi universel,' a self befor e th e day's divisions . But the sel f wa s here seen fro m th e outside , a s an object , and no t animated from withi n by a first-person voice. Thus the 'Considéra tion' lacked the intensit y of other aubades ; it s moi, moreover, re mained outside the awakening world, 'en dehors du monde,' just as that world remaine d outside the fragment. 'A Grasse,' whic h I have chosen as the culminating sequence o f th e prose aubades, i s on the contrary a hymn t o the world by a voice that is part of it. In this poem, corps, esprit, and monde ar e i n a harmonious equilibrium. As the human sel f accepts the world, the world become s humanized, an d a s Man accepts Nature's mortality , he leaves his immortal mark on nature. In celebrating human industr y in the cultiva-

132 Th

e Rhetoric of Valéry's Prose Aubade s

tor of the earth and linkin g agriculture to architecture and art , th e poet integrales poetry with the general huma n endeavou r an d the individual self wit h generations of men. The matutinal mor here reaches out not t o transcend, but t o embrace life and al l mankind, an d th e final fragmen t i n vers libre i s the poet' s offering i n th e communa l ritual observance celebrating a new dawn, sung in by morning bells and birds and th e poem of reconciliation. But as we conclude our readin g o f these aubades, w e do so without a 'concluding ' poem. Fo r Valéry's morning pros e poems do not for m a determínate structure or a closed cycle , but reappea r agai n an d again, always renewed, in his poetic universe, lik e the sun itsel f through th e numberless dawn s o f the mutable world, like the immortal spirit o f man throug h numberless generation s o f mortal men. Ou r texts constitute but a fragment o f a larger whole, composed i n par t of other morning piece s dispersed throughout Valéry' s work, both tha t which is published an d tha t which i s still hidden. 11 Thus, like the oeuvre of which they are a part, they remain 'open/ and w e read thes e fragments in the light and i n the shadow o f texts yet to be read.

Notes

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTIO N 1 Cf . Octave Nadal , A Mesure haute (Paris : Mercure de Franc e 1964) 229-46, Toémes en prose.' 2 Suzann e Bernard , L e Póeme en prose de Baudelaire jusqu'a no s jours (Paris: Librairie Nizet 1959) . Mme Agathe Rouart-Valéry has just published a n edition o f a collection o f Valéry's prose poems, Alphabet (Paris : Blaizot 1976); an d sh e is presently preparin g a n edition o f Poésie brute. These book s wil l n o doubt stimulate interest i n Valéry' s prose poetry . 3 Pau l Valéry, Cahiers, n, ed. Judith Robinson (Paris : Gallimard 1974; i, 1973 ) 1261 . Al l quotations fro m Valéry' s Cahiers wil l be fro m thi s edition, unless otherwise indicated , and note d b y page number . 4 Charle s Baudelaire , Petits Poemes en prose (Paris : Garnier 1962) 7 . 5 Cf . my A n Anatomy of Poesis: The Prose Poems ofSte'phane Mallarme' (Chape l Hill: North Carolina Studie s in the Romance Languages and Literatures 1976). 6 Fo r a recent luci d discussion o f the 'Illuminations ' an d thei r relation t o Rimbaud's oeuvre, cf. Robert Greer Cohn , Th e Poetry o f Rimbaud (Princeton: Princeton Universit y Press 1973 ) 243-397 . 7 J.-K . Huysmans, A Rebours (Paris : Editions Pasquelle 1968 ) 244 . 8 Lettres á quelques-uns (Paris : Gallimard 1952) 26. 9 Paul Valéry Oeuvres, \\, ed. Jea n Hytier (Paris : Gallimard 1960; i , 1957 ) 1386-92. Al l quotations from Valéry' s work wil l be from thi s edition, unless otherwis e indicated , and note d b y page number . 10 Cf . Germaine Bree, 'The Break-up of Traditional Genres : Bataille , Leiris, Michaud/ Bucknell Review xx i (Fall-Winte r 1973) . Als o Julia Kristeva, La Re'volution du langage poe'tique (Paris : Editions du Seui l 1974 ) 289ff .

134 Note

s t o pages 7-1 3

11 Cf . Florenc e de Lussy , La Cénese d e '¡a jeune Parque' de Paul Vale'ry (Paris : Minard 1975 ) fo r an excellen t recent study o f the gradua l growth o f 'La Jeune Parque' out of its constituent - sometime s 'mobile ' - fragments. 12 On e i s reminded tha t Mallarm é used variou s fragments in a mobile wa y in Dívagations, eg, the 'J e dis: une fleur!... ' whic h appears in 'Cris e de vers' a s well as in th e 'Avant-dir e au Traite' du Verbe.' W e recall, moreover, tha t the unboun d (sepárate ) pages o f Mallarmé's projected 'Livre ' (which Valér y probably did no t know) , provided a mobility that could alter interpretation , an d thu s constitut e a ful l exploitatio n of the 'mobil e fragment' i n modern literature . CHAPTER TWO : PURS DRAMES

1 Pau l Valéry, 'Purs Drames/ Entretiens politiques et litte'raires i v 2 4 (mar s 1892) 102-4 ; André Gide-Paul Vale'ry Correspondance 1890-1942, ed. Robert Mallet (Paris : Gallimard 1955) 147 . 2 Octav e Nadal , Turs Drames,' Cahiers du Sud (avri l 1957 ) 368-70 ; Nadal , A Mesure haute 237 . 3 Gide-Valery Correspondance 150 . 4 Fo r a n excellen t brief treatmen t of the theme , cf. James R. Lawler, The Language ofFrench Symbolism (Princeton : Princeton University Press 1969) 185-217 , 'Valéry' s "Pureté".' 5 Gide-Valéry Correspondance 68 . 6 Rimbaud , Oeuvres Completes (Paris : Gallimard 1963) 193 , 195 . 7 Oeuvres Completes d e Ste'phane Mallarmé (Paris : Gallimard 1945 ) 67 . 8 Rimbaud , Oeuvres 175. 9 Ibid. 194. 10 A t the same tim e Gide was elaborating hi s Symbolist garden i n hi s 'Traite du Narciss e (Théori e du Symbole) / dedicate d t o Valéry. 'Chaste Edén! Jardín des Idees!' André Gide, Romans (Paris : Gallimard 1958) 5 . 11 I n a letter t o Mallarmé of April 1891 , Valér y writes: 'L a poési e m'apparaít comm e une explication du Mond e délicat e et belle, conte nue dan s un e musiqu e singuliére et continuelle.' Lettres ii quelques-uns 46. 12 Cf . '"Au commencement était la Pable" c e qu'il fau t entendr e ainsi : O n appelle Pable tou t commencement: origines, cosmogonies, mythologies... ' (o u p 796). 13 A possible sourc e her e i s Poe's 'Poetic Principie, ' Complete Tales and Poems (Ne w York: Vintage Books 1975) 905-6 : 'I t has been my purpose to suggest that , while this Principie itself is , strictly and simply , th e Huma n Aspiration for Supernal Beauty , the manifestatio n of the Principi e is

Notes to pages 13-2 6 13

5

always found i n an elevating excitement of the Soul .. . or o f that Truth which i s the satisfactio n o f the Reason. ' 14 Fo r a conceptual exposition o f Valéry's notion o f artistic visión, cf. Introduction á la Méthode d e Léonard d e Vinci, a veritable treatise on th e phenomenology o f (artistic ) perceptio n (oí , esp. p p 1165ff.) . 15 Th e 'une nue' o f Vévapore au cálice du ciel , une nue ' constitute s a marvelous Mallarméan ambiguity. 16 'La s de l'amer repos.../ Mallarmé , Oeuvre 36. 17 Thi s ending ha d cause d Valér y much difficulty . H e writes to Gide: 'La fin es t absurde, impenetrabl e - m' a ennuyé beaucoup.' Conespondance Gide-Vale'ry 147 . 18 Mallarmé , Oeuvres 51 . 19 'Le s Vieilles Ruelles' of 1889, 'Page s Inédites' o f 1891 (oí , pp 1599-1602 ) and 'Un e Chambre Conjecturale / posthumousl y published i n L e Fígaro Littéraire (1 5 octobre 1971) . Cf. my ' A Dialectical Triad of Three Early Prose Poems by Paul Valéry: "Les Vieille s Ruelles," "Page s Inédites" and "Pur s Drames"/ t o appear i n the Kentucky Romance Quarterly. 20 Gide-Vale'ry Conespondance 43 .

21 22 23 24

Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid.

44. 59. 63. 83.

25 Fo r an excellen t English translation of 'Purs Drames,' cf. Paul Valéry: Poems i n th e Rough, ed. Jackso n Mathews, Bollingen Series XL V 2 (Princeton: Princeton Universit y Press 1969) 213-15 . CHAPTER THREE : FRAGMENT S

1 Fo r a detailed exposition o n Valéry' s views o n language and thought , cf. Jürgen Schmidt-Radefeldt, Paul Valéry linguiste dans le s 'Cahiers' (Paris : Klincksieck 1970 ) esp. 34-3 8 and 169-71 . 2 Jame s R. Lawler, Th e Poet as Analyst (Berkeley : University of California Press 1974 ) 180 . I n this chapter, pp 166-200 , Professor Lawler gives a most sensitive cióse readin g of 'A 1'Aurore'; his chapter 'J e pense..., je sens...,' 201-29, includes an equall y fin e treatmen t of 'L'Oiseau cruel. ' 3 Cf . 'Introduction biographique' (oí , p 41): '191 8 ... juin: il quitte Paris pour suivre M. Lebey qui se refugie á ITsle-Maniére, dans l a Manche. ... 10 juillet... il lui envoie [ á Mme Paul Valéry] aussi c e poéme ['Le Platane'], écri t "dans cette riche región o ü l'arbre pousse comme l'herbe .. . oü la puissance végétale est comme inépuisable..."' 4 Berne-Jeffroy , Pre'sence d e Valéry (Paris : Pión 1944) , Tropos m e concernant,' 3-61. Als o in on, pp 1505-36 .

136 Note

s t o pages 27-3 2

5 D'Ariane á Zoé: Alphabetgalant e t sentimental (Paris : Librairie de France 1930). 'Laure' here appears betwee n Colette' s 'Divine ' and Pau l Morand' s 'Marión/ L a Nouvelle Revue Francflise xxxv i 8-9 (janvie r 1931) . 6 Edmé e de l a Rochefoucauld, Valéry's friend an d commentato r o f th e Cahiers, E n Lisant les Cahiers d e Paul Vale'ry m (Paris : Editions Universitaires 1967) 73-74 , quotes fro m Cahier xx m - whic h dates fro m 1940 , the 'defeat,' a time which Valér y spent at the Charmettes , i n Dinard, work ing on his 'Faust ni ' - as follows: A la ville des Charmettes .. . Valéry trouve u n peti t volum e de Charlotte Bronté, Jane Eyre, évocateur d e Cette: "J'a i lu cette histoire en 84 au plu s tar d - i l y a 56 ans au moins, et je n'en avai s gardé qu e le souvenir d'un e chose trop trist e - e n relation avec la maison d u quai de l'Esplanade, ave c le petit saló n .. . - á cote était le "grand salón" et ce piano (d e 1840) qu'elle [Valéry's mother ] n e touchait jamáis, qui avait été celui de sa soeur Laur a de Grassi, mort e en 1848 du cholera - tre s jeune - qui abhorrait le temps perdu, etc . Another o f Valéry's friend s an d commentators , Lucienn e Julien Cain, in Trois Essais sur Paul Vale'ry (Paris : Gallimard 1958) 57-8 , evoke s th e same incident an d 'l e grand salón , toujours fermé, [qui ] contenait le piano á queue su r leque l avait joué sa tante, Laura de Grassi, morte á seize an s du cholera... ' 7 Cf . my 'Th e White Night of "Agathe": A Fragment by Paul Valéry/ Essays i n French Literature 12 (Nedlands : The Universit y of Wester n Australia 1975 ) 37-58 . 8 Laura' s fadin g image , th e perfum e of her dresses , her hair , rising from a past lon g dead, recall s the Hérodiade o f the 'Ouvertur e ancienne / 'Un e voix, du pass é longu e évocation/ and 'L e parfum de s cheveux endor mis.' Oeuvres 42, 43. 9 Fo r a sensitive discussio n o f the them e of autumn i n Valéry , cf. Christine M. Crow , Paul Valéry: Consciousness o f Nature (Cambridge : Cambridge University Press 1972) 142-5 . 10 'Laure ' is translated int o English in Pau l Valéry: Poems i n the Rough (Princeton: Princeton University Press 1969) 235-6 . CHAPTER FOUR : THE TRILOGY A B C

1

Commerce: Cahiers trimestriel s 5 (automn e 1925) 4-14 . I n 'Introductio n biographique' (oí , p 48), we find unde r 1924 : 'I I s'occupe d e la prochain e publication d e la revue Commerce, cahiers trimestriels qu'il dirige avec Valéry Larbaud , et León Pau l Fargue . - Septembre : I I séjourne á

Notes t o pages 32- 3 13

7

Deauville chez l a princesse d e Bassiano, fondatric e de cette revue. ' Commerce wa s somewha t short-lived , fro m 192 4 to 1932 . For an Englis h translation of the pros e poems 'ABC, ' and o f many of the prose aubades , cf. Paul Valéry, Poems i n th e Rough (Princeton: Princeton University Pres s 1969 ) 223-8. I n the Note s t o ' A BC,' p 319 , th e edito r in forms u s a s follows : 'In th e 1920' s Valéry was plannin g a collection of prose poems t o be title d Alphabet. The A B C poems wer e writte n fo r that series, whic h wa s neve r completed. In the Valéryanum ( a collection of Valéry's published work s mad e by Julien P . Monod, an d no w i n th e Bibliothéque Jacques Doucet i n Paris ) ther e are severa l prose poems i n typescript probabl y written fo r Alphabet. They are Atiente "Waiting" ; Midi "Midday" ; L e Bain "The Bath" ; Laure "Laura" ; L'Unique "Th e Unique"; Accueil du jour "Greetin g th e Day" ; and L a Rentrée "Th e Re turn".' Some o f these piece s d o appea r i n th e Ple'iade edition ; some have been publishe d by Valéry in othe r series , suc h as 'L'Unique,' 'Accueil d u jour,' an d 'La Rentrée' unde r th e headin g 'Petits Poémes abstraits' i n La Revue de France i n 1932 . In bot h th e 195 6 and th e 197 1 Valér y exposi tions at th e Bibliothéque Nationale, there wa s on displa y an autograp h Cahier o f these poems , with the followin g not e (195 6 Catalogue #313): ' A B C ' Cahier autographe: 'Suit e d e courts "poémes en prose " commencant chacun par un e lettr e différente, e t disposés suivant l'ordr e alphabétique. lis évoquent le s diverses heures d e l a journée. Les trois premiers on t par u séparémen t dan s l a revue Commerce, un autr e parmi les "Petits poémes abstraits," publié s en 193 2 par la Revue de France. En 1939 Pau l Valéry avait songé á publier l'ensemble e n un e editio n de luxe, dont l a maquette avai t été entreprise. La guerre l'empéch a d e mener so n proje t á bien.' 2 Pau l Valéry , Morceaux choisis (Paris : Gallimard 1930) 51-2 . 3 Th e poem's opening sentence , with th e change fro m 'sommeil ' t o 'soleil' - 'A u commencement sera le Soleil' - ha s become th e title of the free-verse renditio n o f a fragmen t o f the poe m i n th e 'Poémes ' section of Histoires brise'es (on, pp461-2). 4 Cf . Rober t Greer Cohn , Toumrd th e Poems o f Malí armé (Berkeley : University of California Pres s 1965 ) especially 269-70. Professor Cohn discusse s these ' A BC' S of Poetry' i n an articl e by tha t title, in Comparative Literature 2 (1962) 187-91 . 5 Cf . Nicole Celeyrette-Pietri, 'L e Jeu d u je, ' i n Paul Valéry Contemporain (Paris: Klincksieck 1974) 11-25 , for a discussion o f the 'interio r dialogue' in Valéry , and i n the 'ABC ' poem(s) . Mme Celeyrette-Pietri agai n dis cusses th e firs t o f these thre e poems i n 'A u Commencemen t ser a l e som meil: quelque s réflexion s sur u n poém e en prose ' in Cahiers Paul Valéry I: Poétique e t poésie (Paris : Gallimard 1975 ) 205-24 .

138 Note

s t o pages 33-4 3

6 Fo r a recent discussio n o f th e 'insula r self/ cf . Ludmilla M . Wills, L e Regará contemplatif chez Vale'ry e t Mallarmé (Amsterdam : Rodopi N V 1974) 81-6. 7 I I n'est pour ravi r un mond e De blessure s i profonde Qui n e soit a u ravisseu r Une fécond e blessure, Et son propr e san g l'assur e D'étre l e vrai possesseur (oí , p 113) . 8 Marce l Raymond, Paul Valéry e t la tentation de l'esprit (Neuchatel : A la Baconniére 1948) 55-9 , in a brief discussion o f the 'ABC ' fragments, notes the shif t fro m firs t t o third person i n th e fragment s V an d 'B.' 9 Cf . Lawler, Th e Poet as Analyst, 135- 6 an d 204-6 , for a brief discussio n o f 'c.' 'CEM le présent es t l a liaison de l a sensation corporelle ave c l a percep tion des choses environnante s e t avec celle de la production psychique . I I est done perception d'u n accor d C E M des liaisons entre ee s constituants ' (ci, pl!41). 10 'L'Unique / 'Petit s Poéme s abstraits / L a Revue de France (janvie r 1915 ) 48-9. 11 Recal l the frequen t sketches i n th e Cahiers o f the uroboros , the snake , or double snake , swallowin g it s tail. 12 Cf . Hugette Laurenti , Paul Vale'ry e t le the'átre (Paris : Gallimard 1973) 112-17 for Valéry's admiration of the liturgy. 13 Thi s dialectic of darkness an d ligh t i s well seen b y Jean Levaillant, 'Paul Valéry et l a lumiére/ Association Internationale des Eludes francflises, Cahiers 2 2 (May 1968) 187 : 'Ainsi , l a lumiére qui donne l e sens universel á ce qui est, n'exist e pa s sans l a vie qu'elle es t capable de fair e connaítre, mai s qu'elle reste incapabl e de fair e comprendre. ' 14 J.-L . Faivre, Paul Valéry e t l e théme d e la lumiére (Paris : Lettres Moderne s 1975). In th e firs t chapte r th e author discusses severa l o f Valéry's morning prose poems, as well as 'Aurore.' CHAPTER FIVE : TROIS REVEILS

1 Paul Vale'ry vivant (Marseilles : Cahiers du Su d 1946 ) 273-6. For an English translation of 'Trois Réveils / cf . the fina l volum e o f the Collected Works ofPaul Vale'ry i n th e Bollinge n Series (Princeton : Princeto n University Press 1975), vol. xv, Moi 15-18 . 2 Cf . o i, p 17 . In Paul Valéry vivant, betwee n pp 5 6 and 57 , is the reproduc tion o f a photo of Valéry in th e unifor m of the 122n d Regiment, taken i n 1889.

Notes to pages 43-5 5 13

9

3 Huysmans , A Rebours 244. 4 Cf . my 'Mallarméa n and Othe r Affinitie s i n an Earl y Pros e Poe m by Paul Valéry : "Une Chambr e conjecturale"/ Th e French Review, 2 \i (1977). 5 Ho w 'imprisoned ' th e young poe t fel t durin g the beginning of his 'ser vice militaire' is evident from a n undated letter to Albert Dugrin, Lettres á quelques-uns 11 , whic h the editor desígnales as 'qui doi t avoir été écrite á la fin de l'anné e 1889 , peu apré s l e debut d u servic e mili taire/ and i n which Valér y says: 'Voil á que j'ai deja u n moi s d'escalvage, u n moi s d e douloureu x sacrifice á la Patrie! ... Pour moi , la Patrie n'est pa s sous le s plis d'un drapea u n i une terr e limitée; ma pa trie, ce sont me s idees, me s revés, e t ceux-lá sont me s compatriotes qui les détiennent avec moi.' 6 Robinson , Cahiers i , p 223 . Both parts o f our secon d 'réveil ' are together , spaced int o three paragraphs, occupying pp 9 9 to 10 0 of the facsímil e edition o f Paul Valéry Cahiers xxvm (1943-4 ) (Paris Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique 1961) . 7 Cf . Huguett e Laurenti, Paul Valéry et le théátre (Paris: Gallimard 1973) 260: 'Le dédoublement qu'impliqu e la connaissance fai t qu e l a "vie consciente" est théátre.' 8 Cf . Román Jakobson, Questions de poe'tique (Paris : Editions du Seui l 1973 ) 120: 'Toute expressio n verbal e stylise et transforme, en u n certai n sens, l'événement qu'elle décrit.' This whole chapter, 'Qu'est-c e que la poésie?', p p 113-26 , i n discussing th e interrelationshi p of the poetry an d the Journa l of the poe t Macha , deals with the fundamenta l problem of Dichtung una Wahrheit. 9 Cf . Robinson, Cahiers i, p p 22 2 and passim. The seventy-three-year-ol d Valéry ha d jus t undergone a serious illness . 10 Ebauches de 'Mon Faust/ i n L a Table Ronde 1 (Paris: Les Editions d u Centre 1944). 11 I n th e origina l Cahier (CNRS , Vol . xxvm) , this sentence i s accentuated by three vertical marginal lines. And, curiously, the entry followin g our 'réveil' is annotated 'Faust-Solitaire. ' CHAPTER S1X : THREE MATINS

1 L a Revue de Frunce 1 4 (1 5 décembre 1926) 762-6 . 2 Fo r a n Englis h translatio n o f 'Matin, ' cf . Paul Valéry : Poems in th e Rough (Princeton: Princeto n Universit y Pres s 1969 ) 167-9 . 3 W e recall here that th e ' A B c' prose aubades wer e publishe d i n the revie w Commerce (cf . note 1 , Chapter 2) , whose title has it s source i n Saint-Joh n Perse's epic poem, 'Anabase/ Oeuvres completes (Paris: Gallimard 1972 )

140 Note

s t o pages 55-6 4

93: '...j'arrétais sur le s marches déserts ce pur commerc e de mon ame, parmi vous. ' 4 I n 'Répons e premiére / Valér y says: 'l a premiér e perception est , avant tout e chose, cell e de lumiere e t de Voir' ( c u, p 199) . 5 Th e structural refinement of both thi s and th e opening sentenc e ar e subsequent t o the 191 3 Cahier fragment . 6 Thi s moment and it s verbalization recall a similar one fro m Rimbaud' s 'Déserts de l'amour / whos e moi i s 'emú jusqu' á la mort par l e murmure du lai t du matin... ' Oeuvres completes 171 . 7 A n Englis h translatio n of this 'Matin' is to be foun d i n Poems in th e Rough 171. 8 Cf . Paul Valéry, Cahiers vi u (Paris : Centre National de l a Recherche Scientifiquel961), 259 . 9 W e should here like to draw attentio n to a discussion by Jacques Derrida of th e 'sources ' of Valéry, even those 'écartées.' I n 'Qual Quelle: le s sources d e Valéry / i n Marges d e la philosophie (Paris : Editions de Minuit 1972) 325-63 , th e author takes as point o f departure Valéry' s prose poem 'Louange s de l'eau,' written in 193 5 fo r la Source Perrier; and h e points t o certain hantises de ¡'origine i n Valér y which are manifest , i t appears, unde r th e sign of water. 10 Fo r a n Englis h translation of this 'Matin,' cf. Poems i n th e Rough 66-8 . 11 I t is for this reason tha t Valéry subjected language to the mos t critical considerations, whic h lie beyond th e limit s of this study. He reminds us : 'II fau t bie n penser á ceci: le langage a presque tou t fait , e t entre autres choses i l a fai t l'esprit ' (ci , p 405). CHAPTER SEVEN : REPRIS E

1 Fo r a n Englis h translation of 'Reprise/ cf . Paul Valéry: Poems i n the Rough (Princeton : Princeton Universit y Press 1969) 171-3 . 2 Th e allusion to Acts 17: 28 - 'ca r en lui nous avon s la vie, le mouvement, et l'étre. C'es t c e qu'ont di t aussi quelques-uns de vos poetes: Nou s sommes d e sa race...' - i s obvious an d ironic. 3 Jacque s Derrida, D e la Grammatologie (Paris : Editions de Minuit 1967) 95: 'La trace est en effet l'origine absolue du sens en general. Ce qui revient á diré, encoré une fois, qu'il n'y a pas d'origine absolue du sens en general. La trace est la différence qu i ouvr e l'apparaitre e t l a signification.' 4 Thi s prose poem wa s printed posthumousl y by J.-P. Monod i n the for m of a 'nain' (i n 64) in twelv e exemplaires, on e o f which i s in th e Bibliothéque Nationale (Specia l Collections). There it bears th e title: 'Paul Valér y Invocation.' I t was furthe r publishe d i n 195 3 i n Ar s Specta-

Notes t o pages 64-8 4 14

1

cíes unde r the titl e 'U n Poéme inédit de Pau l Valéry.' Its rhythm recalls the 'versets Claudeliens. ' 5 Th e lectures given by Valéry , wh o wa s appointed t o the Chair for Poetry at th e Collég e d e France in 1937 , wer e reproduce d i n Yggdrasil, no's . 9 (décembre 1937) , t o 34 (2 5 février 1939) . Ou r quotatio n is fro m th e lecture given on 1 7 December 1937 , no . 9 , p 144 . 6 S . Yeschua, '"Substitutions" et poétique che z Valéry' i n Cahiers Paul Valéry. 1 : Poétique et poésie (París : Gallimard 1975) 145-6 . 7 Yggdrasil, no . 9 , pp 141-2 . 8 Tw o versions o f this piece wer e publishe d posthumousl y i n L a NouveUe Revue Francaise (aoü t 1971) 12-16 , wit h several 'Alphabet ' prose poems. 9 Thi s expectation of and readines s fo r th e decisive event recalls 'Abeille' (oí, p 118) . CHAPTER EIGHT : NOTE S D'AURORE

1 Cf . Paul Valéry, Analects (Princeton : Princeton Universit y Press 1970 ) 462-4, fo r an Englis h translatio n of 'Notes d'aurore. ' 2 Cf . 'La Jeune Parque's' magnificen t aube : 'Fe u ver s qui s e souléve un e vierge de sang/Sous le s espéces d'o r d'u n sei n reconnaissant! ' (oí , pllO). CHAPTER NINE : MOMENT S

1 I n th e Bollinge n Series, th e translatio n of 'Moments' appear s i n Poems in the Rough (Princeton : Princeton University Press 1969) 37-9 . 2 Valér y visited Nice frequently , especiall y from 193 3 on , whe n h e be came 'administrateu r d u Centr e méditerranéen ' ther e (oí , p 59). The poet fulfille d thi s functio n unti l 1941 , whe n th e Vich y government divested hi m o f it. 3 Mauric e Toesca, 'Pau l Valéry : Agathe,' NouveUe Revue Francpise (mai!957) 911 . 4 Cf . Marce l Raymond, Paul Valéry e t la tentation de l'esprit (Neuchatel : A la Baconniére 1948). 5 Rimbaud , who wante d to radically reshape languag e into hi s instrument, understood, a s did Mallarmé and Valéry , that the poet, a t the sam e time, might well be the instrument of the language which speaks throug h him: 'J e pense: o n devrai t diré on m e pense ... Je est un autre . Tan t pi s pour l e bois qu i se trouve violón' (Oeuvres 249). 6 A possible sourc e fo r 'le Zaimph' and it s associations migh t be Flaubert's Salammbó.

142 Note

s t o pages 84-9 3

7 Ou r 'Moment ' o f surprise an d deligh t at th e snow i n the morning sun recalls 'Neige': Quel silente, battu d'u n simpl e bruit de béche!... Je m'éveille, attendu par cett e neige fraich e Qui m e saisit au creux de ma chére chaleur. Oh! combien d e flocons, pendan t m a douce absence , Durent le s sombres cieu x perdre tout e l a nuit! ...(o i, pp 325-6). 8 Cf . Christine M. Crow, Paul Valéry: Consciousness of Nature (Cambridge : Cambridge University Press 1972) , especially 'Livin g Things' 104-6 , fo r the presenc e o f birds i n Valéry's poetry. CHAPTER TEN: PETITS POEMES ABSTRAITS

1 Pau l Valéry, 'Petits Poéme s abstraits / L a Revue de Frunce (janvie r 1932 ) 47-52. 2 Fo r Englis h translations of th e poems , cf. Poems i n th e Rough (Princeton : Princeton Universit y Press 1969 ) 61-2 for 'Avant toute Chose/ pp 237-42 for th e other thre e pieces . 3 Tha t Valéry himself conceived i t so is evident fro m th e followin g Cahier entry about these poems: ' A l'Académi e Bazin m e tire á part et á mon immense étonnement m e fai t d e grands compliment s sur me s Poémes Abstraits d e la Revue de France\ L e ton mystiqu e de ees pieces - a dü l'impressionner. J e tombe des núes . L'obscurité d e ees essais dont j e suis fort pe u satisfai t n e l' a pa s rebut e n i choqué!...' ( c i, p 271) . 4 'Agnostic ' mus t be used wit h caution concerning Valéry . In a 1936 Cahier entry, h e says: 'O n m' a di t agnostique -Mais on l'entend : celu i qui croit que tel probléme es t insoluble - tandisqu e j e dis bien plu s souvent : celui qu i croit que le probléme n' a poin t de vérifícation ' (cu , p 667). I mean 'agnostic ' a s here applie d t o Valéry in th e sense of his attitude being 'noncommittal. ' 5 Valér y likened the mind's cyclica l movement ('j e n e sais comment batir ee s définitions de fonction, phase, cycle qui permettraient d e suivre le s variations multiformes de l'homme. Cependant j e sens ees notions' t e i, p 893]) t o the transformatio n of a substance fro m on e stat e t o another i n the cycle of a closed thermodynami c system; indeed , the laws of thermodynamic s became hi s favourit e instrument of psychologica l analysis. Cf. Judith Robinson, Analyse d e l'esprit dans le s Cahiers de Valéry (Paris: José Corti 1963 ) esp . 64ff .

Notes t o pages 93-10 5 14

3

6 Tropo s sur l a poésie' ( o i, p p 1371-8) . I n thi s crucial text, Valéry also defines th e key notion of the 'univer s poétique / an d elabórale s the classical comparison o f poetry t o dance. H e makes here, moreover , hi s most explicit statement abou t th e function s of 'forme' an d 'fond ' in poetry. 7 Thi s psychological experience appear s almos t universa l in th e excepcional creative individual, from th e 'Nigh t of Pascal' and Descartes ' similar crisi s to Mallarmé's 'Crise d e Tournon/ an d finall y Valéry' s own 'Nuit d e Genes ' of 1892, which resulted literall y i n a death o f poetry before i t could b e reborn afte r som e twenty year s of ascetic abstention and absence , 'l a périod e aigüe. ' 8 Pau l Valéry, Cahiers (Paris : Centre Nationa l de l a Recherche Scientifique 1961 ) Vols . xiv , p 574 , xxvi , p 291 . Ned Baste t discusses th e opposi tion of Tesprit' to the cyclical operation of nature, of which it partakes, in 'Faust e t l e cycle' in Entretíens su r Paul Valéry (L a Haye et Paris : Mouto n 1968) 115-28 . 9 Th e 'bel Aujourd'hui qu e tu es - Aujourd'hui qu i m'entoures' recall s Mallarmé's 'L e vierge, l e vivace et le bel aujourd'hui,' Oculares 67 . 10 On e o f the mos t accomplishe d o f these i s 'Sur l a Jetee de Cannes,' whic h Valéry wrot e i n 193 6 fo r L e Rotary (no . 87, mars, 9-10). In thi s piece h e evokes al l th e refulgenc e of the sunse t ove r th e harbour , befor e its fina l decomposition. 11 Th e vocabular y here is strongly reminiscen t of Baudelaire's 'Correspon dances': 'Comm e de longs échos qui de loi n s e confondent/Dans une ténébreuse e t profonde unité,/Vaste comme la nuit et comme la ciarte,' Le s Fleurs du mal (Paris : Garnier 1961 ) 13 . 12 Thi s 'jou r decapité' recalls Mallarmé's 'Cantique de Saint Jean/ 'L e soleil que sa halte/Surnaturelle exalte/Aussitót redescend/Incandes cent,' Oeuvres 49 , and abov e al l Apollinaire's final lin e of 'Zone/ 'Solei l cou coupé. ' Alcools (Paris : Larousse 1972 ) 43. 13 Th e femininity of the sunset - contrastin g wit h the virile sunrise - is most beautifull y versifie d in on e o f Valéry's own favourit e passage s o f the 'Fragments du Narcisse' : O douceu r d e survivre á la forcé d u jour, Quand ell e se retire enfin ros e d'amour , Encoré un pe u brúlante , e t lasse, mais comblée , Et de tan t de trésors tendremen t accablé e Par d e tels souvenirs qu'il s empourprent s a mort, Et qu'ils l a font heureus e agenouille r dan s l'or , Puis s'étendre , s e fondre, et perdre s a vendange , Et s'éteindre en u n song e e n qui l e soir s e change (oí , p 123) .

144 Note

s t o pages 107-1 8

CHAPTER ELEVEN : MEDITATIO N AVAN T PENSEE

1 Fo r an Englis h translation of 'Méditation avant pensée / cf. Poems in the Rough (Princeton : Princeton Universit y Press 1969 ) 61-3 . 2 Diderot , Oeuvres romanesques (Paris : Garnier 1962) 395 . 3 Th e narrator of Gide's Nourritures terrestres - whic h also celébrate thei r author's friendshi p wit h Valéry-Ambroise Cá Montpellier, le jardín botanique. Je me souviens...') - als o prefers the moment o f his hunger over tha t of its satisfaction: 'Ce que j'a i connu d e plus bea u su r l a terre,/Ah! Nathanaél! c'est m a faim. ' Romans 167 . CHAPTER TWELVE: L A CONSIDERATION MATINAL E

1 Fo r English translations of these tw o versions, cf . Analects (Princeton : Princeton Universit y Press 1970) 400, 486-7. 2 Cahiers du Sud (jui n 1938 ) 409-11 . Onl y two piece s o f this sequence o f nine fragments , the one discussed here an d th e free-verse 'Peti t Psaum e du matin / ar e actually aubades. Th e other piece s are about dreams , the functioning o f the min d i n general, and, in two cases , abou t literature . CHAPTER THIRTEEN : A GRASSE

1 Fo r an Englis h translation of 'A Grasse/ cf. Poems in the Rough (Princeton: Princeton Universit y Press 1969) 21-3 . Th e fac t tha t our thir d fragment was incorporated i n the sequence 'Fruit s de mer/ whic h Valér y pub lished i n 194 0 in th e luxuriou s art magazin e Verve (No . 8, Vol. n), pp 22-5 , points agai n not merely t o the 'mobil e fragment / bu t also to the cióse interrelationship of the theme s of dawn and o f the sea in thi s poeti c universe. 2 Th e question o f Valéry's use o f anagrams has recentl y been raise d by Professors Moutote, Schmidt-Radefeldt, Mignot , Celeyrette-Pietri, Laurenti, and Robinso n i n their discussion a t the occasio n o f the Sémi naire Trimestriel du Centr e d'Etudes Valéryennes on th e theme of 'Valéry e t l a science d u langage. ' Cf . Bulletin des Etudes Valéryennes, Montpellier, Universit é Paul Valéry, No. 8 (janvier 1976 ) 38. 3 Thu s th e sensitive renditio n o f the Bollinge n Series translatio n Poems in the Rough (Princeton: Princeton Universit y Press 1969 ) 21 . 4 'L'homm e qui pioche' ma y be an allusion on Valéry's part t o the emblem o f the original Lemerre edition of Leconte de Lisie. The poet, in thi s emblem, i s graphically likened to a labourer . 5 W e recall that Valéry published th e thir d fragmen t of the pros e poem sequence 'ABC ' subsequently separatel y i n vers libre.

Notes to pages 119-2 3 14

5

6 A Cahier entry fro m 192 4 demonstrates th e rigorou s specification s of a 'commande': '80 pages x 32 lignes x 50 lettres. J'a i á faire (pou r mettr e des paroles autou r de s gravures de Beltrand) un text e ... les gravures comprennent 3 et 1 et 4 planches - 4 moindres, 3 plus grandes, 1 importante. I I y a 40 grandes page s á fourni r .. . Je vais essayer d e rempli r cette tache qui doit étre assez bie n payé e e t dont j e ne vois pas du tou t le contenu, par approximation s successives á partir des conditions quantitatives' (cu , p 1014) . An d i n the same entry, Valér y continúes: 'Cette marche paradoxale est au fond la marche vraie - cell e qui serait genérale en littérature sans les idees fausses , vague s et préconcues sans examen qui régnent e n ce royaune d e l'absurde. Ca r c'est lie r durée, fond, e t form e de l a construction. .. . Cette créatio n artificiell e es t au fon d la naturelle.' Again , this text links poetic production a s a solving o f technical problems impose d b y the consumer, to human industry in a general sense. I should agai n like to recall Valéry's collaboration wit h Valéry Larbaud o n th e revu e Commerce, and th e origin o f that review's ñam e in the line s of Saint-John Perse's 'Anabase/ (quote d above not e 3 , Chapter 5), which points to the 'literary commerce' tha t existed between Valéry and hi s great contemporary poets . 7 Laurette , Fierre, L e Théme d e l'arbre chez Valéry (Paris : Librairie Klincksieck 1967) . Cf. also the les s well-known pros e poe m 'Arbre ' (011 , p 659). CHAPTER FOURTEEN : CONCLUSIÓ N

1 Jea n Thibaudeau, 'Le Román comme autobiographie' i n Tel Quel: The'orie d'ensemble (Paris : Editions du Seui l 1968 ) 215-16 . I t is interesting to note that Valéry, one o f the severes t critic s of the traditiona l novel, should i n hi s predilection fo r and hi s practice of the fragmen t and o f the sequence alread y presage, i n a sense, one of the form s th e ne w an d non-traditional román wa s t o take. The most recent study on Valér y and th e nove l i s Silvio Yeschua's Valéry, le román et l'oeuvre á faire (Paris: Minard 1976) . 2 Valéry' s notions o n th e indissolubilit y o f forme an d fond ar e mos t poeti cally image d i n the famous 'pendule qu i oscille entre deu x point s symétriques. Supposez qu e l'une de ees positions extreme s représent e la forme ... Associez, d'autr e part , á l'autre point... toutes le s valeurs significatives' (oí , p 1332) . I n the same text , 'Poésie e t pensée abstraite, ' he continúes, 'entr e la Voix et la Pensée, entre l a Pensée e t la Voix, entre la Présence e t l'Absence, oscille le pendule poétique . I I resulte d e cet analyse qu e la valeur d'u n poém e reside dan s l'indissolubilit é d u son et du sens' ( p 1333). One recall s that Román Jakobson profitably adopted thi s Valéryan image.

146 Note

s t o pages 123-3 2

3 Emil e Benveniste, Problémes de linguistique genérale (Paris: Gallimard 1966, n : 1974 ) i 259. 4 Ibid. u 85-6 . 5 Ibid. 74. 6 Cf . C.G. Jung, Psyche an d Symbol (Ne w York: Anchor Books 1958) 142 : 'it is readily understandable tha t the primordia l imag e of the hermaphro dite shoul d reappea r i n moder n psycholog y i n the guise o f the male female antithesis, i n othe r words a s mulé consciousnes s an d personifie d female unconsciousness. ' Cf . also Erich Neumann, Th e Origins andHistory of Consciousness (Princeton : Princeton Universit y Press 1954 ) 42 : 'But one thing, paradoxical though it may seem, can be established at once as a basic law: even i n woman, consciousness ha s a masculine character. The correlation "consciousness-light-day " and "unconsciousness-darkness night" holds true regardless o f sex. Consciousness, as such, is masculine even i n women, jus t as the unconsciou s i s feminine in men.' 7 Ibid. 18 , 'in every individual life , consciousness reexperience s it s emergence fro m th e unconsciou s i n the growth o f childhood, and ever y night in sleep, dying with the sun, it sinks back into the depths o f the unconscious, t o be born i n the mornin g an d t o begin th e day anew.' 8 Fo r a most recent discussio n o f the rejectio n of the notio n of the 'subject ' in Structuralis t thought, cf . Jonathan Culler, Structuralist Poetics (Ithaca: Cornell Universit y Press 1975 ) esp . 26ff . Cf . also Jean-Marie Benoist, La Révolution structurale (Paris : Grasset 1975 ) esp . 55ff . an d passim. 9 Sémirami s literally 'ascends' t o her fata l marriag e with th e sun, whil e the Spirit' s involvemen t in Time is frequently figured as a 'descent.' Cf. this fragment from Me'lange: 'U n esprit allai t voir cesser so n état; il de vait tomber dan s l e Temps; s'incarner : "T u va s vivrel" C'étai t mourir pour lui ; Quel effroi ! Descendr e dan s l e Temps' (oí , p 299) ! 10 Cf . Neumann, Th e Origin 317-18: 'In this sense all knowledg e rest s o n a n aggressive ac t of incorporation. Th e psychic system, an d t o an eve n greater extent consciousness itself , i s an orga n for breaking up, digesting, and the n rebuilding the objects of the world and th e unconscious, in exactly the same wa y as our bodil y digestive system decompose s matte r physiochemically and use s it for the creation o f new structures. ' 11 A beautiful ne w pros e aubad e whic h has come t o light (fro m th e ine'dits) since my work on thi s book bega n is that of the awakening Lust, 'Eveil de Lust et Monologue,' just published wit h Texte s inédits, Quatriéme acte de "Lust", ' by Ne d Baste t in th e Cahiers Paul Valéry 2 : 'Mes Thédtres' (Paris: Gallimard 1977) 55-6 : 'Bonjour , jour ... Fils de jour , pére de jours ... O tout jeune mais encoré semblabl e á tous le s autres e t dej a différent d e tou t autre . O jour vierg e comme je suis vierge. I I me sembl e que je suis encoré sans nom , sans age, sans désirs, sans regrets, comm e

Notes t o page 13 2 14

7

une lumiére qui n'est qu e lumiére qui ne sait rien encoré sans choses, bien séparée d e ce qu'elle v a leur fair e diré en les touchant. Ainsi , moi .. . Je me sens toute amour, rien qu'amour , mai s absolue amour. Et il n'y a rien encoré que cette tendré amour ¡Ilumine...'

Bibliography

WORKS CITED

Valéry, Paul Oeuvres, i & u (París : Gallimard 195 7 & 1960 ) - Cahiers, i & u (Paris : Gallimard 1973 & 1974) - Cahiers, 28 Vols (Paris: Centre Nationa l de la Recherche Scientifique 1961) - Alphabet (Paris : Blaizot 1976) - Morceaux choisis (Paris: Gallimar d 1930) Paul Valéry vivant (Marseilles : Cahiers du Sud 1946 ) Valéry, Pau l Cours de Poétique nos . 9-3 4 (Paris : Yggdrasil, décembr e 193 7 to février 1939 ) - 'ABC / Commerce: Cahiers trimestriel s (automn e 1925 ) - 'Ebauch e de "Mon Faust"/ L a Table ronde, no. 1 (Les Editions du centr e 1944) - 'Laure / L a Nouvelle Revue Francflise xxxv i (janvie r 1931 ) - 'Petit s Poéme s abstraits / L a Revue de franee (janvie r 1932 ) - Tur s Drames/ Entretiene politiques et litte'raires i v (mar s 1892 ) - 'Revés, ' La Revue de frunce (décembr e 1926 ) - 'Un e Chambre conjecturale / L e Fígaro litte'raire (octobr e 1971 ) Paul Valéry, Analects, Bollinge n Series XL V (Princeton: Princeto n Universit y Press 1970) Paul Valéry, Poems i n the Rough, Bollingen Series XL V (Princeton: Princeto n University Pres s 1969 ) Paul Valéry, Moi, Bollinge n Series XL V (Princeton: Princeto n Universit y Press 1975) André Gide-Paul Valéry Correspondance 1890-1942 (Paris: Gallimar d 1955 ) Lettres á quelques-uns (Paris : Gallimard 1952 ) Paul Valéry, Exposition d u centennaire (Paris : Bibliothéqu e Nationale 1971 ) Paul Valéry (Paris : Bibliothéque National e 1956 )

Bibliography 14

9

Apollinaire, Guillaum e Alcools (París : Larouss e 1972 ) Baudelaire, Charles Le s Fleurs du ma l (Paris : Garnier 1961 ) - Petits Poémes en prose (Paris : Garnie r 1962 ) Diderot Oeuvres romanesques (Paris: Garnie r 1962 ) Gide, Andr é Romans (Paris : Gallimar d 1958 ) Huysmans, J.-K. A Rebours (Paris : Editions Pasquelle s 1968 ) Mallarmé, Stéphane Oeuvres completes (Paris : Gallimard 1945) Perse, Saint-John Oeuvres completes (Paris : Gallimar d 1972 ) Poe, Edgar Alia n Th e Complete Tales and Poems (Ne w York : Vintage Books 1975) Rimbaud, Oeuvres completes (Paris : Gallimard 1963 ) Benoist, Jean-Mari e L a Révolution structurale (Paris : Grasse t 1975 ) Benveniste, Emil e Problémes de linguistique ge'ne'rale i & n (Paris : Gallimard 1966 & 1974 ) Bernard, Suzanne LePoéme en prosede Baudelaire jusqu'á nos jours (Paris : Nizet 1959) Berne-Jeffroy Présence de Vale'ry (Paris : Pió n 1944 ) Bulletin de s Etudes Valéryennes, Montpellier , Universit é Paul Valéry , no . 2 (janvier 1976 ) Cohn, Robert Gree r Toward th e Poems of Mallarmé' (Berkeley : University of California Pres s 1965 ) - Th e Poetry of Rimbaud (Princeton : Princeto n Universit y Press 1973 ) Crow, Christine M . Paul Valéry: Consciousness ofNature (Cambridge : Cambridge University Press 1972 ) Culler, Jonathan Structuralist Poetics (Ithaca : Cornell Universit y Press 1975 ) Derrida, Jacques D e la Grammatologie (Paris : Editions de Minui t 1967) - Marges d e la philosophie (Paris : Edition s de Minuit 1972 ) Faivre, J.-L. Paul Vale'ry e t l e théme de la lumiére (Paris : Lettres Moderne s 1975) Franklin, Úrsul a A n Anatomy o f Poesis: The Prose Poems of Stéphane Mallarmé (Chapel Hill : North Carolin a Studie s in the Romanc e Language s an d Literatures 1976 ) Jakobson, Román Questions d e poétique (Paris : Edition s d u Seui l 1973 ) Julien-Cain, Lucienne Trois Essais sur Paul Valéry (Paris : Gallimar d 1958 ) Jung, C.G. Psyche an d Symbol (Ne w York : Anchor Book s 1958 ) Kristeva, Julia La Révolution d u langage poétique (Paris: Editions du Seui l 1974 ) Laurenti, Huguett e Paul Valéry e t le théátre (Paris : Gallimar d 1973 ) Lawler, Jame s R . Th e Language of French Symbolism (Princeton : Princeton Universit y Pres s 1969 ) - Th e Poet as Analyst (Berkeley : Universit y o f California Press 1974 ) Laurette, Fierr e L e Théme de l'arbre chez Valéry (Paris : Klincksiec k 1967 )

150 Bibliograph

y

Lussy, Florenc e de L a Cénese de 'La jeune Parque' de Paul Valery (París: Minard 1975 ) Nadal, Octave A Mesure haute (Paris : Mercure d e France 1964 ) Neumann, Eric h Th e Origins an d History of Consciousness (Princeton : Princeton Universit y Press 1954 ) Raymond, Marcel Paul Vale'ry e t l a tentation de l'esprit (Neuchatel : A l a Baconnierel948) Robinson, Judith Analyse d e l'esprit dans le s Cahiers d e Valery (Paris : Corti 1963) la Rochefoucauld , Edmée de E n lisant le s Cahiers de Paul Valery n i (Paris : Editions Universitaire s 1967 ) Schmidt-Radefeldt, Jürge n Paul Vale'ry linguiste dans ¡es 'Cahiers' (Paris : Klincksieck 1970 ) Wills, Ludmilla M. L e Regará contemplatif chez Vale'ry e t Mallarme' (Amsterdam: Rodopi N V 1974) Yeschua, Silvio Valery, l e román et l'oeuvre á faire (Paris : Minard 1976 )

Articks in Periodicals

Bastet, Ned Taus t et le cycle' in Entretiens sur Paul Valery (L a Haye and Paris : Mouton 1968 ) - '"Mo n Faust," Textes inédits, Quatriém e act e de "Lust"' in Cahiers Paul Vale'ry U- 'Mes Théatres' (Paris : Gallimard 1977 ) Bree, Germaine 'Th e Break-up of Traditional Genres: Bataille , Leiris, Michaud,' Bucknell Review xx i (Fall-Winte r 1973 ) Celeyrette-Pietri, Nicol e 'Le Jeu du Je ' in Paul Valery Contemporain (Paris : Klincksieck 1974 ) - '"A u Commencemen t sera le sommeil": quelques réflections sur un poéme en prose ' in Cahiers Paul Valery I - Poétique et poésie (Paris : Gallimard 1975 ) Cohn, Robert Gree r 'Th e ABC' S of Poetry,' Comparative Literature 2 (1962 ) Franklin, Úrsul a ' A Dialectical Triad o f Three Earl y Prose Poems by Pau l Valery: "Le s Vieille s Ruelles," "Pages Inédites," and "Pur s Drames"/ to appear i n Kentucky Romance Quarterly - 'Mallarméa n Affinitie s i n an Early Prose Poem by Paul Valery, ' The French Review x i 2 (1977 ) - 'Th e White Nigh t o f Agathe: A Fragment b y Pau l Valery / Essays i n French Literature 1 2 (1975 ) Levaillant, Jean 'Pau l Valery et l a lumiére/ Association Internationale des Etudes francflises, Cahier s 2 2 (ma i 1968 ) Nadal, Octav e 'Pur s Drames,' Cahiers du Sud (avri l 1957 ) Thibaudeau, Jean 'L e Román comm e autobiographie' in Tel Quel: The'orie d'ensemble (Paris : Edition s d u Seui l 1968 )

Bibliography 15 Toesca, Mauric e 'Paul Valéry: Agathe' Nouvelle Revue Francaise (ma i 1957 ) Yeschua, Silvio 'Substitutions et poétique che z Valéry' in Cahiers Paul Valéry I- Poétique et poésie (Paris : Gallimard 1975 )

1

This page intentionally left blank

Index

NAMESCITF.D

Goncourt, Edmond e t Jules de 44 , 126

Apollinaire, Guillaum e 14 3

Heredia, J.-M . 4 6 Huysmans, J.-K. 4 , 5, 43, 133 , 13 9

Basted, Ne d ix , 143 , 14 6 Baudelaire, Charles 4 , 6, 13 , 43, 55, 133, 14 3 Benoist, Jean-Mari e 14 6 Benveniste, Emil e 123 , 124 , 14 6 Berne-Jeffroy 13 5 Bernard, Suzanne 3 , 133 Bree, Germaine 13 3 Celeyrette-Pietri, Nicol e ix , 137 , 14 4 Cohn, Robert Cree r ix , 133, 13 7 Crow, Christine ix , 136 , 14 2 Culler, Jonatha n 14 6 Dante 2 8 Derrida, Jacque s 14 0 Diderot, Denis 108 , 144 Faivre, J.-L. 42 , 13 8 Flaubert, Gustave 14 1 Gide, Andr é 5 , 10, 11 , 17, 18 , 47, 134, 135 , 14 4

Jakobson, Romá n 139,14 5 Julien-Cain, Lucienne 13 6 Jung, C.G. 14 6 Kristeva, Julia 13 3 Larbaud, Valer y 14 5 Laurenti, Huguette ix , 138, 139 , 14 4 Laurette, Fierre 14 5 Lawler, James R . ix , 134 , 135 , 13 8 Lebey, Edouar d 25 , 135 Levailant, Jean ix , 13 8 Lussy, Florenc e de 13 4 Mallarmé, Stéphane 4 , 5, 6, 10, 11, 12, 14 , 16, 17 , 18 , 19, 41, 43, 44, 46 , 125, 134 , 135 , 141 , 14 3 Nadal, Octav e ix , 10 , 133, 13 4 Neumann, Eric h 14 6 Perse, Saint-Jean 13 9

Index

154

Petrarch 2 8 Plato 11 , 1 3 Poe, Edgar Alia n 10 , 13, 134 Raymond, Marce l 138 , 14 1 Rimbaud, Arthu r 4 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 17, 19, 82, 125 , 133 , 134 , 140 , 14 1 Robinson, Judit h ix , 47, 133 , 139 , 142, 14 4 La Rochefoucault , Edmé é de 13 6 Schmidt-Radefeldt, Jürge n 135 , 144

Theocritus 8 5 Thibaudeau, Jea n 122,14 5 Toesca, Maurice 81 , 144 Vergil 8 6 Verlaine, Pau l 4 Wills, Ludmill a M . 13 8 Yeschua, Silvi o 141 , 14 5

UNIVERSITY O F TORONJO ROMANC E SERIE S 1 Guid o Cavalcanti's Theory o f Love J.E. Shaw 2 Aspect s of Racinian Tragedy John C. Lapp 3 Th e Ide a of Decadente in French Literature, 1830-1900 A.E. Cárter 4 L e Román de Renart dans l a littérature francaise e t dans le s littératures étrangéres a u moyen age John Flin n 5 Henr y Céard : Idéalist e détrompé Ronald Frazee 6 L a Chronique d e Robert de Clari: Elude de la langue et du style P.F. Dembowski 7 Zol a before the Rougon-Macquart John C . Lapp 8 Th e Ide a of Art as Propaganda i n France, 1750-1759: A Stud y in th e Histor y o f Idea s J.A. Leit h 9 Marivau x E.J.H. Greene 10 Sondages , 1830-1848 : Romancier s francais secondaire s John S. Wood 11 Th e Sixt h Sense: Individualism i n French Poetry, 1686-176 0 Robert Finc h 12 Th e Lon g Journey: Literar y Themes o f French Canadá Jack Warwick 13 Th e Nárreme in the Medieval Romance Epic: An Introduction t o Narrative Structures Eugene Dorfma n 14 Verlaine : A Study in Parallel s A.E. Cárter 15 A n índex o f Proper Ñame s in French Arthurian Verse Romances, 1150-1300 G.D. West 16 Emer y Bigot: Seventeenth-Century Frenc h Humanist Leona rd E . Doucette 17 Didero t th e Satirist : An Analysis of Le Neveu de Rameau and Relate d Works Donal O'Gorman

18 'Naturalism o pas mort': Lettres inédites d e Paul Alexis á Emile Zola 1871-1900 B.H. Bakker 19 Crispi n ler : L a Vie et l'oeuvre de Raymond Foisson, comedien-poete du xvii e siécle A. Ross Curtís 20 Tusca n and Etruscan: The Problem o f Linguistic Substratum Influente i n Central Italy Herbert J. Izzo 21 Fécondit é d'Emile Zola : Román á thése, évangile, mythe David Baguley 22 Charle s Baudelaire. Edgar Alian Poe: Sa Vie et ses ouvrage s W.T. Bandy 23 Pau l Claudel's Le Soulier d e Satín: A Stylistic, Structuralist, and Psychoanalyti c Interpretation Joan Freilic h 24 Balzac' s Recurring Characters Anthony R. Pugh 25 Moralit y and Socia l Class in Eighteenth-Century French Literature and Paintin g Warren Roberts 26 Th e Imaginatio n of Maurice Barres Philip Ouston 27 L a Cité idéale dans Travail d'Emile Zol a F.I. Case 28 Critica l Approaches to Rubén Darío Keith Elli s 29 Universa l Language Schemes in England and Franc e 1600-1800 James Knowlson 30 Scienc e and th e Human Comedy : Natural Philosophy i n French Literature from Rabelai s t o Maupertui s Harcourt Brown 31 Moliere : An Archetypal Approach Harold C. Knutson 32 Blais e Cendrars: Discover y an d Re-creatio n Jay Bochner 33 Francesc o Guicciardini: Th e Historian's Craf t Mark Phillips 34 Le s Debuts d e la lexicographie francaise : Estienne, Nico t et le Thresor d e la langue fran?oys e (1606 ) T.R. Wooldridge

35 A n Index of Proper Ñames i n French Arthurian Prose Romance s G.D. West 36 Th e Legendar y Source s o f Flaubert' s Saint Julien B.F. Bar t and R.F . Cook 37 Th e Rul e of Metaphor: Multi-disciplinary Studies o f the Creation o f Meaning i n Languag e Paul Ricoeur 38 Th e Rhetoric of Valéry's Pros e Aubades Úrsula Franklin

This book was designed by ANTJE L I N C N F R

University of Toronto Press