Nineteenth-Century French Poetry
Introductions to Close Reading

Present a fresh approach to studying nineteenth-century French poetry through the method of close reading.

Christopher Prendergast (Edited by)

9780521347747, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 26 January 1990

272 pages
21.6 x 13.8 x 1.5 cm, 0.378 kg

"This is an important collection....the writers of these essays have directed their efforts at all-encompassing readings that leave the reader satisfied that the texts in question have been examined in a thorough manner, with a genuine concern for an understanding of the poems in their entirety. The essays in this collection will undoubtedly encourage the students' efforts to understand the intricacies of French poetry and to appreciate the richness of the many theoretical approaches at their disposal." William Thompson, European Romantic Review

This volume of essays, written by scholars from a wide range of critical and theoretical viewpoints, presents a fresh approach to the study of nineteenth-century French poetry. Each of the eleven essays, on different poets from Lamartine to Mallarmé and Laforgue, focuses on the detailed organisation of a single poem. The method of close reading has been adopted in order to effect an introduction to the analysis of the 'basics' of poetic language (sound, metre, syntax, etc.), and in order to explore and illustrate some of the claims and arguments about poetry arising from developments in the prevailing literary theory. Theoretical positions are posed and tested in the terms of practical analysis and interpretation. Christopher Prendergast's introduction to the volume situates the essays in a series of general perspectives and contexts, and Clive Scott has provided an appendix on French versification.

1. Introduction Christopher Prendergast
2. The poem as hypothesis of origin: Lamartine's Le Lac Eric Gans
3. The rhetoric of contemplation: Hugo's La Pente de la réverie Victor Brombert
4. The designs of prosody: Vigny's La Mort du loup Clive Scott
5. The lyric persona: Nerval's El Desdichado Rae Beth Gordon
6. Under-reading at noon: Leconte de Lisle's Midi Mary Ann Caws
7. Intertextuality and interpretation: Baudelaire's Correspondances Jonathan Culler
8. Questions of Metaphor: Gautier's La Nue Christopher Prendergast
9. Training for modernity: Verlaine's Le Paysage dans le cadre des portiéres … Ross Chambers
10. Sylleptic Symbols: Rimbaud's Mémoire Michael Riffaterre
11. Poetry and cliche: Laforgue's L'Hiver qui vient Peter Collier
12. Genius at nightfall: Mallarmé's Quand l'ombre menacé de la fatale loi … Malcolm Bowie
13. Appendix - French versification: a summary Clive Scott
References and suggestions for further reading.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: poetry & poets [DSC]