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The Versification of Corbière's Les Amours Jaunes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Marshall Lindsay
Marshall Lindsay*
Affiliation:
University of California, Davis
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Extract

The name of Tristan Corbière has scarcely been mentioned in manuals or in histories of French versification. His prosody has been considered neither sufficiently skillful, in the traditional sense, nor sufficiently original to be a model for imitation or an example of innovation. Most biographers and critics who have written about Corbière have mentioned, at least in passing, the peculiarities of his versification, some disapproving of the construction of his lines, and others coming to his defense. Laforgue called Corbière “cassant, concis, cinglant le vers à la cravache,” but he was highly critical of what he described as “incurable indélicatesse d'oreille” and “strophes de tout le monde.” Léon Bocquet, on the other hand, wrote that Corbière possessed “l'oreille musicienne.” That these critics are in such disagreement shows how subjective their judgments of technique are. Laforgue undoubtedly missed in Les Amours jaunes his own kind of prosody, and Bocquet, defending Corbière from the injustices of earlier critics, overstated his case.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 78 , Issue 4-Part1 , September 1963 , pp. 358 - 368
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1963

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References

1 I should like, at the outset, to express my appreciation to Professor Jeanne Varney Pleasants, of Columbia University, for reading an early draft of this article and for making very pertinent suggestions.

2 “Mélanges posthumes,” Œuvres complètes (Paris, 1919), iii, 119.

3 Œuvres complètes, iii, 121–122.

4 Les Destinées mauvaises (Amiens, 1923), p. 109.

5 Citations from Les A mours jaunes are to the edition by Y.-G. Le Dantec (Paris, 1953).

6 There are three false alexandrines in Le Dantec's edition of Les Amours jaunes; the following corrections are from the 1st ed. (Paris: Glady Frères, 1873): p. 31, insert “ce” after “voici” in “S'il vit, c'est par oubli; voici qu'il se laisse”; p. 65, delete s from “Certes” in “—Certes, Elle n'est pas loin, celle après qui tu brames”; p. 144, insert “pas” after “il” in “—Eh, faut-il du cceur au ventre quelque part.”

7 He was guided, however, by popular speech in certain lines in his chapter “Gens de Mer,” e.g., “L'équipage … y en a plus. Il reviendra peut-être” (“Lettre du Mexique”).

8 Maurice Grammont, Le Vers français: Ses Moyens d'expression, son harmonie, 3rd ed. (Paris, 1954), pp. 468–470.

9 The list of “diérèses et synérèses insolites” in Le Dantec's edition of Les Amours jaunes, p. 17, is far from complete.

10 Le Dantec pointed out this example, p. 17.

11 In L'Art, 23 Dec. 1865. Citing two examples (“Pour entendre un de ces || concerts riches de cuivre”; “Exaspéré comme un || ivrogne qui voit double”), Verlaine maintained that Baudelaire was “le premier en France qui ait osé des vers comme ceux-ci.”

12 “Où je filais pensivement la blanche laine” (La Revue Fantaisiste); later he changed the line: “Où je filais d'un doigt pensif la blanche laine” (“La Reine Omphale,” Les Exilés, 1867).

13 The following poems, written entirely or mostly in alexandrines, have no irregularities at the caesura: “À l'Eternel Madame,” “I Sonnet,” “Bonne Fortune et Fortune,” “Femme,” “Déclin,” “Bonsoir,” “À un Juvénal de Lait,” “À une Demoiselle,” “Aurora,” “Sonnet posthume,” “Paris nocturne,” “Paris diurne,” “Sous un Portrait de Corbière,” “Moi ton amour.”

14 Maurice Grammont, Petit Traité de versification française, 14th ed. (Paris, 1952), p. 40.

15 The enjambment of the 3rd line is obscured in Le Dantec's edition by a period printed after “Maintenant”; the line is punctuated here as it is in the 1st ed.

16 Exclusive of poems published after the 1st ed. of Les Amours jaunes. The following are omitted from the count: “Litanie du Sommeil,” lines 15–147 (assonanced laisses); “Le Douanier,” lines 39–47 (all in -ique); and 38 rhyme words that are third members of groups of three rhymes. Names of rhymes are used as defined by Grammont, Petit Traité, p. 36: rime riche requires homophony of final vowels and of two additional phonemes; rime léonine, three or more additional phonemes; rime suffisante, one additional phoneme; assonance is homophony of the final vowels only. The rime imparfaite (not used by Grammont) is an attempt to rhyme vowels that are not homophonous. Most examples of the latter are combinations of posterior a and anterior a: “pâle-rafale.” However, this practice was not uncommon in classical French poetry; Racine rhymed “âme” with “madame” and “flamme.” It should be noted that Grammont's definitions differ from those of earlier theorists, e.g., Adolphe Tobler, Le Vers français ancien et moderne, trad. Karl Breul and Leopold Sudre (Paris, 1885), pp. 149–150.

17 Cf. Baudelaire, “Ciel brouillé,” “A une Mendiante rousse”; Verlaine, “Croquis parisien” (Poèmes saturniens), “En Sourdine” (Fêtes galantes). Laforgue was mistaken when he said of Corbière: “Cependant jamais une pièce tout en féminines ou tout en masculines,” Œuvres complètes, iii, 124.

18 Published by Ida Levi, “New Light on Tristan Corbière,” French Studies, v (1951), 239–242.

19 Les Amours jaunes, ed. Le Dantec, p. 253.

20 “Male-Fleurette,” the last rondel, is an exception; it has a thirteenth line set aside from the others, summarizing all of the rondels and bringing the chapter to a close.