“But, Degas, it is not with ideas that one makes verse. It is with words.”

Original: Mais, Degas, ce n’est point avec des idées que l’on fait des vers… C’est avec des mots. — Emphasises that poetry is made through the particular substance and possibilities of language. · Conversation with Edgar Degas, reported by Paul Valéry in Degas Danse Dessin (French)

• Language
• Poetry
• Writing

“Poetry is the expression, through human language restored to its essential rhythm, of the mysterious meaning in the aspects of existence; it gives authenticity to our sojourn and constitutes the sole spiritual task.”

Original: La Poésie est l’expression, par le langage humain ramené à son rythme essentiel, du sens mystérieux des aspects de l’existence: elle doue ainsi d’authenticité notre séjour et constitue la seule tâche spirituelle. — Defines poetry as a rhythmic use of language that reveals the mystery within existence. · Letter to Léo d’Orfer, 27 June 1884 (French)

• Language
• Mystery
• Poetry

“Everything in the world exists to culminate in a book.”

Original: Tout, au monde, existe pour aboutir à un livre. — Distils Mallarmé’s belief in literature as a gathering point for experience and the world. · Le Livre, instrument spirituel, 1895; collected in Divagations, 1897 (French)

• Books
• Literature
• Writing

“To name an object is to suppress three-quarters of the pleasure of the poem, which lies in the delight of guessing little by little; to suggest it, that is the dream.”

Original: Nommer un objet, c’est supprimer les trois quarts de la jouissance du poème qui est faite du bonheur de deviner peu à peu: le suggérer, voilà le rêve. — Captures the Symbolist ideal of suggestion, mystery and the reader’s imaginative participation. · Interview with Jules Huret, Enquête sur l’évolution littéraire, 1891 (French)

• Imagination
• Mystery
• Poetry