Mallarmé, Valéry et le silence (dés)incarné

Abstract

This article analyses the essence and roles of silence in the œuvres of Mallarmé and Valéry. The Mallarmé’s musicality gradually gives way to the silent music of words; poetry is becoming spatial and takes the form of the music score. In the poem Coup de dés it gets up to the incarnation of silence which shows the ideal of the Mallarmé’s musicality; the ideal in which an eye serves to listen. The theme of music and silence reappears in the Valery’s œuvre. In spite of the connection between music and architecture, which can incarnate silence, poetry uses the subjectivism of music and the ambiguity of silence to achieve the ideal of pure art which is hidden in the artist’s interior. Silence as nothingness is the starting point for poetry whereas non-incarnated silence can express the mystical sense of poetry.