Du Bouchet's Contributions to the Review L'éphémère
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_full_alt_author_running_head (neem stramien B2 voor dit chapter en dubbelklik nul hierna en zet 2 auteursnamen neer op die plek met and): 0 _full_articletitle_deel (kopregel rechts, vul hierna in): Du Bouchet’s Contributions to the Review l’Éphémère _full_article_language: en indien anders: engelse articletitle: 0 34 Chapter 2 Chapter 2 Du Bouchet’s Contributions to the Review l’Éphémère … maintenir la place découverte vide ( ouverte ) (SLPLP, 5) … keep the uncovered place empty (open) ⸪ Despite André du Bouchet’s reputation as a solitary figure, signs of the atten- tion he devotes to others are visible in his work for the literary review l’Éphémère. As editor and writer, his contributions show openness to the work of others, to the natural, cultural, and, in some instances, political environ- ment, and that openness emerges as much through form as in the content of the review. The discernment and sensitivity that he brought to l’Éphémère is as clear in the format of a given issue as it is in the layout and detail of the poetic texts he published there. Often considered a successor to Le Mercure de France, which was a review of ‘la vie culturelle du temps’ (contemporary cultural life) with a long, interrupted history that finally closed in 1965,1 l’Éphémère (1967-72) occupies a small but significant place in the history of the review in French in the twentieth centu- ry. Alain Mascarou, who has written a thorough account of the history of l’Éphémère, suggests that one of its influences on successors such as L’Argile, edited by Claude Esteban, and Yves Peyré’s L’Ire des vents, is that all the editors considered their reviews to constitute ‘lieux’ (places) where different writing came together.2 L’Éphémère published contemporary commissioned or unso- licited texts, with an emphasis on poetry, alongside writing from all periods that particularly interested its editors, whose own work constituted a 1 Jean-Michel Maulpoix, ‘Mercure de France (Le)’, in Dictionnaire de poésie de Baudelaire à nos jours ed. by Jarrety, pp. 486-87 (487). 2 Mascarou, Les Cahiers de « l’Éphémère », p. 18. Mascarou questions the association with Le Mercure de France, arguing that l’Éphémère did not follow the eclecticism of Le Mercure de France (pp. 55-56). He mentions Verve and Mesures as previously adopting a similar approach to l’Éphémère (p. 11). © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020 | doi:10.1163/9789004432888_004 _full_alt_author_running_head (neem stramien B2 voor dit chapter en dubbelklik nul hierna en zet 2 auteursnamen neer op die plek met and): 0 _full_articletitle_deel (kopregel rechts, vul hierna in): Du Bouchet’s Contributions to the Review l’Éphémère _full_article_language: en indien anders: engelse articletitle: 0 Du Bouchet’s Contributions to the Review l’Éphémère 35 significant proportion of its content. Translated texts from other (largely Euro- pean) traditions were given priority, and it is also distinctive for its high-quality reproductions of drawings and engravings, included not to illustrate the writ- ten pieces, but as standalone contributions, often interspersed through the pages of text without explanation. At the heart of this enterprise was André du Bouchet, an editor throughout the six years of the journal’s history, who is an acknowledged influence on cer- tain aspects of the journal and on particular numbers displaying strengths in visual art, translation, and the work of young, unknown poets. His role as edi- tor is also tangible in every number of the review, tangible in part because he was influential in developing its distinctive form and layout. In line with the editors’ strong authorial presence, he contributed texts of his own to eleven of the twenty numbers, and translations to twelve. At the moment in late 1965 when, along with Jacques Dupin, Yves Bonnefoy, Louis-René des Forêts, and Gaëtan Picon, he was invited by Aimé Maeght to co-edit a quarterly review of poetry and literature to be printed by Arte, Du Bouchet was a literary advisor at the ORTF. He had published thirteen poetic volumes, many of them brief works illustrated by contemporary artists. He had also published translations from English and German. He was therefore an established writer, but aspects of his mature style were not yet in evidence. In his piece inspired by the events of May ’68, which appeared in issue 6, he wrote: L’écart – le nouvel écart – est à trouver – l’écart dont nous voici, dans la parole de nos proches, dépossédés soudain… (SLPLP, 11) The gap – the new gap – remains to be found – the gap of which we are now, in the words of those who surround us – suddenly dispossessed… Several important elements of his approach are encapsulated here. Gaps, rup- tures, and openness, both evoked and produced by disrupted syntax, are es- sential if the writer is to be attentive to the words of others and to the world around. A sustained temporal openness – it is always ahead, ‘to be found’ but not appropriated – motivates all of his writing. The temporal forms taken by that openness are the subject of this book, and this chapter examines the place, time, and role of gaps, figured in the text as ‘écarts’, but also as ‘brèches’ (breaches), ‘ouvertures’ (openings), and ‘vides’ (voids). This is a very different understanding of openness from that which could be attributed to Du Bouchet if his work were viewed through a Heideggerian lens. In that case, gaps and .