“André Breton, History and the Meaning of Myth,” in: Paule Plouvier, Renée Ventresque, Jean-Claude Blachère: Three Poets Facing the Crisis of History—André Breton, Saint-John Perse, René Char, L’Harmattan, 1997, pp. 11–36.
This symposium, designed and organized by my colleagues at the University of Montpellier III on March 22 and 23, 1996, was highly significant in my view, as it situated Breton among his peers and within History, with a capital H. In particular, it had the merit of welcoming Gérard Legrand (1927–1999), one of André Breton's closest collaborators after the Second World War. In addition to the private conversations he was able to have, his public interventions were both very precise and very relaxed, as if he were, for the first time, becoming aware of the importance of bearing witness with complete sincerity. This can be confirmed in the final debate, reproduced in this volume. As for my own contribution, it synthesized the work I had led and published in the journal Mélusine, emphasizing the quest for a new myth, formulated well before 1940.
Three Poets Facing the Crisis of History: André Breton, Saint-John Perse, René Char: Proceedings of the Montpellier III Symposium, March 22–23, 1996. Paris, L’Harmattan, 1997.
“It would be absolutely necessary, and urgent, to remedy what may be limiting and distressing about the concept of time.”
André Breton, Arcane 17.
“There is no history except that of the soul.”
Saint-John Perse, Exile.
“Civilizations are fat. History fails; God, for lack of God, no longer steps over our suspicious walls; man snarls in man’s ear; Time gets lost, fission is underway. What else?”
René Char, The Lost Nude.
This volume brings together the proceedings of the symposium organized in March 1996 by the Boussole Grand Sud Research Center (Université Paul-Valéry, Montpellier III) and the ensuing debate.
Abstract:
Re-examines how Saint-John Perse, André Breton, and René Char attempted—through either refusal or participation—to address the political and cultural crisis of the second half of the twentieth century, and raises the question of poetic commitment. The book is available on Google Books, where nearly all of my article can be read. Here is the beginning
Text also in: H. Béhar, Histoire des faits littéraires, Paris, Classiques Garnier, 2022, pp. 101–117
See also: Dictionnaire André Breton