The meaning of poetry...ends in its opposite, a feeling of hatred for poetry. Georges Bataille, “Etre Oreste” in Oeuvres complètes (Paris: Gallimard, 1971) 3:220
There is only one man who has the right to be an anarchist, me, the Poet, because I alone create a product that society does not want, in exchange for which society does not give me enough to live on. Stéphane Mallarmé, quoted in Rosemary Lloyd, Mallarmé: The Poet and his Circle (Ithaca: Cornell, 1999) p.213
The text therefore signifies an experience of heterogeneous contradiction rather than a practice which, by contrast, is always social. The proof may be seen in Mallarmé’s refusal to consider the possibility of a political activity that would be simultaneous to textual activity, whatever his well-founded reasons for criticizing anarchist or social commitment. Julia Kristeva, Revolution in Poetic Language (New York: Columbia University, 1984) p. 195
Poetry must have for its object practical truth. It expresses the relation between the first principles and the secondary truths of life. Everything remains in its place. The mission of poetry is difficult. It is not concerned with political events, with the way a people is governed, makes no allusion to historical periods, regicide, coups d'etat, court intrigues. It does not think of those struggles which, exceptionally, man has with himself and his passions. It discovers the laws by which political theory exists, universal peace, the refutations of Machiavelli, the cornets of which the work of Proudhon consists, the psychology of mankind. A poet must be more useful than any other citizen of his tribe. His work is the code of diplomats, legislators, and teachers of youth. Compte de Lautréamont, Maldoror and Poems, Paul Knight, tr. (London: Penguin Books, 1978) p. 271
Literature has always been the most explicit realization of the signifying subject’s condition. Julia Kristeva, Revolution in Poetic Language, p.82
...in order to close the gap created by our lack of interest in what lies outside the realm of aesthetics.—Everything can be summed up in Aesthetics and Political Economy. Mallarmé, “La musique et les lettres,” Oeuvres complètes (Paris: Gallimard, 1945), p.656
Though poetry may trample on the established order, it is no substitute for it. When disgust with a powerless liberty thoroughly commits the poet to political action, he abandons poetry. But he immediately assumes responsibility for the order to come: he asserts the direction of activity, the major attitude. When we see him we cannot help being aware that poetic existence, in which we once saw the possibility of sovereign attitude, is really a minor attitude. It becomes no more than a child’s attitude, a gratuitous game. Georges Bataille, Literature and Evil, Alastair Hamilton, tr. (London: Calder and Boyars, 1973) pp.23-24
A student could acquire a considerable amount of literary knowledge by saying the opposite of what the poets of this century have said. He would replace their affirmations with negations. If it is ridiculous to attack first principles, it is even more ridiculous to defend them against the same attacks. I will not defend them. Compte de Lautréamont, Maldoror and Poems, p.269
Vive la ré-!. Ravachol, his sentence divided by the guillotine.
Posted by jane at August 20, 2005 04:12 PM | TrackBack