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The Poetry Of Henry Murger: Themes And Style In "Les Nuits D'Hiver"

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The Poetry Of Henry Murger: Themes And Style In "Les Nuits D'Hiver"

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Content THE POETRY OF HENRY MURGER: THEMES AND STYLE IN LES NUITS D'HIVER by Valdo Paul Herby A Dissertation Presented to the FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY French February 1973 INFORMATION TO USERS This dissertation was produced from a microfilm copy of th e original docum ent. While th e most advanced technological means to photograph and reproduce this docum ent have been used, th e quality is heavily dependent upon the quality of the original subm itted. The following explanation o f techniques is provided to help you understand markings or patterns which may appear on this reproduction. 1. The sign or "targ et" for pages apparently lacking from the docum ent photographed is "Missing Page(s)". If it was possible to obtain the missing page(s) or section, they are spliced into the film along with adjacent pages. This may have necessitated cutting thru an image and duplicating adjacent pages to insure you com plete continuity. 2. When an image on the film is obliterated w ith a large round black mark, it is an indication th at the photographer suspected th at the copy may have moved during exposure and thus cause a blurred image. You will find a good image of the page in the adjacent frame. 3. When a map, drawing or chart, etc., was part of the material being p h o to g rap h ed th e photographer followed a definite m ethod in "sectioning" the material. It is custom ary to begin photoing at the upper left hand corner of a large sheet and to continue photoing from left to right in equal sections w ith a small overlap. If necessary, sectioning is continued again - beginning below the first row and continuing on until complete. 4. The majority of users indicate that the textual content is of greatest value, however, a som ewhat higher quality reproduction could be made from "photographs" if essential to th e understanding of the dissertation. Silver prints of "photographs" may be ordered at additional charge by writing the O rder Departm ent, giving th e catalog number, title, auth o r and specific pages you wish reproduced. University Microfilms 300 North Zaeb Road Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106 A Xerox Education Company 73-m,410 HERB*, yaldo Paul, 1938-,. THE POETRY OF HENRY MURGER: THEMES AND STYLE IN LES NUITS DRIVER. University of Southern California, Ph.D., 1973 Language and Literature, modern University Microfilms. A X E R O X Company, Ann Arbor. Michigan (£) Copyright by VALDO PAUL HERBY 1973 THIS DISSERTATION HAS BEEN MICROFILMED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED. UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA THE GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY PARK LOS ANGELES. CAL FORNIA 8 0 0 0 7 This dissertation, written by under the direction of h.ie.... Dissertation Com mittee, and approved by all its members, has been presented to and accepted by The Graduate School, in partial fulfillm ent of requirements of the degree of D O C T O R O F P H IL O S O P H Y VALDO PAUL HERBY Dim* Date. February 1973 DISSERTATION COMMITTEE PLEASE NOTE: Some pages may have indistinct print. Filmed as received. University Microfilms, A Xerox Education Company PREFATORY NOTES WITH ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS It was the late Dr. Rene Belle, Professor of French at the University of Southern California, who inspired and encouraged the present essay on the poetry of Henry Murger and whose thoughts greatly shaped my own. In accordance with his suggestions, the study is at times general, for Murger— the poet— has remained virtually unknown, even to the most vastly-read of literati, and at times specific, for what is required in a preliminary consideration of a poet is a repository of the themes and stylistic devices he employs. Always able to raise a student's (or a colleague's) spirits and to offer sound advice on theoretical questions (advice based on a prodigious store of knowledge), Dr. Belle never failed to join his spiritual services with practical ones: he took from his personal library and put into my hands copies of the (extremely rare) first two editions of Les Nuits d'hiver. It is to Dr. Belle that this study is, in very fond memory, dedicated. I extend my sincere appreciation to Dr. Arthur Knodel, who kindly agreed to direct my work in Dr. Belle's absence and whose "Graduate Seminar in Modern Poetry" has been a frequent point of reference; to Dr. Robert Blake, who (among other services) introduced me to some very ii useful works of criticism; to Dr. Theodore Sackett for his kind advice; and to Dr. Max Berkey whose many friendly gestures have greatly encouraged and facilitated this project. To my good friend Uwe Faulhaber, of Wayne State University, I am indebted for a graceful, much-consulted English translation of Johann Peter Hebei's poem, "Sonntagsfriihe, " originally written in the Alemannic ("Swabian-Swiss") dialect; without such a translation, the full comprehension of Murger's adaptation of the poem ("Dimanche Matin") would have been impossible. Gerard Cleisz and Rosabianca LoVerso, dear colleagues of mine, have done much to create an atmosphere conducive to the accomplishment of an extended work. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter I - Introduction ...................... 1 Chapter II - The Question of the Ballades .... 21 Chapter III - The Swallow and the Wanderer: The Urban Poems............ 38 Chapter IV - The Belfry and the Azure Sky: The Bucolic Poems............102 Chapter V - Technical Considerations ......... 150 Chapter VI - General Conclusions ............. 201 Appendix I - Selected Vocabulary............... 233 Appendix II - Special Vocabulary Groups ........ 265 Appendix III- Versification .................... 272 Appendix IV - Verse Akin to that of Murger .... 283 Bibliography .................................. 290 iv Chapter I Introduction 1 2 Au commencement de 1844, Murger quitta definitivement la chambre de la rue de La Tbur-d ’ Auvergne et alia demeurer avec Champfleury. Champfleury, apres tant d'autres, lul conseilla d'abandonner la poesie inproductive et de s'adonner a la prose. II eut raison, l'evenement l'a prouve. --Adrien Lelioux, Histoire de Murger "Je frequentai assidument le quartier latin et j'y appris beaucoup de choses, entre autres a m'interesser a des etudiants qui crachaient, tous les soirs, dans des bocks, leurs idees sur la politique, puis a gouter aux oeuvres de George Sand et de Heine, d'Edgar Quinet et d'Henri Murger."*- Of the four writers hailed by the hero of Huysmans' Sac Au Dos as the idols of the youth of 1860, all have suffered a decline in popularity, none more so than Henry Murger: historians of society as well as of the novel continue to pore over the various manners of the novel of George Sand; students of the modern epic must avow that the vast, curious poems in prose and verse of Edgar Quinet^ in some manner prefigure visionary and humanitarian writers like Hugo (La Legende des siecles). Romains, and even Claudel; the outcast Heine3 struck modern notes in the midst of romanticism and has remained relatively popular; to most well-educated persons, the name Murger endures as a footnote to the libretto of La Boheme. for Puccini's opera was based on Murger's Scenes de la vie de Boheme.^ Thus hailed in 1870 as the most skilled writer about truculent Bohemian life, Murger began falling into neglect 3 about a decade later. Fourteen years after Huysmans' novella, a modern critic like Lanson could publish a massive Histoire de la litterature francgaise without once mentioning the name of Murger. Other recent critical histories, such as Cazamian's, similarly have no room at all for the "first Bohemian" in their index, or accord him one line, as does the "Roman et Prose lyrique au XIXe siecle," of Gaetan Picon (Gallimard Histoire des Littera- tures. Vol. II). At best, critical historians, like Thibaudet in his Histoire. devote a fleeting paragraph to the curious prosateur of the Scenes de la vie de Boheme. A perusal of the major periodicals of our day concerned specifically with nineteenth-century verse and prose reveals no monograph on, and very few references to, the man.5 Murger's slender volume of poetry, collected in the year of his death (1861) under the title Les Nuits d'hiver. has never received serious consideration among men of letters. It is perhaps comprehensible that the superficial, quasi-realistic sketchers of moeurs contemporaines have lost their first brilliance. Writers like Murger, Henri Monnier, and Champfleury spun tales whose interest was as ephemeral as the curious modes and manners they evoked.® Only the most flawless realists (Flaubert, Merimee) could stand before the awesome waves of naturalism and symbolism. There are other explanations, less obvious and less general perhaps than that of the "aging" of realism, for the neglect of the poems, Les Nuits d'hiver— a neglect which has been practically total. Often reprinted in the years immediately following the author's death,7 Les Nuits d'hiver has not been re printed since 1911, whereas the Scenes were recently re published (in 1964) by Julliard. It should be noted, moreover, that most libraries abound in copies of the Scenes in many editions, while even the greatest libraries contain a very incomplete gathering of the various editions of the poetry of Murger.8 One may presume, therefore, that Michel Levy published many more copies of the Scenes than of the Nuits d'hiver. or that fewer copies of the poems than of the prose were bought by the public, or that both hypotheses are true, and this latter supposition is most likely the case. Prom the foregoing consideration several conclusions may be gathered which go far toward explaining the neglect of the poems in question. First, the volume is not and has never been widely circulated. Second, Murger enjoyed a clamorous reputation as a writer of prose, and that reputation prejudiced his public against the possible merit of his verse. Third, Les Nuits never were published under separate cover, coming initially, as they did, as an "obscure" volume of the Oeuvres completes. Fourth, the author's death, con current as it was with the publication of the poems. 5 further jeopardized the success of the work, for the myth of the man (the popular, happy-go-lucky leader of Bohemian life) was suddenly and sharply hewn by an idolatrous public. In the masses, interest was rekindled in the work that best conjured up the memory they had concocted of the author: this work was, understandably, the Scenes de la vie de Boheme. Despite the fact that Murger had said in dying, "Pas de musique, pas de bruit," some 1500 mourners (according to le Figaro. February 3, 1861) attended the funeral of their hero. Robert Baldick, in his biography, recounts the scene: Behind the hearse, flanked by four pall bearers, Edouard Thierry, Baron Taylor, Theodore Barriere and Eugene Labiche, came officialdom in the persons of Camille Doucet, representing the Ministry of State, Larozerie, the secretary to the Minister of Education, and three Academicians, Sainte-Beuve, Jules Sandeau and Francois Ponsard. They were followed by half the writers and jour nalists of Paris: Gautier, the Goncourt brothers, Theodore de Banville, Arsene Houssaye, Jules Valles, Villiers de l'Isle-Adam, and so many others that Villemessant, conscious of the honour that would redound to his newspaper, gave instructions that a list of all the better-known mourners should be published in the Figaro, thus inaugurating a practice which has since been current. The sur viving Water-Drinkers were there in full force: Lelioux and Leon Noel, Le Gothique, Vastine, Tabart and Chintreuil. So were other models for Murger's characters: Schanne, Wallon, Champfleury, even the servant Baptiste. Nadar was tenderly watching over two heavily-veiled women: Ana’ is and Mariette Roux. And bringing up the rear were scores of young men, students from the Left Bank and artists from Montmartre, who had come unbidden to pay tribute to the supreme chronicler of the pays latin.9 Thus may one justly speak of a "clamorous reputation," 6 which may or may not have been warranted by the intrinsic value of the author's works, and of a "personal myth" which spread like wildfire in Paris in 1861,^° thereby eclipsing the first publication of a work not wholly in accord with the myth. In addition to the biographical and bibliographical explanations for the volume's obscurity, there are aesthetic ones. As a physical entity, for example, the collection has a rather motley appearance, resulting from the numerous types of verse the poet was "testing out." It lacks the visual appeal of the regular quatrains of Lamartine and Theophile Gautier, of the sonnets so frequent in Baudelaire and so totally dominant in Heredia.^ Still more detrimental was the fact that Les Nuits d'hiver did not appear at a propitious moment of literary history. Baudelaire's Fleurs du mal had set the tone for the period five years earlier: the world of letters was "au mal," "au melancolique," "au violent." It seems rather difficult to accept categorically the statement of Pierre Martino that "dix ans apres Les Fleurs du mal. Baudelaire commenja a etre connu et a exercer une certaine influence. Banville, for example, had offered his friend a poem as early as March of 1845, the title of which was simply, "A Charles B a u d e l a i r e ."13 In her lengthy biography of the author of Les Fleurs du mal. Enid Starkie says, contrary to the suggestion of 7 Martino, In 1852, in a work that dealt with modern writers, Prarond mentions the old friends of his youth— Levavasseur, Champfleury, Murger, Banville, and others— but cites Baudelaire only as a writer who "amongst others we hope not to have lost foreverHe goes on to say that Baudelaire had enjoyed the rare fortune of having made a name without publishing a single line of verse, merely by reading his poems to his friends.^ Indeed, Baudelaire's influence was great— be it socially or in print-—among his immediate contemporaries. Even if the immediate influence of his poems were successfully put in doubt, there were the widely-read articles, which spread the same gospel as his poems. Thus he admired the melan choly of Delacroix' Femmes d'Algeria (j.n his Salon de 1846) as well as the Satanism and the hallucinatory quality of Wagner's Tannhauser^ (in his article, "Richard Wagner et Tannhauser a Paris"). Moreover, Baudelaire really differed from his contemporaries more in degree (the violence or intensity of emotion) and in manner than in mood, his "spleen" being a paroxystic variant of the mal du siecle. He had had his predecessors, as he would have his followers. Among the predecessors was Heine, whom he defended in two "rough drafts" of letters addressed to Jules Janin, "A propos du feuilleton (signe Eraste) Sur Henri Heine et la Jeunesse des Poetes": J'ai de tres serieuses raisons pour plaindre celui qui n'aime pas la Mort. Byron, Tennyson, Poe et cie. Ciel melancolique de la poesie moderne. Etoiles de premiere grandeur. 8 Pourquoi les choses ont-elles change?...Elies ont change parce qu'elles devalent changer. Votre_ami le sieur Villemain vous chuchote a l'oreille le mot: Decadence. . . . Pourquoi done toujours la joie? Pour vous divertir peut-etre. Pourquoi la tristesse n'aurait-elle pas sa beaute? Et l’horreur aussi? Et tout? Et n'importe quoi?i7 Thus in 1861, the very year of the publication of Murger’s poems, Baudelaire sums up the prevailing mood: mort. tristesse. horreur. Before Les Fleurs du mal. there had been the "muse phtisique" and the "rayons jam^s" of Sainte-Beuve (Joseph Delorme), the Breughelesque creams of Aloysius Bertrand, the macabre aspects of Alfred de Musset and Heine. In Banville's collection Le Sang de la coupe. containing work principally from the period 1841 to 1854, there is much in the way of bloody and graphic imagery, many invitations to drunkenness. Shortly after Les Fleurs du mal would come the "Saturnian" complaints of Verlaine, the cosmic destruction of Ducasse, the "long, immense, et raisonne dereglement de tous les sens" cultivated by Rimbaud. By contrast, Murger's poems, although sometimes morbidly ironic, were as often as not hopeful, and in any case, thoroughly sane. Seemingly conscious of the psychological predis position of his contemporaries, the leader of Bohemia at the last minute changed the original title he had envi sioned, Via dolorosa, to its present one, and penned two preliminary piecesin the sonnet "Au Lecteur" he sardonically mocks the bourgeois who would buy his volume ("Sans marchander d'un sou, malgre son prix modique"), and in the "Dedicace" he speaks of the baleful lot of Bohemian artists: ...Et deja j’entends les cris De mes compagnons dans 1'ombre Qui marchent les pieds meurtris. J'entends leur chant de misere J'entends la plainte de mort De ceux qui restent derriere; Et pourtant j'avance encor. Et debout sur le rivage, Les pieds mouilles par le flot. Ami, c'est d'apres l'orage Que j'ai trace mon tableau. It is thus with thoughts of misery, death, and a stormy climate that the reader begins his journey into Murger's world. He is partly deceived. There are some poems on death, some poems on misery, but Murger is in no sense a "poete de l'orage." There are many types of storms— for example, the fantasmagoric storms of Ducasse, the sublime and divine storms of Hugo, the macabre storms of Baudelaire Pluviose, irrite contre la ville entiere, De son urne a grands flots verse un froid tenebreux Aux pales habitants du voisin cimetiere Et la mortalite sur les faubourgs brumeux. ("Spleen," I)20 and the stormy reaches of artistic creation in Banville: Par quelque prodige pompeux Fais-moi monter, si tu le peux, Jusqu'a ces sommets ou, sans regies, Embrouillant les cheveux vermeils Des planetes et des soleils, Se croisent la foudre et les aigles. ("le Saut du Tremplin")21 10 Artiste foudroye sans cesse, o dompteur d'ames, Sagittare a l'arc d'or, captif melodieux, Qui portes dans tes mains ton bagage de flammes Et tes soleils voles autour du front des DieuxI ("Les Souffranees de 1’artiste")22 And there are political storms: "Que faire d'une lyre en ces jours d'orages?" wondered Joseph Delorme around 1815. A number of French writers of the preceding two centuries had conceived love as a stormy (tempestuous, cloudy, thundering) passion. But none of the common literary con ceptions of the term storm (divine or infernal, political or amorous, objective or subjective) seems applicable to Murger’s poetic works. The promise made as a concession to the time was never kept. Small wonder the volume was not warmly received. In choosing a title for his poems, Murger was similarly attempting to intrigue a public addicted to the melancholic in literature. His first idea, Via dolorosa. conveyed romantic melancholy, but not the mysterious, oneiric, moribund connotations of "Winter Nights." The poet was able, moreover, to capitalize on a wide array of forebears who had used similar titles. Murger's book is to a great extent, Parisian; before him there had been the nightly strolls through the city recounted by Restif de la Bretonne (Les Nuits de Paris ou le Spectateur nocturne. 1788-1794) and Gerard de Nerval (Les Nuits d'octobre. 23 1852). The whole notion of nocturnal brooding had been fostered to a great extent in France by Letourneur's trans 11 lation of the Night Thoughts on Life. Death, and Immorta lity of Edward Young (Meditations de la Nuit. 1769).2^ Novalis, in his Hvmnen an die Nacht (1798-1800) and Musset, in his Nuit de decembre (1836), had already combined thoughts of lost loves and death in a strangely ironic fashion that foreshadowed Murger. But Les Nuits d'hiver contains prose poems, and before these had been written there had appeared Aloysius Bertrand's Gaspard de la nuit (1842, containing a group entitled, in turn, La Nuit et ses prestiges) and a collection of six of the eventual Poemes en Prose of Baudelaire, published in Le Present (1857) as Poemes nocturnes. To inspire Murger, there had also been "Le Visiteur nocturne" (Le Livre du Promeneur. 1854) of Lefevre-Deumier, harking back to Musset, and perhaps even lines in Maurice de Guerin's "Au Grillon" (although in this piece, the feeling of the "winter night" is peaceable rather than ominous, as in the other poems we have referred to) : Inspire par un doux sourire, Les soirs d'hiver. je chanterais Et doux maintien et doux attraits, Ou regarderais sans rien dire. ("Au Grillon")25 The reading public was aware, moreover, and curious about, the sociological phenomena of the nocturnal exis tence of Bohemians and dandies. Between Balzac and the fictional Des Esseintes, Murger was one of those eccentrics who pulled the shades and barred the door so as to live or 12 work by night and sleep by day.26 Warned, after a bout with purpura at the "hopital," to give up his nocturnal habits and his coffee, Nous imaginames de fermer en plein jour les volets, de calfeutrer les fen&tres, d'allumer la chandelle, enfin nous voulumes essayer de tromper la Muse par cette contre- fagon de la nuit. Malheureusement le stratageme n’eut aucun succes...27 Nerval compared the capital of France unfavorably with that of London, because Paris "officially" went to bed too early, while London glittered, for example in "gin palaces (palais de genievre) resplendissants de gaz, de glaces, et de dorures, ou l'on s'enivre entre un pair d'Angleterre et un chiffonnier." He adds, "Si j'etais prefet de police [de Paris] , au lieu de faire fermer les boutiques, les theatres, les cafes, et les restaurants a minuit, je payerais une prime a ceux qui resteraient ouverts jusqu'au matin."28 It was, thus, with an "appealing" biographical and sociological trait in mind, as well as with a sense of literary fashion, that Murger chose a title vhich applies, in truth, to the tone of only a restricted number of his poems. Those readers (the less initiated) who chose to see Murger as the gay, resourceful figure of the Scenes de Boheme. were undoubtedly put off by the lugubrious aspect of the volume. Those who were more aware of Murger's true existence and who welcomed the modern notes in literature were, conversely, disappointed that the morose atmosphere was not sustained. 13 Out of tune with the poetic tenor of the historical moment, out of character with the mythic image of the author, neither wholly despondent nor cheerful, possessed of a rather motley physical appearance, the poems of Les Nuits d'hiver have been subject to a neglect that may or may not be warranted by the intrinsic value of the verse. The fundamental question still remains: "Why study the poetry of Murger?" Murger is one of those writers who, like Pixerecourt in the theater, Sainte-Beuve in poetry, and the Goncourt brothers in the novel, popularized a certain vein of literature without being creative talents of the first order. His sketches of Bohemian life left a deep imprint on his generation.^ As a historical figure then, the author of Les Scenes de la vie de Boheme deserves to be studied, but in more than one dimension. A reading of Stella, one of the short novels collected in Le Dessous du panier. for example, reveals an "unknown" side of the author; for here he explores salons and delves analytically and unsparingly (almost in a Stendhalian manner) into the lives of a count, a countess, and "le Tout Paris." But still one other dimension, that of the author of Les Nuits d’hiver. remains to be studied before the composite por trait of the writer can be completed, for Murger thought of himself first and foremost as a poet. Speaking of a clumsy story of Murger's (written in 1842), Baldick explains, 14 "Perhaps the reason why Murger's prose work at this time was so unsatisfactory was not so much lack of experience as lack of interest, for he regarded his stories as of little or no importance compared with his poems."'*® The poems, therefore, must be considered, and it is the object of the ensuing chapters to study the themes, vocabulary, and poetic technique of Les Nuits d'hiver. and to come to some con clusion on the ultimate value of the poems. In what rank of poetry does the volume merit a place? With what other poets does Murger form a spiritual kinship? Is he basi cally classic, romantic, or "realistic"? What was his particular apport. if any? Our immediate goal, then, is an objective exposition of themes and style in order to arrive at the ultimate goal— that of placing the poetry of Murger in the general framework of the nineteenth century. Before turning to exclusive considerations of theme and style, several prefatory comments on the volume and its various editions must be made. We have been able to examine and compare the first and second editions (1861), those of 1862, 1866, 1867, 1868, and 1872, but we were unable to obtain that of 1911.^1 This latter omission, however, can scarcely be of crucial importance, since the reading of the seven nine teenth-century editions revealed no textual variants, no changes whatsoever in punctuation. All editions contain 42 poems in verse, three of which do not bear a title in 15 the text and do not even appear in the final Table with their first lines as titles (which is the usual editorial practice with untitled poems): "Trainant, trainant ta chetive existence," "Celui-la dont je veux dire la triste fin..." and "Mais Chenier n'est pas le premier qu'il ait lu...." The title pages all bear the same complete title, Les Nuits d'hiver: poesies completes, suivies d1etudes sur Henry Murger par MM. Jules Janin. Theophile Gautier. P.-A. Fiorentino. Arsene Houssaye. Paul de Saint-Victor. With the exceptions of minor changes in type style, and with that of the differing dates of edition, the remaining data on the title page, giving a complete address of the pub lisher, is the same throughout. Each edition comprises, according to catalogue style, "288 pp. in-18." Of the 288 pages, the first 179 are indeed devoted to verse; following the sonnet, "Au Lecteur" and the "Dedicace," the remaining pieces are divided (rather arbitrarily, as we shall see) into four categories; Les Amoureux (ten poems), Chansons rustiaues (six), Fantaisies (fifteen), and Petits Poemes (ten). Then, following a page bearing the simple title, Ballades. Murger dedicates a group of seven prose poems (sixty-one pages in all) to Arsene Houssaye: Mon cher Arsene, Faites-moi le plaisir d'accepter la dedicace de ces petites pages. Quelques- unes ont a vous remercier de l'accueil que vous avez bien voulu leur faire quand vous 16 dlrigiez le recueil hospitalier de L'ARTISTE. C'est de vous que m'est venu le premier en couragement, et, bien que vos bonnes paroles soient vieillies de quinze ans, le souvenir m'en est rest! jeune. Due to problems both of prosody and theme particular to their unusual "genre, " the Ballades of Murger probably merit more space than can be accorded them in this study. (We will have occasion to refer to them only marginally as to a number of the poet's "other" works.) Yet in this initial inquiry into Les Nuits d'hiver. they cannot be totally neglected. Aside from the fact that they occupy considerable space in a rather slender volume, certain primary considerations on them are not foreign to the point of our inquiry, and may, in part at least, point the way to further future study of them. In fact, there are real advantages— quite beyond that of "getting them out of the way right from the start"— in beginning the body of our study with some remarks on the Ballades. 17 *Joris-Karl Huysmans, Sac au dos. in Les Vinqt Meilleures Nouvelles franyaises. ed. Alain Bosquet (Paris: Editions Seghers, 1956), p. 281. 2Ahasverus (prose, 1833); Promethee (verse, 1838). ^Baudelaire recognized a kindred spirit m Heine and was among his earliest partisans. When Jules Janin patriotically celebrated the sunny, Gallic ioie de vivre of writers like Beranger, Hegesippe Moreau, and Delphine Gay, Baudelaire retorted by saying "Quant a toutes les citations de petites polissonneries franyaises comparees a la poesie d'Henri Heine, cela fait l'effet d'une serinette ou d'une epinette comparee a un puissant orchestre. II n'est pas un seul des fragments d'Henri^ Heine que vous citez qui ne soit infiniment superieur a toutes les bergerades ou berquinades que vous admirez." ("Premier Projet de Lettre a Jules Janin," Oeuvres com pletes. ed. Y.-G. Le Dantec, rev. Claude Pichois [Paris: Gallimard, 196]], p. 801.) 4The prototype of the future Scenes appeared in installments in Le Corsaire-Satan beginning in 1846; La Vie de Boheme. a play written with the collaboration of Theodore Barriere premiered^in 1849; the full-blown novel, Les Scenes de la vie de Boheme. appeared two years later. ^In writing his recent biography (The First Bohemian: The Life of Henry Murger. see infra, note 9) Robert Baldick has done an admirably exhaustive job of unearthing and fruitfully deploying the substance of these few sources. ^A comparison of Flaubert's Education sentimentale with Champfleury's Aventures de Mademoiselle Mariette or Murger's Scenes shows how the former created a much richer texture from essentially the same stuff. ^There were seven editions of Les Nuits d'hiver. as part of the Oeuvres completes, between 1861 and 1872. The work was reprinted only once more in French (for the bicentennial revival of Murger's works by C. Levy, in 1911), although Arthur Clark Kennedy bought out an English verse translation (Winter Nights) in 1923 (London and Glascow, Gowans and Gray). On the other hand, in the last fifteen years alone, there have been seven French publications of the Scenes. ®The B. N. catalogue (1933) lists only the editions of 1861 (the second, however), 1866, and 1892. The B. M. catalogue (1955) lists only the third edition (1862) and 18 Kennedy's 1923 translation. No library in the Western United States has a copy of Les Nuits d'hiver. ^The First Bohemian: The Life of Henry Murger. (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1961), p. 186. l®The Goncourt Journal dated February 3, 1961, further attests to the "noise" of Murger's death: "Les feuilletons sont venus, les articles, les oraisons funebres. Les plumes ont pleure leurs larmes. Les regrets ont chante sur tous les tons. On s'est mis a faire un Murger legendaire, une sorte de heros de la Pauvrete, un honneur des lettres." And what follows is a denouncing— too severe— of certain aspects of the myth of Murger. (Edmond et Jules de Goncourt, Journal: Memoires de la vie litteraire Q22 vols.; Monaco: Imprimerie Nationalel, IV, p. T57.) In nis Histoire de Murger pour servir a l'histoire de la vraie Boheme (Paris: Jung-Treuttel, 1864), Adrien Lelioux writes, three years after Murger's death, of a "tradition legendaire, la plus dangereuse et la plus impitoyable bavarde gui soit dans Paris. Elle se promene dans les garnis et les estaminets, elle cancane dans les mansardes et raconte dans les ateliers des chapitres tout a fait inedits et apocryphes des Scenes de Boheme..." (p. 7). HYet, a disparate appearance is not alone sufficient to explain a lack of success in a volume: consider Hugo's Odes et Ballades and Banville's Cariatides or Stalactites. which were enormously successful. ^ Parnasse et svmbolisme (Paris: Armand Colin, 1967), p. 89. Martino does avow, further in the same paragraph, that Baudelaire "etait une autorite, un oracle, un poete- consultant deja, mais pour un tres petit nombre de poetes." This "tres petit nombre de poetes," Martino had earlier explained (p. 80), was all of Bohemia, which is to say, all who counted in the world of letters from 1845 to 1860. l3Les Stalactites, in Vol. Ill of Oeuvres completes (3 vols.; Paris: Charpentier, 1889-91). ^ Baudelaire (Norfolk, Connecticut: New Directions, 1958), p. 106. 15»ce petit poeme d'interieur...exhale je ne sais quel haut parfum de mauvais lieu qui nous guide assez vite vers les limbes insondes de la tristesse. En general, il ne peint pas de jolies femmes, au point de vue des gens du monde toutefois. Presques toutes sont malades, et res- 19 plendissent d'une certaine beaute interieure." (Oeuvres completes. p. 898) . 16"ii semble parfois, en ecoutant cette musique ardente et despotique, qu'on retrouve peintes sur le fond des tenebres, dechire par la reverie, les vertigineuses conceptions de 1'opium." (Oeuvres completes, p. 1214.) 17"Deuxieme Projet de Lettre," in Oeuvres completes. p. 805. See supra, p. 17, note 3. l®See, for example, "La Colombe blessee," "Le Vin de 1'amour," etc. IQ ■^These two poems hark back, consciously or uncon sciously, to the first two poems of Les Fleurs du mal. both from a standpoint of order in the volume and of general content. In his first poem, Murger insults his "Ami lecteur" as Baudelaire had insulted his "Hypocrite lecteur,— mon semblable,— mon frere!" In the second poems of each man it is a question of the "damned" role of the poet. The differences between the two poets, however, are great, and any further attempt at "rapprochement" would be vain. 20 Fleurs du mal. m Oeuvres completes. There is also a subjective storm in Baudelaire, as Pierre Martino points out. Having quoted Baudelaire's avowal of the two contradictory forces ("l'horreur de la vie et l'extase de la vie") that made the poet a nervous victim of ennui. Martino says, ”11 passa son existence a tenter les curiosites et les experiences qui pourraient rompre ce grand 'Spleen.1 Sa sensibilite, sans cesse boulevers€e et remuee a fond, s'est developpee dans une atmosphere d'orage." (Parnasse et svmbolisme. p. 80.) diodes Funambulesaues. in Vol. Ill of Oeuvres com pletes (3 vols.; Paris: Charpentier, 1889-91). (All sub sequent quotations of Banville have similarly been taken from the three tomes of this edition.) 2^Le Sang de la coupe: the theme of "Stormy crea tion" is insistent in this volume. See "Les Affres de 1'amour," for further illustration. 23Both these writers circumambulated Paris with eyes as keen as those of a journalist. Their "Paris by Night" is much more complete than Murger's, embracing cafes, billiard parlors, les Hailes, the police department and the courts. Nerval even muses on literary articles. See infra, pp. 89-90, 209-10, on the confines of Murger's Paris. 20 ^Letourneur is perhaps even more important as a purveyor of melancholy by dint of his translation of "Ossian" (1777), though the title of that work has little relationship to our concern. 25Particularly reminiscent of Murger in Guerin's "Au Grillon" are (1) the solitude of the poet, who,com fortable as he seems, longs for "un peu de chaleur a la flamme/Et puis un regard pour mon ame"; (2) the image of the dying fire ("La pale cendre du foyer"? see infra. pp. 88-89 on Murger’s images of extinction)? ( 3) the fan tasy of a conversation with a cricket (see infra, pp. 85- 86? 153-54). (The whole of "Au Grillon" is reproduced in Appendix IV„) 26As Lelioux informs us (Histoire de Murger. p. 43), "...Murger travaillait toutes les nuits et dormait tous les jours, de sorte que son lit barrait la porte." He later adds (p. 49), "Les privations, les chagrins reels et^ les melancolies factices ont deja Q.841J quelque peu creuse ses joues et bistre [son] teint...La verve, 1'inspiration... ne descend qu'avec la nuit et se dissipe aux premieres lueurs du jour...Du cafe! Du cafe!" 2^Ibid., p. 58. 28See Les Nuits d'octobre. Parts V and VI, on Nerval's comparison of London with Paris. 28A11 the boulevardiers of the mid-nineteenth century were affected by Murger's enthusiastic, anecdotal style. The Souvenirs litt6raires of Maxime Du Camp, the Confes sions of Arsene Houssaye (both written in the 1880's when the authors were mature) are good examples of the unwitting transposition of autobiography into doting, quasi-fictional anecdotes of young artists and the demi-monde. 30First Bohemian, p. 44. 3lThe nineteenth-century editions issue from "Michel Levy freres," while that of 1911, which is listed in Vol. XXIV (ed. D. Jordell) of the Catalogue general de la Librairie francaise of Otto Lorez, bears the name of "C. Levy" as publisher. Neither the British Museum nor the Bibliotheque Nationale catalogue the 1911 edition. Chapter II The Question of the Ballades 21 22 Ma mere rentrait, tantot animee d'une joie profonde, et tantot triste et trainante et comme blessee. La joie qu'elle rapportait se marquait de loin dans quelques traits de sa marche et s'epandait de ses regards. J'en eprouvais des communications dans tout mon sein; mais ses abattements me gagnaient bien davantage... — Maurice de Guerin, Le Centaure The term "poeme en prose" may be justifiably used in speaking of the seven pieces which close Les Nuits d'hiver. However, some of them fail in one way or another to meet the three preliminary criteria in Suzanne Bernard's defi nition: unite organiaue. gratuite. brievete.^ In general, they exhibit the qualities of unity and independence (gratuite) , but lack that of concision. While most of these pieces are short (except "Les Amours d'un grillon et d'une etincelle"), in terms of physical space, they seem to sprawl linearly and discursively, in accordance with the rules of logic and historical time, instead of operating intuitively. Yet they all employ a poetic sus pension of the ordinary world of reality and have at base a theme that is fundamentally "poetic": the dreamy poet in love with a fleeting illusion ("Les Amours d'un grillon et d'une etincelle"); the debauching of a village by an envoy of the devil ("La Tournee du diable"); the "death of an innocent" ("Les Trois Voiles de Marie Berthe"); the communication between lovers and nature ("Les Messages de la brise"). In another poem, a daisy, which the morning sylph, "amoureux de la rose,” has forgotten to water, is 23 on the verge of perishing when it is miraculously resus citated by teardrops that have fallen, unknowingly, from the cheeks of a young girl who thinks she has been forsaken by her own lover ("Rose et Marguerite"). The sixth piece ("Le Collier de larmes") is the story of a countess whose husband ("un seigneur d'Allemagne") has been captured while fighting a holy war against the Saracens. She cannot pay the Sultan's ransom, as her chateau has been ravaged by fire and drought, but sets out to find her husband, her sole viaticum a "piece of the true cross." Si mon seigneur doit mourir, il mourra dans mes bras, Et pourra benir son heritier, qui n'aura d'autre heritage, helas! She finds her husband in the enemy camp. On the eve of his execution, the countess has a dream in which her patron saint, Marguerite, gives her a three-stringed necklace of pearls made of the tears that the countess shed on route from Germany to Palestine. The necklace is sold to pay the ransom. The final (seventh) piece is on the Faustian theme of Marguerite's loss of innocence ("Le Premier Peche de Marguerite"). It is difficult to label the themes of the Ballades in a word or two; one has a tendency to want to recount the story, which bespeaks, perhaps, their prosaic quality. Yet their poetic side cannot be ignored. Even the most discursive of them ("Le Collier de larmes") turns on a poetic image (the metamorphosis of the tears into pearls, 24 a miracle symbolizing the indomitability of love and religious faith). And their collective title, Ballades, suggests their substance: the poetry of fantasy,2 the traditions of medieval settings, and dreams of various elemental spirits. Suzanne Bernard explains the province of such "ballades": Sur Aloysius Bertrand en particulier, le recueil de Loeve-Veimars paru en 1825, Ballades, leqendes et chants d'Anqleterre et de l'Ecosse. semble avoir exerce une in fluence decisive: outre gu'il contient des ballades traduites de Scott, notamment Jock d1Azeldean. il offre des modeles caracteris- tiques de ces refrains et repetitions, qui sont une des lois du genre; enfin on y trouve quantite de ballades fantastiques, toutes peuplees de spectres, de sorciers, d'esprits ou d'ondins, qui jouent un si grand role dans la litterature populaire. Her definition is completed by the fascinating essay on the "Ballade allemande" which Charles Asselineau wrote in manner of an addendum to the Trente-Six Ballades Joveuses of Banville. The dates he ascribes to the apogee of the genre show that as an adolescent, Murger would indeed have been nurtured on the German form: Clairs de lune, chateaux en ruines herissant les monts, lacs mysterieux hantes par les Elfes, chevalier-fantomes surgis- sant visiere baissee dans l'oratoire des chatelaines, coursiers infernaux emportant au galop les amants parjures, amoureuses Ondines tapies dans les roseaux, spectres, fantdmes, apparitions, vampires, echos fallacieux, couvents profanes, chasseurs aventureux trouves morts un matin dans la clairiere, Dieu sait de quelle faveur vous avez joui de 1820 a 18351...Tout fut Ballade alors: la jeune fille filant son rouet, le vieux seigneur pleurant son fils 25 mort a la bataille, le chatiment des soldats blasphemateurs emportes par le diable, le voyageur egare par le feu- follet pendant la nuit, le sabbat des moines sacrileges dans le cloitre abandonne.... ce nouveau genre...n'etait au fond gue la Romance. Remarquons en passant que ces pretendues Ballades allemandes s'appellent proprement des Lieds (Lieder), mot qui se traduirait exactement en franjais par celui de Lai.... Les Ballades de Goethe sont des Lieder; celles de Burger s'appellent simplement Poesies (gedichte); celles de Schiller sont ou des Lieder, ou des chants (gesange).3 In Murger's Ballades we find a cricket chatting with a beetle and serenading a star; a diabolical visitor Son visage etait sinistre,---on eut dit la tdte d'un decapite.— Sous d'epais sourcils herisses, ses yeux luisaient, pareils a des flammes. Un affreux sourire raillait sur sa bouche.^ Etincelants comme des brins d'acier rougis a la fournaise, ses cheveux se tenaient droits sur son front. Et les rides de son crane ruisselaient d'une sueur infecte, dont les gouttes tachaient le sol comme la morsure d'un acide. ("La Tournee du diable") whose boiling, flaming appearance recalls motifs of Hugo's ballades ("A un Passant" and "La Ronde du Sabbat") as well as of Bertrand's fantaisies de Gaspard ("La Ronde sous la cloche" and "L'Heure du sabbat"); a child's veil made of azure and stars; a zephyr that carries messages from a swallow, a nightingale, a village clock, from crickets in fields of cornflowers and from a young man in love, to a young girl. The world in which roses, daisies, crickets, sylphs, and humans converse, recalls that of Hugo's ballade. "Le Sylphe."^ "Le Collier de larmes" harks back 26 to many poems of Hugo (especially "La Fiancee du timbalier") and to the whole medieval framework of Gaspard de la Nuit. "Le Premier Peche de Marguerite" similarly appeals to the nostalgia of medieval legend, recalling through Goethe the long Faust tradition. There is much in the atmosphere of Murger's prose poems, then, that justifies the title, Ballades, in the Germanic and Scottish sense of the term which the French romantics adopted as their own.^ As Suzanne Bernard sees in such romantic works as Le Poignard du Moven Age of Alphonse Rabbe, Smarra of Charles Nodier, and La Guzla of Merimee,® literature that is at least marginally allied to the vein of prose poem that Aloysius Bertrand worked, aren't the poems of Murger, at least in content, equally allied to that vein? Another criterion of the prose poem would seem to be hallucinatory imagery (the distinction between the fantastic and the hallucinatory is at times nebulous, the latter seeming to be, indeed, a luminous intensification of the former): "D'un certain point de vue on peut con- siderer Bertrand comme un hallucine, Rimbaud comme le poete de 1'extravagance et du chaos, Lautreamont comme un fou, et le Coup de Des de Mallarme comme un 'acte de demence'. In the Ballades of Murger, one encounters certain resplen dent evocations, although the term hallucinatory would seem somewhat strong in describing them: Le troisieme voile de Marie Berthe etait fait d'un morceau de l'azur celeste. 27 II etait brode d'etoiles, et il embaumait les odeurs du paradis. Ce fut son ange gardien qui le lui donna le jour ou elle s'en alia dans le ciel. ("Les Trois Voiles de Marie Berthe") C'est un collier de perles plus rares et plus belles que celles qui naissent sous l'eau de la mer, Ou les rois les envoient chercher par des esclaves habiles a la nage et sans peur contre les requins. Ce collier precieux a ete travaille et monte en or fin par saint Eloi, mon ami, qui est orfevre du paradis, et il y a mis tous ses soins. Ces perles ont ete puisees dans votre devouement et dans votre courage conjugal et chretien. Ce8 sont les larmes que vous avez versees pendant votre douloureux pelerinage; je les ai recueillies une a une, sur vos pas, et, avec l'agrement de Dieu, je les ai metamorphosees ainsi que vous voyez." ("Le Collier de larmes") Alors l'etranger s'incline, et en echange du service qu'elle venait de lui rendre, il tira de son doigt^un anneau d'or, dans lequel etait enchasse un diamant brillant comme une etoile, et le passa au doigt de Marguerite, Qui trouva le diamant plus beau que celui de sa compagne. Et le visage du cavalier s'illumina d'un sourire etrange. ("Le Premier Peche de Marguerite") Lorsque le vent gonflait son echarpe, elle semblait avoir des ailes et pres de s'envoler. ("Rose et Marguerite") The resplendent vision of a garment or piece of jewelry as a divine token "voile/azur celeste" "collier/saint Eloi" "anneau/etoile" "echarpe/ailes de la brise" 28 seems to be one of the principal reveries of Murger. It is curious to note that it was to Arsene Houssaye that Murger addressed his "petites pages;"9 it was precisely to Arsene Houssaye that Baudelaire dedicated, in turn, his "prose poetique, musicale sans rythme et sans rime." While even Baudelaire's first correspondence with Houssaye on Le Rodeur parisien* - 0 dates from December 1861, which is to say, some months after the publication of Les Nuits d'hiver. it would be foolhardy to think that a poet of Baudelaire's dimensions would have written a dedication in imitation of Murger— even though Baudelaire was in Paris in 1861 and probably was familiar with the contents of the new volume of his Bohemian friend. (Baudelaire and Murger had known each other for twenty years by this time. If Murger's funeral and the subsequent publication of his works received little overt attention from Baudelaire, it is understandable. Baudelaire was despondant over debts and a "thievery" he deemed he had committed; his affair with Jeanne Duval was coming to an ugly end ^January to March, 186^ ' be was actively beating the drums for his candidacy to the Academy; he was fast at work revising Les Fleurs du mal. adding to Le Spleen de Paris, and turning out articles, most noteworthy of which was that of April 1, 1861, in the Revue Europeenne. on "Richard Wagner et 'Tannhauser' a Paris. "H) it is quite plausible that the author of Flowers of Evil, knowing full well that 29 Arsene Houssaye had in the past been receptive to prose poems, such as those of Murger, thought first of that critic, who directed La Presse at the time and still had a hand in L'Artiste. Baudelaire, in fact, proposes (letter dated "Noel, 1861") to send Houssaye one batch of prose poems prepared specially for L'Artiste, and one specifi cally chosen for La Presse. And so the question of the relationship of Murger with Baudelaire, chronologically his successor, begs con sideration as much as that of Murger's connections with his predecessor, Aloysius Bertrand. Through Bertrand (or perhaps independently of him) the German influence must be 12 reckoned with. To such questions of source, intent, and subject should be joined that of style, and the sum of these studies should result in a reponse to the most funda mental inquiry: Do the Ballades constitute "poemes en prose" as the genre has been defined by modern critics? Or do they remain basically "imaginative stories" or "prose poetique"? In the last analysis, a future study of the Ballades may find that they meet most of the external criteria of the definition of "prose poem," but that whether or not they are indeed "poems" of any sort is a matter of the poet's force— of his talent or "religiosity." If this be the case, the conclusions reached in our own essay on the versified poems may be of some use. Should some of the "poemes" resemble prose or clearly 30 constitute stories rather than poems, would the group still not be deserving of study? Just such an admixture of forms marks the celebrated pieces of Le Spleen de Paris: Pour ne pas risquer le malentendu, il conviendrait peut-etre de prendre garde que ces petits poemes sont des poemes plus ou moins. Les poemes purs, ou presque purs, sans doute sont les plus beaux...Mais d'autres sont, ne sont que des "moralites," des "sotties"...ou des "histoires extra- ordinaires." Et, enfin, des "fusees," ou des bribes de confession comme echappees, avec des tressaillements au "coeur mis a nu."13 Let us proceed then to an examination of the themes and stylistic devices of Henry Murger. A close study of his subjects of revery reveals a certain duplicity; there is a dichotomy that separates the oeuvre poetiaue without, yet, dividing it. It was our original hope to find a method of consideration that would permit a "global critical view" of the poems, that is to say, which would, through the discovery of recurring reveries, result in a unified and coherent understanding of the poet's volume as a whole. As Jean-Pierre Richard had put it, in his Univers imaqinaire de Mallarme. La critique se laisse tres libre- ment aller dans l'objet qu'elle pretend comprendre, confiante que celui-ci saura bien de lui-mSme, et par le seul bonheur de sa presentation, lui signaler le dessin virtuel de sa coherence. Chez Mallarme, par exemple, la critique essaiera de relier l'erotique a la poetique, de mettre en rapport drama turgic, philologie, esthetique. Elle voudra que Les Contes indiens prolongent 31 tel Sonnet funebre ou1Herodiade soit la soeur du Faune. et qu1Iaitur debouche tout droit dans La Derniere mode. Bref, elle revera d'instituer entre toutes les oeuvres particulieres, et tous les registres— serieux, tragique, metaphysique, precieux, amoureux, esthetique, ideologique, frivole— , de cette oeuvre, une relation d'ensemble qui les oblige a mutuellement While our own effort is far from having the amplitude of Richard's prodigious volume, we feel we have to a certain degree realized the basic hope of "global understanding" in the present essay. When viewed as a whole, the forty-three poems of Les Nuits reflect the dilemma of the Centaure. the mythic creature popularized by Maurice de Guerin twenty-five years before Murger's poems were published.^ Guerin's centaure, Macaree, exhibits an ambivalent attitude toward humanity, usually suffering in the realm of mortals la saluai pas, car elle s'empara de moi avec violence, m'enivrant comme eut fait une liqueur funeste soudainement versee dans mon sein, et j'eprouvai que mon etre, jusque-la si ferme et si simple, s'ebran- lait et perdait beaucoup de lui-meme, comme s'il eut du se disperser dans les vents. yet unable to find utter and lasting peace in the divine realm "which a God, summoned to recount his life, would describe in two words: the simple, the solitary." Off spring of Ixion and Nephele, the centaur is subject to many contradictions (which may be alternate or simultaneous s'eclaircir.l^ Quand je descendis de votre asile 32 conditions), including prideful self-sufficiency and a self- effacing integration into a sort of nirvana? reality and illusion; agitation and tranquility; mortality and immor tality; flesh and nebulosity; ignorance and wisdom, and so forth.^ Speaking of his youthful passion for swimming in the "fleuves" where he was born, Macaree says Une moitie de moi-meme, cachee dans les eaux, s'agitait pour les surmonter, tandis que I1autre s'elevait tranquille et que je portais mes bras oisifs bien au-dessus des flots...Combien de fois, surpris par la nuit, j'ai suivi les courants sous les ombres qui se repan- daient, deposant jusque dans le fond des vallees 1'influence nocturne^des dieux! Ma vie fougueuse se temperait alors au point de ne laisser plus Cju'un leger sentiment de mon existence repandu par tout mon Stre avec^une egale mesure, comme, dans les eaux ou je nageais, les lueurs de la deesse qui parcourt les nuits. As an aging centaur (Chiron) reveals, "...hommes et cen- taures reconnaissent pour auteurs de leur sang des soustracteurs du privilege des immortels, et peut-etre que tout ce qui se meut hors d'eux-mSmes n'est qu'un larcin qu'on leur a fait, qu'un leger debris de leur nature emporte au loin..." If men are indeed of the same "ill-begotten" origin as centaurs, it should not be surprising to find poets like Murger torn between the deception of "reality" and the perception of the divine. In Murger's imagination, the alternate states of turmoil and beatitude are reflected, consciously or not, in his visions of the city and the 33 covin try, respectively. Such had been the romantic tradi tion for some time, as would attest almost any of the most celebrated Wordsworth pieces ("Expostulation and Reply," "The Tables Turned," "Sonnet XXXIII") Yet most romantic transcendental poets disdained the urban decor as being "unworthy" of verse. Indeed it was really not until the rise of symbolism that poetic substance was regularly derived from urban settings. In any case, most poets show a definite bent toward one decor or the other, whereas the author of Les Nuits d'hiver sustained the two. The next two chapters will bear upon themes and imagery (1) in the urban poems and (2) in the bucolic pieces. Such a division is legitimized in part by the fact that Murger himself, in antithetic fashion, employs 20 the terms Les Amoureux and Chansons rustiaues to characterize the first two of the four groups of poems in verse. (The second two "parts" are named for manner, rather than for theme or decor, being called Fantaisies and Petits Poemes. and most poems in each of these groups fit in rather well, thematically, with one or the other of the first two groups.) The urban/rustic antithesis seems, furthermore, to have been more or less present in the col lective poetic mind in France toward 1860, witness Hugo's Chansons des rues et des bois of 1865.2^ What then is. the city of Les Amoureux? 34 ^See the "Introduction” to her work, Le Poeme en prose de Baudelaire iusau'a nos iours (Paris: Nizet, 1959). 2 it will be remembered that one of the first batches of poemes en prose which Baudelaire succeeded in publishings appeared in the ephemeral Revue Fantaisiste. of November 1, 1861. ^"Histoire de la Ballade," in Banville, Oeuvres completes. II, 406-08. 4It will be remembered that in this piece from the Odes et Ballades, a diurnal sylph, having been detained when his wing was caught in a human kiss, asks a young lady to give him refuge from the approaching night. (The follow ing quotation, and all subsequent ones, come from the edition of Hugo's Oeuvres poetiaues prepared by Pierre Albouy Q vols.; Paris: Gallimard, 1964-67j.) Ce soir un couple heureux, d'une voix solennelle Parlait tout bas d'amour et de flamme eternelle. J'entendais tout; pres d'eux je m'etais arrSte; Ils ont dans un baiser pris le bout de mon aile, Et la nuit est venue avant ma liberte. Helasl il est trop tard pour rentrer dans ma rose Chatelaine, ouvre-moi, car ma demeure est close. Recueille un fils du jour, egare dans la nuit; Permets, jusqu’a demain, qu'en ton lit je repose: Je tiendrai peu de place et ferai peu de bruit. Hugo's predilection for fantaisie noire is evident further on in this poem (in which he evokes "nains monstrueux," "Gnomes," "follet fantastique," "un mort parmi ses os," "quelque necromant riant de mon effroi") whereas Murger's spirits remain diurnal and innocuous. ("La Tournee du Diable" is exceptional, in that respect, in the work of the Bohemian poet.) As suggested above, Murger's "humanizing" of plants and animals may have come to him from sources more immediate than the fantasy of Germany. Suzanne Bernard, in speaking of the diary of Maurice de Guerin (a poet of whom Murger was very fond) says, "II faut lire le Cahier vert pour sentir jugqu'a quel point Guerin est en 'cor respondence avec l'ame de la nature'...allant jusqu'a 35 souhaiter s'identifier au printemps...se sentir a la fois fleur, verdure, oiseau, chant, fralcheur, elasticite, volupte, serenitei" (Poeme en Prose, p. 78.) ^According to the article "Ballade" in the Bloch and Wartburg Dictionnaire etvmoloqiaue (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1964), "Le sens de 'poeme ayant pour sujet une legende populaire,' XIXe, est du a l'all. Ballade ou a l'angl. ballad." ^Poeme en prose, see Chapter One (especially Part I, "De la prose poetigue au poeme en vers," and Part II, "Aloysius Bertrand et la naissance du genre"). 7Ibid., p. 13. ®While style is not our concern here, one observa tion that may prove fruitful in future studies of the Ballades seems too strong to resist: the repetition of the initial demonstratives (C1est. Ce. Ces. Ce) lends a litany like rhythm to the piece. Suzanne Bernard points out that Bertrand achieves an architectural unity in his "Ma Chaumiere," for example, by a certain symmetry,.cette symetrie etant souligne par la reprise des mSmes termes au debut de Qchaque couplet]." (Poeme en prose, p. 62.) ^Murger's avoidance of any generic terms, poemes, poemes en prose, etc., is as curious as unavailing. 10This title, along with Le Promeneur solitaire and La Lueur et la fumee (see the two letters to Houssaye dating from the end of December, 1861) succeeded that of Poemes nocturnes (1857) in Baudelaire's mind, and preceded that of Le Spleen de Paris. ^On all this, see Starkie, Baudelaire. Part III, Chapters II to V. It is not certain just where Baudelaire and Murger met for the first time. Baldick suggests the Cafe Momus, which seems to us the most likely supposition; Enid Starkie suggests the Hotel Merciol, where Murger and his fellow "Water-drinkers" resided. Dornier (Revue de France. March 1925) suggests that it was in the Cafe de la Rotonde. Still another frequent Bohemian rendez-vous was the Cage Tabourey. The date generally agreed on is 1841 (at which time the Cafe Momus was the most frequent rendez-vous of Champfleury, Nadar, Courbet and Charles Barbara, and, less often, of Pravat d'Anglemont, Theophile Gautier, and Gerard de Nerval). Starkie says, "Although Murger was the most famous of the writers whom Baudelaire met at this time, the most influential was unquestionably Champfleury..." 36 (p. 172). The same biographer explains Baudelaire's in debtedness to Murger: "The Salon of 1846 laid the founda tions of Baudelaire's reputation as a critic in glorious manner. It was favorably noticed in many quarters. Henri Murger was one of the first to draw attention to it in the Post-Scriptum to his own Salon of the same year, in the Moniteur de la Mode in May: 'In a word Monsieur Baudelaire has written an original work, strange and full of youthful and noble daring. What is more, it is a work which will lasti'" (pp. 160-61.) 12 Adrien Lelioux (Murger, p. 232) confirms the Germanic influences on Murger: "Comme la plupart des jeunes gens de son §poque, Murger subit tout d'abord a ses debuts 1'influence litteraire des idees allemandes qui etaient a l'ordre du jour. Elies devaient etre particulierement sympathiques a cet esprit na'if et sans defiance qui cher- chait a tatons sa voie. Vous vous rappelez encore que Murger etait de sang allemand, et, de plus, en ces temps de l'art pour la forme et par la forme, les lettres qui concourent a la formation d'un nom propre n'etaient pas sans quelque influence predestinatoire." 13yve Plorenne, notes on Le Spleen de Paris, in his edition of Charles Baudelaire: Oeuvres completes (3 vols., Paris: Le Club Frangais du Livre, 1966), III, 1601-02. ^4(Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1961) p. 15. l^The author read aloud the manuscript of Le Centaure to Chopin in 1836, but had probably written it in 1834 or 1835. The poem was printed several years later, as Bernard d'Harcourt explains in his Maurice de Guerin et le poeme en prose. "Le public lettre du Second Empire fut vivement intrigue par 1'accent etrange des Poemes de Guerin. George Sand, en revelant Le Centaure aux lecteurs de la Revue des Deux-Mondes. leur donnait vingt ans plus t8t, le conseil suivant: 'Au risque de passer pour pedant nous-meme, nous n'hesiterons pas a dire qu'il faut lire deux et meme trois fois Le Centaure pour en apprecier les beautes.'" (p. xiii.) l^Maurice de Guerin, Oeuvres completes, ed. Bernard d'Harcourt (2 vols.; Paris: Societe d'Editions Les Belles Lettres, 1947), I, 5. (The following citations are also taken from this edition.) ■ * ‘ 7"Ixion's name, formed from ischvs ("strength") and io ("moon"), also suggests ixias ("mistletoe")....Mistletoe was regarded as the oak-tree's genitals, and when the Druids ritually lopped it off with a golden sickle, they were performing a symbolic emasculation. The viscous juice of its berries passed for oak-sperm, a liquid of great 37 regenerative virtue." Interpolated from Robert Graves, "Ixion" and "Asclepius," The Greek Mvths (2 vols.; New York: George Braziller, 1957), I, 209 and 176. Nephele was a cloud formed by Zeus into the likeness of his own wife, Hera, whom it was Ixion's intention to seduce. Zeus surprised Ixion making love to the "false Hera" and con demned him to roll eternally through the sky, bound to a fiery wheel. (See Graves, "Ixion.") l^Le Centaure. in Oeuvres completes. I, 10-11. ^A single couplet from "Sonnet XXXIII" should suffice to recall the theme: Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers: Little we see in Nature that is ours. 20The most cursory glance at these poems reveals that they have a Parisian decor or manifest the facile sort of love one found in Bohemia from 1840 to 1865. 2^Often other writers whose volumes exhibited the dual nature in question preferred a city of politicians to a city of lovers. As Jacques Seebacher avows in his "Introduction" to Les Chansons des rues et des bois (Paris: m ______ J /i * 1______________• ____' llrt_______ _ I x. 1 _ ____________ _1 a operer cette retra _ jcher^une fugitive valeur dans les verdoiements du moi; de 1856 a 1861, Michelet publie coup sur coup L'Oiseau. L*Insecte. L1Amour. La Femme. La Mer en meme temps qu'il reprend son Histoire de France a la Renaissance. Tout le siecle semble sentir le besoin de se retremper." Garnier-Glammarion Hugo n'est pas le seul Chapter III The Swallow and the Wanderer: The Urban Poems 38 39 Dans ces moments, je m'inquietais de mes forces, j'y reconnaissais une puissance qui ne pouvait demeurer solitaire, et me prenant, soit a secouer mes bras, soit a multiplier mon galop dans les ombres spa- cieuses de la caverne, je m'effor^ais de decouvrir dans les coups que je frappais au videt et par 11 emportement des pas que j'y faisais, vers quoi mes bras devaient s'etendre et mes pieds m'emporter. — Maurice de Guerin, Le Centaure I. The Swallow: Urban Poems of Love Immersed as he was in the peculiarly brilliant Second Empire society and given as he was to inveterate habits of "realistic" observation, Murger records faith fully and indelibly certain aspects of that society, and none with more keenness than its attitude toward love. In the "Chanson de Musette," which was intercalated in the Scenes de Boheme. Murger struck upon the swallow as an apt image of the fleeting, inconstant, fickle nature of the lover (and love itself). Louis Untermeyer, in speaking of Heine's engaging poem, "The North Sea," says, "Shelley's bird, indicative of his soaring spirit, is the skylark; Keats is identified with the nightingale; Poe and his raven are inseparable, but Heine saw himself riding desperate waves with the restless wanderer, the wind-driven and home less sea-gull."1 Poe's bird symbolized wisdom; Heine's bird was the image of the dispossessed; Murger's bird, on the other hand, is the image of the fluctuating relation ships which existed among artists and grisettes in the Bohemia of the mid-nineteenth century. 40 Having been reminded, in "La Chanson de Musette," of a former love by the return of a swallow, Hier, en voyant une hirondelle Qui nous ramenait le printemps, Je me suis rappele la belle Qui m'aima quand elle eut le temps the poet "wishes aloud" that his love similarly return: Muse de l'infidelite Reviens encor manger ensemble Le pain beni de la gaite. Her garb, however, will not be like the sleek plumage of the swallow: Tu remettras la robe blanche Dont tu te parais autrefois, Et comme autrefois, le dimanche, Nous irons courir dans les bois. Assis le soir sous la tonnelle, Nous boirons encor ce vin clair Ou ta chanson mouillait son aile Avant de s'envoler dans l'air. Just as the first breath of warm weather signals the swallow to return to its summer habitat, the carnival re calls to Musette previous happiness with the poet during that season in years gone by, and she returns (unfortunate ly) as if in answer to the wish expressed by the poet. Musette qui s'est souvenue, Le carnaval etant fini, Un beau matin est revenue, Oiseau volage, a l'ancien nid; Mais en embrassant l'infidele, Mon coeur n’a plus senti d'esnoi, Et Musette, qui n'est plus elle, Disait que je n'etais plus moi. The poet is forced to admit that love is dead. Adieu, va-t'en chere adoree, Bien morte avec 1'amour dernier; Notre jeunesse est enterree 41 Au fond du vieux calendrler. Ce n'est plus qu'en fouillant la cendre Des beaux jours qu'il a contenus, Qu'un souvenir pourra nous rendre La clef des paradis perdus. Thus does the swallow stand for "l'infidele" in Murger's most widely-acclaimed poem (Scribe claims, in a preface to La Dame aux camelias, that he would give all his works to have written "La Chanson de Musette"; Gautier thought it fitting that for an epitaph one should simply inscribe on Murger's tombstone: "He wrote 'La Chanson de Musette'"). The image of the Parisian female as a "flighty" creature, marks not only Murger's poems but his prose as well. Several notions expressed in the following prose passages involve the bird imagery which Murger reveals in his poems: (1) the equating of the apartment or mansarde with a "nest"? Pour tout dire, Louise etait un de ces oiseaux volages et passagers qui, par fantaisie et souvent par besoin, font pour un jour, ou plutot pour une nuit, leur nid dans les mansardes du quartier latin et y demeurent volontiers quelques jours, si on sait les retenir par un caprice— ou par des rubans. (Scenes de la Vie de Boheme. p. 92) (2) the psychological need to change habitats or migrate; L'artiste la pine larme] secha par un dernier baiser, et conduisit la fugitive en face d'un miroir ou elle attifa ses jolis chiffons, pareille a l'oiseau qui se sait voyageur, et, pret a changer de nid, secoue ses ailes avant de les ouvrir au vent du passage. (Les Vacances de Camille, p. 6) 42 Son etourdie ne pouvait s'immobiliser. C'etait une linotte qui changeait de branche et qui venait de sauter de la branche epineuse sur la branche fleurie. (Camille, pp. 53-54) (3) the gaiety of the chirping bird Comme l’oiseau ne jaseur que le silence etoufferait, elle glissa par la premiere issue qui lui fut ouverte son babil impatient. (Camille, p. 50) Even the preening amidst accumulated trinkets (rubans) is an attribute of a certain group of birds— although not notably of swallows. The concept of the apartment as "nest" had its in spiration not only in the natural expansion of the metaphor of woman as bird, but also in the physical reality of Murger’s existence. Adrien Lelioux, who shared a garret for a time with Murger, used the same metaphor to describe their lofty niche, rue Montholon: Pour arriver dans cette forteresse aerienne, nous gravissions l'escalier de service dont chaque etage etait divise en deux par un large palier et n'avait jamais vu de quinquet allume, de sorte que mon excellent pere, accomplissant un soir penible pour sa taille et pour sa corpulence, de monter jusqu'a notre nid, nous dit en arrivant hors d'haleine: — Sacredie gar50ns, vous demeurez bien haut; j’ai compte douze etagesi2 The nest of "La Chanson d'Hiver" doesn't quite attain the degree of warmth Murger would like. He explains that while the cricket sings to the salamanders ("Q:e£J esprits lumineux du foyer"), 43 Engourdis dans notre bien-etre, Comme au fond d'un nid duvete, Sans regarder le thermometre Nous attendrons fleurir l'ete. In the mordant poem "Printanilre," a Parisian poem despite the expectations to the contrary which the title occasions, Murger reflects that the swallows returning with the spring will find their rents a bit higher than in the previous year. Un trou noir dans la cheminee Comme un entresol a son prix. And he then again speaks of the insufficient warmth of the room (nid) of his neighbor: Avec la jeune feuille verte Qui sort^du bourgeon printanier Paralt, a sa fenetre ouverte, Ma voisine de l'an dernier. Pendant les mois d^hiver frileuse, Elle n'a pas quitte son nid. Jadis elle eut pose pour Greuze, Maintenant c'est pour Gavarni. Thus is the harshness of the Parisian winter, against which the bird's repair is insufficient protection, brought ironically into focus; the reader is surprised by the notion of a "chilly nest." The icy and unhealthful apartment is a frequent sub ject both in Murger's prose and poetry. Two prose examples are: Le medecin parut resumer notre situation en voyant l'atre obscur, la muraille ou l'humidite degouttait en larmes jaunes, car nous etions aux plus mauvais et aux plus tristes jours de l'hiver. L'ouragan de decembre battait de l'aile aux fenetres mal jointes... 44 "J'aurais a revenir ici, je ne veux pas m*exposer a attraper des courants d'air. Qu'on me bouche tous les chemins du rhume avec de bons bourrelets. Je suis frileux, qu'on fasse flamber l'atre. Que je voie demain, assise sur les cendres, une bonne marmite avec une volaille pour faire du bouillon... (Les Buveurs d'Eau, p. 34) And in his poetry we find: La fenetre est etroite et jamais ne s'eclaire Au rayon matinal de la clarte solaire. Du sol jusqu'au plafond, Sur les jaunes parois, la sueur de novembre Semble un long chapelet forme de per les d'ambre Qui s'egrene et qui fond. ("Antithese") (The sickly yellow tint of both rooms seems to hark back to Sainte-Beuve's famous poem, "Les Rayons jaunes." Murger seems indebted to Sainte-Beuve on several scores, as shall later be evident.) To the barren, unseemly apartment, the arisette- hirondelle brings a certain measure of tenuous gaiety and warmth. Part of what may properly be called the "myth of a happy Bohemia" is the incessant good cheer of the female companion. Musset, who (in stories like Frederic et Bernerette. Mimi Pinson, and Les Deux Maitresses, and in verse on the order of "Mimi Pinson") had "fixed" the characteristics of the working girl before Murger, dwelt on this musicality, this insouciance: Gerard s'impatientait, Frederic n'etait pas de bonne humeur. Rien n'est plus 45 triste gue gens qui viennent de rire, lorsgu'un contretemps imprevu a detruit leur joie. Bernerette seule conservait la sienne, et ne semblait se soucier de rien.3 It is Bernerette, "une fille qui ne pense qu'a rire," who then imagines various games to play when rain has spoiled an outing which she and three friends had begun on horse back through the woods of Montmorency? it is she who sings several stanzas of Ossian to amuse her friends. When Frederic and Bernerette move into a small room, "On y trouva la place d'un piano de louage." In Mimi Pinson (Oeuvres en prose, p. 716) Marcel explains facetiously to Eugene that in general "...elles [les grisettes] sont tres gaies, parce que le travail qui les occupe est en general ennuyeux a mourir, et qu'elles fretillent comme le poisson dans l'eau des que l'ouvrage est termine." Murger himself, who held Frederic to be "le chef d'oeuvre de l'art romanes- que," readily pointed out the lineage between Musset's heroines and his own: 0 fille charmante! poeme vivant de jeunesse, au rire sonore et au chant joyeux! coeur pitoyable, battant pour tout le monde sous la guimpe entre- baillee, o Mile Musette! Vous qui etes la soeur de Bernerette et de Mimi Pinson! il faudrait la plume d'Alfred de Musset pour raconter dignement votre insouciante et vagabonde course dans les sentiers fleuris de la jeunesse; et certainement il aurait voulu vous celebrer aussi, si, comme moi, il vous avait entendue chanter de votre jolie voix fausse ce rustique couplet...4 The poet Murger, who maintains a somewhat graver 46 demeanor than that of his lover, often recalls her lilting voice which brought happiness: S' il entendait cet air que tu chantais jadis Mon coeur tressaillirait bien vite... .. .Sol, do, do, si, si. la. — Point cet air, je t'en prie, Nous l'avons, l'an dernier, ensemble repete Avec des Allemands qui chantaient leur patrie Dans les bois de Meudon, par une nuit d'ete. ...Ainsi, quand on entrait, la porte ouverte a peine, On sentait le parfum d'amour et de gaite Dont notre chambre etait du matin au soir pleine, Car le bonheur aimait notre hospitalite. ("Le Requiem d*amour") Et si tu frappais a ma porte, Mon coeur, Musette, irait t'ouvrir. Puisqu'a ton nom toujours il tremble. Muse de 1'infidelite, Reviens encor manger ensemble Le pain beni de la gaite. ...Assis le soir sous la tonnelle, Nous boirons encor ce vin clair Ou ta chanson mouillait son aile Avant de s1envoler dans 1'air. ("La Chanson de Musette") "Antith&se" consists of a long evocation of a miserable abode leading to the surprising ("antithetic") conclusion that despite all, the poor dweller of these parts is happy Car cet hote est l'amant d'une muse divine Qui chante a son cote. The musicality of the Parisian amante is revived in "A Une Dame inconnue" in which the poet wishes to spend an evening with the lady he admires from afar— provided she won't be 47 occupied singing and playing Bellini and Rossini. It is undoubtedly true that the latter poem is addressed to a lady of some means rather than to a grisette and that some care might have been taken to dis tinguish among the various women celebrated in Murger's urban poems: Mimi, Musette, Ninon, and the "neighbor who would now pose for Gavarni" are, historically, not identical. To this reproach there are several replies, the first of which is that the question of the "originales" of Murger's poems and stories is too complex— and cloudy at best— to merit consideration in the present essay (the inquiries of which are fundamentally aesthetic rather than biographical). Robert Baldick, in the First Bohemian, sees "Mimi" as a composite or continuation of at least four women: the unfaithful Marie "Fonblanc" or "Vimal," whose husband was a notorious thief; Lucile Louvet, the fleuriste who died of consumption as did her successor, "Juliette," "whose lips always said yes while her heart never said anything, and who gazed indifferently at the moonlight in 5 the trees when she went to her rendezvous with Romeo"; the seamstress Ana'is who was as faithful to Murger as she was unfaithful to her indifferent husband. To obscure the issue still more, in the portrait of Musette, whom Baldick sees as the fictionalization of Champfleury1s mistress (the notorious model, Marie-Christine Roux6) but about whom Francoise Geisenberger says, "La vraie Musette n'est guere 48 indentifiable,there is a good amount of Murger's own first mistress, Marie Fonblanc. Their attempt at recon ciliation is referred to in "La Chanson de Musette." The distinction between "Mademoiselle" (the grisette) and "Madame" (the older courtisane or the un faithful wife) is one that is difficult to make histori cally in considering the mores of the Second Empire;8 young women passed easily and imperceptibly from the ranks of the working girls to those of the courtisane. Thus Musette and Mimi of the Scenes de la Vie de Boheme: Apres avoir fait longtemps la joie des soupers du quartier Latin ou elle chantait d'une voix toujours tres fraiche, sinon tres juste...Mile Musette quitta brusquement la rue de la Harpe pour aller habiter les hauteurs cythereennes du quartier Breda. (p. 114) Pendant les premiers jours de sa rupture definitive avec Mile Mimi, aui 11avait auitte comme on se rapelle pour monter dan les carrosses du vicomte Paul, le poete Rodolphe avait cherche a s'etourdir en prenant une autre maitresse. (p. 353. Our italics.) In addition to those women moving up the social ladder, there were those— "noble" or respectably bourgeois— who descended. Musset's story, Les Deux Maltresses. points out that women of rank worked side by side with true grisettes;8 in his essay, "The Ladies of the Lake," Donald MacAndrew explains the wide influence of the demi-monde, the doings of which the "'Mosquito Press' reported side by side with the movements of duchesses."I8 At Longchamps and 49 Chantilly, he says, the ladies of the beau-monde gaped from their enclosure at the parade of ladies of the demi-monde, in theirs: "Small wonder, then, that the neglected wives and daughters in the opposing citadel should have copied their rivals' dress, make-up and manners." Successively, the grisette. lorette. and iolie-laide set the physical and moral fashions for all the social strata of their moment in history, despite the futile objections of a narrow but sincere segment of the bourgeoisie. Anna Deslions could simultaneously carry on with Lambert Thiboust, Dumas fils, and Napoleon III. The Parisian poems in Les Nuits d'Hiver collectively evoke the pervasive morality of the day. Any attempt at particularizing it, that is to say, ascribe minor differ ences to the influence of the various women Murger knew or loved, would be superfluous from a sociological standpoint and extraneous, from a critical standpoint. Love is, above all, depicted as pleasure in these urban poems. Far from eternal and platonic, it is a fleeting physical encounter which lasts a day, a week, six months, or as long as the whim might endure. C'est egal, vois-tu, nous aurons, ma chere, Sans compter les nuits, passe d'heureux jours. Ils n'ont pas dure longtemps,— mais qu'y faire? Ce sont les plus beaux qui sont les plus courts. ("A Ninon") 50 Quand je t'aimais le mieux, sans m'en dire les causes, Brusquement ton amour de moi s'est ecarte... Te voila maintenant heureuse: ton caprice Regne sur une cour de galants jouvenceaux. ("Le Requiem d1amour") Je me suis rappele la belle Qui m'aima quand elle eut le temps. ("La Chanson de Musette") Sans crainte nous pouvons dormir: Nous avons six mois de tendresse Sur la planche de 11avenir ("La Chanson d'hiver") Si la maitresse choisie, Qui nous aime par hasard... ("La Jeunesse n'a qu'un temps") Si votre caprice en souriant reclame Un vers qui doit partout dire votre beaute... ("Le Plongeur") Si pour une heure ou deux vous vouliez le permettre, Je tiendrais compagnie a votre ennui naissant. ("A une Dame inconnue") Thus, love is fleeting and ephemeral, because the female lover is fickle, inconstant, and capricious. It should be noted that the poet, in true lyric form, centers the poem about himself, addresses his loved one directly as if she were present to hear him. It is she who is generally held responsible for the breakup, the poet being, apparently, a more constant creature. The interlocutor of "A Ninon," ostensibly a dandy who has lost his income, realizes that his mistress will go when his money has dis appeared, and laments, tongue-in-cheek, Ninon, je m'en vais me faire trappiste, Ou bien m'engager dans un regiment... 51 Je n'al plus le sou, ma chere, et ton code, Dans un cas pareil, condamne a l'oubll... The poet is seemingly willing to sustain love as long as the girl permits, which tallies, incidentally, with the biographical data we have on Henri Murger. Despite the careless testimony of writers who conjure up the mythic Murger of the "public image" to lend a more piquant flavor to their anecdotes, recent biographers have confirmed that the author of Les Nuits bore, in general, a long, faithful, and often even platonic affection for his ladies. Both Arsene Houssaye and Adrien Lelioux, who knew Murger well enough to share quarters with him, seem to tinge (con sciously or no) their recollections of the Bohemian with touches that are more picturesque than accurate. Houssaye has said, for example, "Il a aime Mimi et Musette, mais c'est a peine s'il les reconnaissait au milieu des autres coureuses d'aventures: il prenait celle-ci, il prenait celle-la, sans bien se souvenir de les avoir aimees un jour. Je prononce le verbe aimer, au risque d'indigner les amoureux seculaires comme Petrarque, qui n'ont jamais varie la musique de leur coeur.Lelioux states that "Murger manquait parfois de decision dans ses sentiments, dans ses passions meme. Prompt a 1’enthousiasme, ses elans n'avaient rien de sur et changeait volontiers selon les influences; a ce point qu'au premier abord il seniblait presque n'exister que d1echos et de reflets."^2 Yet further on, Lelioux observes that Murger's love for Marie, 52 "Le seul que je lui aie connu," was the one which all successive affairs attempted to recapture.I5 Murger1s highly autobiographical stories attest, on the other hand, to his own steadfastness in l o v e .14 He never does the jilting; it is he who is always jilted or finds his love unrequited. In the Scenes de Boheme. it is Mimi and Musette who leave Rodolphe and Marcel. In the same work, "Rodolphe etait tres amoureux de sa cousine Angele, qui ne pouvait le souffrir..." (p. 146). Olivier (Les Amours d'Olivier) is of course deceived by Marie Duchampy as the author was by Marie "Fonblanc." Jacques D..., le comte Ulriche de Rouvres, and, "Edouard," heroes of Le Manchon de Francine. Le Souoer des funerailles. and Le Pays latin. respectively, all attempt to ressuscitate or prolong a lost first love by having their new mistresses dress and comport themselves like their predecessors.!5 It is apparent that the poet, somewhat at odds with the "moeurs de grisette" by which the whole Latin Quarter lived, has a penchant towards constancy— a penchant his mistress does not share. His reaction to the infidele1s trangressions ranges from overt dejection ("Le Vin bleu") Dans cette ivresse inquiete et farouche, Je n'ai pas pu noyer mon souvenir. through an admittedly false resignation or ironic mocking of the break-up ("Requiem") Galt6 de croque-mort qui s'enterre lui-meme, Voila que je me mets a rire comme un fou 53 to a seeming complicity in the permissive morality which engenders such disappointments ("La Jeunesse n'a qu'un temps"): ...Lui sachant gre d'etre belle. Sans nous faire de tourments Aimons-la,— meme infidele... La jeunesse n'a qu'un temps. ...Aimons et chantons encore: La jeunesse n'a qu'un temps. In his "Study" (appended to all editions of Les Nuits) Theophile Gautier correctly observed, "L‘amour comme Murger le comprend est d'une espece particuliere...Cet amour ne se presente guere qu'a l'etat de souvenir..." It is true that Murger depicts— in his memory's eye— only loves that are "dead." Practically all his sentimental Parisian poems contain some sort of enjoinment to his former love "not to forget," and he himself, in unpublished verse, takes the mvosotis or "forget-me-not" as his "emblem."*’ ® "A Ninon" is essentially the description of a young dandy, Valentin, sitting down to write a last letter to his mis tress Ninon, whom he can no longer afford. He is afraid she will soon forget him: Et sans pleurs, ainsi qu'une ancienne mode, Tu vas m'oublier,— n'est-ce pas, Nini? "Madrigal" is a poem celebrating a current love, but a love which has taken on a certain importance only because it has reawakened in the poet the passions of his youth: Pour quelques mots echanges a voix basse, Pour un instant aupres de vous passe. 54 Dans mon chemin j'ai retrouve la place Ou mes vingt ans autrefois m'ont laisse. To former loves who are now dead or estranged, the poet asks, in "Renovare," Avez-vous oublie, Louise, Le coin fleuri du vieux jardin... Avez-vous oublie, Marie l'echange de nos deux anneaux... Avez-vous oublie, Christine Le boudoir rose et parfume... Louise, Marie, et Christine Pour moi sont mortes toutes trois; Notre amour n’est qu'une ruine, Et seul j'y pense quelguefois. The poet of "Requiem" would seek to remember through a ghastly tune: Et sur notre amour mort et bien enseveli Nous allons, si tu veux, chanter un dernier psaume... Sur nos amours defunts, sans haine et sans colere Jetons en souriant un dernier souvenir. Similarly, phrases suggesting death recur in most of the verses describing attempts to revive former loves. It is as if the sustaining of the memory would prevent absolute death. Non, ma jeunesse n'est pas morte, II n'est pas mort ton souvenir... ("Chanson de Musette") Au mur de ma cellule, ainsi qu'un reliquaire A qui cinq ans ont fait un linceul de poussiere. Pour tout autre que moi, symboles incompris, De mon premier amour j'ai cloue les debris. ("Au Mur...") 55 Pour oublier ce qu'il faut que j'oublie, J'ai, l1autre soir, ete noyer mon coeur. ("Vin bleu”) "La Chanson d'hiver" treats a love envisioned in the pre sent, yet the poet already is providing for the unhappy future he foresees: Si nous ne voulons pas, ma ch£re, Avant le temps nous oublier, Tristes ou gais, il faut nous faire Des souvenirs pour nous lier. To his "Cousine Angele," the impoverished poet can only offer, in the way of a New Year's gift, "...ces pauvres vers que, ce soir ou demain, Vous oublirez sans doute...". Throughout the urban poems, mort. oubli. and souvenir occur in various combinations, and upon a sustained reading of the text, one is impressed by the numerous occurrences of phrases like "Souvenez-vous du jour ou..." or "N'oubliez pas le soir ou...". Murger shores up his memory of past affairs by the accumulation of mementoes. In so doing, he was but following the literary lead of the romantics, in whom le culte du bibelot is often prominent, and reflecting the curious sociological phenomenon of the mid-nineteenth century of the "addiction" to souvenirs. The narrator of the Scenes de Boheme. advising Rodolphe to rid himself of all the bric-a-brac that recalls Mimi, list^ among other objects, "boucles de cheveux...flacon de Venise ou dort encore un reste de parfurn...; au feu les fleurs, les fleurs de gaze, de soie et de velours; les jasmins blancs; les anemones empourprees...; les myosotis bleus... 56 au feu les rubans, les jolis rubans, roses, bleus, et jaunes...au feu les dentelles et les bonnets, et les voiles et tous ces chiffons coquets...au feu les lettres d'amour" (p. 2 1 0 ) . Several words and phrases of the last lines of "Au Mur de ma cellule" Que reste-t-il de vous pour qu'on ne vous oublie? Quelque ruban fane, quelque rose palie, Un voile, des cheveux en bracelets tresses, Des gants un soir de bal perdus et ramasses... recall the mementoes which Melchior (Un Poete des gout- tieres) arranges symmetrically before him on his writing table before sitting down to recall a love in verse. Il avait dispose toutes les reliques qui lui etaient restees de cette grande passion: des vieux gants blancs, des rubans sales, un masque de bal, des bou quets fanes, etc. Tout cet attirail sentimental etait ordinairement accroche au fond de son alc6ve."18 The poet deems that he alone, sadly enough, is interested in remembrance, as for example when, having recalled (stanza-by-stanza) to Louise, Marie, and Christine, the happy moments they have passed together, he asks each girl, "Dites, vous en souvenez-vous?", he is forced to conclude, Notre amour n'est qu'une ruine, Et seul j'y pense quelquefois. ("Renovare") To recapitulate Murger's concept of love, he con siders it to be ephemeral, brought and taken by the gay, capricious, swallow-like girl who does not reward his own constancy. Past and "dead," love is generally viewed with the irony permitted by historical retrospect. When he views love immediately before him, Murger cannot help but foresee the end. The poet's room, with its sentimental bric-a-brac is often the setting. This room may be de picted as a "nest" but at best it is a chilly nest, its inhabitants frileux or enqourdis in winter. In "Antithese" the room is a "retraite austere jaunes parois"; there is the "reliquary-like cell" of another piece, augmenting the morbid, sterile connotations one cannot help but form; in "La Ballade du desespere," the figure of Death is wel comed into "le foyer de la misere." Strangely, the grisette is never depicted physically, which may be due to the fact that she was not generally renowned for her beauty, a fact attested to by men of belles-lettres^ as well as by historians.20 or perhaps this lack of portraiture may be ascribed to the short comings particular to Murger's companions, one of whom was described by the Goncourts as "a horrible, cranky, little girl with chilblain on her nose, a slut from the Latin Quarter who deceived Murger as a man shouldn't be deceived— not even a husband!2^ The closest the poet comes to giving a physical portrait is in the description of "La Courtisane," yet even there the details are scant (What is the color of her eyes? What of her figure or stature?), for the poet dwells 58 more upon the impressions of disgust and horror which she creates in him than in the precise origins of the impres sions. Moreover, of the first four stanzas, which are the descriptive ones, the first and fourth dwell on olfactory sensations, the third on an auditory one, while the second stanza alone is truly visual. Rather than give details of physical traits, Murger prefers "description by tokens," in accordance with which a girl is summed up by the things she has left behind, or by some minor occurrence^ or by a physical setting which the poet can never dissociate from the girl. Thus in "Renovare" Murger— in typical fashion— attaches Marie to rings exchanged, Christine to a "roofless bedroom," Louise to a corner of the garden where hands first touched. The poet-musician of "Requiem" refuses successively each of the first three melodies he composes because they recall (1) a song she sang; (2) a dance she did; (3) an outing in Meudon. If Musette were to return, she would recognize those furnishings "qu'en deuil mit ton depart...Le petit lit— et le grand verre/Ou tu buvais souvent ma part." Yet it must be avowed that this rather naive and charming method of portraiture, derivative of the culte du souvenir, succeeds in establishing the psychological, rather than the physical, traits of the lost lover. Not only in the verse celebrating girls of the Latin Quarter, but also in the dandyish "A Ninon" and in 59 the poems in the manner of Banville, truly urbane rather than urban, and dedicated to or celebrating "Madame," is the disregard for particularization total. We know little of "Ninon" other than that she is fickle and a spendthrift in the manner of Manon Lescaut.22 Madame Ch. de P..., to whom "Le Plongeur" is dedicated, would find little flat tering said of her in verse other than the phrase— votre beaute. which the poet utters as if incidentally. "Juliette" whose balcony "Romeo would ascend, is not des cribed by so much as a single word. In "Pygamlion" a "beautiful chimera" is referred to, nothing more. The poet who would like to immortalize "mes amours" through art speaks only vaguely, in "Si Tu veux etre la Madone," of "tes purs contours" and "Le lis pur, a ton front pareil"; she who is celebrated remains physically anonymous. Murger's faceless, capricious girl, "sister of Manon," must have the money to buy what her fancy requires: a steeple-chase mount for Ninon; for Musette, a domino for the masked ball— or a carriage, depending on her mood. In a poem written for Ana’ is at a moment when Murger and she were enjoying a windfall, he again reveals that money is the sine qua non of love: Si d‘amour sec et d'onde pure L'amour, dit-on, ne vit pas bien, Notre tirelire murmure Le bruit du flot pactolien A ce doux bruit qui nous caresse. Sans crainte nous pouvons dormir. ("La Chanson d'hiver") 60 For it was but one of the prevailing moral verities that the grisette or lorette or courtisane spend until she ruin her man. Squandering was taken as a sign of charm in the woman, as a mark of prestige in the m a n ,23 which explains the plight of the hero of "A Ninon": En moins de six moip, aux pieds de sa belle, Valentin, dit-on, a deja fondu, Comme en un creuset, sa fortune et celle D'un oncle,— lingot des Indes venu. With regard to the cycle of verse enunciating Murger's cynical attitude toward love, two Parisian poems, neglected above as being only marginally in the category of "moeurs grisette," deserve mention. In "Le Testament," a dying mondain. an old roue who "hates any place that's not on the map of Paris" and who refuses the rites of a clergy man with the retort, "Reponds-lui que j'ai lu Voltaire," dictates that all his goods (jewels, capital assets, kennel, and stable) be left A celle dont le nom aux levres me revient Comme un miel fait de plante amere. He then asks his mistress be told of the day and hour of the interment (which he predicts with exactity) so that she might attend, but cynically warns: ...si dans sa claire prunelle Une larme tremblait, rien qu'une seulement, Vous pouvez dechirez en deux le testament; Alors ce ne serait pas elle. And so the bittersweet mocking of constancy is intact, as is the juxtaposition of love and death. Less lugubrious, but equally mordant, was one of the poet's wishes for the 61 "Dear reader" in the opening sonnet: in view of the squandering and straying of Murger's mistresses, perhaps there was more than some small measure of sincere nostalgia behind the Bohemian's bravado when he proffered his wish: Que ton epouse reste econome et pudique. II. The Wanderer: Urban Poems of Alienation Depuis longtemps je suis entre deux ennemis: L'un s’appelle la Mort et 1'autre la Folie L'un a pris ma raison, 1'autre me prendra ma vie; Et moi, sans murmurer, je suis calme et soumis. — Antoni Deschamps In the first group of Parisian poems, Murger was engrossed by a sociable creature of folly, the grisette; in the second group it is a solitary figure, likely bound for madness, the artist himself, about whom the themes are centered. Perhaps it was in thinking of the "insane" Bohemian m ilieux2^ that the poet permitted himself to say, rather inaccurately, "C'est d'apres l'orage que j'ai trace mon tableau." The poems dealing with art and artists con stitute an important cycle in Les Nuits d'hiver. One joyous poem, "La Jeunesse n'a qu'un temps: Ronde de la vie de BohSme,"2^ is at odds, explicably, with the general conception of artists' life conjured up by the other pieces on the same subject. The refrain Aimons et chantons encore: La jeunesse n'a qu'un temps 62 heralds love and song as the gay pastimes of Bohemia, and the "we" viewpoint underscores the fraternal solidarity of artists. "Cuirasses de patience/Contre le mauvais destin," boasts the poet, "De courage et d1esperance/Nous petrissons notre pain." Then the myth of a carefree Bohemia, which Murger had already propagated in prose (in the Seines), returns: Notre humeur insoucieuse, Aux fanfares de nos chants, Rend la misere joyeuse, La jeunesse n'a qu'un temps. A more reserved depiction of the artist is given in the "Dedicace: De la vie de Boheme," according to which the artist proceeds Comme un enfant de Boheme, Marchant toujours au hasard... Sur le grand chemin de l'art. He still has "hope and courage but without thegi, nothing. " That his idealization of Bohemian life has been shattered, the artist-poet avows: Car cette route si belle Quand je fis mes premiers pas, Maintenant je la vois telle, Telle qu'elle existe, helasl The fraternal we has been replaced by _l, an<* the artist is resolved to plod along, almost heedless of the moans of misery and death which his companions utter in the shadows. The image of the last stanza projects the isolation of the artist: Et debout sur le^rivage, Les pieds mouilles par le flot, Ami, c'est d'apres l'orage Que j'ai trace mon tableau. Thus is the notion of the poet as a solitary wanderer— on a "narrow and gloomy road"— exposed. In the image of the Bohemian urchin, in the allusions to darkness and solitude, in the "complaints of misery and death," in the Ossian-like invocation of gloomy elements, there is a clear-cut feeling of estrangement. "Antithese," which joins the love and artist themes, depicts "un asile pauvre, une retraite austere/Ou s'est clos, dans 1'etude, un hote solitaire." In the brief, untitled piece which begins Trainant, tralnant ta chetive existence, Dans les sentiers tu t'arretes souvent. Regardant fuir 1'ombre de l'Esperance, Spectre railleur... MarcheJ ton but n'est pas bien eloigne. the motif of the wandering poet returns. The same imagery and vocabulary recur (but more hoepfully) in the advice given "Gothique" Desbrosses, who was promising both as a painter and a poet: Ami,— puisqu'a ton front l'art a mis deux etoiles, Puisqu'un double rameau fleurit entre tes mains, Du couple fraternel va soulever les voiles, Et marche rayonnant dans les sentiers humains. In the lugubrious "Letter to a Dead Man," the advice of a dead artist (the sculptor, "Christ" Desbrosses) to his brother ("Le Gothique") and his new roommate (Murger), which consists essentially in the line, "Luttez, souffrez, 64 pleurez,— mais vivez tous les deux," is rejected by the two Bohemians who have been left totally discouraged and devoid of inspiration by the untimely death of their comrade in art. Artistically impotent, they will tread vulgar paths while awaiting death to re-unite them with the departed one: Nous avons cru pouvoir,— et nous l'avons cru souvent, Formuler notre reve, et le rendre vivant Par la palette ou par la lyre Mais le souffle manquait... Maintenant nous suivrons les vulgaires chemins, Nous ferons au hasard oeuvre de nos deux mains Pour vivre encore et pour attendre L'heure ou l'on creusera pres du tien notre lit, Et, comme sur ton nom, sur nos deux noms l'oubli Le lendemain pourra descendre. This poem and two others ("Ultima Spes Mortuorum" and "Celui-la dont je veux dire la triste fin") contain vivid images of trips to the graveyard— the final leg of the road of art. In the dialogued "Ballade du desespere," a strange traveler arrives at the miserable lodging of a disconsolate poet and seeks to gain entrance through a series of ruses. J'ai marche toute la journee. De l'ouest a l'est, du sud au nord. A I1angle de ta cheminee Laisse-moi m'asseoir.— Pas encor. The stranger then identifies himself, falsely, as Glory, Love and Youth, Art and Poetry, Riches, and Power, but is not admitted. As a last resort the stranger avows he is Death itself, and is promptly bid to enter, to eat, drink. 65 and sleep. In return the host asks only that Death carry him off: Je t'attendais, je veux te suivre, Ou tu m'emmeneras— j'irai; Mais laisse mon pauvre chien vivre Pour que je puisse etre pleure. Thus is the poet, who barred the door to the illusion of Art and Poetry (What is the good of it? Je ne sais plus chanter ma mie Je ne sais mime plus son nom), ready to tread his true path, lead by Death. In view of the preponderance of poems linking "Bohemia" or "artist's life" to solitude, despair, and death, how can one explain the optimistic song of a frater nal Bohemia, "La Jeunesse n'a qu'un temps"? As the poem bears a date of 1849, the optimism is hardly explicable, biographically, for the author was in dire straights at that time, as a letter to Hugo (dated 1849) reveals: It is not money I am asking for, but remunerative employment, a post of some sort....Having lived in poverty for ten years, I know it like the back of my hand. I am not complaining of the poverty I have endured: it has been a good master to me and has taught me some excellent things. But now it has nothing more to teach m e . . . 26 In the preceding year Murger, who had been suffering, him self, from purpura for six years and who had just undergone preliminary treatments for syphilis, witnessed the deaths of two tubercular mistresses— the flower-girl, Lucile, and the little-known "Juliette." In the following year (1850) 66 Murger would write (Preface to the Scenes) a lucid expose of the frauds and ludicrous notions with which Bohemia was fraught.Yet while personally repudiating the artist's miserable demi-monde, Murger paid lip-service to it. The only valid explanations of the joy of his "Bohemian Round" are literary: Murger was capitalizing on the myth of insouciance fabricated in his now-popular prose, and he was working a proven literary vein going back as far as Villon. The Bohemian song of a care-free existence had been revived in the coquettes. Napoleon's Chief of Protocol, Segur, for example, came incognito to the Caveau moderne, one evening in 1811, to submit a song of his own composition, the refrain of which was typical: "Rions, chantons, aimons, buvons— En quatre points c'est ma mo rale. Banville, too, sang of the four-point morality in volumes like the Odelettes (which celebrates all the impor tant, "carefree" denizens of Bohemia) and in scattered pieces such as "Au Pays Latin" (Rimes dorees) 0 terre aventureuse Ou vit la fete heureuse Du beau rire argentin, Pays latin! and "La Sainte Boheme" (Odes funambulesques), the refrain of which recalls Beranger and Murger alike:2^ Avec nous l'on chante et l'on aime, Nous sommes freres des oiseaux. Croissez, grands lys, chantez, ruisseaux, Et vive la sainte Boheme! Even well-established writers like Hugo contributed to the 67 vein, although Hugo's evocation of the gay Bohemia of the grisette is tempered by recollections of the girl's mer cenary qualities: Sa vie est un bruyant poeme; On songe, on rit, point de souci Et les verres sont de Boheme, Et les buveurs en sont aussi. Ce monstre adorable et terrible Ne dit pas toujours mais EncorI Et, rempli de nos coeurs, son crible Ne laisse passer que notre or.30 With the exception of one piece, then, which is more a literary exercise than an "inspired" work, Murger's concept of the artist and his lot is rather pessimistic, as was his outlook on love. It is on the ground of alienation that Murger's poems on Ophelia, on Mignon, and on "the emigrants," join those of the wandering artist. Murger's "Ophelia" is only loosely based on the Shakespeare scene (Hamlet IV, vii) in which Queen Gertrude recounts to Laertes his sister's death.31 In the original, Ophelia, attempting to hang "fantastic garlands of crow- flowers, nettles, daisies, and long-purples" upon boughs above a "weeping brook," tumbled into the water when an "envious sliver" broke. As her clothes billowed wide and weighed her down, she "chanted snatches of old tunes." The version found in Les Nuits would have Ophelia at the water's edge because she wants to admire her reflection: Et dans sa folie, etant toujours femme, L'enfant se pencha sur les claires eaux. She is satisfied with her image, but plucks a drifting 68 plant "a fleur jaune et blanche" from the water and puts it in her hair. Et dans sa folie, etant toujours femme, A ce ruisseau clair, qui chante une gamme, L'enfant mire encor sa fralche paleur. Then a blond star, "coquettish like Ophelia" mirrors itself in the crystal water, and Ophelia, "wanting this new jewel," reaches out for it, but it escapes her hand, which she advances a bit further..."Un soir, sur la rive on trouve son voile." Murger had adapted the poem to French soil: the stream runs (traditionally) on a sandy bed between reeds or rushes [roseauaQ; the water-plant is apparently (and traditionally) a water lily,32 rather them "crow-flowers"; it is vanity born of coquetry which causes Ophelia's untimely end, whereas in Shakespeare, the cause of her death is indeed her true distraction (resulting in turn, most critics conjecture, from Hamlet's own "madness"). One is tempted to simplify the poem, to see in it a graft ing of "moeurs grisette" ("for in her folly, being a woman," she must have her baubles— flower and star-jewel) upon the Shakespearean figure; but in truth the theme may well be that of the self-destruction caused by the quest of the absolute. It seems likely that in writing "Ophelia," Murger had some philosophic meaning or some metaphysical theme which would transcend the basic pictoral representa tion of the drowning, for he was seldom borne toward 69 athematic," art-for-art's sake" depiction. In view of (1) the function of the fleeting star in "Les Amours d'un grillon" (see the discussion in the following paragraph); (2) the close connection between artistic genius and stars (see the quote on page 63); Murger's reveries of the dying ember (see p. 88); and (4) the symbolic (eternal) quality of the flowers Murger seems taken with (see p. 122 and note 29 thereto; pp. 154-55), it is at least plausible that Ophelia's reaching for the lily and then the star may suggest the poet's fatal intoxication with absolute or eternal beauty. In any case, as the study of an estranged being, "Ophelia" may be said to belong in the "artist cycle." The prose-poem, "Les Amours d'un grillon et d'une etincelle," treats the theme clearly and thoroughly. In this lengthy poem, an Italian beetle, "un vert galant," being "in good fortune" with a flower, awakes in the calyx to find he has been borne into Germany on a girl's breast, in a bouquet. In a field he is amazed to discover a cricket who perches each night on a stalk to sing the divine praises of Stella matutina. with whom he is hope lessly in love: Qui done es-tu, blanche etoile?— Le nuage aux ailes roses qui te cachait tout a l'heure, et qui semblait un seraphin en voyage dans l'azur, t'a laissee derriere son vol. Serais-tu un diamant tombe sur la route celeste, de la tunique du voyageur divin?— Comme tu es brillante, et comme je suis noir!— Oh qu'il y a loin de toi a moil (p. 192) 70 The beetle (whose advice is to follow pleasure "de tubereuse en jonquille, de jonquille en tulipe, et ainsi de suite") is digusted with these platonic musings, with a useless "amour de loin," but the headstrong cricket con tinues his idolatrous watch. With autumn, Stella grows faint, and after many fruitless vigils, the cricket seeks refuge in a country house, having bid a tearful good-bye to the dying beetle. In the hearth of his new abode, he is amazed to find "Stella" again (a spark in the embers); he approaches her slowly, singing his hymn of love. When he touches the spark, it goes out, leaving a tiny ash. "0 mon amour I" s'ecria l'amant. "0 mon revel" s'ecria le poete Et il rentra dans son trou, ou il demeura muet. The prose-poem is rich, being the fictional trans position of Murger's too-platonic courting of Marie Fonblanc (and Christine, the "Swedish gazelle"), spoofing as it does Mme de Stael's distinction between Mediterranean and Northern temperaments; but what is most apparent, thematically, is that the artist is bound to suffer the pain of chasing an illusion (perfect beauty? the apt esqpression of love?) which is always a step ahead of him. This dilemma, leading him either toward madness (as the "top surgeon in Paris" puts it [Buveurs d'Eau. p. 26^, "Voyez les fousl ils sont presque tous poetes!— Et les poetesl— Tous fous naturellement.") or toward death. In any case, the theme of suffering is really an end in 71 itself, not a by-product of those of love or art. Susan Sontag explains, with regard to Cesare Pavese's diary, The Burning Brand. ...because of the insatiable modern preoccupation with psychology, the latest and most powerful legacy of the Christian tradition of introspection, opened up by Paul and Augustine, which equates the discovery of the self with the discovery of the suffering self. For the modern consciousness, the artist (replacing the saint) is the exemplary sufferer. And among artists, the writer, the man of words, is the person to whom we look to be able best to express his suffering. .o.The writer is the man who dis covers the use of suffering in the economy of art— as the saints discovered the utility of suffering in the economy of salvation.33 In the urban poems, Murger reveals himself to be an "exemplary sufferer" both in art and in love. Mignon was a romantic figure much like Ophelia: she too was child-like and suffered greatly from a first love. As one can hardly envision Ophelia without remembering the garlands she wove by the water, one always associates Mignon with the "fleurs d'oranger." (It will be remembered that the blossoms of the orange-tree, a symbol of innocence because of their resplendent whiteness, were an integral part of every bourgeois wedding in the last century.34) Most persons on the streets of France 150 years ago could recite at least the first few lines of the naive "ballade de Mignon" which Goethe placed prominently at the very beginning of Book III of Wilhelm Meister: 72 Connais-tu le pays ou les citrons murissent? Dans le feuillage sombre l1orange d'or flamboie; Un doux vent souffle du ciel bleu; Le myrte discret, le laurier superbe s'y dressent. Le connais-tu? C'est la, c'est la, 0 mon bien aime! que je voudrais aller avec toi. 5 As Mignon's lyric was but a transposition of Goethe's own obsessive quest for "la patrie ideale" (one finds a related nostalgia in Heine, Baudelaire, and Mallarme^8), Murger's version, "A une Etrangere," begs consideration as belonging— along with the poems on art and "Ophelia"— to the cycle of pieces in which a wanderer is hopelessly in quest of the ideal. Was Murger's impul sion to recreate Mignon not his own unhappiness and solitude among men? Was he not a "homeless romantic"?8? While Murger may have written "A une Etrangere" for "Christine de s.,"-*8— in which case the connection with Italy would tally with lines of "Renovare" La pale Christine est partie Refleurir au soleil romain — the graceful, lyrical evocations seem an apt exteriori zation of Murger's frame of mind: Rien ne peut te distraire, et tu passes les heures A regarder mourir un arbuste apporte Du sol ou l'oranger fleurit toute l'annee. Dans le jardin d'Exil avec toi transplant^, Vois: son feuillage est pale et sa fleur est fanee; 73 Tu n'as plus de sourire, il n'a plus de parfums. Pour gue l'arbre renaisse et de nouveau fleurisse Sa moisson odorante et ses beaux cheveux bruns, Pour que 1'ennui s'efface a son front pur qu'il plisse, Il vous faut a tous deux le soleil du pays... The author of Les Nuits seems preoccupied with the theme of the loss of innocence in the young and homeless: his "Marguerite," like Faust's, and like Ophelia and Mignon, is at the outset, a figure of kindness and innocence: Elle s'appelait Marguerite, Et comme celle a qui jadis Faust allait offrir l'eau benite, On l'attendait au paradis. She loved her father, feared God, prayed as she dressed in the morning. Pour unique et simple toilette, Sans riche atour et sans miroir, Elle ramenait sur sa tete, En bandeaux plats, ses cheveux noirs. "Thus she lived, happy, until her fifteenth year..." Maintenant elle est descendue Aux bas lieux de l'impurete? Son alcSve ouvre sur la rue, Et son nom est numerote. While the piece in Les Nuits evokes, on a literal level, only a woman who is estranged from society by her morals, the explicit connection between this Marguerite and Faust's calls to mind the true delirium of the latter, in prison after her fall from innocence, who cannot comprehend the 74 prudence of the Doctor's urgings to flee: J'ai tuS ma mere! Mon enfant, je l'al noye! il te fut donne comme a moi! oui, a toi aussi.— C'est done toi!... je le crois a peine. Donne-moi ta main. — Non, ce n'est point un reve. Ta main cherie!...Ah! mais elle est humide! essuie-la done! il me semble qu'il y a du sang... ...Je n'ose sortir, il me reste plus rien a esperer...C'est si miserable d'errer dans l'exil! et d'ailleurs ils sauraient bien me reprendre. _ (Tr. Nerval) 9 Like Mignon, the subjects of "Les Emigrants," are nostalgic and disconcerted about their imminent exile: La vieille Europe, notre mere, A trop d'enfants pour les nourrir, Et c'est aux champs d'une etrangere Que notre moisson va murir — but they take hope in the "young and fertile" New World. Despite the rather successful recourse to the imagery of bird migration Comme l'oiseau qui se ressemble Par triangles ailes dans l'air, Des que son frileux duvet tremble Au premier frisson de l’hiver, Chaque jour par cent et par mille Nous partons... and the effective underscoring of the travelers' uncer tainty Nos femmes ont tisse la tente Que doit habiter notre exil, — Fragile abri,— maison errante! this piece seems too well grounded in sociological realities (in particular, the waves of emigration from Europe due in part to the rise of mechanization^®) to constitute any 75 sort of poetic symbolism, to reveal the "unconscious imagi nation" of the author. Two lines of Murger's poem ("Nous n'emportons pour pacotille/Que notre courage et nos bras") recur, slightly altered, in a prose passage which seems to indicate that the poet had personally seen, and been moved by, the shifting groups of Germans who kept up their courage with lieder as they awaited to embark at Le Havre: On les rencontre ainsi, par bandes dans les rues et les environs du Havre, ou quelquefois mime les hotels et les auberges ne suffisent pas pour les loger. Ils campent alors sur les places et sur les quais avec tout leur pauvre $ Unlike the poems on the artist and his lot, which directly or indirectly reflect the Parisian milieux and mores in which the poet was immersed, "Ophelia," "A une Etrangere," "Marguerite," and "Les Emigres" do not literally fall, perhaps, within the province of our study of urban poetry. Yet by their collective sentiment and by their basic poetic revery, they must needs be studied with the poems on the "path of art." That they are notably devoid of setting or decor further suggests that they represent a frame of mind— or recurrent revery— and further legitimizes their inclusion here. leurs bras 76 III. Imagery and Vocabulary The object of this Section of our study is to follow up the general views of Murger's urban themes by an exami nation of details of technique used in treating them: words, phrases, motifs, and incidental imagery. Having thus exposed the poet's most frequent reveries, one may come to some conclusion on the general bearing and signifi cance of the Parisian poems. As in this passage of the study there must be frequent identification of brief phrases, the page number alone, on which the source-poem begins, rather than the full title, will often be given in parentheses. (The Table given in Appendix I should facilitate the translation from number to title.) Nearly every writer has "key" words which reveal his most fundamental preoccupations. (Banville, perhaps taking the cue from Sainte-Beuve, speaks of "le mot DjuCI traduira 1'obsession";42 Sainte-Beuve himself refers to "le mot de predilection...qui traduit par megarde...un voeu secret ou un faible."4^ Such key-words or master- words (the critic Gerald Antoine refers to them as "mots- temoins" or "maltre-mots") are not wanting in Les Nuits d'hiver. even though we must admit with Jean-Pierre Richard that frequency alone is not an adequate criterion in the determination of such key terms.44 Espoir. courage. The terms espoir and courage. often used in conjunction with a reference to youth 77 (jeunesse. vingt ans. sieze ans. etc.) are prominent in the urban verse,45 reflecting sometimes a positive mood Cuirasses de patience Contre un mauvais destin, De courage et d1esperance Nous petrissons notre pain ("La Jeunesse n'a qu'un temps") Comme 1'enfant de Boheme... J'ai 1'espoir et le courage: Sans cela je n'aurais rien ("Dedicace") Dans mon chemin j'ai retrouve la place Ou mes vingt ans autrefois m'ont laisse. Jeunesse. amour, poesie, esperance ("Madrigal") Ainsi, durant l'epoque a laquelle 11enfance Mange ce pain du ciel appele 11esperance ("Celui-la...") but almost always, hope flags, as a reading of even these lines in context reveals. "Apres la terre— l'oubli tombe," says an artist from beyond the tomb (137). To the spirits risen from the grave (in "Ultima Spes Mortuorum") who, d1esperance bercees," are on the lookout for visitors who would remember them, the poet queries, cynically: Ombres de tous les morts, invisibles fantomes, De la terre d'exil pourquoi franchir le seuil? Qu'esperez-vous encor de ce monde ou nous sommes, Puisque vous esperez. meme dans un cercueil? Ce qu'ils viennent chercher, tout le temps de leur vie Ils l'ont a chaque pas heurte dans le chemin: C'est la deception par une autre suivie Pour faire avec 1'espoir un eternel hymen... Seigneur! vous savez bien qu'ici la race humaine Est si lasse de suivre et de poursuivre en vain 78 Le fantome d'espoir qui toujours la promene, Qu'arrivee a la tombe, elle s'eerie: "EnfinJ ...Ici l'on dort en paix sans craindre la souffrance: Rien n'y peut penetrer,— rien, pas meme 1 'espoir.." The ultimate futility of the faltering nurturing of hope in the Parisian poems is found, then, in this graveyard poem. Hope is illusory; the path one follows leads from disappointment (deception) to disappointment. One can only be at peace, the poet says, paradoxically, when all hope is eradicated. That is why "le desespere" (175) refuses to open the door to Glory, "fantome derisoire." It is not by chance that the key-word, esperance. and its synonyms and antonyms, occur repeatedly along with words in the "family" of chemin and jeunesse. as one finds deliberate combinations of these terms even in prose passages: La patience ne lui etait pas inutile pour resister au decouraqement qui se glisse souvent entre 1'art et 1'artiste. Si Theodore avait de l'orgueil, il n'en faisait qu'un usage sain, et seulement a dose limitee, comme le vovaqeur fatigue s'arrete un moment et porte a ses levres la gourde qui contient un courdial fortifiant, ou il puise de nouvelles forces, ayant soin de ne pas la vider, sachant qu'au fond il trouverait 1'ivresse.46 Art is a path (which only the voung may tread) between the finite and the infinite, between the temporal and the eternal, between the real and the ideal. Buoyed by hope he seeks immortality, but is rebuffed, and fears of 79 obscurity (oubli) prevail. The path originates in signs of temporality, "le vieux calendrier" or "le vieil almanach" (35) or "quelque ruban fane, quelque rose palie" (39) whereas the terminus is most' often seen as a star, des tructive and evasive in "Ophelia," illusory in Les Amours d'un grillon. simply indicative of genius in "A G.D.": Ami,— puisqu'a ton front l'art a mis deux etoiles... Ami,— puisque ta sphere est deux fois constellee... Par deux divinites, ton esperance ail6e Dans un ciel lumineux doit prendre un double essor. It must be admitted that there is nothing original in the theme of "le chemin de l'art," in the "absolute" star (love? God? artistic perfection?), in "le courage et 1'esperance de vingt ans." It was Beranger who, most recently, "se fit le chantre de la charmante ivresse des vingt ans, " attested Jules J a n i n . 4 ^ The "young hope" expressed by Beranger's disciple, Hegesippe Moreau, has the same hollow ring one finds in Murger's verse: J'ai dix-huit ans: tout change, et 1'Esperance Vers 1'horizon me conduit par la main Encore un jour a trainer ma souffrance, Et le bonheur me sourira demain. ("Dix-huit ans," 1828)48 Atre, frileux. A key group of terms and images is focused on the hearth (atre) or fireplace (cheminee): charbon. chenet. cendre, marmite. flammes. and so on. On the literal level, Murger's use of these terms seemingly invokes nothing more than the restorative powers and 80 pleasurable sensations emanating from the hearth: Les gens qu1amuse le theatre Nous ont fourni pour cet hiver Du charbon de quoi remplir I1atre... Enfermons-nous pour nous aimer: Tant que bouillira la marmite, Nous serons la pour l'ecumer... Sur la braise qui se consume Nous ferons griller du boudin. ("Chanson d'hiver") Atre. source of warmth, source of sustenance, source even of reposing sounds: "La houille petillait.../La bouilloire chantait son refrain regulier" (23) ; in the hearth, "Le grillon, rossignol des cendres,/Redira son cri familier" (41). Murger deliberately recalls the happy connotations of the expression, "pendre la cremaillere," in entitling Chapter XII of the Scenes. "La Cremaillere." Gaston Bachelard designates as "the Promethean complex"^® still another pleasure of the hearth— that of the "art of stoking" (stirring and fanning), a prestigious art which the disobedient child steals from his father with the first matches to make a furtive fire. Surprisingly, in Murger's evocations of the fireplace, there are very few such wholly positive notions of fire; given the full context of his reveries before the hearth, the usual emotions— "fire-as- comfort" or "fire-as-security"— are either secondary, attenuated, or totally absent. As the poet's attitudes toward fire are not the usual ones, one is rather compelled to seek explanation from the critic who has explored the "psychology of fire" in all (even the most unwonted) of its 81 aspects— Gaston Bachelard. In particular, Bachelard has much to say about the connections of fire with notions of mortality and immortality, and as mort and oubli consti tute recurrent themes in Murger's verse, it would be a step further toward unification, toward the "global under standing" of the volume, if one were able to link various images of fire to the preoccupation with mortality. One finds the term feu employed only once (as opposed to six entries for cendre) in the verse of Les Nuits d'hiver. which is strange, particularly in view of the broad "poetic availability" of the term in a variety of situations— even unrelated to the hearth. What accounts for the rather fireless hearth of the urban poems? There are several hypotheses: (1) a word count is unreli able in a small volume, and the combination of flame near cinders and embers may be due to chance or to purely fortuitous demands of poetic harmony and number; (2) personal experience may explain the absence of bright flame, roaring fires being an infrequent luxury for the poet; (3) or the lack may stem from a more or less willing transcription of artistic and amatory failures. Baudelaire sang of an "icy lover"; why shouldn't Murger lyricize on one who is "chilly"? Too often untouched by the fire of inspiration and rebuffed by flames of passion, why shouldn't his fire, like his stars and spark, tend toward extinction? That this is not all wholly facetious is 82 borne out by precise references in the text to the unfor tunate cricket of the hearth (read "lyric poet") whose song and romance are chilled together: Dans l'atre mort la cendre en talus s'amoncelle Et le grillon frileux, amant de l'etincelle, N'en voyant plus helas! Cesse de lamenter sa plainte^accoutumee Sur le vieux chenet-sphinx ou la buche enflammee Se tordait en eclats. The whole of "Antithese" contains what Bachelard would con sider the vocabulary of a healthy dialectic of the "fire imagination": abundant terms of heat and cold joust with one another, as "smoking lamp" with "bise aigue." On ne fait pas de poesie au sein d'une unite: 1'unique n'a pas de propriete. Si l'on ne peut faire mieux et atteindre tout de suite a la multiplicite ordonnee, on peut se servir de la dialectique, comme d'un fracas qui reveille les resonances endormies. "L'agitation de la dialectique de la pensee...sert comme nulle autre a determiner 1'Imagination. But to interpret the poetry in calorific terms is to remain on the conscious— objective or scientific— level of comprehension, and not to sound the richer depths of poetic revery. Flame or no,^ the frequency of terms relating to the hearth— and their antonyms— indicates that Murger is possessed of a fire imagination. According to the psycho logical investigations of Bachelard, most good poets reveal one— and only one— elemental prepossession: "...les ames qui revent sous le signe du feu, sous le signe de l'eau, 83 sous le signe de l'air, sous le signe de la terre se revelent comme bien differentes. En particulier, l'eau et le feu restent ennemis jusgue dans la reverie et celui qui ecoute la ruisseau ne peut guere comprendre celui qui entend chanter les flammes: ils ne parlent pas la meme 52 langue... These final lines are rather verified by a review of Murger's word-stock, Appendix I, in search of words which would be revelatory of a "water imagination" (lac, riviere, fleuve. tie, bateau, flots. grotte. and so forth). Bachelard's thesis seems borne out; the psycho logies of fire and water appear mutually antagonistic. "Ophelia" and "Ode a Blandusie," which are the only two water-oriented poems in the volume, account for a fair portion of the aquatic vocabulary, and neither piece was truly of Murger's invention. It is true that an air imagination does alternate with or contaminate the fire imagination, however; Bachelard would see such a bastardi zation as the mark of an imagination that is less vigorous than one which dwells exclusively in a pure realm. Murger's fire motifs are marked by three prominent characteristics, all of which have significance: (1) the predominance of cinders or ashes, and embers; (2) the association of insects with the hearth; (3) the recurrent and polymorphic visions of dissipation, self-effacement, self-consumption, and extinction, all of which collectively connote a gradual "slipping away" of substance or 84 etherealization and may best be summed up by the French term, ecoulement. The appeal of the cinder to the human psychism recalls the basically sexual origins of the revery of fire: fire is the offspring of the pleasurable activity of rub bing two sticks together or of twirling a stick (pilon) in a slot (rainure); various primitive rituals (feux de ioie or feux nouveaux) on all continents involved the annual making of a new fire— and sometimes called for a young girl's running through the embers— in various in vocations of conjugal happiness, fertility, and generation; there is little need to dwell on the innumerable gauloi- series turning on the chaud lapin. or to speak of "burning desires" and "flames of passion." Primitive societies not only fertilized their crops with cinders but also saw to it that cattle and infertile women ingested them, for cinders are the aspect of fire most associated with regeneration.^3 Did not the Phoenix spring from his own ashes? The forlorn poet of "La Chanson de Musette," in whom we have already observed dialectic confrontations of oubli and souvenir. and who has already evinced a "ressuscitation obsession," would seek to revive and eternalize his love by sifting ashes: Ce n'est plus gu'en fouillant la cendre Des beaux jours qu'il £le calendriei^ a contenus, Qu'un souvenir pourra nous rendre La clef des paradis perdus. 85 If Murger's frequent reference to ashes may bespeak a yearning for the eternal, so may his fascination for the insects of the hearth. Bachelard convincingly resorts to an interesting passage of an early work of George Sand, L'Histoire du reveur. to show that the imaginative evocation of an insect's death in flames is but a thinly- veiled transposition of a fairly universal psychological impulsion— the wish for (provisional) death by fire. In George Sand's story, a young man climbs the slopes of Mount Etna so that he can see the flaming dawn rise over Sicily. He stops to rest in the Grotte des Chevres and there drowsily contemplates his fire of birch logs: "C'est la, pensait-il, une image reduite des jeux de la flamme et des mouvements de la lave dans les irruptions de 1' E t n a ."54 Having seen his birch fire, then, as a microcosm of the mouth of Etna, the young man cannot help but amplify his revery: "Que n'ai-je les yeux d'une fourmi pour admirer ce bouleau embrase; avec quels transports de joie aveugle et de frenesie d'amante, ces essaims de petites phalenes blanchatres viennent s'y precipiteri Voila pour elles le volcan dans toute sa majestei Voila le spectacle d'un immense incendie. Cette lumiere eclatante les enivre et les exalte comme ferait pour moi la vue de toute la foret embrasee." This death by fire is total, in order not to be final. Bachelard comments: "Par son sacrifice dans le 86 coeur de la flamme, l’ephemere nous donne une lecon d'eternite. La mort totale et sans trace est la garantie que nous partons tout entiers dans l'au-dela. Tout perdre pour tout g a g n e r . " 5 5 La vent souffle et mugit. Le bucher tout en feu Brille autour du heros; et la flamme rapide Porte aux palais divins l'ame du grand (Chenier, "La Mort d’Hercule")56 Perhaps Murger's interest in the buche. rather than the flame itself, belies a preoccupation with bucher. In any case, his connection of insects with the fireplace seems indicative of a complexe d'Empidocle. Anyone who has read the last paragraphs of Les Amours d'un Grillon. in which the cricket approaches his beloved spark to touch it, will recall the suspense: one wonders whether the cricket will be scorched or the spark extinguished. The situation of the crickets and salamanders elsewhere (23, 41, 95) is equally precarious. That the insects are not, in fact, consumed, does not detract from the importunate notion that they might be. Prom childhood, when we all have occasion to witness (and perhaps to contribute to, in a wanton moment) the cremation of an insect, we retain a phantasm that remains more or less conscious. How can one contemplate an insect near a fire without recalling, inadvertently, the whole phantasm? The very mention of salamanders conjures up the 87 notion of immortality "by" fire, for the salamander enjoyed the reputation of being able to pass unscratched through flames. (This reputation gave rise to the name of a brand of stove, "The Salamander," which soon became a rather generic term.5?) Several salamandrine attributes, thoroughly examined in the Grand Dictionnaire Universel du XIXe Siecle. contribute to the value of that reptile as a symbol of immortality: Ces Bactriens peuvent, du reste, supporter 1'abstinence pendant des mois entiers, du moins dans les lieux humides, sans maigrir en apparence....Les salamandres ont la vie tres-dure; on peut les frapper a coups de baton ou leur ouvrir le ventre sans qu'elles meurent toujours pour cela....Si on coupe leurs membres ou diverses parties de leur corps, elles ont la faculte de reproduire ces parties...on a fait a ce sujet des experiences tres-variees: aux unes on a retranche la queue ou les pattes; aux autres on a enleve un oeil en entier, et ces divers organes se sont reformes...Dumeril a con serve en vie pendant quatre mois une salamandre a laquelle il avait coupe la t£te pres du cou..."®® The same source explains that the notion of the salamander braving flames, an image which Francis the First took as his crest (with the motto, "J'y vis et je l'eteins") and which a Spanish noble applied to his beautiful but cruel lady, "froide meme au milieu des flammes," is probably due to the fact that the small animal, when placed on hot coals, secretes a fluid which momentarily may defer its perishing. The dirge composer of "Requiem," recalling happy moments gone by, notes that 88 La bouilloire chantait son refrain rigulier Et faisait un orchestre au bal des salamandres Qui voltiqeaient dans le foyer. The passage is interesting for two reasons. First, it is illustrative of Murger's penchant for terms revealing popular pastimes, like the theater, the balls, and card games. While we shall consider such motifs in the dis cussion of vocabulary in Chapter V, it should be observed here merely that these domains of pleasure which preoccupy the poet are all, to some extent, "foyers d'illusion." As Thibaudet says, C'est un lieu canmun de rapprocher la societe du second Empire de la societe du XVIII® siecle. Comme celle-ci, elle s'est repandue vers le dehors^ C'est une societe aux lustres et aux lumieres. Elle recherche avidement et publiquement les plaisirs.59 In the above three lines from "Requiem," there is also the joining of the fire imagination with that of air (voltiger). This combination is frequent in the poet's revery, as is evident drom the examination of a single poem, "Anitithese," where the two elements strike off a whole series of phrases suggesting gradual dissipation, volatility, or ecoulement. often convolutive: une lampe qui fume le givre arabesquant la buche enflammee se le feuillage irise se tordant en eclats tordant en spirale etoile frissonnante un chapelet de perles la cendre qui s'amon- qui s'egrene et celle en talus qui fond (While the "bise aigue qui souffle," is a phrase not 89 especially indicative of ecoulement. it reinforces the feeling of the "non-corporeal": is a further illustration of "air imagination": "Tout ce qui, dans l'homme, n'est pas purement physique (la vie de 1'esprit, 11 imagination, le reve, la parole meme) s'accommode volontiers d'un symbolisme aerien...Animus et anima. antitheses du corps, An ont la meme racine que le grec anemos. vent." u) One can easily multiply the examples of fire motifs in flight: Valentin, dit-on, a deja fondu Comme en un creuset. sa fortune...(7) Mais l'etoile fuit...(ll) Sur la braise qui se consume (41) There are also many non-calorific images of waning: "fading ribbons and flowers"; the game of "la franche marguerite" in which petals are stripped off one by one; a song which is wafted on the breeze and a plant which drifts off on the meandering current. * * * * Paris. If Murger be a poet of Paris, what sort of Paris does he describe? Unlike Villon and Banville, the author of Les Nuits d1hiver never names a cafe, a tavern, or his friends. Nerval writes of Les Hailes, Apollinaire of the Eiffel Tower and the Pont Mirabeau, Houssaye of the Academie, Baudelaire of gaslights, but what neighborhoods, what institutions, what inventions does Murger name?6! (It is incredible that the "First Bohemian" never employs 90 the terms Pays latin. Boheme. or bohemien. in his verse except where he uses the latter two in the geographical sense. Paris lies dormant and anonymous, a vague entity on the other side of the bedroom wall. How can the boule- vardier of the Second Empire fail to mention the omnibus, the universal expositions, the famines and revolutions, the invention of the sewing-machine and the "velo." the carriages; how can the art critic pass over the salons and contemporary painters, how can the playwright ignore the Odebn, Houssaye's friend omit the Comedie Francaise? While there are a few references and allusions to contem porary aspects of Paris (which will be dealt with under "vocabulary considerations" in Chapter V), it must be avowed that the urban verse is the work of a Second Empire moraliste. a La Rochefoucauld where it is a question of love, a Le Sage where it is a matter of notaries and biographers. It is the psychology and not the geography of the city that is explored. Essays. Dialectics of Mortality. Murger's poems may be conceived of as essays, in the Montaignian sense of "trials" or "experiments." Trials, to be sure, in form and style, as shall be seen in Chapter V, but also in a psychological sense. A true lyric poet, Murger was in quest of an inspiration that would lead to that profoundly felt, straightforward (shall we say religious?) expression which may be termed naif. The dialectics entertained in 91 the urban poems, between the almanach and the star, for example, or between 1'oubli and le souvenir, are concomi tant with the psychological and literary groping about; they reflect the essaying. The ensuing pages will take up the second term of a vaster dialectic, one which divided the poet as it did the Centaure of Guerin: the debate be tween the busy world of man and the peaceful, self- sufficiency of nature. In the last analysis, the human realm inspires (in the poet as in the Centaur) only a certain "emportement des pas," a restiveness resulting in "coups que je frappais au vide." We have seen the twisting ember, the fleeing star, the winding road, the swallow: all figures of illusion, movement, and inconstancy. How could one savor permanence and eternity in Paris, where love is ruled by a grisette and literature by usurious editors^ and the bourgeois public? The generation of 1850, which Thibaudet calls "theStrocratique, may claim to share a distinction which Rousset gives to the generation of 1680: "Cette epoque...a dit et cru, plus que tout autre, que le monde est un theatre et la vie une comedie ou il faut revetir un r6le.. . A jaded Goncourt attests to the theatricality of love, for example Ce que je trouve le plus beau et le plus fort dans 1'amour, c'est que la femme ne vous possede jamais. Entrer dans un rdle, quand on entre dans une liaison, et dire: "J'irai de la a la; je ferai sur ma maitresse telle et telle expSrience; je l'etonnerai de telle ou telle fagon; je me l'attacherai invinciblement par telle ou telle attache basse et charnelle..." Cacher une espece de Valmont au fond d'un Cherubin... J'ai l'idee que 1'occasion de m'amuser a cela et de m'interesser a ce jeu me viendra un jour.65 The son of a concierge and seamstress, finding little to worship in such a Paris, naturally turned to the country side— real or imagined. 93 J - An Introduction to the Poemes of Heinrich Heine, tr. Louis Untermeyer (New York: The Heritage Press, 1957), p. XXXVIII. ^Histoire de Murger. p. 42. 3Frederic et Bernerette, Oeuvres completes en Prose. ed. Maurice Allem (Paris: Gallimard, Bibliotheque de la Pleiade, 1957), pp. 471-72. ^Scenes de Boheme. pp. 115-16. On the admiration of Murger for Musset's prose, see also Charles de Ricault d'Hericault, Murger et son coin (Paris: P. Jannet, 1896), pp. 51-52. In addition to Musset, Balzac (La Grisette. 1830) and Alphonse Karr (Sous les Tilleuls. 1832) had preceded Murger in sketching the working girl; Dumas fils and Paul de Kock, among others, were later to elaborate on Murger's portrait of the type. ^Le Dernier Rendez-vous (Paris: Michel Levy, 1857), p. 34. ^The First Bohemian, p. 97. 7(Her own edition of) Scenes de Boheme (Paris: Julliard, 1964), p. 114, note. Q Dumas invented and illustrated the term, Le Demi monde . in his play of 1855. In a Preface to that play, he explains, as Maurice Allem recounts, that the demi-mondaine "a perdu la consideration du monde qui fut le sien, mais elle en a garde les manieres et le ton. Si elle n'est plus tout a fait une femme du monde, elle est encore femme du monde a demi....Demi-mondaines done: la femme mariee declassee par suite d'infidelit€s conjugales; celle qui vit maritalement et— cette irregularite admise— vit correcte- ment avec son amant; la jeune fille qui a 'debute dans la vie par une faute.'...Le demi-monde est separ§ des honnetes femmes par le scandale public,,^des courtisanes par 1'ar gent." (Vie Quotidienne Sous ie Second Empire (Paris: Hachette, 1948), p. 82. 9"...Valentin eut bientot saisi, dans les reponses du gargon qu'il interrogeait, un mystere qu'il ne soupcon- nait pas, et que bien d'autres que lui ignorent: e'est qu'il y a a Paris un grand notnbre de femmes, de demoiselles pauvres, qui, tout en ayant dans le monde un rang conven- able et quelquefois distingue, travaillent en secret pour vivre...Celle-la, fille de nobles aieux, fiere de son titre et de sa naissance, marque des mouchoirs; celle-ci, que vous admirez au bal, enjouee, si coquette et si legere, 94 fait des fleurs artificielles et paye de son travail le pain de sa mere..." (Oeuvres en Prose, p. 364.) lOsee Second Empire Medley, ed. W. H. Holden (London: British Technical and General Press, 1952), pp. 52-53. llSouvenirs de Jeunesse (Paris: Ernest Flammarion, 1896), p. 105. l2Histoire de Murger. pp. 85-86. l-*See infra, note 15. 1 4 " D a n s ie cenacle ou vivait Rodolphe...on affectait de traiter 1'amour comme une chose de luxe, un pretexte de bouffonnerie.o.Au milieu de tous ces faux sceptiques, Rodolphe etait le seul qui osat parler avec quelque reverence de 1'amour...il en avait pour une heure a rou- couler les elegies sur le bonheur d'etre, l'azur du lac paisible, chanson de la brise, concert d'etoiles, etc., etc." (Scenes de Boheme. p. 210.) l^This "ressuscitation fixation" is pointed out by Lelioux, Histoire de Murger. pp. 64-65. The first two stories were collected in the Scenes de la vie de jeunesse. while the longer Pays latin appeared under separate cover. l^Adrien Lelioux reprints (Histoire de Murger. pp. 39-40) two poems and one independent stanza which Murger jotted down on the fly-leaf of the Mvosotis of Hegesippe Moreau before giving the volume to Lelioux. He had originally given this volume to his beloved Marie Fonblanc, but upon their break she returned the book to him. ^Similarly, in Stella (the nouvella published in Murger's Dessous du Panier [Paris: Michel Levy, 1855]), the delirious poet Tristan, mistaking Stella for his former love, Helene, cries from his sick-bed, "'Tenez Helene, je vais vous rendre tout ce que j'ai a vous...tous ces char- mants souvenirs que vous m'aviez donnesaux jours lointains de ce bonheur qui ne devait pas avoir de suite...vos lettres surtout, reprenez-les...1 Et Tristan tira de dessous son traversin un petit coffret d'ebene qu'il remit entre les mains de Stella..." (p. 55). I Q ^ xoScenes de ieunesse. p. 228. l9Thus Musset, in his Mimi Pinson (Oeuvres en Prose, pp. 717-18): "Mile Pinson n'etait pas precisement ce qu'on appelle une jolie femme...Un tel ensemble Qiez retrousse, cheveux ad libitum, yeux noirs, etc.], comme on le voit, est loin de la beaute proprement dite. C'est ce qu'on 95 appelle une figure chiffonnee, figure classique de grisette, qui serait peut-etre laide sous le morceau de carton, mais que le bonnet rend parfois charmante..." 20Donald MacAndrew says, in his "Ladies of the Lake“ (pp. 54-55), "A rabid freakishness of looks and manners, le genre canaille, became the vogue. A premium was put on the iolie laide with her hair as red as Rufus on the hoyden, the chienne. the squirt, the tomboy." The lorette or iolie laide evolved from, and eventually superseded (in the forties and fifties), the grisette. Robert Burnand (Vie 1830. pp. 81-82) also dwells on "la mode garconniere" after 1835. 2*Journal, February 3, 1861. The girl in question here is Anais, the "fourth Mimi." Because of their tendency to exaggerate and of their inveterate dislike for Murger ("He was not our friend...he was of our trade but not of our society"), the Goncourts1 accounts are always a bit suspect, yet Murger himself never sang the "impeccable beauty" of his paramours. In speaking of his first great love, Marie, he claims that she was charming but "d'une beaute maladive" (thus "Mimi," Scenes de Boheme. p. 211); she was "de cette race frele et maladive ou les poetes de l'ecole poitrinaire vont ordinairement chercher leur ideal (thus "Marie," Les Amours d'Olivier. Scenes de Jeunesse. p. 157). 22 Jules Janin's "Study" of Murger (Les Nuits d'hiver. pp. 255-56) points out this lineage: "Musette, enfant des hauteurs de la rue Saint-Jacques, habitante des hauteurs de Breda. Elle aimait le luxe, elle haissait le vieillard; il ’ ' ’" ‘ ’ :une, un etes men xa soeur ae uerneretxe et ae Mimi Pinson:— II disait juste, il disait vrai; mais il fallait dire aussi que Mimi Pinson et Bernerette etaient les soeurs cadettes de Manon Lescaut. Alfred de Musset, l'abbe Prevost, Henry Murger, trois bohemiens de la meme boheme..." 23gee Donald MacAndrew ("Ladies of the Lake," Second Empire Medley, p. 55 in particular) on the ladies' penchant for squandering and Robert Burnand (Vie 1830. Chapter IX) on the universality of debtors and the indulgent attitude of society toward them. In Murger's own Vacances de Camille (p. 81), he says, "Qieon] est arrivfi a un age ou un jeune homme de famille doit avoir trois choses: un cheval, des dettes, et une maltresse." 2^In the many foyers d1artistes that Murger frequented (among which were the Hotel Merciol, Hotel Pimodan, the Cafe Momus, and Oinochau's restaurant, Au Petit Rocher. in vous 96 the Breda), he surely knew most of the celebrated eccen trics who died insane, some before Murger, some after. Among them were the playwrights Charles Barbara (the "Carolus Barbemuche" of the Bohemian Scenes) and Charles Bataille; the journalist Lautour-Mezeray and the cartoonist Andre Gille; Dinochau. Those who died young and delirious, of the various effects of starvation, consumption, and stimulants, included Antoine Fauchery, "Grandville," Edmond Roche, Eugene Cressot, Charles Becoeur, Privat d'Angelemont, Roger de Beauvoir; Hegesippe Moreau, whom Murger greatly admired and probably knew through Houssaye; the celebrated Aloysius Bertrand, whom Murger was too young to know, personally. (In The Bohemians Q>outh Brunswick: A. S. Barnes, 196S^, Joanna Richardson devotes at least a para graph to each of these tragic personnages.) 25"La Jeunesse n'a qu'un temps" is the title of a Chapter XXIII of Les Scenes, although in this chapter the song which appears is not the "Ronde de la Vie de Boheme" but rather the "Chanson de Musette." 26Cited by Baldick, The First Bohemian, p. 116. 2?The 1850 attack on the folly of Bohemia castigated several types of would-be artists: there are those without talent, who, making heroes of Gilbert, Malfilatre, Chatterton, Moreau, and (even) Victor Escousse, invite an obscure death which would remove them from an unworthy world; there are others, with talent, who form self-pitying groups, the members of which prefer dying of starvation to the slightest commercializing of their art. It was a group of the latter whom the apostate Murger took to task in de nouncing Les Buveurs d'eau (1853): "Ils prolongent ou per- petuent cet etat d'anonymite qui est au talent ce que le boisseau est a la lumiere. Reclus dans la pratique de leur art, le monde finissait pour eux aux murailles de leur chambre ou de leur atelier..." (p. vii). 2ft ^ Pierre Brochon, Beranger et son temps (Paris: Editions sociales, 1956), p. 52. 2Q *The Odelette. "A Henry Murger," and the posthumous tribute, "A la Jeunesse: Prologue pour la Vie de Boheme au Theatre de l'Odeon" (Rimes dorees). are the two most promi nent but not the only verse which Banville respectfully penned for the author of Les Nuits d'hiver. In "Nadar" (Odes funambulesaues). Murger's bald head is celebrated. 30"Senior et junior" (La Chanson des rues et des bois). Cf. "L'Oubli" in the same volume. 97 31See infra, pp. 160-61, on possible sources of inspiration. •^The water-lily truly has blossoms that are either yellow, white, or red, whereas Murger speaks of "Une herbe marine, a fleur jaune et blanche." In any case, the yellow and white flower he mentions is applicable to none of the English plants of which Shakespeare makes mention. Cf. similar metamorphoses in Rimbaud's Qphelie: Sur l'onde calme et noir ou dorment les etoiles La blanche Ophelie flotte comme un grand lvs... Les saules frissonnants pleurent sur son epaule Sur son grand front reveur s'inclinent les roseaux... Les nenuphars froisses soupirent autour d'elle... 33Susan Sontag, The Artist as Exemplary Sufferer, in Against Interpretation and Other Essays (New York: Dell, 1967), p. 51. 34Burnand, Vie 1830. pp. 57-58. The orange blossoms had to be "live" moreover, he humorously remarks: "Quand, peu apres 1830, on commence d'en fabriquer d'artificielles, les meres de familie y virent une nouvelle conquete— et non la moindre— de 1'esprit du siecle, une sorte d'offense faite au principe de la virginite." 3^This translation of the popular song comes from the Larousse Grand Dictionnaire Universel du XIX^ siecle. under the article on "Mignon." Under "Wilhelm Meister" the same dictionary offers only the first line of a different trans lation, foregoing the rest, apparently for the reason that "Tout le monde connait cette admirable chanson dans laquelle elle exprime ses regrets pour l'ltalie: Connais-tu le pays ou les citrons murissent. etc." Perhaps the most familier of all French translations was that done by Carre and Barbier in their libretto to Thomas' opera, Mignon. Their song began, "Connais-tu le pays ou fleurit l'oranger?" 3®The connection between the voyage-to-the absolute themes dear to Baudelaire and Mallarme and the image of Mignon is elucidated in an interesting (if uninspired) sonnet of a friend of Murger's. Undated, but smacking of "La Brise marine" and "L'Azur," "Adieu a la Poesie" closes the collected Poesies cf [Sic] Arsene Houssave (Paris: E. Dentu, 1877): 98 Adieu, je vais partir! Deja la Poesie Descendant jusqu'a moi, vient me donner la main; Je pars, mais sans savoir ou je serai demain: Dans la jeune Amerique ou dans la vieille Asie. Je pars! j'irai partout ou va la fantaisie; Ici-bas, nul ne peut m'indiquer mon chemin; Je vais a l1Ideal— o vieil orgueil humain!— Cherchant la vision que je n'ai pas saisie. Oui, comme toi, Mignon, qui vas nonchalamment, Les yeux toujours lev€s vers le bleu firmament Sans voir jamais l'abyme ou tout songe d'or tombe, Je vais! cherchant plus loin le pays inconnu, D'ou— regret eternel!— tout poete est venu, Mais qu'il ne reverra qu'en passant par la tombe. (Poemes et Chansons: XXXVI) 37As Harvey W. Hewett-Thayer explains, in the wake of another critic: "Ricarda Huch, one of the most penetrating and illuminating students of German Romanticism, has said of the Romantic writers, but with especial reference to Hoffmann, that they were 'homeless' in their bodies; they did not feel at home there: 'the immediate homeland of the human being is his body and whether he feels happy or wretched in this environment determines his feeling of having a home on this earth.'" (Hoffman: Author of the Tales H'tinceton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1948J, p. 121.) 38In a letter of "18 mai 1842" (Lelioux, pp. 118-19), Murger writes that he has found "la soeur de mon ame... laquelle est une femme en velours, Danoise de nation, de vingt-cinq ans d'age, mariee, spirituellement mechante, et jolie comme une vignette anglaise." Elsewhere in the letters he refers to the enigmatic muse of the untitled verse, "A Christine de S...," as his "Scandinavian sylph," or "daughter of Ossian," or "daughter of Fingal," or "Swedish princess." Baldick (Chapter III) thinks her Danish or Swedish. 3^Les Deux Faust de Goethe, ed. Fernand Baldenspergex; Vol. VI of Oeuvres completes, ed. Aristide Marie et al. (6 vols.; Paris: Champion, 1926-32), pp. 210-11. See infra, p. 161 , on the question of Nerval as a source of inspiration. 40Robert C. Binkley puts the annual rate of European emigration at about 300,000 during 1851-55 and 200,000 in the following decade. He estimates that Europe sent five and a half million overseas, "mostly to the United States," 99 in the period 1852-72. (Realism and Nationalism Qlew York, Harper and Row, 1963], pp. 74-75.) 4^ - Les Buveurs d'Eau. p. 240. 42"Theodore de Banville: Poete lyrique," Part II, in Banville, Poesies completes. II, p. 430. 4^cited by Gerald Antoine in the Introduction to his critical edition of Sainte-Beuve, Vie. Poesies et Pensees de Joseph Delorme (Paris: Nouvelles Editions Latines, 1956), pp. LXIX-LXX. 44Univers imaqinaire de Mallarme. pp. 24-25. Word counts, the author maintains, such as those done by the "mathematical1 1 critic Pierre Guirard, are inadequate to consider the whole breadth of a theme ("le theme d€borde souvent le mot") and fail to account for the various de notations and connotations of individual words ("les variations de sens, et, a l'interieur d'un meme sens, la difference de tension ou de niveau, de ce sens, entendons son plus ou moins grand enracinement dans 1'experience, sa plus ou moins grande vertu de retentissement..." (p. 25). 4%ope— in the object of love (I, IV, V, VI), in religion (III, VI)— is a key theme in most of the Ballades. 4^Vacances de Camille, pp. 122-123. 4^In the Independence Beige. Cited in Baudelaire, Oeuvres completes, ed. Le Dantec et Pichois, p. 1683. 48Le Mvosotis. in Oeuvres completes de Heaesippe Moreau, ed. R. Vallery-Rodot, 2 vols. (Paris: Alphonse Lemerre, 1890). The first volume of our reference edition contains an Introduction with Correspondance and the Contes a ma soeur; the second volume contains Le Mvosotis and Premiers Vers. Poesies inedites. Poesies posthumes. 49 See Chapter I, "Feu et respect: le complexe de Promethee," La Psvchanalvse du feu (Paris: Gallimard, 1949). 50Bachelard, Feu, p. 180. (The enclosed quotation is from Armand Petitjean, Imagination et Realisation.) SlThose having the richest fire imagination believe fire is intime, suffused— with or without the accidental qualities of heat and light— in all bodies, animal or mineral. (See Michel Mansuy. Gaston Bachelard et les Elements ^Paris: Corti, 1967J, pp. 40-41; see also Bachelard |~Feu. pp. 133-34J, where he explains Mme du 100 Chatelet's conviction that "la chaleur et la lumiere sont des modes et non des proprietes du feu." She based her Memoire on studies of the rays of the shining moon, which generated no heat £she marvelled], not even through a lens.) ^Bachelard, Feu, quoted by Mansuy, in Gaston Bachelard. p. 46. 53See Bachelard, Feu. Chapters III, IV, on the "feu sexualis§." 54This (and the following) excerpt of Sand's prose is quoted by Bachelard, Feu, p. 36. 55idem. 56Bachelard mentions the theme of Hercules1 death "from Hugo to Regnier" but neglects to mention the Bucoliaue of Chenier. Andre Chenier, Oeuvres completes. ed. Gerard Walter (Paris: Gallimard, 1958). 3^The Bloch and Wartburg Dictionnaire Etvmologique de la langue francaise (1964) confirms the evolution of the term: "Au sens d'esprit, animal vivant dans le feu, d'apres Paracelse (XVIe ) ; d'ou l'emploi du mot, fin X ix e , pour designer une sorte de fourneau (d'abord un nom de marque)." 58"salamandre" (15 vols.; Paris: Larousse, 1866-76). 59Histoire de la litterature franqaise de 1789 a nos jours (Paris: Stock, 1936), p. 387. ^Michel Mansuy, Gaston Bachelard. p. 245. 6^-In the prose works, Paris is sketched in more detail: in Madame Olvmpe. Murger takes us, by "la route ferree qui joint Paris a Saint-Germain," (p. 15) to the riverside chateau of Mme Delarue, who organizes a boat excursion to the construction that M. Alexandre Dumas is having done on an island he has baptized "Monte-Christo." (44) In the opening pages of the story, Christine, a girl meditates suicide under the gaslights of Pont-au-Change (in Madame Olvmpe. pp. 203-06). 62"Les sympathies sont venues de tous cotes au lit^ de mort de Murger. Michel Levy, son editeur, qui a gagne 25.000 francs avec la VIE DE BOHEME, payee 500 francs, lui a envoye genereusement 100 francs." Goncourt, Journal. January 30, 1961. 63Histoire. p. 386. 101 64La Litterature de l'acre baroque en France (Paris: Corti, 1953), p. 28. Rousset meant that the world was a theater in the physical sense ("houses open like surprise- boxes, walls open like stage sets," he says); in 1850, the world was a stage in a spiritual or moral sense. Journal, "July," 1862. Chapter IV The Belfry and the Azure Sky: The Bucolic Poems 102 103 Ces troubles alternaient avec de longues absences de tout mouvement. Des lors, je ne possidais plus d'autre sentiment dans mon @tre entier que celui de la croissance et des degres de la vie qui montaient dans un repos absolu, je goutais sans^alteration le bienfait des dieux qui se repandait en moi. — Maurice de Guerin, Le Centaure Charles Baudelaire once commented, in connection with Banville, "Tout poete lyrique, en vertu de sa nature, opere fatalement un retour vers l'Eden perdu. Tout, hommes, paysages, palais, dans le monde lyrique, est pour ainsi dire apotheose.''^ The Murgerian essays seem indeed a quest for a lost Eden; the quest might have begun (but did not) with a vigorous renunciation of the city, whose blisses were chimerical. Murger's attraction to the city was persistent enough, and strong enough, to prevent him from recognizing the illusory and ephemeral nature of its inspiration. His friend Houssaye, on the other hand, laden in his mature years with responsibilities as an editor and theater director, recalled with nostalgia a Bohemia whose fleeting pleasures, he knew, could never be re-captured: Theo, te souviens-tu de ces vertes saisons Qui s'effeuillaient si vite en ces vieilles maisons Dont le front s'abritait sous une aile du Louvre?... Chimeres aux cils noirs, Esperances fanees, Amis toujours chantants, Amantes profanees, Songes venus du ciel, flottantes Visions, Sortez de vos tombeaux, jeunes illusionsI Et nous rebatirons ce chateau perissable Que les destins changeants ont jete sur le sable. 104 Cette fille aux yeux bleus, follement rejouie, Les blonds cheveux epars, la bouche epanouie... Fut de notre jeunesse une image fidele...2 If Murger does not reject the city as a bogus Eden, he does, nonetheless, reject it explicity— for varying reasons— in two poems which form a transition from the urban to the bucolic mode. The theme of "Celui-la dont ie veux dire la triste fin..." is that of the "loss of innocence" through schooling. In this poem the poet tells of how an orphan of fifteen, "misguided" toward education by his late, "ignorant" father, heads for Paris to study, having been given a modest viaticum by an affectionate mother in the village. The poet castigates the father: S'il en est temps encore, o pere imprudent! vite Retourne a ce college, et, sans perdre un instant, De ces bancs studieux enleve^ton enfant Arrache de ses mains, foule a tes pieds, dechire Ce livre qu'il epele, avant qu'il sache lire; Conserve-lui 1'habit que tu n'as pas quitte, Le pauvre vetement qu'aima la liberte, Le sarrau plebeien fait de bure grossi&re; Qu'il reste un paysan, comme est reste son pere. L'humilite d'esprit, c'est le savoir du coeur. N'en fais pas un savant, fais-en un laboureur and then closes the piece on an ironic note, making fun of the village women who undoubtedly are unaware of the wide variety of new things which the boy has learned in the city: Mais il sait maintenant bien des choses nouvelles, Et, le soir, en filant, a la veillee, entre elles, 105 Les femmes du village a la mere ont souvent Envie le bonheur d'avoir un fils savant. "A un Adolescent” similarly enjoins a young boy to "depouiller ce faux manteau de sage." "A quoi bon," the poet queries, "...jouer a seize ans ce role de Nestor?" Laissez dormir en paix tous vos auteurs poudreux, Qui, s'ils etaient vivants, discuteraient entre eux; Et, dans l'antiquite si vous voulez un guide, Choisissez Epicure, ou l'amoureux Ovide. And so, whereas in the first poem the poet had enjoined the boy to leave his school for the fields, in this poem, the "Adolescent" is counselled to abandon a feigned sagacity for the open expression of true love. The end of the poem suggests that the proper setting for love is in the countryside where "...pour vous le ciel/Etale la splendeur de ses ecrins nocturnes," where birds in their nests "font un epithalame a vos amours benis," yet the bucolic tenor is suddenly falsified a bit by the likening of the girl who awaits (in the fields?) to Shakespeare's "Julietta": the "ladder rests upon the ancient sculptured balcony." There is then a return to nocturnal, bucolic imagery, indicative of the fact that the similarity between the case in point in the poem and the situation in Romeo and Juliet is only in that a fresh young girl ("dans ses vetements blancs") awaits to elope: no urban atmosphere was meant to be created. As in any verse which may rightly be termed 106 "bucolic," in Les Nuits d'hiver the very land, with the non-human life which inhabits it, truly constitutes a theme in itself. An inquiry, therefore, into the themes of Murger's rustic verse may legitimately begin with a study of nature as he conceives it. I. The Village Belfrys The Limits of Nature. surgamus: solet esse gravis cantantibus umbra, iuniperi gravis umbra, nocent et frugibus umbrae. — Virgil, Ecloga X The out-of-doors, in Les Nuits d'hiver. is almost always of very limited expanse. This is perhaps due to the fact Murger's first-hand experience of nature was quite limited, being confined, until the period 1848-50, when the poet discovered the forests of Meudon and Fontainebleau, to the three principal public parks of Paris^ and to the many cabarets (from the Latin Quarter to Montmartre) which boasted gardens. Certain "pastoral breaks" in poems which seem essentially Parisian, like the "coin fleuri du vieux jardin" of "Renovare" are probably references to apartment courtyards or to gardens of the numerous restaurants and cabarets which boasted verdant, flowering "corners" in the very heart of Paris: Le Chateau des Fleurs, La Grande Chaumiere, L'Auberge du Cheval Blanc (rue Contrescarpe-Dauphine), Le Jardin Turc, Les Tivoli, and the famous "bal Mabille," where the orchestras of 107 Pilodo and Metra played for dancers in gardens lit by five- thousand gaslights.4 In the poems which clearly do have a thoroughly natural setting, that setting is seldom specific. The poet and his sweetheart of "Ma Mie Annette" will return to their village via "la Venelle"; in the wake of Horace, Murger will compose an Ode to Blandusia, the location of which C still puzzles classical scholars; the Chanson rustique devoted to the "Poacher's Dog," recalls Murger's fondness for Marlotte, a village in the Forest of Fontainebleau. (The poet had strolled through the woods of Meudon, Clamart, and Bellevue, in the period of 1850-51, before deciding to make Marlotte his home away from Paris.6) Yet the village is never named in the verse, and were it not for the biographical data available, one would be just as mystified over the location of the poacher's terrain as he is over the setting of "Les Abeilles," "Les Corbeaux," "La Menteuse," "Ma Cousine Angele," and the other rustic pieces. An examination of the list of proper nouns found in these poems (see Appendix II, A, 2) shows an utter dearth of precision. Even a Ronsard, to whom Murger is clearly indebted, and who was so often rooted in ideal, Arcadian countrysides, readily referred to names of cities, rivers, and contemporaries in such poems as "Le Voyage de Tours" t P the foremost poet of "la grande nature" in Murger's century, Victor Hugo was equally specific in his 108 "A M. Le D. de Thus the author of Les Nuits d'hiver has already made a first step toward rendering his poems ideal and "classical": he has pared away place names. Despite the lack of specificity, one feels that Murger's rustic pieces are set in Ile-de-France: the countryside is gentle, flowering, and apparently level, the anti-thesis of the sublime crags that delighted Saint-Preux and Julien Sorel. The relative absence of water rules out basins like that of the Loire, the absence of fog and mist the North of France, the absence of thick forests the Southwest and East. One cannot help but compare the "natural" vocabulary of the First Bohemian with that of the two poets, so different from one another, who were the most influential of the romantic generation: Hugo, whose nature was vast and represented the "ecole pittoresque" and Sainte-Beuve, who launched the "ecole intime."® The idiom of the later Hugo, the "force of nature" of "Ce Qu'on Entend sur la Montagne" and "Oceano Nox," is foreshadowed in the various Odes of 1828, of which the last (Book V, Ode XXV) is exemplary: On croit sur la falaise. On croit dans les for§ts. Tant on respire a l'aise, Et tant rien ne nous pese, Voir le ciel de plus pres. La, tout est comme un reve; Chaque voix a des mots, Tout parle, un chant s'eleve De l'onde sur la qreve. De 11 air dans les rameaux. 109 C'est une voix profonde, Un choeur universel, C'est le globe qui gronde. C'est le roulis du monde Sur 1'ocean du ciel.... (Part III) Ce bruit vaste. a toute heure, On 1'entend au desert. Paris, folle demeure, Pour cette voix qui pleure Nous donne un vain concert. OhI la Bretagne antique! Quelque roc ecumant! Dans la foret celtique Quelque donion gothiquel Pourvu que seulement La tour hospitaliere Ou je pendrai mon nid, Ait, vieille chevaliere, Un panache de lierre Sur son front de granit.... (Part IV) Murger's repertory of words is lacking in natural terms expressive of height (falaise, montaqne. tour)y of the Ossian-like elements (roulis du monde. ocean du ciel. roc ecumant)y of the romantic indulgence for ruins (donjon gothique. tour de granit a panache de lierre)y of terms suggesting expansiveness (globe qui qronde). Vaste. tour (in the sense of "tower"), granit. roc, lierre. donjon, qreve. are not to be found in Murger's versey Ocean, desert(s), falaise occur but once each— and in the same poem. Onde. meaning "sea-water" or "billow" does not occur. Murger uses that vocable only as a synonym for eau— in a river (11), in a glass (41), in a fountain (151). In the complete absence of water and of rocky promontories. 110 one feels far from the world of a Chateaubriand or of an Ossian; in the absence of ruins, one feels far from that of a Hugo or a Nodier. Nor is Murger, in matters of nature, the Sainte-Beuve of the "Enfant RSveur," which is to say, "Baudelairian" (for the author of Joseph Delorme prefigured the poet of Flowers of Evil in many ways) .^ In the "Enfant Reveur," the poet addresses a melancholic young boy who often goes off at dusk to sit pensively by a pond or swim: Qu'as-tu vu sous les eaux? precipices sans fond, Aretes de rocher, sable mouvant qui fond, Monstres de toute forme entrelaces en groupe, Serpents des mers, dragons a tortueuse croupe, Crocodiles vomis du rivage africain, Et, plus affreux que tous, le vorace requin... Et quand tu reviendrais, par miracle echappe... Et que, pale a jamais des scenes de naufrage... Tu voudrais les chanter durant les longues nuits, Personne sous tes chants ne suivra ta pensee, Et de loin on rira de ta plainte insensee. ...Et 1*affreux souvenir revenant s'y meler Gatera tout, soleil, flots bleus, doux noms de femme... Malheur a qui sonda les abymes de l'ame! Without delving into the writhing or aquatic bestiary (which had its repercussions in Baudelaire and Ducasse) and the nightmarish evocation of chaos (affreux. vorace. vomis. naufrage. malheur), both of which would be repug nant to Murger's sensibility, one must come to grips with the images of profundity— because of their important role in nineteenth-century poetry— resumed in the "earth terms," Ill precipices, abtmes. and *qouffre.which are virtually absent from Les Nuits d'hiver. The avoidance of abysses, like that of mountains, cliffs, and crags, could be ex plained by reason of: (1) Murger's limited contact with nature, as a typically untravelled Parisian; (2) a literary or aesthetic predilection for classical (Horatian, Vir- gilian) bucolic settings; (3) psychological predispositions. Given the fact that the poet, like many of his contempo raries, sought artistic and psychic rejuvenation in a primordial nature that was pure and tranquil, the third explanation seems the most valid. Murger conceives of the land in terms of security, which is attested to by the lack of accidents in his topography. There is no feeling of weakness or nakedness before vast expanses; there is not the fear of engulfment caused by a shaky, collapsing, or sliding surface (no earthquakes, no rockslides, no slime); the fear of cataclysmic fall, a paramount theme in Buffon and Hugo, is nowhere in evidence in Murger; the obsession with a destructive earth that wants our death definitively, a notion authorized by the Biblical "dust-to-dust" and explored at length by writers like Gautier (Le Roman de la momie. "Affinites secretes"), is far from the spirit of Les Nuits d'hiver. ^ In the pastoral scenes of Les Nuits d'hiver. one feels Murger is never far from the smoking farmhouse, for 112 humanity is almost always near; yet the limits of the scene are almost never clearly traced out, as the poet seems to avoid artifacts such as houses, fences, and ruins. Some times the limitation is effected by natural terms ("dans le ble mur" Q7j; "dans les prairies/Et dans les bois des environs," "sous le grand marronnier" |j57j; "dans les plaines," "sous les saules" Q>3j;) but just as often, one is reminded of the proximity of humanity and safety by the pealing of the bell in the village church (51, 57, 87, 127). The sounding of the Angelus or Ave Maria is especially conspicuous in the Ballades (219, 225, 229) ; similarly, the tambourin may beckon villagers to public celebrations. These celebrations, however, like the church rites and various communal, agricultural activities referred to, are never depicted. Murger is interested in scenes that can best be described by the French word intime: peaceful scenes with two or three protagonists who sustain charming dialogues, neither attached individ ually by work to the soil, nor assembling in festive groups (before our eyes at any rate). The intime, illustrated and popularized by Sainte- Beuve and his hero, Joseph Delorme, is an apt term to categorize the verse of Murger. Properly construed by critics^ to mean "interior," the term suggests at once psychological intimite. in which the description of realistic exteriors is subservient to the expression of 113 sentimental nuances, and physical intimite. that which is confined being preferred to that which is expansive. The squalid Parisian rooms of Sainte-Beuve and Murger are roughly comparable, as are the attitudes toward nature in the two poets. Amaury, hero of Sainte-Beuve's Volupte. eloquently explains this attitude: Moi, j'ai tou jours tant aime Q.. .1 reconnaitre les destinees les plus nunioles, leur naissance, leur premier flot encaisse dans les vallons et les fonds obscurs, au bas des chaumieres, tout leur agencement particulier avec les choses d'alentour. Plus ces destinees sont simples, naturelles, damestiques, plus j'y prends gout, m'y interesse, et souvent en moi-meme m'en emerveille; plus je m'attendris devant Dieu, comme a la vue d'une margueritelle des champs.14 But while Sainte-Beuve's intimisme. in the wake of the English Lake poets, pensively seeks the shadows and in vites death, the author of Les Nuits d'hiver. in the wake of Ronsard, celebrates (rather unphilosophically) the beauty of morning, seeking the sun. (Here the pastoral verses are in contrast to the urban ones, which are usually nocturnal.) "Dimanche Matin," "Ma Mie Annette," and "Les Corbeaux" are morning poems through and through; both the versified and the prose versions of "Marguerite" insist on the morning-fresh innocence of the girl Comme l'aurore matinale, Fraiche comme elle, s'eveillant Dans son alcove virginale, Elle s'habillait en priant before she succumbs to vice; other poems celebrate a 114 mixture of hours and seasons, yet no bucolic verse is devoted to a somber meditation on death. "La Menteuse" takes place at twilight, but is a playful pastoral. The classical Mediterranean love of the sun, evident in Murger's adaptation of the "Ode to Bandusia" (which Horace set in the Dog-days), is a basic element in Murger's poetic revery of nature. One of Murger's prose heroes, Leon, in fact theorizes in a Staelian manner on the inherent link between the sun and lyricism: "Les Allemands, disait-il d'un ton dedaigneux, ce sont des savants et non des musiciens. Comment pourraient-ils l'etre, des gens qui habitent un pays ou le brouillard enrhume^les oiseaux, et qui passent leur vie a boire de la biere a grande cruche...Aussi, le premier Italien guidant ses boeufs dans la campagne romaine en sait-il plus long dans vingt-cinq mesures que tous les symphonistes d'outre-Rhin, qui font de la musique avec le traite du contrepoint, comme les faux poetes, qui font leurs vers a coups de dictionnaire.15 The importance of a sunny nature cannot be over emphasized, as in France, during the course of the eighteenth-century, the poetic view of nature, which was principally to be found in the elegy, had become increas ingly brooding. "En effet," says Henri Potez, "avant la Revolution, l'elegie est surtout galante. Apres, elle est surtout funebre." And much further on, Potez alludes to the somber nature of the foremost poets of the early s nineteenth century, Lamartine and Hugo,!7 before reviewing the minores who lamented, complained, and wept— control- 115 lably: Dusillet, Ulrich Guttinger, Alexandre Guiraud, Jules Lefevre, Amable Tastu, Marceline Desbordes-Valmore, and, in certain verse, Sainte-Beuve. The landscape in the pastoral verse of Les Nuits d'hiver is then gentle in its features, limited in extent, peopled by small groups, and bathed in a sun that makes the reader unsure if he is still in Ile-de-France of in Italy. In the last analysis, the poet has, like his pre decessors of the Pliiade, adapted Greco-Latin motifs to French soil. Adding Ile-de-France to Tour and Loir, and Rose to Pierrot, one might extend Marcel Raymond's obser vation on Ronsard and Du Bellay to include Murger as veil: Le principe de ces adaptations est commun aux deux po&tes: infideles a 1'original, ils placent des touches frangaises au lieu des elements antiques; la naturalisation est aisee, car il y a moins loins qu'on ne croit de la Grece ou de la Sicile au pays de Tours et du Loir. Lycidas devient Pierrot, contre quoi protestera Boileau... Q)u Bellay, in paraphrasing Virgil's Moretunf] nomine proprement les fleurs, les legumes, les fruits, les instruments champetres. Voici le jardin potager: La se trouvait toute herbe de potage, La s'espandoit la bette au grand feuillage, Et la vinette espessement croissant, Avec la maulve, et l'eaule verdissant. Les chiches pois y prenoient nourriture, Oignons, pavots d'endormante nature: La s'estendoit la friande laictue, Et la s'enfloit la coucourde ventrue.l® Murger has no such vegetable garden, yet his fauna and flora are assuredly of Central France, even at moments 116 when his themes and style recall classical and "neo classical" poets (the Pleiade or Chenier). His bestiary is suited to his terrain: there is no creature that causes fear or would do violence, no mon sters, nothing bizarre in his animal world, as a review of his fauna (see Appendix II, B, 2) proves. It is hard to believe that a writer of the generation steeped in the Odes et Ballades could remain so unaffected by, so indepen dent of, the vast menagerie of Victor Hugo. Birds and other creatures that flit about seem to hold the greatest fascination for Murger, as attested to by an avian tour de force in Les Vacances de Camille: the scene is in the Forest of Aulnay where Theodore Landry and M. Hericy have met to duel (the underlining is ours): A cette invasion d'une troupe d'hommes au milieu de leur solitude, tous les oiseaux etaient en emoi. La pie bavarde s'envolait d’un arbre a 1'autre, echangeant dans son langage quelque injure avec le geai criard et vorace comme elle; trouble dans sa picoree par le bruit des pas, le merle prudent rasait de son vol agile le falte des buissons, ou l'aubepine commencait a fleurir. Et tandis que le pivert*grimpeur. occupe a perforer le tronc des chenes, interrompait par une note claire le martellement regulier de son bee acere les petites mesanges sautil- laient en fredonnant leur babillage sur les branches menues que leur poids leger inclinait a peine. (p. 223.)19 Such is Murger's collection of birds in Les Nuits d'hiver as well: small, harmless, song-birds. Finches, wrens, larks, swallows, and unspecified birds are depicted as friends to man, giving lovers warning of the approach of 117 dawn (in the aubade-like ending of "A un Adolescent"), or carrying messages back and forth ("Les Messages de la Brise"); these birds prefer shrubs to trees and often occupy niches in human habitats. The only birds of dubious character in the volume would be "Les Corbeaux," yet even in their poem (where the bird is named only in the title), it is a positive quality which is stressed, the instinctive purposefullness and keen intuition of the raven: Sans etudier la Science Dans le Grand Messager boiteux. Ils savent quand on ensemence... Le plus fin chasseur de la terre De pres ne les approche pas,^ Et de loin ne les atteint guere: Ils flairent la poudre a cent pas» The poet's ornithology seems a bit unsure, for the ravens seem to be carnivorous "buzzards" in the third stanza and granivorous in the following lines, just as the starlings, which in reality feed on grain or fruit, are curiously depicted as carnivores in the third stanza. Withal, his sincere admiration for the bird's prowess cannot be questioned. Along with the ravens, "The Bees" and "The Poacher's Dog" seem to symbolize a sort of unerring intent, and it would not seem too far-fetched to suppose that a poet often plagued by the failure to accomplish his goals would place in his Arcadia creatures whose steadfastness before work is awesome.20 It is clear that nature offers, in various guises, vivid images of productivity, even if 118 Murger seems content to let animal-life make the accomplish ments while man reposes. Murger's predilection for small creatures that sing and flit— in close proximity to man— is borne out by the attention paid to the cicada, which can symbolize a season Au mois ou la terre etale La richesse des moissons, Quand la sonore cigale Frappe 1'air de ses chansons, Dans la lumiere vermeille Bourdonne un essaim joyeux, Aux fleurs des sillons l'abeille Prend son miel delicieux. ("Les Abeilles") or the incessant good cheer of Marguerite: Puis comme elle avait fait la veille, Au joug du labeur se mettant, Cigale en meme temps qu'abeille, Elle travaillait en chantant. or the tranquility of a Virgilian meadow in which the poet sits to read of mythological heroines: Toutes il vous connalt, et vous aussi, pasteurs, Qui paissez vos troupeaux dans la prairie en fleurs, II vous comprend et lit vos chansons pastorales Ou dans les bles murmurent les cigales.21 Voltiger. one of Murger's preferred terms, sums up his preferences in the animal world: at the risk of af fronting zoologists, the poet even dares speak of "le bal des salamandres qui voltigeaient..." (23) and of "vives salamandres" (41), the adjective connoting, through its etymology, "warmth" and "brilliance" as well as "liveli ness." One may legitimately compare Murger's animal world 119 with that of Ronsard, in passages like the following one from Les Amours de Marie: C'estoit en la saison gue l'amoureuse Flore Faisoit pour son amy les fleurettes esclore... Lorsque les papillons et les blondes auettes, Les uns chargez au bee, les autres aux cuisettes, Errent par les jardins, et les petits oiseaux Voletans par les bois de rameaux en rameaux... Quant tout arbre florit, quand la terre devient De vieillesse en iouuence, et 1*estrange Arondelle Fait contre un soliveau sa maison naturelle; Quand la limace, au dos qui porte sa maison... ("Le Voyage de Tours") Such would be a composite of the nature in Les Nuits d1hiver: that which is minute, actively crawling, hopping, or flying. Yet Ronsard's "bestiaire de 1'allegresse," as the co-authors of "L’Imagerie amoureuse de Ronsard" term it, is dominant especially in the poems dedicated to Marie, who readily grants her favors to the poet, whereas in the poems for Helene, "le poete croit que Dieu fit les Dames ’afin de nuire a 1 'homme.. .comme/Les tygres, les lyons, les serpens et les lous."'22 Of the tawny creatures Ronsard mentions, and which Hugo often invoked before the Parnassians, not a glimpse in Murger, whose most savage animals are "la biche [appareilleej au cerf langoureux" ( 6 7 ) . Hugo, Baudelaire, Banville, and Leconte de Lisle had their eagles, bats, vultures, owls, albatrosses, ospreys, swans, and condors,2^ birds that hover awkwardly or portend evil; it seems unimaginable that a poet of the mid- 120 nineteenth century, whose poetic menagerie specialized in creatures of flight, could remain aloof from the general aesthetic proclivities of his time. Animals of any sort are, moreover, less prominent and less numerous in Les Nuits d'hiver than forms of vegetation, all of which bears further witness to the undeniable observation that it was a thoroughly peaceful idyll which the poet created: "...la vegetalite, par opposition a l'animalite, est la bonne part du monde vivant, sa juste instance: l'animalite est brutalite destructrice, ducassienne... "24 A rapid glance at Appendix II, B, shows that Murger is much more attracted by flowers than by trees, again an indication of his preference for the minute and delicate rather than the sturdy elements in nature. The noun fleur occurs twenty-nine times in Les Nuits d'hiver. the word arbre but once; in all, there are one hundred nineteen words related to the various aspects of flower-life, eight to shrubs, and thirty to trees. The count does include proper names which are names of flowers, like Rose, but as Murger certainly meant to recall the flowers in naming his girls, the inclusion seems legitimate. Yet even if one were to excise the proper names from the list of flowers, one should in any case group terms of flowers and shrubs together, in opposition to trees, for the low-lying, spreading forms of plant-life reveal a thinker whose musings are earthbound, a poet taken with the notion of 121 secure rooting (enracinement), whereas the sublime revery of the tree would indicate, in general, an impulsion toward air.25 Jean-Paul Sartre, Bachelard points out, had to work out a "refus de 1'image ascensionnelle" in describing the famous plane-tree that imposed its unknowing existence on the historian of Bouville. It will be remembered that the appearance of that plane-tree was one of affalement rather than iaillissement.26 in other words, a tree con sidered as a symbol of existence exhibits a downward or inverted thrust because of the life-giving quality of the roots and of the earth itself. It is not by chance that Murger insists on recurrent motifs of re-birth in nature, many of which turn on the harvest, and that in "Les Abeilles," each stanza has a prominently-employed term of reproduction. Bourgeonner. moissons. graminees. are the keys in the first, third, and sixth stanzas, while the fourth and seventh stanzas dwell on the wonders of animal and human mating, rather than vegetable propagation. The cutting down of vegetable life marks the second and fifth stanzas, but one knows that from a stalk or stump, life will spring again, attesting once more to the liveness of the root. ...11immortalite de la racine trouve une preuve eclatante, une preuve claire bien souvent invoquee, comme dans le livre de JobQJ "Car si un arbre est coupe, il y a de l'esperance, il repoussera encore, et il y aura encore des rejetons; 122 Bien que sa racine soit vieillie dans la terre, et que son tronc soit comme mort dans la poussiere."27 Moreover, Murger's refrain on the creative bee assures the reader at the end of the second stanza (as in every stanza) that despite the destructive scythe nature's life-cycle will not end: En juin, quand la plaine brille Sous les feux de la Saint-Jean, Quand l'acier des faux scintille En rapide eclair d'argent; Quand la faucheuse sommeille, Son grand chapeau sur ses yeux, Aux fleurs du sainfoin l'abeille Prend son miel delicieux. David Ferry, in discussing Wordsworth's Ode: Intimation of Mortality, explains that the bees of that poem, like the creature celebrated in To A Butterfly, are for the author a symbol of immortality. Even though every life in nature must meet its end sometime, the most delicate winged creatures and flowers, being unconscious of their mortality, convey effectively to man natural and effective images of immortality.28 The flora of Les Nuits d'hiver. like the fauna, con sist of the delicate, the familiar, the petite, the useful or playful: "bleuets qu'on tresse en couronne" (17, 108); oracular petals a girl consults to see if her beau loves her "a little," "a lot," or "passionately" (17, 229). Like the migrating swallow or the impervious salamander, the field and the flower are forever reborn. The theme of immortality forms, in fact, the link between most of the 123 rustic verses, as will be seen in the ensuing pages. Suf fice it to say that the daisy, the violet, the cornflower, the rose, in a word, the commonest of flowers, are those which dot Murger's field. His seeming predilection for bleuets. immortelles, and other unspecified "fleurs d'azur" may be explained autobiographically (his mother, having dressed him in blue, dubbed the future author "Petit Bleuet"), literarily (he delighted in Hegesippe Moreau's Mvosotis), or artistically (the celestial symbolism of blue being traditional).29 In any case, blue or not, the humblest flowers afforded the Bohemian poet, as well as any other natural phenomenon, noble microscosms of eterhal workings. "It is even a rhetorical advantage," says Ferry of Wordsworth, "that daffodils, such mere pretty flowers, so humble and modest in the great scheme of things, can represent such grandeur."30 II. The Azure Sky To every natural form, rock, fruit or flower, Even the stones that cover the highway, I gave a moral life... — Wordsworth, "The Prelude," III. Murger's interest in delicate flowers is similar to Wordsworth's, for the two poets find in such apparently frail lives, apt signs of eternity. But whereas the 124 English poet seems to Integrate his flowers directly with the whole cosmos, the French poet first equates the flowers with humanity and then points out the eternal and divine nature of the double creature. Here it is principally the human aspect of nature which concerns us, the more physical aspects having been examined in the preceding pages. In his pastoral poems, Murger turns his flowers into women, and, with equal liberty, his women into flowers. Sometimes he unabashedly does both at the same time, as in a passage from "Chanson," where a human flower consults a glib natural flower: Rose, dont le coeur bat plus vite, Dans les pres effeuille a son tour La marguerite Qui dit les secrets de 1'amour. Humanity and nature not only communicate, but also render one another services, in a fraternal fashion. In the Ballade. "Rose et Marguerite," a wandering girl named Rose, who imagines her love is unrequited, sheds a tear which brings to life a marguerite which was withering mortally in the sun, having been left unwatered by the matutinal sylph— for the sylph had hurried off with his job half-done to join the rose (small-letter) over which he is love- struck. The resuscitated, oracular marguerite saves the girl, in turn, promising that she is indeed loved— "beaucoup. passdonnement." In "Dimanche Matin," the gold finch, "Dans son bel habit du dimanche," brings to village families ribbons for the girls and cakes for the children; 125 moreover, II ne fait que chanter et rire, Il debouche les vieux flacons, Et, le soir, de sa poche il tire Les flutes et les violons. (In the original poem by Hebei, there had been a goldfinch in Sunday clothes, but the bird remains in the forest and does not bring gifts to humanity.) Such marvels are not unusual in the rustic verse of Les Nuits d'hiver. as the fields are invested with a divine quality, where any sort of miraculous fantasy is accepted. Indeed, the idylls are colored in the traditional colors of Christian symbolism, azure and gold. In another stanza of "Le Dimanche Matin" that strays far from the original lines of Hebei, Murger concisely leads from Christian spiritual notions (azure, paradis. roses^) to the miracles of a hylozoic universe: L'amandier met sa robe blanche, Le bleu du ciel azure l'eau. Les fleurs du jardin sont ecloses, On croirait voir le paradis; La violette parle aux roses, Le chene orgueilleux parle au buis. In a universe which seems at once pantheistic and Christian, it is not easy to distinguish between human activity Reveillez-vous, ma mie Annette, Et mettez vos plus beaux habits; C'est aujour'hui grand jour de fete... and cosmic behavior (as where, in "Dimanche Matin," Sunday says to the Sun: "Venez, venez, c'est jour de fete,/ Choisissez vos plus beaux rayons"). 126 Murger's revery of a divine realm of campagnards begins, it is apparent from the above passages, with the preclusion of work. "Dimanche Matin" and "Annette" occur on a jour de fete; "La Menteuse" depicts a peasant girl gotten up in frills, on her way to a tryst, but claiming to be heading for wedding festivities; "Les Abeilles" re calls "la Saint-Jean" and depicts a gleaner asleep on the job; Ramoneau, the poacher's terrier, is aging and rather than seek his quarry, prefers to idle about the fireplace— or, "Autour de sa vieille epagneule/Il rode encore de temps en temps"; "Printaniere" takes place on Easter; the poet worries over his New Year's etrennes in "Cousine Angele"; the end of "Celui-la..." refers to birthdays, New Year's Day and talkative veillees. It seems an eternal day's end or holiday in the pastoral scenes; the tools lie in the shed and no one is at work but the bell-ringers or the village musicians: Personne ne travaille aujourd'hui Excepte le menetrier. ("Dimanche Matin") Comme une outre enfant sa musette, Ce soir, le vieux menetrier Fera, pour terminer la fete, Danser sous le grand marronnier. ("Ma Mie Annette") Et du bal, ou je suis priee J'entends d'ici le tambourin. ("La Menteuse") In the festive country, the heroines are inevitably angelic. In depicting the peasant girl, Marguerite (who 127 was a city-dweller in Goethe),32 Murger says. On 1'attendait au paradis... On l'appelait l'ange du lieu. (Her eventual moral fall, caused by Faust, is unique in the rustic poetry— but in the second part of the poem the poet moves her to the city, where she has an "alcove on the street and a name that is numbered," thus leaving the country untainted by her debauchery.) The connection of the peasant girl with the divine realm is equally explicit in nearly all the poems. One might compare the benevolent eye of God which watches over "Helene," for example, Lorsque Dieu, d1amour la main pleine, Fait sa divine semaison, Tu peux ouvrir ton coeur, Helene, Le semeur benit sa moisson with the protective angel's wings in "Angele": La nuit un ange blanc vous couvre de son aile, Et des songes benis descendent tour a tour Du ciel a votre lit... The facile passage from the human to the celestial realm is effected with as much grace as that from the horticultural to the human domain. Because they are invariably young ("Seize ans" 155, 229j, quinze ans ^67, 83, 127]) and "pray while dressing” or have "in their heart a saintly piety," the country girls are indeed God's children, and those among them who die are received directly into heaven. If Marguerite disappoints those who "awaited her in Paradise," 128 Marie Berthe does not: Le troisieme voile de Marie Berthe etait fait d'un morceau d'azur celeste. II etait brode d'etoiles, et il embaumait les odeurs du paradis. Ce fut son^ange gardien qui le lui donna le jour ou elle s'en alia dans le ciel. And we know that the child, Annette, who was missing at the last harvest, has also found a place in the heavens: Da sa maison quand je l'ai vue Pour la derniere fois sortir, Elle etait d'un drap blanc vetue Et ne devait pas revenir. Even the poet's terrier will have a divine end: Son oeil s'eteint, sa voix se casse; Mais les vrais chiens n'ont pas de fin... Dieu la-haut leur garde un bon gite, Frais en ete, chaud dans l'hiver, Au paradis des chiens d'elite, Dans la meute de saint Hubert. The appeal to the "divine innocence of fifteen years" was commonplace in the mid-nineteenth century. Musset for example, had sung it: Quinze ans!— o Romeo! l'age de Juliette L'age ou vous vous aimiez!... Quinze ans! — l'age ou la femme, au jour de sa naissance, Sortit des mains de Dieu si blanche d'innocence, Si riche de beaute, que son pere immortel De ses phalanges d'or en fit l'age eternel!... Undoubtedly the recent popularity of Ronsard, fostered by Sainte-Beuve, was greatly responsible for the mode of "les quinze ans." All Murger's contemporaries knew Ronsard's tributes to that pure age: 129 Fleurs Angeuine de quinze ans, Ton front monstre assez de simplesse... (Amours de Marie) Vne beaute de quinze ans enfantine, Vn or frise de maint crespe anelet, Vn front de rose, un teint daxnoiselet, Vn ris qui l'ame aux Astres achemine... (Amours de Cassandre) as well as the Globe journalist's own sonnet in honor of the blonde Aline (form of "Helene"), "Sur un Front de Quinze ans..." (Joseph Delorme). Whether the theme be the traditional "death of an innocent" or the miraculous revival of a flower, the bucolic verse clearly purveys the notion that the peasantry, and in particular, the peasant girl, is divine and eternal. The importance of stars goes far to remind us of the neoplatonism of the vein. A passage from one of the Ronsard poems published by Sainte-Beuve illustrates the divine quality of love: Tu sgais, Lune, que peut l'amoureuse poison: Le Dieu Pan pour le prix d'une blanche toison Peut bien flechir ton coeur. Et vous Astres insignes, Favorisez au feu qui me tient allume, Car s1il vous en souvient, la plus part de vous, Signes, N'a place dans le ciel que pour avoir aime.^4 In Les Nuits. the stars are used in various manners as signs of divine love. Rose ("Chanson") will interrogate her marguerite "A l'heure ou la premiere etoile/Ramene le patre aux hameaux;" less chaste stars give counsel to Christine, in "Renovare": "...Ainsi que nous,/Belle, 130 laissez tomber vos voiles"; the cricket of the first Ballade is literally in love with a star. Marie Berthe’s last veil is embroidered with stars, just as the scarf woven by the peasant girl of "Les Messages" for her lover is strewn with flowers: flowers and stars are equally good tokens of the eternal. Stars are usually invoked either in passing remarks or metaphorically in the poems, which are generally diurnal. We are often reminded of the heavenly vault by the term azur. which is more suited to sunny decor. Along with references to the symbolic blue, there are also frequent invocations of gold. The two colors have long been combined in Christian and Neo-Platonic traditions. A single example from Les Nuits d'hiver should suffice: Pour en tresser une couronne, A pleines mains dans le ble mur Rose moissonne A pleines mains les fleurs d'azur. Cheveux blonds flottant sous le voile En longs anneaux... ("Chanson") There is a sort of pretty conceit in the linking of the opulently divine— crown, (golden) wheat, azure, "golden" hair, rings— with the banal and humble task of harvesting. (It is because of their humility and frailty, cheerfully accepted conditions, that Murger's flowering peasants are apotheosized, immortalized.) The consciously-gathered array of golds sets off vividly the luxuriously abundant flowers fathered "a pleines mains...a pleines mains." 131 There is some measure of wit again in the insistence, in this poem, as in many others, on the revelation of azure upon the ground, for one is made to think, despite the inverted direction, of the blue firmament. Be it star- studded or in the pure blue of day, the heavenly vault— so prominent in Romantic poetry^— is constantly suggested in these poems. Unlike the English Lake Poets, Murger prefers the sunlight. Even in his sunny scenes, though, he does not pursue, develop, and vary his references to azure as might have the British poets. In contrast to those same poets, again, and to Mallarme, who also passed through a (juvenile) "seraphic mode," in which "l'azur penetre le lacis vegetal qu'il anime de son rire,the poet of Les Nuits is apparently uninterested in integrating himself, mystically, with the physical universe— even though that universe which he observes is otherwise pantheistic. Another aspect of Lakist poetry is the loss of a sense of human time, which is assuredly a concomitant of the mystic immersion discussed above. With this sort of temporal negation, Murger's natural poems are at odds. They often seem, in fact, to be narrative, following marked steps in time. Yet these steps are marked so not much by "calendar" or "clock" time as by the various harvests, lifecycles of plants and animals, or the ritualistic ringing of the village belfry. (Murger's festive or pious 132 bell is refreshing, in view of the "ominous bell," more popular among his contemporaries, who took inspiration from Schiller's "Das Lied der Glocke" which Emile Des- champs popularized in France as "Le Chant de la Cloche.") Such marks of time help to wed man to his environment: La Jacqueline matinale En branle dans le vieux clocher, Sonne la messe patronale Et nous dit de nous depecher. Allons, ma mie, allons plus vite, Monsieur le cure nous attend... A typical, but rather burlesque, example of how man and nature are joined through time comes from a prose passage: Les fiancailles de Leon et de Clementine eurent lieu aux violettes, et, comme la tante l'avait prevu, le mariage fut fixe aux lilas.^7 * * * * With an apparent lack of discrimination, we have referred to those verses of Les Nuits d'hiver which have the countryside as decor as "bucolic," "idyllic," "pas toral," or simply "rustic." While these terms have, in their extended meanings, traditionally been employed somewhat interchangeably, it would seem a necessary part of our attempt to categorize Murger's verses to group the country poems by theme or style and to seek fitting labels. Such a task is always difficult: one wonders on what basis poems as disparate as the marmorean "Vierge au visage blanc...," the mythic "Mort d'Hercule," and the coy 133 "Mnazile et Chloe" are all grouped together, along with the narrative poem, "Le Mendiant," in Chenier's works, as Bucoliaues.38 There are at least three cycles of rustic poems in Les Nuits d'hiver. The first cycle contains "Les Abeilles," "Les Corbeaux," and "Le Chien du Braconnier," written in 1854, 1856 and 1859, respectively. These poems seem to form a triptych, despite the chronological inter vals, as they bear on similar subjects and were placed side by side in the volume. As has previously been mentioned, these animal poems have in common the celebra tion of instinct and resolution: the bee unswervingly "takes his honey" from various blossoms throughout the different seasons of the year; the persevering ravens loom up in the dawn mist to seek out their carrion, or, showing adaptability, make do with fresh seeds at sewing time, instinctively wary of human guns; "Bon a courre et ferme a 1'arret," Ramoneau is a "rude et madre compere." These three pieces have in common that they are portraits, that is to say that they treat (material) subjects rather than (metaphysical) themes. They seem to operate discursively rather than intuitively: the poet could easily have given us more (or less) on the qualities of Ramoneau without mutilating the poem. One would be tempted to compare these poems, for their lack of "poetic theme," to art-for-art pieces or Parnassian works, but they 134 lack the quasi-symbolic quality and the formal discipline of Gautier's "athematic" works on the one hand, and the philosophy of Leconte de Lisle on the other. Whether it be the gigantic, millenarian "Corbeau" (of the Poemes barbares). who is condemned to "live by the dying," the "Oiseaux de proie" (of the Poemes antiques), which are the rapacious passions that "trouble the poet's dreams and joy," or the Condor ("Le Sommeil du Condor," Poemes bar bares) who awaits the sea of night atop the Andes to soar over the globe, there is a philosophical symbolism in the Parnassian's birds of prey which is wholly foreign to the mood and intent of Murger's "Ravens." Even in these three works which strive to illuminate the animal world and shade out humanity, in chiaroscuro fashion, the two realms are inextricably joined, for as usual, the poet can scarcely envision nature as being multiple. In “Les Corbeaux," for example, the poet smilingly recalls La Fontaine's humanization of nature's creatures when he says of the ravens, Sans etudier la Science Dans le Grand Messager boiteux. Ils savent quand on ensemence. The poacher goes hungry to share his meal with the "com pere" who knows enough to tip off his master when the proprietor on whose lands they are encroaching is about. Ramoneau is "prudent comme un gendarme"; in fact his wrinkles look like chevrons. "Les Abeilles" is probably 135 the richest of the poems. It moves vividly through the natural phases of the year, seemingly pointing out— in contrast to those changes— the steady industriousness of the bee. But in the last stanza, where the poet speaks of the young love that buds during winter veillees. the focus changes, wittily, to the result of the bee's industry— fecundity. This poem, more than the others, then, seem to lay claim to a "theme," the question of the poet's productivity— be it industry, natural fecundity, or both. Bees have long been connected with poetry and eloquence: Virgil was of course the son of a bee-keeper; Chenier, who was obsessed by the desire to earn future glory as an accomplished poet— to the point where he avowed breaking out into sweats and suffering from insomnia^— wished he might "ouvrir ma ruche entiere"; Socrates, according to legend, was once surprised to find a bee alight on his lip— which was taken by observers as an omen that he would utter sweet and sagacious things. A second cycle of country verse comprises those in imitation of classic writers: "Blandusie," "A un Adolescent," "Celui-la...," "Mais Chenier n'est pas le premier...." The first, avowedly an "Imitation d'Horace[:] (0 fons Blandusiae)," smacks less of Horace than of Chenier, from a standpoint both of style and theme. Murger's first alteration, unavowed, was to join the original "Ode to Bandusia" (II, xiii) with the preceding 136 ode (II, xii). The effect of the conjunction was to use the Ode to Bandusia as the decor for the exposition of the adolescent love theme of the previous Horatian piece. What results is a work that recalls many verses of Chenier in which timid, gauche adolescents dissimulate their love by a brook, a fountain, a spring. Chenier's "Malade," for example, having long been too shy to tell his mother of the cause of his languishing— a love he suspects will be rebuffed— finally reveals his love and his impressions of the beauty seen but once: Dieux! ces brasI et ces flanes! ces cheveux! ces pieds nus Si blancs! si delicats! je ne te verrai plus. 0! portez, portez-moi sur les bords d'Erymanthe Que je la voie encor, cette vierge dansante! The mother goes out to find the young girl and brings her back to cure the youth with a promise of marriage; he hides under the blankets, meanwhile, out of timidity. In the same poet's "Mnazile and Chloe" (Bucoliques). two adolescents, wandering separately in a copse by a river. each implore nature to conjure the image of the other. Nature complies, but upon meeting they are too embarrassed to speak of love. Each in fact denies having had the other on his mind. In the Elegie (XII) which begins, "Ah! le pourrai-je au moins? suis-je assez intrepide?" the young poet rails at his own timidity: 137 Moi, tendre, meme faible, et dans l'age d'aimer, Faut-il n'oser plus voir tout ce qui peut charmer? Similarly, Murger, or the singer who lyricizes by the Fountain of Bandusia, evokes young and timid love: he is disappointed that the beautiful bather, "Neobule, the blond," whom he loves, flees from his attempts at conver sation, preferring the company of the young discus-hurler Hebrus, "Timide adolescent qui ne sait que rougir,/Et qu'un baiser d1amour ferait evanouir." The sixteen-year old youngster of "A un Adolescent, " not sure of his wings of love, would absorb himself in scholarly pursuits, but Murger tells him to strip off "ce faux manteau de sage," to abandon the "role de Nestor." "Celui-la..." departs from the theme of adolescent love, but deals with a problem of youth: whether it is not wiser to plow the fields in ignorant bliss than to go off to school to learn to "epeler couramment l'Evangile" and "compter selon Bareme." "Mais Chenier n'est pas le premier qu'il ait lu..." is in fact a celebration of the heroines of Chenier— and Horace and Virgil— who enchanted a young reader (Murger himself) to the point where he fell in love with the Muse herself, "la deesse reveuse." The details in the description of the Muse, the white robe, the sacred head-band, the "front inspire," and the lyre which hangs from her hand, capture all the highlights of Chenier's description of the "Vierge au visage blanc, la jeune 138 Poesie..." (Bucoliaues).4o By its theme of dissimulated adolescent love, by its grace of expression, its concision, and its bantering dialogue, and even by its title, "La Menteuse" might well have emerged from Chenier's Bucoliaues. between "Le Malade" and "Le Mendiant." The "death of the innocent" motif, and especially the untimely death of a nubile virgin ("Ma Mie Annette" or "Marie Berthe") is a theme that has a long classical tradition,41 even if Murger's stylistic treat ment of it is original. "A Helene" is a "Gather Ye Rosebuds" poem whose debt to Ronsard seems attested to by the name of the heroine as well as by the theme. Yet it should be remembered that various intermediaries in France maintained the themes of the Pleiade; elegiac poets like Millevoye, for example, may claim some share of the "PlSiade" feeling in mid nineteenth century poetry. Millevoye's Charlemagne a Pavie (Chant II) reads, for example, in part, Aime et jouis; le plaisir n'a qu'un jour Moins fugitive est la fleur printaniere. Dans les bosquets de rose et de lumiere, Viens te meler a nos danses d'a m o u r .42 Yet the vocabulary and rhythm of "Chanson," also on the "Cueillez" theme, have the distinct ring of the Vendomois: Bouche mignonne et levre rose, A la chanson Toujours ouverte... as does the opening line of another poem: "Reveillez-vous, ma mie Annette." (Both of these poems wander, however, in 139 various ways from Renaissance modes.) Stylistically as well, most of the "neo-classical" verses discussed in the preceding paragraphs reveal the touch of Chenier, as characterized by Sainte-Beuve: "[Ses alexandrinsj sont pleins et immenses, drus et spacieux, tout d'une venue et tout d'un bloc, jetes d'un seul et large coup de pinceau, souffles d'une seule et longue haleine..."43 One might take for example several lines from Murger's poems: Quand, derriere ce corps qui vetit le linceul, A marcher en pleurant on se trouve tout seul, Quand votre mere est morte et que sa fosse ouverte Fait 1'enfant orphelin et la maison ouverte... ("Celui-la. Et depuis cette epoque... ...il s'enivre en buvant Un miel de poesie a cette coupe antique D'ou s'eleve un parfum de liqueur homerique. ("Mais Chenier...") The poems in the manner of Chenier and Ronsard may be grouped together in the "classical" cycle, using the term in a broad sense. The rustic poems which remain, "Dimanche Matin" and "La Rosee," along with Ballades I, III, IV, and V, may be grouped into a miscellany of "fantasies." These have been discussed at length through out the present chapter. In general these poems exhibit the fraternal intercourse of supernatural (the sylphs, the miraculous flowers), human, and natural phenomena. The "hallowed floral terrain," in which flowers often revive under the step of the girl in love, is a theme that is 140 continuous from Petrarch (Sonnets LXXXV, CX, CXIII) through Ronsard (Amours de Cassandre; "Voicy le bois que ma saincte Angelette...") to Chenier ("Mnazile et Chloe"). Murger's bucolic verse is many-facetted, in style and theme, and recalls a number of poets. It has the delicate aesthetic balance and the insects, especially the Cicada, of "Anacreon," but not the joyful wine-drinking songs which Ronsard was later to adapt in odes and gaites. In fact, Murger probably has, in general, a temperament more like that of Remi "Belle Eau," whose purity was better suited, thought Ronsard, rather disgustedly, to "Avril" than to translations of Anacreontic verse. Of Virgil, 44 Murger has captured the admixture of fantasy and reality, the compassionate universe: the nature of Gallus' com plaint (Bucolic X) is less important than the sympathetic gestures of the goats, the Naiads, the laurels, the shep herd with his flock, and Silvanus. Virgil again, and Chenier, are brought to mind by the dialogued scenes, particularly those of adolescents. Nature has almost the scope in Murger it does in the Ple’ iade, Belleau's flower and birds being typical, L'aubepine et l'eglantin Et le thym L'oeillet, le lys, et les roses... Le gentil rossignolet, Doucelet Decoupe, dessous l'ombrage, Mille fredons babillards, Fretillards..,45 141 yet Belleau's botanical range, and Ronsard's avian tours de force (in which there are a number of water-birds), were more extended than Murger's. Murger lacks the erudition of the Ronsard of Cassandre. as well as the latter's frank eroticism, the realistic visions of fleshless bones and hoary heads, the rich, extended, sometimes precieux metaphors. Murger's depiction of peasant activity is neither so vivid as that of "Le Voyage de Tours" or so cleverly woven into a theme as in Ronsard's "La Quenouille" (the idea of which came originally from Theocritus). The wildlife of Les Nuits d'hiver shows a paternally-contrived anthropomorphism which occasionally recalls La Fontaine, but the versification is far from having the liberty of the seventeenth-century master. Despite the diversity of their inspiration, the rustic pieces of Les Nuits d'hiver might be categorized, in a general fashion and with obvious exceptions, as pastorals, in accordance with the definition laid down by Gilbert Highet in his Classical Tradition: (1) the heroes are shepherds or goatherds, never laborious ploughmen or field-workers, (2) "nymphs, satyrs, and other flora and fauna also appear, to express the intense and beautiful aliveness of wild nature'; (3) life is simple, reduced to music and love, and marked by a healthy diet and simple clothes; (4) "the coarseness of country life is neither emphasized nor concealed, but is offset by its essential purity"; (5) the land is idealized (think of Virgil's dulcification of the harsh Arcadian country); (6) the poet usually takes part in amiable conversation with his friends; (7) the surge of pastoral mode in literature usually cor responds to an exceptionally corrupt period in the cities or courts.^ Point by point, it is true that (1) the rustic verse of Les Nuits d'hiver usually depicts minstrels or idle flower-gatherers rather than field-workers; (2) sylphs, flora and fauna are man's companions; (3) life is simple and the peasant girl is always dressed in a simple cotton or linen frock, usually white; (4) there is no coarseness in Les Nuits d'hiver, where even the braconnier is a "gentleman poacher"; (5) here in the Ile-de-France as in Arcadia, no rocks, torrents, or barren wastes torment humanity; (6) most of the poems are marked by conversation, being full scenes with several roles (53, 185, 225, 241) true dialogues (63, 229) or "conversations" the poet holds with an absent, silent, or inanimate partner (17, 57, 91, 107, 111, 151, 155). Lastly it is true that morality was at a low ebb in Paris at this time: capital gain, prosti tution, and gambling were the three principal pursuits in Second Empire Paris, explaining the huge success of plays like La Question d*Argent. La Dame aux camelias. Les Filles de marbre. Trente Ans ou la vie d'un ioueur. Le Demi-Monde. and so on.4^ The modern conception of lyricism is rather 143 coordinate with naivete, in the sense Chenier used the term, "etre vrai avec force et precision,"^® a definition which leaves the question of erudition aside. In this light, "naivete" becomes rather a matter of sincerity, emotion, and straightforwardness. It is paradoxical that Murger waxes the most lyrical, or "true," in the rustic verse, where his inspiration was often bookish, and that, conversely and contrary to expectation, in the urban verse, where the poet's inspiration was real, his lyricism is often dampened by intellectual procedures like irony, wit, and sarcasm. In sum, the pastorals of Murger are exceptional because he, with a small number of other poets, continued to work the Christian, spiritual vein at a moment when Theophile Gautier was rather successfully replacing the Virgin Mary, in the collective aesthetic mind, with Venus Anadyomene. 144 ^-"Theodore de Banville: poete lyrique," II, in Banville, Poesies. II, p. 432. 2Les Paradis perdus. V: "La Boheme du Doyenne." 3"Tuileries, Luxembourg, Jardin des Plantes sont les trois seuls jardins publics de Paris." (Robert Burnand, Vie 1830. p. 39.) In this ignorance of the countryside, Murger was not alone: "La bourgeoisie," writes Robert Burnand on the generation of 1830, "les petites gens, le peuple, que connaissent-ils de la campagne? Rien... La campagne, pour la plupart des Fran^ais, c'est une promenade dans la plus proche banlieue, une omelette mangee a l'auberge, un poulet dont on tord le cou, une sieste sous les arbres et de gros bouquets cueillis dans les champs." (Ibid.. p. 159.) 4Maurice Allem, Vie Second Empire, p. 211. See in general, on the vogue of tavern gardens, Allem, Chapters X and XI, and Burnand, Chapter IX. 5In the Glossary appended to his bilingual edition of The Odes of Horace (New York: Washington Square Press, 1965), James Michie notes, "Bandusia: a fountain near Venusia [Horace's native village in Southeastern Italy] or Tibur [north of Rome, Horace's country manor]." ®See Baldick, Chapter VIII. ^Nous visines en un bois s'esleuer le clocher De sainct Cosme pres Tours, ou la nopce gentille Dans vn pre se faisoit au beau milieu de l'Isle... La parmy tes sabIons Augeuin devenu Ie veux viure sans nom comme vn pauure incognu, Et des l'Aube du iour avec toy mener paistre Apres du port Guyet nostre troupeau champestre... Qjules. votre chateau, tour vieille et maison neuve, Se mire dans la Loire, a l'endroit ou le fleuve, Sous Blois... Serre une xle charmante en ses bras qu'il replie. (Les Ravons et les ombres.) 9It seems impossible to attempt the classification of a minor nineteenth-century poet without a tediously abundant number of comparisons of his verse to that of the most influential poets of the century, expecially Hugo, Sainte-Beuve, and Baudelaire. 10lt is Gaston Bachelard who sees abysses, declivi ties, and precipices as "earth-terms," for such phenomena are an important aspect of the psychological dialectics of 145 persons obsessed with the notion of falling through space due to the absence or failure of terra firma. ^"Ayant done rejete les reves du beau et du bien et le bouquet mystique du lakisme, il lui apporte en retour ses promesses de 'Fleurs du Mai' avec son amour du pauvre, du rebutant, et du laid, sa morbidesse et sa malsaine sensualite." (Gerald Antoine, Introduction to Sainte-Beuve, Vie. Poesies et Pensees de Joseph Delorme ^Paris. Nouvelles Editions Latines, 1956], p. LIV.) l2These negative concepts of earth are exposed throughout Bachelard's La Terre et les reveries de la volonte. The end of that book dwells on the role of the abyss, as does Chapter III of L'Air et les sonqes. "La Chute imaginaire." Mansuy summarizes most of these notions in Gaston Bachelard. Chapter VI, especially pp. 262-88. l^See Gerald Antoine, Introduction to Joseph Delorme. pp. XLVIII-LIV. l ^ Q u o t e d by Antoine, Joseph Delorme. Introduction, p. L. ^ Vacances de Camille, p. 117. ^ L'Elegie en France avant le romantisme (Paris: Calmann-Levy, 1897), p. IX. l7"La matiere de l'elegie, qui est devenue singu- lierement complexe et variee, se deverse dans la goesie lyrique, dans la Meditation, dans l1Ode. C'est la surtout qu'on retrouve ses themes eternels, 1'amour, agrandi, epure et divinise, la mort, les grandes mutations historiques, les illustres infortunees..." (Ibid., p. 474.) 1 f t Marcel Raymond, L*Influence de Ronsard sur la poesie francaise (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1965), pp. 120-21. IQ ✓ ^’The Dictionnaire etvmologique of Bloch and Wart- burg points up the fact (under "babiller") that babillage (1583) and babillement were first employed in the Renaissance, then adopted by the Romantics (1835, 1829). Babillard is dated from 1496, by the same dictionary, which neglects to mention that Sainte-Beuve did much to foster the resuscitation of that word and its relatives with his celebrated "rires babillards" in Joseph Delorme ("La Contredanse"). The last lines of Murger's prose ring of the Plelade— filtered through Sainte-Beuve or not. 146 20 ^Bachelard points out, incidentally, that the principal magnetism of the country for "the intellectual who wrestles with fleeting ideas and becomes angered because he has just spent two hours without writing a thing of value," is that the land (its soil, wood, and mineral) affords regular work that is both soul-satisfying and profitable. (Mansuy, Gaston Bachelard. p. 268; see also p. 273.) 2^Cf. Ronsard's eclogue: "Les Pasteurs: ALVYOT ET FRESNET" La cigale se plaist du chant de la Cigale, Et pasteur i'aime bien la chanson pastorale... 22Paul Soulie and Danielle Vieville-Carbonel, "L1Imagerie amoureuse de Ronsard d'apres 'Les Amours de Marie' et les 'Sonets pour Helene,'" Bulletin de 1'Asso ciation Guillaume Bude. Quatrieme Serie, No. 3, October 1971, p. 408. 2 3 In the Odes and Ballades alone, a partial review of Hugo's bird reveries would include (in the Odes) citadel/vulture (II, iii), Napoleon/eagle (III, vi), Chateaubriand/albatross (IV, vi), and (in the Ballades) soaring eagle/poet's soul (IV), poet-giant/plunging cormorant, scavenger of graves/raven (V), soldiers/eagles, owls, vultures, crows (VII), the owls and bats of the sabbath (VIII) ; time of rendezvous/the hour when thousands of ravens caw (XIII), poet's soul/raven (XII). 2^Mansuy, Gaston Bachelard. p. 321. 25Bachelard deals with the tree most completely in his work on Air, rather than in La Terre. 2®Bachelard quotes from Sartre: "On aurait voulu me faire prendre £ce platane, avec ses plaques de pelade, ce chene a moitie pourri] pour de jeunes forces apres qui jaillissent vers le ciel. Et cette racine? II aurait sans doute fallu que je me la represente comme une griffe vorace, dechirant la terre, lui arrachant sa nourriture? Impossible de voir les choses de cette fagon-la. Des mollesses, des faiblesses oui. Les arbres flottaient. Un jailissement vers le ciel? Un affalement plutot; a chaque instant je m'attendais a voir les troncs se rider comme des verges lasses, se recroqueviller et choir sur le sol en un tas noir et mou avec des plis. Ils n'avaient pas envie d'exister, seulement ils ne pouvaient pas s'en emp&cher. (La Terre et les reveries du repos ^Paris: Corti, 1948J, p. 304.) 27Ibid.. p. 291. 147 28The Limits of Mortality (Middletown, Connecticut: Wesleyan University Press, 1959). On the synibolism of the bee, see pp. 40-43; on the butterfly, pp. 1620. Ferry sum marizes his case on p. 16: "It seems to man, then, that flowers and all the other non-human creatures of the world belong to another order than mem: for them, change brings no individual death, since in the human sense they have no individuality, no consciousness of death. In effect, this means to man that change for them brings no death at all. Therefore nature can be for man a kind of metaphor for eternity, for the absence of death..." ^80n "Le Petit Bleuet," see Baldick, p. 2, Lelioux, pp. 19, 86-87, and Henry Curwen, Sorrow and Song (2 vols., London: Henry S. King, 1875), I, 5. See also Murger's autobiographical story, Les Premieres Amours du Jeune Bleuet (in Madame Olvmoe. pp. 263-81). The "fleurs d'azur" may be in fact allusions to the brilliant myosotis, of which the Larousse Dictionnaire du Xixe Siecle. says, precisely, "Leurs fleurs, petites, mais tres souvent remarquables, par leur elegance, sont d'un joli bleu d'azur, parfois blanches ou rosees..." In a poem for Adrien Lelioux, scribbled on the edition of Moreau that Murger gave him, the Bohemian averred that his love, like Le bleu myosotis qui nalt au bord des greves Par son etui d'azur ne sut se proteger... (Lelioux, p. 40) 3<3The Limits of Mortality, p. 30. ^Murger frequently seems fond of the "rose" (be it the flower itself or the name of a peasant girl) which has a long tradition of divine signification: "For example, the rose that culminates Dante's Comedy embraces Mary, Paradise, grace, and Divine Love, and at the same time reconciles these spiritual concepts with the hitherto opposing concept of courtly love..." (Barbara Seward, The Symbolic Rose Qlew York: Columbia University Pr6ss, 1960J, p. 3). 320ne may argue that despite the comparisons to the cicada and bee, despite the rustic suggestion of the phrase "On l'appelait l'ange du lieu." the "Marguerite" of the versified version may live in the city; a glance at the prose version, in which a "cavalier magnifiquement vetu" who passes by asks Marguerite "the way to town," clearly shows Murger envisions the Germanic heroine as a peasant girl. 33Rolla. Chant III. 148 34Sonnet: "Cache pour ceste nuict..." (Amours de Marie). 33G. Wilson Knight, in his Starlit Dome (New Yorks Barnes and Noble, 1960), has made in fact a strong case for the pre-eminence of the firmament and its "architec tural, " metaphoric substitutes (house, temple, palace, domet grove) among English romantic concepts of the eternal. The title page quotes from Yeats, A starlit or a moonlit dome disdains All that man is. All mere complexities, The Fury and the mire of human veins. Practically the whole of the Starlit Dome must be read in order to comprehend the wide variety of metaphors which Knight deems to be in the family of dome- and wheel-shaped signs. But see especially Chapter V, "Symbolic Eternities/' for a general orientation. 3®Jean-Pierre Richard, L'Univers poeticue de Mallarme. p. 41. "Dans cet eden d'azur continu," he continues ( p. 43), "ou n'existent ni distance entre les etres ni obstacles entre les objets, les divers moments de la duree ne se separent pas non plus les uns des autres." 3^Camille, p. 145. 38chenier's own conception of "bucoliques, " discussed by Dimoff in his long study of the poet's work (see pp. 374-82) is itself so broad as to admit the variations in organization which one finds in comparing Dimoff's own edition of Chenier's work with that of Walter. 39See Paul Dimoff, La Vie et 1'oeuvre d1Andre Chenier (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1970) I, 374. 4®Gerard Walter points out in the notes of his Pleiade Chenier (p. 843) that the eighteenth-century poet himself was probably inspired by Raphael's Poesie which was to be seen in the Vatican. 4^-One of the many strains of the "death of innocents" theme is that pursued in "La Jeune Tarentine" by Chenier (after Antipater the Macedonian and Xenocrates): a child like bride-to-be meets her death in a sea-crossing. (See Walter's notes to the Pleiade Chenier. p. 847.) 42Quoted by Potez, L'Elegie en France, p. 443 43(Pensees de) Joseph Delorme, p. 139. 149 ^On Virgil's mixture of fantasy and reality, see E. V. Rieu's essay on Ecloga X. in his bilingual edition of Virgil: The Pastoral Poems (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1967), pp. 123-28. ^Most of "Avril," from the Bergeries. is reproduced in Vol. I of Sainte-Beuve's Tableau of 1838. 4*>see Chapter Nine in Highet, but especially pp. 162- 63 and p. 165. (The quotations are from p. 162.) 4?See Thibaudet, Histoire. pp. 387-89. 48"ii ne suffit pas dans les arts de ne jamais s'ecarter grossierement de la verite; il faut etre vrai avec force et precision, c'est-a-dire fetre naif." ("Essai sur la perfection et la decadance des lettres et des arts," Oeuvres completes, p. 685. 49See Pierre Martino, Parnasse et Svmbolisme. p. 15. Chapter V Technical Considerations 150 151 Mals Theodore de Banville refuse de se pencher sur ces marecages de sang, sur ces abimes de boue... En pleine atmosphere satanique ou romantique, au milieu d'un concert d'imprecations, il a l’audace de chanter la bonte des Dieux, et d'etre un parfait classique. — Charles Baudelaire, "Theodore Banville, Poete lyrique" I. Sources of Inspiration In the preceding two chapters it has occasionally been a question of the poet's literary forebears, in particular, the classical inspiration of the rustic poems. There were, of course, writers closer in time whose style, themes, and phraseology had much in common with Murger. Originality was not the Bohemian's most prominent virtue. Of the forty-three verse poems in the volume, two are direct adaptations (of Hebei and Horace), while four others depend on well-known literary works or themes (Hamlet. Faust. Wilhelm Meister. and Pygmalion) for their inspiration, which leaves thirty-seven that are more or less original. Of these thirty-seven, there are a number that seem to be "A la maniere de..." Ronsard, Chenier, Sainte-Beuve, and Banville. Then there are the numerous cases where Murger copies himself: (1) the whole poems "Marguerite" and "La Rosee" are re-stated in the Ballades; (2) the miserable death of Joseph Desbrosses, treated in "Lettre a un mort" is delved into at least three times in prose works,1 while the "Poacher's Dog" is celebrated in 152 familiar terms in Le Sabot Rouge as well as in Les Vacances de Camille.2 Similarly, the versified "Requiem" and "La Chanson de Musette" first appeared (in slightly varying forms) in the Scenes de Boheme. while "Cousine Angele" had been the subject of Chapter IX of the same Scenes. "A Helene" is inexplicably dated "1854" in Les Nuits d'hiver. but had appeared in Les Buveurs d'Eau. first published in 1853. From our consideration of the provenience of whole poems, it is apparent that roughly half the pieces of Les Nuits d'hiver are borrowed from other authors or from various previous prose works of Murger himself, leaving the other half with a "fresh look." One could further point out that certain phrases of the poems are also to be found in prose passages. Cigale en meme temps qu'abeille, Elle Qlarguerite^] travaillait en chantant. Ces jolies filles TgrisettesJ, moitie abeilles, moitie cigales, qui travail- laient en chantant toute la semaine, ne demandaient a Dieu qu'un peu de soleil le dimanche... (Scenes de Boheme. p. 306) But to belabor the point is needless. Murger re-worked Horace as Horace had re-worked the Greeks. And what has been said of Ronsard seems equally accurate for Murger: Disons toutefois que, l1invention chez lui etant a peu pres nulle, c'est par le style encore qu'il se rachete le plus a notre jugement, et^qu'il est vraiment createur, c'est-a-dire poete.3 153 Without seeking to propose "definite" sources, for that undertaking is most often a game of chance, we would like to speak of similarities between Murger's motifs and those of some poets near to him in time and to point out the common ground and the differences between them. With regard to Murger's fondness for small creatures, it may be recalled that the immortal salamander, in particular, the fortune of which can be traced back in French literature at least to Desportes,^ was popularized in the Romantic era by German writers, particularly Hoffmann. The long and complex "narrative of the salamander"5 was well known to all writers of Murger's generation. In this piece a salamander is condemned by the Spirit-Prince Phosphorous to long endure the passions of mankind for his crime of loving the green serpent (daughter of a lilyi). Equally well-known in the same period was "La Salamandre" of Aloysius Bertrand. In that work, the Salamander tries to coax a cricket to life (as the cricket of "Les Amours d'un grillon" tries to coax Stella into responding): "Grillon, mon ami, es-tu mort, que tu demeures^sourd au bruit de mon sifflet, et aveugle a la lueur de 1'incendie?... "Oh! chante-moi ta chanson de chaque soir dans ta logette de cendre... "II est mort, il est mort, le grillon mon amii... Et puisqu'il est mort,^je veux mouriri" Les branches de sarment etaient consumees, la flamme se traina sur la braise en jetant son adieu a la cremail- lere, et la salamandre mourut d'inanition.6 154 Even if the insect roles are reversed, there is the same fascination with the hearth, the same frenetic insect behavior and speech, the same mute grillon in the two poets. Virgil had found the cicada's song harsh,? but against him Murger sided with Anacreon, Ronsard, and La Fontaine, considering the creature an excellent singer, along with the cricket. Mallarme went so far as to find in the grillon*s voice a symbol of total unity. In a letter to Eugene Lefebure, Mallarme claims that he has felt rather "disintegrated" since training the various parts of his body to work together or independently, at will; and then he speaks longingly of the unified cry of the cricket: "...cette voix sacree de la terre ingenue, moins decomposee que celle de l'oiseau...combien plus une surtout que celle d'une femme...Tant de bonheur qu'a la terre de ne pas etre decomposee en matiere et en esprit etait dans ce son unique du grillon."8 The particular interest in blue flowers as signs of immortality has romantic origins, beginning with the original Germanic legend of the Vergissmeinnicht. according to which a young girl and her fiance, strolling along the Danube, sight a beautiful azure blossom being harried by the currents. The girl expresses her concern for it and her groom-to-be reaches out to save it, but in so doing, plunges into the water. Before disappearing in the current, he manages to throw the blue flower at his girl's 155 feet, crying out to her, "Forget-me-not!Pierre-Georges Castex sees the blue flower of Novalis' Heinrich von Ofter- dingen as symbolizing an eternal love, just like the star in Nodier's "Une Heure ou la vision" (Les Tristes): "Comme la fleur bleu d'Heinrich, l'etoile que contemple le heros de Nodier peut passer pour le symbole d'une vision secrete, ou 1 'Sine meurtrie par les deceptions de la vie terrestre se console et se rassure dans 1'intuition de l’eternite."l° Gerard de Nerval similarly devotes two "stanzas" of the last part of Aurelia to the evocation of the blue flower of eternal love. Jean-Pierre Richard points out that in Mallarme's seraphic poems, women and blue flowers "servent de resposoir au ciel..." "Le bleu est pour Mallarme la couleur de la realite celeste ou spirituelle."^ The cynical insistence on the "wings of love" in Les Nuits harkens back to Ronsard's "Amour oiseau" (a bird best not to catch) and Baif's "Amour volage" (which flitted about to be sure that "Le raisin que je choisis/Ne soit ni verd ni moisi"), yet no poet, old or new, seems to have used the swallow in just the same way Murger did. Musset cleverly employed bird imagery: Eh! depuis quand un livre est-il done autre chose Que le reve d'un jour qu'on raconte un instant; Un oiseau qui gazouille et s'envole... (Namouna. Chant II) and even used the swallow, metaphorically, but to represent man in the vain pursuit of hope. 156 Lorsque la coquette Esperance Nous pousse le coude en passant, Puis a tire-d'aile s'elance, Et se retourne en_souriant; Ou va l’homme? Ou son coeur l'appelle. L'hirondelle suit le zephyr... ("Chanson") Similarly, in Beranger's song, "Les Hirondelles," a soldier, captive in irons "on Moorish shores," sees the birds as messengers of hope from France: Hirondelles, que l1Esperance Suit jusqu'en ces brulants climats, Sans doute vous quittez la France: De mon pays ne me parlez-vous pas?^2 Gautier was fond of all birds, and swallows hold a very prominent rank among the others: in the sonnet, "L'Hirondelle," the poet tells his lady he needs freedom and wide space to fly in, for "he is a swallow and not a dove"; in "Ce Que Disent les Hirondelles" the theme is similar: the poet longs to join the swallows that are gathering to head for Athens, Rhodes, Smyrna, Malta, and Cairo: Des ailesl des ailesi des ailesl Comme dans le chant de Rvickert, Pour voler, la-bas avec elles Au soleil d'or, au printemps vert. It is Arsene Houssaye who, in "La Boheme du Doyenne" (Les Paradis Perdus. V), comes the closest perhaps to the swallow of the "Chanson de Musette": Ah I si ces heureux jours nous devaient revenirj Mais la mort a passe, mais sans le souvenir Que^resterait-il? Comme les hirondelles, Deja 1'amour frileux s'envole a tire-d'ailes... 157 In any case, the verse of Les Nuits d'hiver lent a new prestige to frail birds, especially the swallow, which had been largely neglected by the romantics in favor of larger and more ominous types. In short, Murger's swallow was the physical image of the coming and going of the fickle woman, whereas Musset and Gautier invoke the bird more symbolically, to suggest nostalgically the unattainable— hope, in Musset, a green or gold paradise for Gautier. The rhythm of the last stanza of "Ce Que Disent les Hirondelles" ( cited above) and the matter of the preceding stanza, in which the poet is depicted as a captive bird beating his wings against an invisible net, foreshadow Mallarme, who was unquestionably the most effective bird poet of the century.^-3 (The vast differences between Mallarme's treatment of birds and Murger's will be discussed further on.) Hugo was never much interested in the delicate or minute species of life— until La Chanson des rues et des bois. in which, for example, a house sparrow converses with a willow, with some oiselles. with a pond and a linnet, then watches a trout and "makes fun of a sobbing Lake Poet" ("Sagesse: Comedie dans les feuilles"). In that volume he sees the swallow as a symbol of purity (in direct contrast to Murger's view): L'hirondelle, sur ton front pur, Vient si pres de tes yeux fideles Qu'on pourrait compter dans l'azur 158 Toutes les plumes de ses ailes. ("La Nature est pleine d'amour") Murger's "Arondelle" may have had its inspiration in selections gathered in Sainte-Beuve's Tableau,^ but it seems as far removed from its Renaissance forebears as from its contemporary cousins. So much for insects, flowers, and birds— subjects which span the various poems. Individual poems show more precise origins. "A Ninon" recalls, by the name of the hero (Valentin) and by his essential plight (he has wasted his uncle's fortune), the situation developed by Musset in the first scene of II ne Faut Jurer de Rien (1836). In the two cases, a young dandy with a passion for gambling and horses is about the business of ruining his uncle— in each case a merchant fond of drinking who has acquired his fortune through overseas ventures. The similarities go no further. On the contrary, Murger's need to describe the end of a love affair dictates that the uncle "...est mort avec son dernier ecu:/Mort le verre en main, et la bouche pleine"; and of the central, Marivaux-like intrigue of 11 ne Faut Jurer de Rien. there is nothing in the poem. It will be remembered that Musset also used the name Valentin in his autobiographical story, Les Deux Maitresses, and that "Ninon" was the name under which he celebrated Madame Jaubert, whose salon he frequented and whom he loved 159 before Louise ("Mimi Pinson").^5 While it is less likely, it is possible that "Ninon" may have been inspired by a girl of that name who was the mistress of Murger’s good friend, Houssaye. "Tous mes amis ont fait des vers a Ninon," claimed the ex-director of the Theatre Frangais. "On pourrait fagoter un bouquet de tous les sonnets et de toutes les stances qui saluerent alors cette jolie fille. 11 y a meme a son propos un sonnet de Theophile Gautier."*-® While Houssaye's liaison with Ninon (1841) was indeed anterior to Murger's poem (1845), the affair offers little to explain the uncle-nephew relationship, not the apparent mondain aspect of the poem, as Houssaye1s girl was a stray from the provinces whom he picked up on the street one day and rented a room for the next.*-^ Yet is seems likely to us that Houssaye's Ninon may well have been at least an indirect inspiration for Murger's "Chanson de Musette," for Houssaye wrote in the girl's honor, apparently at the time of their liaison (1841), a song which has the same theme as Murger's poem— an unsuccessful resumption of a broken love affair. Houssaye's piece exhibits the same nostalgic cult of the souvenir, as well as the rhythmic dialogue and the refrains that stamp Murger's Parisian poems of love. A few stanzas should suffice to show the similarities. "— 'Ninon, chere Ninon, c'est toi mon adoree! Que viens-tu faire ici?" — "Je viens me souvenir!" 160 "— Ninon, te souviens-tu de nos folles journees? Que nous avions le coeur pres des levres, Ninon!" "— Ah! oui, je me souviens des fralches matinees Ou je te disais oui quand tu me disais non..." "— Ninon, te souviens-tu des heures de paresse Qui passaient sur nos coeurs plus vite que le vent?" "— Ah! oui, je me souviens! Je sens encore l'ivresse Qui couronnait mon front sous ton baiser savant." "— Tu n'as pas oublie, Ninon, ma chere maltresse! Ce balcon ou minuit nous surprenait souvent?" [They cling passionately to one another, and hope for a reunion wells up momentarily7] En bien, non, ce fut tout! — Apres cette secousse, Et toute anSantie en cet embrassement, Ninon me prit la main, et d'une voix plus douce Que la brise du soir sur la mer s'endormant: "Adieu," dit-elle, "adieu! je pars, le vent me pousse Au pays desoli du disenchantement." "Adieu, je sais 1'amour... Je suis trop familiere avec 1'Experience Pour vouloir retrouver 1'Amour, s'il est perdu. As for "Ophelia," it will be remembered that in 1843 Delacroix published a series of thirteen lithographs on Hamlet which he had begun some nine years earlier. This set contained four works devoted to Ophelia's role, and one in particular, "La Mort d'Ophelia," may have been of particular inspiration to Murger, himself a frustrated painter who was writing art criticism for Le Moniteur de la Mode and L'Artiste in the year his poem is dated, 1845. (See Lelioux, p. 170; Baldick, Chapter V.) Murger was too young to have known the furor of the twenties caused by the tours of English players, and the most popular French versions, until 1847, were all derivates of the corrupt adaptations of Ducis, who virtually excised the "shocking" 161 role of Ophelia in accordance with French classical taste. Chronologically, Murger could have known the first of two Delacroix oils (1844, 1853) on "Ophelia's Death" before composing his poem, but one of the striking features of the oils is the red flowers which Ophelia clutches in her hand and wears in her hair, whereas Murger's girl seeks a yellow and white plant.^ In dreaming of "Marguerite, " Murger may well have been inspired by Nerval's two celebrated translations of Faust, especially that of 1840. He would seem less in spired by the series of seventeen lithographs and water- tints which Delacroix published in Stapfer's 1828 trans lation of Faust, despite the fact that Murger's Marguerite (especially as imagined in the prose poem, "Le Premier Peche de Marguerite") may be summed up in three scenes of Delacroix: "Marguerite at the Spinning Wheel," "Marguerite at Church," and "Faust Accosting Marguerite in Prison"); and the baroque detail ("Mephistopheles flying over a City") of Delacroix' scenes are far removed from the tone of the poems. Tom Prideaux has rightly termed Delacroix' Faust "impish, exaggerated, theatrical...caricature. In a semi-fictional work, Murger mentions a statuette of Marguerite done by his friend, "Christ" Desbrosses at his death in 1844. (See note 1 to this chapter.) If such a statue did in fact exist, it must have been of inspiration to Murger. 162 Particular phrases here and there in the verse of Les Nuits d'hiver. recall similar utterings in other poets. The "Reponds-lui que j'ai lu Voltaire" (169) seems an answer to the thrice-posed question of Banville, "As-tu lu Voltaire?"^ The "clef des paradis perdus" (38) brings to mind the very popular song of Beranger, "Les Clefs du Paradis," in which the naughty Margot steals the keys to heaven and opens the gates to sinners and believers, a Turk, a Jew, a Protestant, some Jesuits, and Satan himself: Le paradis devient gaillard, Et Pierre en veut avoir sa part. (L'histoire est vraiment singuliere!) Pour venger ceux qu'il a damnes, On lui ferme la porte au nez. "Je vais, Margot Passer pour un nigaud; Rendez-moi mes clefs," disait Sainte-Pierre. Also taken with the "heavenly keys" was Arsene Houssaye, who, disappointed by women, takes courage by saying, "II faut aimer! J'en connais quelques-unes/Ayant encor les clefs du Paradis" ("Les Clefs du paradis," La Poesie dans les bois, II). Two lines from "Requiem" Ton amour inconstant flotte sans preference Du brun valet de pique au blond valet de coeur have an echo in Baudelaire's Spleen. I ("Pluviose, irrite...") : ...en un jeu plein de sales parfums, Heritage fatal d'une vieille hydropique, Le beau valet de coeur et la dame de pique Causent sinistrement de leurs amours d e f u n t s .22 In a general way, Murger's faded tickets and flowers 163 recall the tokens in those poems of Joseph Delorme which were inspired by Sainte-Beuve's "loisirs de v a l s e u r "23 at the Arsenal balls: ... si pour guelgue peine Vous pleurez, gue ce soit pour un peigne d1ebene, Pour un bouguet perdu, pour un ruban gate. (Sonnet: "Causerie au bal") (It has already been observed that Murger's room, with its "gaite de crogue-mort," comes on the heels of Sainte- Beuve 's and leads to Baudelaire's.) Musset and Heine were, however, the poets whose verse, through a macabre entwining of love and death, most resembled the urban lines of Les Nuits d'hiver. While Hugo and Lamartine somberly visited scenes of love-past, discoursing rather metaphysically, poets of the hue of Musset and Heine sang their recollections with a humorous irony that ran the gamut from the sardonic to a forced levity. The difference between Musset, Heine and Murger, on the one hand, and Lamartine and Hugo on the other, is eloguently summed up in Musset's "Dedicace du Spectacle dans un fauteuil": Vous me demanderez si j'aime la nature, Oui; j'aime fort aussi les arts et la peinture.... Mais je hais les pleurards, les reveurs a nacelles, Les amants de la nuit, des lacs, des cascatelles, Cette engeance sans nom, gui ne peut faire un pas Sans s'inonder de vers, de pleurs et d'agendas.... 164 The difference in tone between the older two and the younger poets may be accounted for (in part) by the fact that Lamartine and Hugo truly knew and celebrated fulfil ling "grandes passions," whereas Musset and Heine, like Murger, experienced a number of abortive affairs. ^ Musset's materialistic cynicism in contemplating an "amour enseveli" recalls Murger's" J'enveloppais dans un morceau de bure Ces ruines des jours heureux. Je me disais qu'ici-bas ce gui dure, C'est une meche de cheveux ("La Nuit de decembre") And Heine joined in this cynicism of the forlorn: Die eine lachte, eh sie ging. Die andre tat erblassen; Nur kitty weinte bitterlich, Bevor sie mich verlassen. ("Das Gluck, das gestern mich g e k u s s t " ) 2 5 Oben Lust, im Busen Triicken, Strom, du bist der Liebsten Bild! Die kann auch so freundlich nicken, Lachelt auch so fromm und mild. ("Berg' und Burgen schaun herunter") Aber dich und deine Tucke, Und dein holdes Angesicht, Und die falschen frommen Blicke- Der erschafft der Dichter nicht. ("Liebste, sollst mir heute sagen") Heine was unable to believe in feminine claims of love, "For women's oaths are light as air," but for a moment of pleasure, he was willing to play at the illusory game of constancy: 0 schwore, Liebchen, immerfort, Ich glaube dir aufs blosse Wort! An deinen Busen sink ich hin, 165 Und glaube, dass ich selig bin; Ich glaube, Liebchen, ewiglich, Und noch viel langer, liebst du nich. ("0 schwore nicht und kvisse nur") In the last analysis, each poet believes in bitter-sweet perpetuation of the "painful memories: De cet amour j'ignore l’origine; Mon coeur plus tard doit peut-etre en souffrir, Mais ma blessure aimera son epine: II est des maux qu'on a peur de guerir. (Murger, "Madriga1") Entzuckende Marter und wonniges Wehi Der Schmerz wie die Lust unermesslichJ Derweilen des Mundes kuss mich begluckt, Verwunden die Tatzen mich grasslich. (Heine, "Das ist der alte Marchenwald") Baudelaire, perhaps more than any other poet of the century, dwelt on "l'amour macabre" as a poetic theme. Indeed, Jean-Paul Weber, in his Genese de 1'oeuvre poeti- que. sees in both the Flowers of Evil and Le Spleen de Paris the insistent remnant of a childhood phantasma which the death of Baudelaire's father might have produced in a sensitive boy of six. According to this phantasma, as outlined in the unfinished "Automate: Proiet de Nouvelle." and as illustrated, fragmentarily, a great number of the author's works (cf. La Chambre Double in prose and "Le Revenant" in verse), the theme involves a lover, often an aging man, but sometimes a woman, who dies and then returns from beyond the grave to make love to his mate, and then kills the mate in order to whisk her (or him) off to "Paradise." It is clear that the sensibility of 166 Baudelaire is so different from the poets mentioned above that the differences between him and them are much more salient than the apparent thematic bond of "macabre love": he is more graphic and violent than they; they are humorous where he is philosophic. Other nineteenth-century poets resemble the rustic Murger; we shall be concerned with them in a later passage on the "Famille spirituelle. "2^ II. Chronology and Phases Thirty-three of the verses in the volume are clearly dated. Of the remaining ten, the dates of seven can be fixed with a fair measure of probability, which leaves only three in doubt. Like most pieces "to the reader" and "dedications," the first two verses in the book, both undated, were probably composed on the eve of publication, probably sometime late in 1860. That the initial poem was posterior to 1858 would seem attested to by the reference to the "vin de la comete," for in that year a good harvest followed the passage of a comet.28 Various biographers and critics are of the opinion that the "Testament" was a piece Murger knowingly drafted near the end of his life; because of its bitter irony, because of the very despera tion in it, we would ascribe the "Ballade du Desespere," along with the "Testament," to the poet's final productive 167 year, 1860. The mention of the dog in the final stanzas of the "Ballade" confirms the approximate date, as the griffon, Ramoneau, played an important part in the poet's life and works only beginning in the late fifties. ("Le Chien du braconnier" bears a date of 1859.) The technique of "expostulation and reply" between a lone person and a mysterious night visitor was a common enough technique— even in classical literature— that one should not feel compelled to attach the ballad to the earlier influence of Musset and his cycle of Nights. Because "Les Emigrants" seems a versified version of a chapter of Les Buveurs d'Eau. we would ascribe to it, with reservation, the same date as the prose work, 1853. "Celui-la..." and "Mais Chenier..." form a bond, stylistically and thematically, with the "Ode to Bandusia,1,29 and one would certainly not be off by more than a year if he were to date them, with "Bandusia," from 1842. In a letter of 1842, moreover, the poet in fact links Chenier with Horace as his inspirations of the moment. Having spoken at length about "A Blandusie" and several other pieces of classical inspiration he had just finished, he says, "Je lis et relis Chenier; et~je le confie a toi, ne le dis pasI— pour tacher d'attraper une intuition d'harmonie, je lis tout haut, oui, tout haut, en latin. Horace, Virgile, et autres anciens, que je ne comprends pas, mais dont la cadence metrique est 30 pour moi pleine de charme." Pierre Dufay, whose article 168 on Murger offers precious information on the dates and places of the first appearance of various prose and verse pieces by Murger, informs us that "A une Etrangere" first appeared (with "La Rosee") in the Mohiteur de la Mode on June 20, 1847.31 With the chronology now probably established for all but two poems ("A une Dame inconnue" and "Courtisane"),3^ we may now attempt several observations on apparent phases that the poet underwent. Beginning his career as a poet predictably, in 1841, with a romantic evocation of specters ("Ultima") and with a salute to the artist who was showing him how to count syllables ("A G.D."), he turned for inspiration in the following year to the classical masters he was studying. In 1843-44, Murger shows a fondness for themes of Sainte-Beuve and Banville. Debauched or deformed types in gloomy rooms, such is the legacy of Sainte-Beuve's "Rose," "Ma Muse," "Rayons jaunes," and "La Veillee"y Murger's "Courtisane" seems to combine Sainte-Beuve's "Rose” and "Ma Muse," playing on the former's theme (an awkward night spent with a prostitute) but having a heroine more in the mould of Sainte-Beuve's consumptive "Muse." It is fairly likely therefore, that "Courtisane," one of the two hitherto-undated pieces, was written at the same time (1843-44) as "Renovare," "Antithese," and "Au Mur de ma cellule.” Even if she seems a Ronsardian peasant girl, 169 the Rose of Murger's "Chanson" receives the same warning Cheveux blonds flottant sous le voile... Tout se fane vite, Rose: Un jour tu n'auras a cueillir De fleur eclose Que dans les champs du souvenir as Sainte-Beuve's young prostitute: RSves-tu quelquefois a l'avenir...longtemps? On n'aura pas toujours ces blonds cheveux flottants Ni sous les grains de nacre une epaule nacree... L'age vient, la fraicheur se fane, et l1abandon Succede a tout ce bruit...Pardon, Rose, pardon! "J'ai parle de sa 'manie,'" says Lelioux of Murger, "...d'acheter et de lire tous les volumes de vers qui avaient eu l'heureux privilege de rencontrer un imprimeur. L*apparition d'un de ces volumes fut pour nous un evene- ment: c'etait la premiere publication de Theodore de Banville: les C a r i a t i d e s . "33 A year or two later the two Bohemians became acquainted with Banville and on July 30, 1846, Murger wrote a critical appraisal of Banville's Stalactites, in the Moniteur de la M o d e . 35 it is hardly surprising to find a distinct series of poems in Les Nuits d1hiver which bear the unmistakable stamp of the precocious and prolific author of Les Cariatides. The series, con taining one poem of 1843 ("Si Tu Veux Etre la Madone") and three from 1844 ("Le Plongeur," "Au Balcon de Juliette," and "Pygmalion"), was not treated in the preceding two chapters because (1) the pieces in it so clearly form a group that it was unnecessary to "organize" them; (2) they 170 constitute plastic art rather than explore metaphysical themes; (3) the significance of each poem in the group is, frankly, immediately apparent. "La Madone" borrows from Banville, the biioutier; "Au Baldon de Juliette" from Banville, the popularizer of Shakespeare; "Pygmalion" from Banville, the classic scholar whose marmorean creations were now reality, now dream, now again reality and dream simultaneously. In "Aureole" (Les Cariatides). the poet is at a dance enjoying the company of a "swarm of girls, all drunk with love, and (for an enchanted viewer) sur passing hyperbole and Idealism." But suddenly he spots a "divine marquise" among all the others: Mais tout changea bientSt et je n'en vis plus qu'une De meme, quand Phoebe sur le char de la lune Apparalt dans les cieux de saphir et d'azur. Tout se voile et s'efface, et son front seul est pur. Celle que j'entrevis en oubliant les autres, Madame, avait des yeux brillants comme les votres, Des cheveux d'or, des mains qui n'avaient rien d'humain, Et des pieds a tenir dans le creux de la main. Ajoutez un cou mat de cette blancheur rare Qui fait paraitre jaune un marbre de Carrare, Et deux bras qui prouvaient, ineffable collier, Que Lysippe a Samos ne fut qu'un ecolier. As Banville thus turned his reality into dream (or vice versa) and sometimes back again to reality, Murger made similar experiments. In addition to his "Pygmalion" (dedicated, expectedly, "A T. de B."), Murger's "A Blandusie" (dated the year after the publication of the 171 Cariatides) also assumes the question of reality in the last two lines— which suddenly compound the simple idyll or elegy with metaphysical philosophy: Dans tes flots transparents, de ma Neobule, Ce beau cygne inconstant de mon toit envole, Dans tes flots pour mes yeux conserve au moins 1'image, Miroir de Blandusie, et que sous^ton bocage Je rencontre toujours, flottant a mon cote, Le mensonge aussi bien que la realite. The "Banvillisms" Le lys pur, a ton front pareil ("Madone") L'immobile splendeur de son beau corps divin ("Pygmalion") Parmi les sables d'or et les coraux pourpres ("Le Plongeur") Un jeune Amour paien, d'une espiegle figure ("Au Balcon de Juliette") are too abundant and too obvious to bear full enumeration. Filtered through Banville or not, there is a Shakespearean interest evinced in a group of Murgerian pieces of like date: in the period 1844-45, one finds, in addition to "Juliette," "Ophelia," and two poems bearing fleeting references to Shakespeare, "A un Adolescent" and (perhaps) "A une Dame inconnue" (the date of which is unsure, it must be allowed). ° Murger1s output in the late 1840's and 1850's is sparse and diverse; in 1860, the poet pens the final melancholic pieces. To recapitulate, Murger's poems move in general, and with some overlapping, from a 172 Romantic debut (1841) to a classical mode (1842) and from there to a beuvien manner (1843). Banville's influence seems to be felt as early as 1842 but is most prominent in 1843-44 and may tie in with the interest in Shakespeare, 1844-43. After a hiatus of some fifteen y e a r s ,37 there is again, in 1860, a sort of recognizable "phase"— but the only link between the poems is a certain vitriolic despondency that is overt (169), partially dissimulated (1), or seemingly feigned (3, 175). For the period 1846- 59, the only general observations one can make are that Murger seemed intrigued by the poem in prose in 1848 (as he had been in 1844) and that there is a vaguely-discernible preference for the bucolic mode, although Murger went back and forth between urban and country verses throughout his whole career. It is curious that the poet left us no verse from the years 1846, 1851, 1852, 1857, and 1858. III. Style Form. There are but five poems in Les Nuits— all sonnets— which are constructed in accordance with rules for fixed forms. "Sonnet to the Reader" was probably penned in 1860, the four others (99, 101, 103, 105) are from the period marked by the influence of Sainte-Beuve and Banville, which brings to mind a curious discrepancy: while both these poets employed the sonnet in collections 173 published early enough to have been of inspiration to Murger, they both adhered to orthodox forms, whereas the sonnets of Les Nuits are all irregular, though uniform in irregularity, rhyming ABAB ABAB CCD EED. Sainte-Beuve, drawing his inspiration from both Wordsworth and Ronsard, limited himself, in Joseph Delorme and Les Consolations, to "les deux constructions qui avaient suffi au Ronsard de Cassandre: ABBA ABBA CCD EED and ABBA ABBA CCD EDE.(Sainte-Beuve's sonnets have the shadowy, elegiac flavor of the English poets, moreover, which is far from the classical tenor of Murger's poems.) Banville was even more orthodox, theorizing that the sonnet should only be constructed on the ABBA ABBA CCD EDE scheme, and that Si l'on introduit dans cet arrangement une modification quelconque, Si l'on ecrit les deux quatrains sur des rimes differentes... Si l'on croise les rimes des quatrains... Si enfin on s'ecarte, pour si peu que ce soit, du type classique dont nous avons donne deux exemples, Le sonnet est irregulier.39 Even though he then admits that Baudelaire has given masterful examples of irregular sonnets, Banville himself, who published seven sonnets in works (Les Cariatides, Les Stalactites) whose themes likely influenced Murger, never wrote a sonnet on any scheme but ABBA ABBA CCD EDE. Lamartine never wrote a sonnet; Hugo, who overtly scorned the form, used it but once; Vigny wrote four of them; 174 prior to 1840, Musset had published but two sonnets, while Gautier, more fond of the form, included twelve in his collected poems of 1838.4° None of these poets indulged in irregular quatrains. Baudelaire's irregular sonnets were published after those of Les Nuits d'hiver. Where, then, did Murger, who was seldom innovative, borrow? Perhaps from Auguste Barbier. ...Auguste Barbier avait, sur les onze d'll Pianto. quatre sonnets irreguliers de quatrains QU3AB BABA], et ce n'etait pas ignorance ou hasard, car en 1843, sur les 30 de ses Rimes Heroiaues. il offrait dans 15 huit dispositions autres que ABBA ABBA."41 Barbier even had a marmorean orientation ("...il y burine des figures de sculpteurs, de peintres et de musiciens... "42) and enjoyed great esteem among his contemporaries, both of which facts would reinforce the supposition that he in fluenced Murger. Before launching into a bitter castiga tion of Barbier's later collections (Odelettes and Sylves), Barbey d'Aurevilly recalled the celebrity which the poet had honestly earned with II Pianto: "Alfred de Musset, Victor Hugo, Lamartine et Auguste Barbier, sont, de fait, en possession, tous les quatre, de cette gloire acquise qu'on ne perd pas en France une fois qu'on l'a..."43 While time may have proven Barbey's judgment wrong, it is within the realm of possibility that along with Banville, a now-neglected poet may have been an inspiration to Murger, especially stylistically, in the period 1843-44.44 175 In two of his sonnets, "Le Plongeur" and "Au Balcon de Juliette," Murger sustains the most traditional theme of the sonnet form, that of the servile celebration of a reluctant or "cruel" l a d y . ^ 5 In the first piece, the poet will dive to the depths of the sea to bring up a "pearly" rhyme for "his sovereign"; in the second piece, the poet, wounded by Cupid, hopes his "Juliette" will permit him to scale her balcony. If their final tercets are sometimes rather weak and devoid of "surprise," Murger's sonnets do have a certain vigor (especially "Le Plongeur" and "Pygmalion") which springs from the form itself. Perhaps it is by contrast with the utter linearity of the other poems that these pieces seem particularly "masculine." Murger's "Madrigal" does seem to fit the vague definition of the "form" given by Banville: "un compliment ingenieux dit en quelgues vers,"46 even if the poet's paradoxical last two lines underline the egocentric, rather than the "complimentary" feeling of the poem. Pierre Dufay, in his article on Murger, speaks of a vilanelle that eventually became La Menteuse.4? We have been unable to locate the vilanelle which Murger finally developed into the five-line stanzas of La Menteuse. The closest approximation of a vilanelle to be found in Les Nuits is the poem "A Une Etrangere," composed of a series of four tercets leading to a final quatrain. Vilanelles similary were series of tercets followed by a quatrain, but in a 176 true vilanelle (1) the last two lines of the first tercet are used, alternately, throughout the following tercets, to appear together again only in the final quatrain, where as in "Etrangere" no line is repeated; (2) the rhyme scheme of a six-stanza vilanelle should be ABA ABA ABA ABA ABA ABAA. whereas Murger's piece is ABA BCD CPE FEF GHHG; (3) the vilanelle should begin on a feminine rhyme, where "Etrangere" begins with a masculine rhyme. Murger's poem also lacks the regular interlocking rhyme-scheme of Gautier's terza rima (ABA BCB CPC PEP EFE F) yet shows enough tendancy toward a (rather haphazard) linking of the stanzas, the last ones excluded, to be distinguishable from Brizeux' usually independent tercets (AAA BBB CCC). called Ternaires.48 Most of Murger's poems may simply be called chansons. as each strives to be "gaie, legere, amoureuse," and to "fuir le pedantisme."49 Stanza. Being "songs," Murger's poems often employ refrains. There are many types and systems of deployment for these refrains. "Ophelia" has a particularly unusual and varied refrain-system in which the ideas expressed in the first stanza are repeated and varied here and there throughout the seven quatrains of the poem: 177 1/ 1: VII, 4: If 2: III, 3: VII, 3: If 3P III. 2: V, 3L If 4: II. 1: VIII, 1: A ce ruisseau clair, qui chante une gamme ► Et dans sa folie, etant toujours femme penche l tombe est au bord de ces claires eaux The first three octaves of "Renovare" have identical first and last lines which are abruptly contradicted in the final stanza; five of the early stanzas of "Requiem" are tied together by like attempts "to find a proper tune" for the Requiem. The short "Au Mur de ma cellule" has a wistfully- repeated phrase; "0 jours qui n'etes plus..." Such repeti tions of a phrase, such recurrences of a line (sometimes identical, sometimes with variations), mark many other poems. The legacy of the era's premier chanteur. Beranger, seems clear not only in these intra-stanza refrains, but also in the repetitions of whole stanzas. Murger1s "La Jeunesse," for example, opens and closes with identical stanzas, like Beranger's "Les Gueux"; all lines of "La Jeunesse" contain seven syllables, more over, as do all lines of "Les Gueux"— except those of the first and last stanza. It will also be noticed that the last line in every stanza of Murger's poem is the same: "La Jeunesse n'a qu'un temps." Identical last lines were 178 virtually a trademark of Beranger's stanzas ("Le Vin de Chypre," "Les Clefs du Paradis," and "Le Grenier" are fair examples, especially the last poem, whose repeated line Dans un grenier qu'on est bien a vingt ansi certainly recalls the verses of Les Nuits). In "Angele" the last hemistich of the last line of every stanza is repeated (cf. Beranger's "Hirondelles" or "Mon Tonibeau"); the first lines of all stanzas but the last in "A G.D." begin, "Ami,— puisque...", while the beginning of the last stanza varies to "Ami,— peintre et poete..."; the last two lines of the two octaves of "Vin Bleu" are quasi- repetitive, as are the look-alike, two-line endings of the octaves of "Les Abeilles" (cf. Beranger's "Les Oiseaux"). Murger is equally fond of repeating whole stanzas as refrains: "Marguerite," "Si tu veux etre la Madone," and "Les Emigrants," like "La Jeunesse," have identical first and last stanzas, while in the "Chien du braconnier" it is the second stanza which is echoed by the last (cf. Beranger's "Souvenirs d'Enfance" or "Le Violon brise")y "Ma Mie Annette" employs a whole-stanza refrain in the odd-numbered stanzas, alternating with varying "informative" stanzas (cf. Beranger's "De Profondis: A 1'Usage de deux ou trois amis," "Le Prisonnier," "Les Deux Soeurs de Charite," "Le Carillonneur"). 179 It is not our intent to suggest that Murger wrote his songs with those of Beranger's beside him, but rather to point out that by his frequent and varied use of re frains, the author of Les Nuits was a member of a tradi tion popularized and exemplified by the champion of Le Caveau moderne. and seconded by two poets upon whom Murger doted, Alfred de Musset and Hegesippe Moreau.50 The seven-syllable lines of "Les Abeilles" and the "Dedi- cace" may well confirm the influence of Beranger, who resorted to lines of all lengths in accordance with the exigences of music. ("Le Carillonneur" deploys nine- syllable lines in prominent positions in the refrain; all stanzas of "Les Gueux" except the first and last are built on seven-syllable lines, while "La Descente aux Enfers" mixes verses of five syllables with the dominant ones of seven.51) The interspersing of occasional short lines amid more frequent longer ones (see, in Les Nuits. 17, 95, 137, 143, 169) was also a key feature of the song tradition. The poet's favorite stanza form, as one may conclude from a summary of Appendix III, is clearly the quatrain; if this form seems hard-pressed for first place by the great number of octaves, it should be pointed out that many of the octaves are "false," being composed of separ- 52 able quatrains:"'* 180 Stanza-form (Number Number of stanzas of lines per stanza) so constructed 3 (tercet) 14 4 (quatrain) 95 5 6 6 (sixain) 45 8 (huitain) 81 10 (dizain) 3 There are but five longer stanzas, one of 12, one of 18, one of 26 and one of 36 lines. The lack of longer stanzas indicates that Murger disdain those vaguely-defined forms which are freely and often lengthily constructed: epitres. odes, elegies, or "stances." Line. More classic than Verlaine and Beranger, between whom he stood, Murger prefers to avoid the impair. A summary of the versification chart (Appendix III) again shows, from a numerical standpoint, his predilections: the octosyllabic line is his favorite, although he also is fond of the alexandrine. Type of Line (Number Total Number of of syllables per line) Lines so Devised 4 (tetrasyllabic 8 6 32 7 80 8 (octosyllabic) 809 10 (decasyllabic) 120 12 (dodecasyllabic) 697 It will be noticed that the poet shuns the romantic antics of the juvenilia of Hugo and Musset: there are no verses of one, two, three, five, or nine syllables, and only a modest number of seven-syllable lines. Attuned as he was 181 to Chenier's "full and immense" alexandrines (see p. 139) and "mobile caesurae," Murger could mix within a single poem ("Blandusie") fluid lines: Victimes dont les fleurs parfument l'agonie, Ses derniers belements a la douce harmonie Que la brise du Tibre^eveille en tes roseaux Se meleront ainsi qu'a tes limpides eaux... and slightly dislocated ones: Neobule, la blonde, aux regards ingenus, Que, sur l'autel du temple, on prendrait pour Venus. The first two lines of "Le Plongeur" are unusual, having only a tenuous caesura after the sixth syllable and a "true" caesura after the tenth, and depending on enjamb- ments that are, for Les Nuits d'hiver. fairly audacious: Voulant mettre une etoile a son bandeau, la reine Fait venir un plongeur et lui dit: "Vous irez Dans ce palais humide..." Whatever the length of the line, Murger is, in general, rather conservative: his enjanibments and caesurae are free without being obtrusively audacious. He is after natural patterns of speech, but not at any price. The liberties of Hugo's Orientales would have been repugnant to his sensibility. Rhyme. Murger religiously observes the classical dictum on the alternation of masculine and feminine rhymes, and shows a very decisive preference for crossed rhyme to all other sorts: 182 Type of Rhyme Number of Verses Employed to Effect Such Rhvmes Croisees Suivies Embrassees (Other or difficult 1,286 294 132 to isolate) 72 It will be seen from the rhyme table (Appendix III) that "rich rhyme" does not constitute the forte of Les Nuits d'hiver— neither in the mathematical nor in the artistic concept of the term. There are few rhymes one could call "fulgurant." From the foregoing data on the formal aspects of Murger's poetry, one might synthesize a hypothetical, composite poem which would "typify" the volume without being an exact replica, perhaps, of any specific example. Such a poem would be a chanson comprising ten octosyllabic quatrains5^ of rimes croisees which alternate between masculine and feminine endings. "A Ninon," "Marguerite," and "A une dame inconnue," all come close to this composite ideal, as would "Printaniere," if its five octaves were divisible into quatrains— and such seems to be the case. If one thinks only of such typical poems, he would be tempted to compare the overall appearance of the volume with that of the Emaux et Camees of Gautier,5* also based primarily on octosyllabic quatrains— among which crop up 183 a handful of sonnets. Yet the pieces of Les Nuits d*hiver are, collectively, more disparate than those of Emaux et Camees. and they are not so often chiseled from "marbre de Carrare." Syntax and rhetorical devices. Murger avoids classical inversions, hermetic ellipses, and other devices that impede immediate comprehension or smack of rhetoric. His speech patterns are often narrative, even though his poems are all much shorter than usual narrative forms such as the ballad, rhymed romance, or epic. A poem like "Les Emigrants," for example, which is not atypical by any means, has a very straightforward, even plodding, syntax. When Murger is elliptical, it is because he is using popular speech patterns for poetic effects Muse de 11infidelite, Reviens encor manger ensemble Le pain de la galte. ("Chanson de Musette") The poet occasionally abandons the popular idiom for rhetorical devices like metonymy Nos femmes ont tisse la tente Que doit habiter notre exil ("Les Emigrants") or hyperbate Pelerins des grandes mers bleues, Voyez, a 1'Orient vermeil, Les oiseaux qui font mille lieues Entre deux levers de soleil ^ ("Printaniere") 184 Feullletant un roman, paresseuse et frileuse, Tandig que tu fermais tes yeux ensommeilles, Mol [the male poet^ je rajeunissais ma jeunesse amoureuse... ("Requiem") but unschooled as he was in the classics and in the Romance traditions of rhetoric, Murger seems more at ease when he leaves aside self-consciously rhetorical devices— and he usually does. His fondness for parallel construc tion and enumeration (see stanzas 2 and 3 of "Renovare," for example), a question broached earlier in our discussion of refrains, stems not from rhetorical training, but from the ever-present popular idiom. The poet permits himself the "inarticulate" repetitions of everyday speech. In "Printaniere" the second half of the fourth stanza is a fragmentary sentence, an afterthought, the natural spontaneous rhythm of which charms where the breach of logic might have offended. With regard to Murger's imagery, the quality of which will be discussed further on, suffice it to say that the generally pedestrian quality of his figures may stem less from an impoverished imagination than from the in different attitude toward rhetoric discussed above. All popular Parisian poets from Villon to Queneau have placed heavy emphasis on rhythm, often relegating imagery to a secondary role. One is not sent into the visual depths of metaphor by such poets, but one is enchanted by the linear verbal embroiderings— that is to say the flowing colloquial 185 rhythms, the "naive" repetitions, the refrains. Vocabulary. With the exception of the classically bucolic or Banvillian poems, those of 1842-44 (99, 101, 103, 115, 133, 151)— in which Murger gives the reader virtual kyrielles of traditional names like Amaryllis, Pannichis, and Amymone— most of the proper nouns, and especially the more provocative ones, come from urban poemso Perhaps what is most surprising, however, in a writer famed for his description of Bohemian life, is the lack of place names: Hugo celebrated his Feuillantines. Gautier, Nerval, and Houssaye the Impasse du Doyenne, Banville the "Pays latin." In Les Nuits d'hiver. as in Musset's A quoi revent les ieunes filles. "la scene est ou l'on voudra." Except for fleeting references to the "passage du Caire" and to the Opera, neither of which is brought to life, Paris seems quite anonymous. A general scanning of the proper nouns reveals only a few terms indicative of remote places; seen in context, their exotic value is nil: "encre de Chine." "dentelle de Flandres." "point d'Angleterre." Murger relished the poetry of writers like Banville, Sainte-Beuve, Gautier, Moreau, and Brizeux,^^ but where is Greece, where is Oxford, where is Spain or the Orient, where is the reflection of Moreau's Provins or Brizeux' Armorica? One can combine the new and the ancient, the "here" and the remote, as Banville does in his "Voie lactee," Hugo in his "Bande noire," and 186 Gautier in his "Obelisque de Luxor," but it is not done in Les Nuits d'hiver. Murger’s rustic pieces are nearly all classical, admitting few references to the nineteenth century? conversely, his urban pieces admit few references to classical modes. Unlike Banville, the author of Les Nuits d'hiver could not envision a nineteenth-century courtesan as a "Phryne." Whence the lack of mythological or classical terminology in the urban verse (see Appendix II A). The "echeveau gordien" (121) and the "flot pactolien" (41) are notable exceptions. Murger ventures to simulate the erudition of his contemporaries on rare occasion, referring rather gratuitously, for example, to artists such as Cellini, Froment, Clodion, and Greuze. There is then, on occasion, in the urban or urbane poems, a slight tendancy toward dilettantism. When he speaks of Fornarine, the poet feels obliged to explain to us immediately that she was the "mistress of Raphael." These artists, it will be noted, are from centuries gone by, which is predictable? for as he had remained silent on his haunts, the poet avoided naming his friends. Among Murger's contemporaries, only Gavarni is mentioned in verse, and although the poet greatly admired the caricaturist, the two were hardly good friends. Banville and the Desbrosses brothers are referred to, by initials only, at the beginning of poems (103, 113, 137), as is a mysterious Ch. d P..." (99). At the head of the "Chien du Braconnier" there is one final dedication, equally obscure for us, to an Amadee Guyot, perhaps a resident of Marlotte. The most effective terms are those which reveal, deliberately or not, contemporary modes and myths or which invoke proverbial formulas, like "le diable s'est loge dans ma bourse" or "les lauriers sont coupes" (both found in "Angele"). Among the contemporary manners re called are those of photography (an art which, thanks to the Bohemian, Nadar, in part, was budding at the moment), Que le fruit de son sein soit ton portrait flatte Sans retouche...(1) and the new grands maqasins, ...tous mes parents ont commande leur deuil: Les hommes au Cypres. les femmes chez Chevreuil (169) and of keepsakes and the rise of confectionery:®® Done, vous n'aurez de moi nul present aujourd'hui, Ni keepsake eclatant... Et ni bonbons sucres. Murger's anglophilia was not as evident as that of either Gautier, who celebrates "le steam-boat" in several pieces, or Houssaye, who wrote, in recounting an evening that Murger spent with a faithless grisette, "Voila qu'apres une premiere coupe de vin genereux, Murger surprend la belle Hortensia lancant des oeillades a un sportsman qui 188 venait d'arriver pompeusement en mail-coach avec un de ses amis."59 Murger is content with three anglicisms in his volume; keepsake, chale.60 and steaple-chease ^ic]: "Personne qui ne sache ou n'ait su monter It cheval...C'est a cheval qu'un dandy se montre le plus volontiers dans sa gloire...qu'on fait ses courses...que M. de Chateaubriand a fait ses visites academiques... "Demande d'Audience a une dame inconnue" is a repository of modes: 1 * Opera. le club, le baccarat, the extra-marital affair with "Celui...que vous nommez lui." les tisanes, les griffons d'Ecosse. les salons, le boudoir parfume, the ladies' mastery of piano, voice and embroidery. The reference to the Opera brings to mind a long-standing joke alluded to by the moribund roue of "Le Testament": Je suis fini, fini: le ciel n'a pas voulu Que je puisse m'asseoir parmi le groupe elu Des gens qui verront 11Africaine. Meyerbeer first mulled over the idea of composing an opera called "L'Africaine" as early as 1840; by 1845 he was carrying around the partially-finished manuscript; he finished it in 1849; he asked Scribe to re-work the paltry . libretto in 1852; he finished his own readjustments to the new libretto by 1860; each year during this time the public expected to go hail the long-rumored opera and each year the public was disappointed. Just as Murger died while reading the proofs of his cherished Nuits d'hiver. so Meyerbeer died as preparations were being made to stage 1'Africaine. in 1864.62 Le club, le griffon d'Ecosse. and the reference to Otello in "Dame inconnue" all attest to the continuing appeal of things English and Italian. Robert Burnand, having placed a typical girl of 1830 at her candle-lit piano, ready to entertain her suitors, wonders what she'11 play: Quelle^romance italienne nee d'un de ces drames a la mode, ou le genie de Shakespeare etait si habilement transpose— quel lied, quelle chanson d'Angleterre? Echos de France. Echos d'Allemange. Echos d1Italie...Pas une jeune personne qui ne souhaitat avoir son piano, qui ne tint pour casserole horsd'usage le vieux clavecin qui avait berce le reve de sa mere ou de son aieule. En fait, le piano (le piano-forte, comme on disait, est encore £en 1830J un instrument de luxe. Erard a signe ceux qui ornent les appartements des Tuileries, de Saint-Cloud, de Compiegne. Pleyel travaille plutot pour le faubourg Saint-Germain et pour la haute bourgeoisie...En 1833 il y a deja trois cent vingt facteurs de pianos a Paris, cent trente en province.63 That Murger uses "Erard" as a common noun shows the ever- increasing popularity of that brand of piano toward 1850. Musset's heroines all played piano, and Mme de Parnes, an 64 - Erard. Rossini was usually played at the Opera or at Louvois, whereas the Salle Feydeau remained the seat of the classical comic opera.65 Almost as cryptic for the modern reader as the allusion to the standing joke of L'Africaine. is the mention of "Jean Hiroux parlant a la justice." According to the legend, Jean Hiroux, a sort of macabre comic-strip 190 figure, is brought before a magistrate for having killed and robbed an "invalo" at 3:00 a.m. on the Place de la Concorde; the foul-mouthed Hiroux berates and corrects the judge frequently in a ridiculous conversation— that Henri Monnier often recreated at banquets in uproarious verbal charges— for which he is convicted and sentenced to be beheaded. He tells the priest, "un bon zigue,1 1 to bring his wife and child to "mon operation." After the execution, another ridiculous, obscene argument with Saint- Peter ensues.66 The Hiroux yarn seems to have been at its peak in the years 1855-60: Banville makes mention of the legend in the Preface to his Odes funambulesques (1857). Murger's references to "Hiroux" and L'Africaine help to date "Le Testament" toward 1860. That the "Corbeaux" know when it's sewing time— "sans la Science/Dans le Grand Messager boiteux"— recalls Murger's special preoccupation with almanachs ("vieil almanach" or "vieux calendrier" [35] ), even though such booklets undoubtedly enjoyed as wide a distribution as keepsakes in the middle of the last century. Many of Murger's words and images come from two realms, (1) that of fashion and fabrics and (2) that of nocturnal public amusements. Perhaps Murger's stint on the Moniteur de la Mode explains his interest in fabrics: 191 dentelle de Flandres (23) point d'Angleterre (23) indienne ou modeste organdi (23) robe moiree (23) guipure gothique (23) robe blanche (35, 54) fin soulier, dentelle (63) enveloppe de flanelle (107) manteau des Dieux (115) funebre tailleur (169) (There is equal attention given to the female toilette, to the way hair, jewelry and cosmetics are arranged: Autour de ton bras blanc une perle choisie Constelle un bracelet cisele par Froment... Tes cheveux crespeles selon la mode antique La poussiere de riz blafarde son cou maigre.,. [16*0.) From the various realms of public amusements, especially the brilliant and illusory realms of the theater, the gambling dens, the public dance halls, come a number of terms and images: Et sur nos amours baissons le rideau: Quand je serai loin tu pourras, Ninette, Le relever sur un amour nouveau (7) Que le brelan te suive autour des tapis verts (l)68 brun valet de pique, blond valet de coeur (23) bal des salamandres (23) Quand la valse t'emporte en son gai tourbillon (23) Le carnaval etant fini (35) Echos de Rome et de Venise, Quand les grelots du carnaval, Qu'a son gre Gavarni deguise, Fredonneront l'appel au bal (41) 192 As Murger's first verses were ditties written for inclusion in a short-lived vaudeville. Souvenirs du bal ("paroles de M. Henry Murger, musique de M. Camille Devos"), it is not surprising that the poet became enamored of public balls at an early age and had words relating to them ever-present in his mind. His first poem (of five-syllable linesi) began Ah: le bal, le bal, Plaisir sans egal, Que mon coeur adore Du soir a l'aurorei Oui, danser toujours, Oui, valser sans cesse, Voila mon ivresse, Voila (4 fois) mes amours...Etc.69 Just as Murger's attraction to flowers may likely be related to the general passion in the public for flowers (artificial or real, individual or bouquets), so may his insistance on cards, waltzing, and the theater be considered an accurate reflection of vogues in his society. He is a popular poet whose appeal to the masses was in great part due to his seeming fidelity to stubborn beliefs in the fecundating powers of comets, in the sagacity of marguerites, in the eventual magic of L'Africaine. Fleeing the exotic, the learned, the metaphoric, the poet preferred the familiar, 70 the domestic, the prosaic: "la bouilloire qui chante,"/u "la tirelire qui murmure," "un serrement de main— etrenne fraternelle." 193 ^In the short story on Desbrosses' life and death, Le Dessous du Panier: Biographie d'un Inconnu. which bears a date of 1849, Murger mentions (p. 24) "une petite statuette de Marguerite, qui semblait sortir toute milan- colique de la pensee de Goethe," that the sculptor entered in the salon shortly before his death in 1844„ It is within the realm of possibility that the poet's "Marguerite," dated 1842, and his friend's sculpture were wrought simultaneously. Oesbrosses is also the hero of a short story, Le Manchon de Francine (Scenes de Jeunesse), of the chapter of the Scenes de BohSme. also entitled "Le Manchon de Francine," and he appears under the name of Antoine in the Buveurs d'Eau. 2In Camille: "...ce lambin de Tabareau, qui vaut tous les anglais de Robert (p. 105)"; "...le vieux garde fut si enchante en apprenant que son lambin, comme il l'appelait, avait fait^tuer une chevrette sur les terres de Robert, qu'il mela a sa patee du soir la moitii de sa propre soupe, et sacrifia une portion de son vieux cognac pour frictionner ses rhumatismes..." (114). 3Sainte-Beuve, "Vie de Ronsard," in the Tableau of 1838, II, p. XXV. ^Rene Bray, in his Antholoaie de la poesie precieuse (Paris: Nizet, 1957, p. 72) picks out a sonnet of Desportes containing the following lines: Celui que 1'Amour range a son commandement Change de jour en jour de fa^on differente... Or je suis salamandre et vis de dans la flamme: Mais j'espere bientot me voir changer en voix, Pour dire incessamment les beautes de ma dame. 3The narrative of the salamander is to be found in the "Eighth Vigil" of the short novel, The Golden Flower Pot. 6Gaspard de la Nuit.(Paris: Nouvel Office d'Edition, 1965), pp. 100-01. In the volume, "La Salamandre" is preceded by a piece called "ondine," which reminds one of a strange coupling described by "Le Sylphe" of Hugo's second Ballade: ...Le follet fantastique erre sur les roseaux. Au frais Ondin s'unit l'ardente Salamandre, Et de bleuatres feux se croisent sur les eaux. 7Ecloga II. 8Correspondance, ed. Henri Mondor (3 vols.; Paris: Gallimard, 1959-69), I, 249-50. 194 9"Myosotis," Grand Dictionnaire Universel du XIXe Siecle (15 vols.; Paris: Larousse, 1866-76). lOLe Conte Fantastiaue en France (Paris: Jose Corti, 1962), p. 127. l^-See L'Univers poetiaue. pp. 41-42; p. 45. l^The excellent 1834 edition of the Oeuvres completes (4 vols.; Paris: Perrotin), which gives the music as well as the texts, has been our source for Beranger. 13Mallarme was particularly fascinated by birds in the two or three years prior to the publication of Murger's Nuits. Jean-Paul Weber, who gives (in his Genese de 1'oeuvre poetiaue 0Paris: Gallimard, 1960J, esp. pp. 224- 37) a vast and fascinating repertory of Mallarme's references to birds and flight, says, "...il est certain que la poesie de Mallarme est, durant ces annees 0.859-60] comme hantee par 1'oiseau...Mais le motif de l'Oiseau— escorte tout naturellement de ceux de l'Aile et de la Plume— est non moins vivace dans les poemes de la jeunesse et de la maturite que dans ceux de l'enfance" (p. 299). l^The bird is prominent in Ronsard's "Voyage de Tours" and Ode. "Dieu vous gard...," and in Belleau's "Avril," for example. ^Maurice Allem says, speaking of Mme Jaubert, "...une meme femme...aurait ete 1'occasion de plusieurs ouvrages et des plus divers d'Alfred de Musset: la nouvelle d* Emmeline. la comedie du Chandelier, les poemes de la Lettre a Lamartine, de la Nuit de Decembre. et des deux suites de stances a Ninon." (Alfred de Musset [Grenoble: B. Arthaud, 1948J, p. 136.) ^ Souvenirs de Jeunesse. p. 317. 17Houssaye recounts this brief liaison in "Volupte," Book V, Tome II, of his Confessions (6 vols.; Paris: Dentu, 1885). In the lengthy poem, "Les Vertus de Ninon" (Les Paradis perdus. Ill), Houssaye gives a version of his affair with Ninon that differs in several minor points with that of the Confessions. On Ninon, see further, in Houssaye's Poesies. "Les Cent Vers Dores," I; Les Cent et un Sonnets. XIX, XXII, XXXIII, LIV. 18 Ibid.. pp. 84-85. (Houssaye presents his poem by saying only, "Ici je ne saurais mieux faire que de trans- crire ces strophes qui diront la fin de ce petit roman," which suggests by the word transcrire that the poem had 195 been written long before the writing of the Confessions, probably at the moment of the affair.) l^On the Hamlet series, on Ducis and Hamlet, see Prank Anderson Trapp, The Attainment of Delacroix (Baltimore: John Hopkins Press, 1970), esp. pp. 156-71. ^Qworld of Delacroix (New York, Time Publications, 1966), p. 81. 21"Eieve de Voltaire" (Odes funambulesaues). This poem is dated "Janvier 1859" along with the following piece "Monsieur Homais" which bears an epigraph from Madame Bovarv: "Lisez Voltaire, disait l'un..." The dates tally, as "Le Testament" appears to be one of Murger's last poems, probably written in 1859 or 1860. ^ M u r g e r ' s piece is dated 1849, while Baudelaire's first appeared in 1851, in Le Messager de l'assemblee. according to critical edition of Les Fleurs (Paris: Corti, 1942) prepared by Jacques Crepet and George Blin (who are generally more complete on dates than other editors). Here again no direct influence should be presumed, however; the "marriage" of cards seems to have enriched the French language of the nineteenth century with widely-used metaphors. 23Joseph Delorme. Introduction, p. VIII. 24Maurice Allem points out, "Alfred de Musset avait la faculte de se guerir d'un amour par un autre. Comme Don Juan passait de la grande dame a la chambriere, il passa de la femme du monde a la grisette." (Alfred de Musset, p. 139.) Heine's successive loves were more or less an attempt to recapture the dream of happiness with his cousin, Amalie, as he avows in the collection, Verschiedene. Thus is "Ich bin nun funfunddreissig Jahr' alt" Ich bin nun funfunddreissig JahrV alt, Und du bist funfzehnjahrig kaum... 0 Jenny, wenn ich dich betrachte, Erwacht in mir der alte TraumJ Im Jahre achtzehnhundert siebzehn Sah ich ein Madchen, wunderbar Dir ahnlich an Gestalt und Wesen, Auch trug sie ganz wie du das haar. (Henri Henie. Samtliche Schriften. [4 vols.; Munich: Carl Hanser, 1968JJ 25 All our texts of Heine come from the edition referred to in the preceding note. 196 2^See Chapter III. Weber gives numerous examples, some of which appear to us as strained, in illustration of the universality of his engaging hypothesis. Typical of his better examples are the following ones: L'amoureux pantelant incline sur sa belle A l1air d'un moribond caressant son tombeau ("L'Hymne a la beaute") Et le vieillard pour qui cette fosse est creusee Rechauffe sur un sein sa vieillesse blasee. ("Sur le Trou du cercueil nouvelle- ment creuse") 27See pp. 217 et sag. 2®The Larousse du XXe siecle (6 vols.; Paris, 1928- 33; see "Comete") informs us that the first time a good batch of wine was associated with a comet was in 1811 and that in 1858 and 1861 there were notable repetitions of the occurrence. 29See the discussion above (pp. 135-40) on the classical cycle of rustic verse. 39Lelioux, Histoire de Murqer. p. 130. 31 "Des Buveurs d'Eau a la Vie de Boheme" ^icT], Mercure de France. April 1922, p. 46. 32on a possible date for "Courtisane," see immediately below; for "Dame Inconnue," p. 171 and note 36. 33Histoire de Murqer. p. 54. 34Ibid.. p. 56. 39Dufay, "Des Buveurs d'Eau," p. 57. 36ey its mondain atmosphere— rather an unwonted quality in Murger— the poem may have a period of inspira tion similar to that of "A Ninon" (1845), which would indeed put it in the cycle of "Shakespearean verse." More over the request made to "Madame" and the various contem porary allusions (see pp. 186-87) all ring of Banville's urbanity. If, indeed, "A une Dame inconnue" may be dated approximately 1845, the dates of all the poems have been fixed, tentatively, at least. 37It would seem to stretch the term too much to think that three poems, the "animal poems" discussed in the preceding chapter, composed over a period of five 197 years, constitute a cycle of inspiration. ^®Max Jasinski, Histoire du sonnet (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1970), p. 229. 39 ^ ✓ Petit Traite de poesie francaise. Seconde Edition (Paris: Bibliothegue de l'Echo de la Sorbonne, n.d.), pp. 173-74. 40See Jasinski, Histoire du sonnet, p. 193, on Hugo, Lamartine, and Vigny; pp. 200-01 on Gautier and Musset. 4^Ibid.. p. 231. Ten poems vary the traditional ABBA quatrain by crossing the rhymes, we leamin a note to this passage. 42Ibid., p. 201. 43,1 Auguste Barbier, " Les Poetes. Deuxieme Serie. in Les Oeuvres et les hommes (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1968), p. 126. 44A letter of September 18, 1841, reveals that Murger was acquainted at least with the first collection of Barbier's poems: "Ce qu'il y a de plus neuf en littera- ture, c'est la publication des Ternaires de Brizeux. J'en ai parcouru quelques fragments qui sont loin de m'autoriser a croire que ce soit lui qui ait fait la Curee de Barbier, comme Lafizeliere voulait me le soutenir." (Lelioux, Histoire de Murqer. p. 99.) 4^The humble poet may, on a similarly chaste tone, beg the favor either of a lady or of God, says Jasinski (p. 19). 46petit Traite. p. 138. 47"Des Buveurs d'Eau," p. 46. 48We are indebted to Banville's Petit Traite for the definition of the vilanelle (pp. 188-90), and for the information on Gautier's terza rima (pp. 152-56). He is shortwinded and self-contradictory on Brizeux' Ternaires. of which he says "Ils sont beaux, mais bien infSrieurs aux Terza Rima. pusique les strophes n'y sont pas attachees les unes aux autres. Ils sont pourtant habilement inventes et il faut les etudier" (pp. 153-54). A perusal of Brizeux1 graceful Ternaires (such is the name of a volume, as well as of several otherwise-untitled pieces in other volumes) makes one question Banville's "bien inferieurs" judgment. Brizeux frequently mixes tercets with various 198 other stanza-forms in polymorphic pieces, and these may or may not interlock with other stanzas. ^Banville, Petit Trait£. p. 137. SOBanville says in his discussion of "La Chanson" that "Le vrai chanteur frangais, vif, gracieux, alerte comme Cherubin, c'est encore Alfred de Musset" (Petit Traite. p. 137). In 1828 Moreau wrote a salute to his idol, simply called "Beranger," the refrain of which was "Tout has, tout has, amis, chantons ses vers!" 5^The refrain of "Le Carillonneur" affords a glimpse of the impairs and varying line-lengths: Digue, digue, dig, din, dig, din, don. Oh! que j1aime A sonner un bapteme! Dig, din, don, din, digue, digue, don. C O ^Banville points out that "si une strophe est com- binee de telle fagon qu'en le coupant en deux on obtienne deux strophes, dont chacune sera individuellement une strophe complete, elle n'existe pas en tant que strophe." (Petit Traite. p. 141.) And for the conservative author of Les Cariatides. a classical octave rhymes ABABBCBC so that there is a sort of "enjambment" between the two halves of the octave (Petit Traite. pp. 148-50). The oataves of Murger's "Vin Bleu," on the other hand, are divided by both punctuation and rhyme, into independent groups of four lines each. Murger does, except upon rare occasion, abide by Banville's precept that the octave be built of octo- or decasyllabic lines. 53The forty-three poems in the volume comprise 1810 lines in all, which gives an average length of forty-two lines per poem— whence our "ten quatrains..." 3^The first published pieces of Les Emaux et camees date from 1847, the volume itself, 1852. As Murger's marmorean period was in the early forties, the primary influence must have been that of Banville, along with that of Barbier, perhaps. 5^Murger had, like his hero Melchior (Un Poete de aouttieres), a passion for buying each year's crop of volumes of poetry from the booksellers on the quais. "Heureusement que cette 'manie' lui faisait rencontrer Alfred de Musset, Hegesippe Moreau, Emile Deschamps, Sainte-Beuve, et surtout Brizeux..." (Lelioux, Histoire de Murqer. p. 30). He also "discovered" Banville's Cariatides in that manner (p. 54). 199 56Cf. (in the same poem) the lines in which the testator speaks of a portrait "Peint par celui qui fut le Raphael du laid," perhaps an allusion to caricaturists like Gavarni or Daumier. 57"Le premier 'grand magasin' cree a Paris, en date de 1824, fut une maison de confection...La Belle Jardiniere. II faut attendre le Second Empire pour voir naitre de grands magasins con^us selon la formule que nous voyons appliquer et developper autour de nous." (Robert Burnand, Vie 1830. p. 205). 58"Dans les grandes villes," says Burnand, "l'anglo- manie coule a pleins bords...0n ne parle plus d'albums, de recueils de poesies, mais de keepsakes" (p. 103). It will be remembered that there were also periodicals like the Keepsake franyais and the Keepsake americain. to which, incidentally, Musset submitted his "Saule" in November of 1830. On the vogue of candy and the "bourgeois gourmand," see Burnand, pp. 126-38. ^ Souvenirs de jeunesse. p. 113. In Gautier, see "Les Nereides" or "Tristesse en mer." 60Chale is dated from 1811 (Chateaubriand) by Bloch and Wartburg; Gerald Antoine points out (Joseph Delorme. p. 211, note 424) that schall was in vogue toward 1828, and that in 1837 there was a "danse du schall." The word must still be considered a neologism toward 1850. 5^Burnand, Vie 1830. p. 114. 62See "L’Africaine," Grand Dictionnaire Universel du XIXe Siecle. The same entry in the Supplement to the dictionary is also useful. It summarizes: "Tout compte fait, la gestation de 1'Africaine dura vingt ans, et son eclosion sembla couter la vie a 1'auteur, car le grand compositeur mourut au milieu des preparatifs de 1*execu tion, le lundi, 2 mai 1864, le lendemain du jour ou la copie de sa partition venait d'etre achevee dans sa maison meme de la rue Montaigne et sous ses yeux." The name of Meyerbeer's opera lends itself to confusion with that of a comedy, L'Africain (1860), by Charles Edmond, a friend of the Goncourts, who refer to the comedy at several points in the Journal. ®%urnand, p. 104. The article, "Erard," in the Larousse de la Musique (2 vols.; Paris, 1957) gives an excellent summary of the technical contributions of the Erard family to the piano and harp. 200 S^Les Deux Maitresses, in Oeuvres en prose, pp. 330- 53. 65It is Gerald Antoine who informs us on the various music halls in discussing (p. 159, note 49) Joseph Delorme's evening return from a concert at Feydeau. 66»niroux," Grand Dictionnaire Universel du XIXe Siecle. The legend appears to be a composite of diverse sources. 67stanzas 24-32 of "Requiem" are almost entirely devoted to consideration of garb. 68cf. "Le Jeu" of the Fleurs du Mai, with its verts tapis, the inspiration of which Crepet and Blin ascribe to an etching of Carle Vernet. We have already mentioned (see p. 162) the importance of cards, especially the valet de coeur and the dame de pique of Spleen. Is "Pluviose..." "Marriages" of queens and kings or of queens and jacks are a key feature of many games (loto. bouillotte), while the jack alone was of special importance in polignac which evolved from the old game of valets and enjoyed an immense popularity after 1830. (Burnand, Vie 1830. p. 142). 69QUOted by Lelioux (Histoire de Murqer. p. 29), who also gives the background we have summarized. 70Cf. Sainte-Beuve1s "Sonnet: Imite de Wordsworth": Je ne suis pas de ceux pour qui les causeries, Au coin du feu, l'hiver, ont de grandes douceurs... Oh! combien je prefere a ce caquet si vain... Ecouter le vent battre...et chanter ma bouilloire. (Joseph Delorme) Chapter VI General Conclusions 201 202 Mes premiers vers sont d'un enfant, Les seconds d^un adolescent, Les derniers a peine d'un homme — Alfred de Musset, "Au Lecteur" The present dissertation had as primary objectives (1) the cataloguing of themes and stylistic traits of a neglected volume; (2) the discovery of a comprehensive manner of interpreting the disparate pieces; (3) the situating of the poet among his contemporaries and amid the so-called "schools" of nineteenth-century poetry; (4) an evaluation of the ultimate worth of his verse. It seems clear that the poet was indeed, consciously or not, torn by the centaurian dilemma of simultaneous antithetic impulses, one toward the city and one toward the country. The chronology of the poems shows that despite the phases one can distinguish, in the middle years the poet sang the two domains by turns. It is possible to recapitulate, schematically, the antipodal visions: Pari^ Country realism manner_ . _ idealization, fantasy grisette of 20 heroine peasant girl of 16 artist-------- ---------------- (leisured) sparse room . decor--------pasture, meadow winter ----s£a, son------ summer ironic, mocking mode (tone) naif, smiling 203 Pari£ (con't.) sophistication _____(theme) isolation, exile- indifference — materialism — (theme) (theme) (theme) Country innocence fraternity tenderness (amitie) charity fire: death or illusion swallow: in constancy elemental motifs _ land. stability azure: permanence biological motifs blue flower: immor tality Murger found nothing in the city to celebrate in the straightforward way he sang the "Bees," the "Etrennes" exchanged with his "Cousine Angele," the friendly veillees of "Le Dimanche Matin," the faithfulness of Ramoneau. That there is a sharp dichotomy between the two modes is evident. Yet to see the country as an antidotal revery to a harsh, real, urban world would be to venture hazardously into the area of biography. It should be remembered, first, that such a dichotomy may be the result of a willing attempt at antithesis. As Aloysius Bertrand put it, "L'art a tou jour s deux faces antithetiques, medaille dont, par exemple, un cote accuserait la ressemblance Paul Rembrandt et le revers celle de Jacques Callot."^ Bachelard similarly maintains that the chief virtues of any decent poet spring from the "dialectics" he entertains.2 Murger's essays may have had, therefore, an aesthetic rather than a psychological rationale. Or perhaps the idealized vision of nature is less an escape from uncomfortable realities 204 than the mere legacy, even inadvertently adopted, of bucolic poets like those of the Pliiade. Still more, Murger's "real" Paris, be it that of a happy Bohemia or of miserable artists, is often just as mythic in its concept as the countryside, even when there is the exterior decorative realism of objects depicted. Even if one grants that Murger's visions of city and rustic life are equally distorted, it cannot be denied that there is a constant dualism in the attitude the poet adopts in exploring the two fields of inspiration: when he envisions the bourgeois sipping tea or the biographer "Qui, pour une pistole ou deux, consentira/A m'appeler cretin, poete,— ou scelerat," there is in the mordant satire a mundane air which is neatly distinguishable from the candid and sincerely respectful attitude the poet maintains before rustic minstrels—-or even a flock of ravens. In Murger's own terms, he is now Voltaire, now "jeune Bluet." A salient aspect of his sensibility is the joining of the "esprit positif" with the "esprit romanesque" a curious trait which, as Albert Cherel points out in discussing Fenelon, was a characteristic of the eighteenth- century mind.3 There was within Murger that antagonism between the spiritual and the scientific which marked the literary debate between the followers of Baudelaire and those of Leconte de Lisle, a debate that arose at the very moment when the Nuits d'hiver were being published: f 205 "Qje Parnasse]...veut tenter d'integrer la poesie au mouvement intellectuel contemporain, alors que precisement, dans le meme temps, Baudelaire proclamera 1'incompatibility de la poesie avec l1esprit positif, et c'est a Baudelaire que donnera raison 1'histoire ulterieure de la poesie. Although he had not their erudition, Murger was often, in the urban verse, a detached observer like the Parnassians. Given, then, the basic contradictions in his own sensibility, Murger's work does hold together, thanks to its very duality. Throughout the volume, there is the omnipresent, obsessive theme of innocence, until with the swallow-like girl's lack of innocence at one end of the spectrum, and the white-frocked peasant at the other. And yet, innocence being the prime requisite of immortality, it is, in the last analysis, the question of, or quest for, immortality, which is the master-theme of the Les Nuits d'hiver. The thread running from the urban motifs of ecoulement to the fleurs d'azur is the one along which most of the pieces in the collection should be strung. When we consider the poet against the multi-colored background of his century, it is well to recall Valery, who rightly warned (in his Mauvaises Pensees). "II est impossible de penser avec les mots comme Classicisme, Romantisme, Humanisme, Realisme. On ne s'enivre ni ne se desaltere avec des etiquettes de bouteilles.Yet in a 206 century which ran the gamut from classicism to symbolism, it is difficult to discuss any poet's qualities without resorting to the handy labels generally received among critics. Murger, like several of his autobiographical prose heroes, was strongly attracted to romanticism: Romantic were many of Murger's themes: nearly every volume of romantic verse had its "Jour des morts," a vein to which Murger added very little with his "Ultima spes Mortuorum"; the nocturnal visit of Death, described in "Le Desespere," was also an over-worked topic. Along with the preoccupation with death, that of the dispossessed, especially the exile or the struggling artist, was common place; and we have seen in Chapter III that there is a cycle of pieces in Les Nuits devoted to solitary figures. Such wanderers were to a certain extent a reflection of the mal du siecle. which had its roots far back, in Rene, in Werther, in Saint-Preux.7 Long before the success of Faust in France, diabolical literature had been part and parcel of romanticism, and every Romantic poet did his "Tournee du Diable." Yet the figure Murger depicts as the envoy of the Devil seems to have as much of the familiar chemineau as of the Devil;8 yet Murger refuses to SanS b anetei xe pxtanxex vuiuiuc uu xumau. C'etait une de ces oeuvres dont se passion- nait il y a une quinzaine d^annees la portion du public qui aime a se laisser entrainer dans les recits de 1'imagination.8 207 incorporate into his "Jour des Morts" the various Sabbath creatures and the ivy-covered ruins in which the Romantic poets revelled. That the poet, even in his most romantic flights, is basically a moralist, is substantiated by his attention to the moral fall of the village in "La Tournee du Diable" and to human forgetfulness in "Ultima Spes Mortuorum." If Murger's works embrace a few romantic themes, so do they adopt one of the two major tendencies in manner or tone: "D'un commun accord," asserts Pierre Martino, "on y [dans le terrain du romantisme]] distinguait deux provinces, deux ecoles. selon 1'expression du temps, c'est-a-dire en realite deux grandes tendances: l'ecole intime et 1'ecole pittoresque.1,9 Given Martino's definition of pittoresque, it is clear that Murger is diametrically opposed to those of the school of color; where they are bombastic, he is humble; where they are stylistically reckless, he is prudent; where they are, indeed, pittoresque. he is moral. Gautier had thought himself a "flamboyant en face des grisatres"; Murger was the grisatre facing the flamboyants. Finally, with regard to romanticism, Rene Wellek has pointed out with clarity that there are three rather consistent hallmarks of writers of the first generation of the nineteenth century: "imagination for the view of poetry, nature for the view of the world, and symbol and myth for poetic style.Further, he sees all three of these aspects of the school as "part of the great endeavor to overcome the split between subject and object, the self and the world, the conscious and the unconscious."^ If we assume that the "natural view of the world" which, as Wellek mentions, involves a "post-Swedenborgian" or "pan-psychic" view of nature— that found in Balzac's Louis Lambert, in Nerval and Quinet, and in Hugo's "La Satyre" or "Le Sacre de la femme" (La Legende des siecles). ^ — Murger' s pieces exhibit few of the typical elements of romanticism and ignore the ultimate goal of the romantic; for even when he invests nature with life, he. the poet, remains conscious amidst it, never losing his own identity. Using David Ferry's terms from his Limits of Mortality, we may say that Murger approaches nature as a "sacramentalist," that is to say, as a stranger seeing signs of immortality, rather than as a "mystic" who truly experiences immortality. Romanticism gave way, in prose, to realism, a term not generally applied to any particular group of poets, but sometimes useful in discussing various movements having connections, more or less strong, with the tenets of positivism. Under such a pretext, movements like the "art for art's sake" cult of Gautier, the "pagan school" of Menard and Bouilhet, and Leconte de Lisle's Parnasse have all been compared, in some aspects, to realism. While Murger lacked the classical, even archeological, erudition 209 of the poets just named, his work, because of its frequent ironic observation, is to a certain degree, positivistic. It has been seen, moreover, that his syntax is often quite straightforward, almost that of prose. "Au Lecteur," "A une Dame inconnue," and "Le Testa ment" all recall observations made by the realist of Les Scenes de la Vie de Boheme and Les Vacances de Camille. What is curious is that the realist's field of vision is so limited. Of politics, of government, of pressing social problems, there is nothing, unless it might be a few lines of "Les Emigres": Aux ouvriers de la patrie Le labeur refuse le pain: Car le progres de 1'industrie Fait chomer l'outil dans sa main... Quand il vient pour offrir ses bras On montre a l'homme une machine Qui travaille et ne mange pas. These lines are exceptional, for in general, like Musset, he avoided serious contemporary problems, political ones above all others. As the author of the Spectacle dans un Fauteuil said in his versified "Dedicace," Je ne me suis pas fait ecrivain politique, N'etant pas amoureux de la place publigue. D'ailleurs, il n'entre pas dans mes pretentions D'etre l'homme du siecle et de ses passions. The upper classes are equally absent from Murger's "real" world. "A Ninon" and "Dame inconnue" each seem to be written for a lady a cut above a grisette. but not much; she is a worldly courtisane, it appears. Anyone familiar with the novella, Stella, or the story, Madame Olvmpe. 210 knows that the writer, ill at ease in aristorcratic milieux, is plagued by stylistic awkwardness and faulty character development when he attempts to deal with the beau monde. His fondness for the "Clodions you hang on the wall" led him to describe interiors almost as thoroughly as might a Balzac or the Goncourts,^ while precluding any vaster scope. The devotion to the hearth and the tea-kettle, which are in most of the urban poems, is but one of the many bourgeois tendencies of the poet who feigned scorn for bourgeois values. Robert Burnand informs us on middle- class ideals during the July Monarchy: La robe de chambre est maitresse en ces temps ou 1'ideal se resume pour beaucoup en un bon feu, une atmosphere douillette, le cercle lumineux de la lampe, le ronron de la bouillotte, un ournal sur le gueridon, un pot It will further be noticed that in the Bohemian life which the poet purports to recreate, the seamy side is consis tently soft-pedaled. No drugs, no tobacco (not even a cigar-smoking heroine), few references to alcohol. Extra marital love is an important part of the poems as it was of society, yet it is never brought to life in physical terms. Thus is Murger's "realism" limited, turned inward toward the hearth and subservient to various moral and spiritual considerations. The mode of poetry born shortly before the publica tion of Les Nuits was eventually to be called symbolism. 211 Murger was even further from this polymorphic "school" than from any of those already discussed. Symbolism has always been the forte of the "religious" poet? such a poet— like Baudelaire, whose double postulate was in fact some sort of Heaven and Hell— has the capability of creat ing, during an intense period of "meditation" or inspira tion, vivid, effulgent imagery. Even were Murger capable of reflecting on a putrifying carcass, he would not have dwelt long enough upon it, not had he the richness of imagination to find in it, as Baudelaire did, (1) a lubricious woman, (2) an opening blossom, (3) a rolling "sea" of maggots, and (4) the universal music of water and wind, and of the winnower's basket. Murger lacked, first of all, any acute religious impulse. The mental dilemma of Baudelaire (and to a certain extent of Verlaine and Mallarme also) being vertically suspended, as in a sort of abysmal Piranesian staircase*-® between hope and despair (or light and darkness, or eternity and temporality, or beauty and ugliness) is not critically enough perceived by Murger. Second, he seems artistically unsuited to con template at length and to explore in depth the possibili ties of any given image.^ Murger speaks often of the hearth but fails to capitalize on the aspect of the hearth which is the richest in poetry— the flame itself. He is fond of birds, but with the exception of the swallow, their function is primarily 212 "picturesque"; and in any case, Murger misses the most important aspect of avian imagery, the vision of flight, the thrust of wings. As Jean-Pierre Richard points out insistently in his Univers poetiaue de Mallarme. it is the sudden vertical action of flight that confers vigor on a good number of the symbolist's poems.1® This is confirmed by Bachelard, who also maintains that the creatures Murger dwells upon, those that flit or hop, moving like butter flies, constitute the most impoverished sector of the "air imagination," whose primary inspiration is the volonte d‘envoi: "Dans le monde veritable des rSves, ou le vol est un mouvement uni et regulier, le papillon est un accident derisoire.The only bird image in Les Nuits which has at all enough richness to approach "symbolic" quality is that of the migratory birds depicted in "Les Emigrants": Comme l'oiseau qui se rassemble Par triangles ailes dans l'air, Des que son frileux duvet tremble Au premier frisson de l'hiver, Chaque jour par cent et par mille Nous partons... The sight of birds falling into or already formed in triangles, a symbol of ardor and wisdom, has been explored in more detail, and more effectively by such varied writers as George Sand ("Appendice" to La Mare au Diable). Lautreamont (the first pages of Maldoror), and Montherlant (Les Celibataires). As he neglected the essential aspects of the poetry of fire and flight, Murger failed (from the 213 standpoint of the imagination) in celebrating the country side, to exploit the land— the physical earth— as, say, Zola and Giono were to do. It should be remarked, finally, that "symbols," for disciples of Gautier and Baudelaire, meant outer signs or correspondances of the interior world, and that their symbols, from a technical standpoint, were to some extent metaphors with the first term omitted.2® In Murger, metaphors do not cross realms, nor is the first term ever left out. As a result, the reader of Les Nuits seldom has the pleasure of the "discovery" of the meaning of an image, nor of the "recognition" of an allusion. For example, in "Si Tu Veux Etre la Madone," the poet promises his muse that he will render her more beautiful than Fornarine— who was, he prosaically tells us,— "La maitresse de Raphael." Murger was not an essentially religious poet; his positivism always restrains his romanticism. In part, the lack of religiosity may explain what would appear to be an impoverished imagination. His work contrasts sharply with that of the symbolists and, for like reasons, with that of Victor Hugo.2! Yet Murger was primarily a chanteur. and it is not fair to ask of him the same qualities one would ask of a symbolist poet. "La chanson est gaie, legere, amoureuse," as Banville has said.22 Estranged from the romanticism of seven-league boots by his moderation and dislike for sensational effects, 214 estranged from realism by his limited scope of vision and his distortion within that scope, aesthetically opposed to the dense imagery and concentrated form of symbolists, Murger, the poet, seems to defy classification . Indeed, despite the various influences we have noticed in the course of our study, Murger's verse seems to have a certain independence. He borrows the "Cueillez..." theme from Ronsard, but proscribes from Les Nuits d'hiver the unabashed pagan eroticism of the Vendomois.23 What is even more inconceivable is that the author of Les Nuits appears totally independent of the most influential poet of the century, Victor Hugo. Even the great Banville avowed, in presenting his Trente-Six Ballades ioveuses. "...je me sens en moi une sorte d'orgueil d'ouvrier, en venant restituer un genre de poeme sur leguel Victor Hugo n'a pas mis sa main souveraine...il nous a laisse si peu de chose a tenter apres lui."24 The only volume of Hugo's having much affinity with the work of Murger is Les Chansons des rues et des bois. which postdates Les Nuits d'hiver. If certain of Hugo's bucolic modes recall the ideals of Murger— as, for example, the divination of the peasant girl, Jeanne, in the octosyllabic quatrains of "La Nature est pleine d'amour," Ta grace est un rayon charmant, Ta jeunesse, enfantine encore, Eclaire le bleu firmament, Et renvoie au ciel de l'aurore — the frequent political and social commentaries, the 215 hyperboles of "Ordre du Jour de Floreal," and the gauloiseries of "Jeunesse: Dizaine de Femmes" Jadis Venus sur la greve N'avait pas l'attrait taguin Du jupon qui se souleve Pour montrer le brodeguln suffice clearly to distinguish Hugo from Murger. Aloof from the major "schools" of his day and from Hugo, Murger is best described by a label from another epoch: he is basically classical, and classical from many standpoints. He is first a moralist, in the common sense of the term, for a distinct bourgeois morality is behind the inquiry into innocence. There is a rather explicit panegyric of the peasant girl. But the poet is also a moralist in the French sense of moraliste. for he relegates the reality of "things" to a secondary role, his prime interest being in psychological considerations. With the exception of those poems deliberately studying the artist and his difficult calling, the majority of pieces, especially the love poems, avoid questions of real existence. Auerbach points out (in his essay, "The Faux Devot."25) that one never knows in classical pieces just what professions or trades the heroes practiced. And so it is in Les Nuits d'hiver. We presume from their morality and from what we know of the poet's life, that the narrator is a poet and his mistress a working girl, but Murger does not say so. If the girl is a grisette, 216 is she a modiste or a fleuriste? Musset always was precise on such matters; Murger seldom is. How did the rich undle of Valentin ("A Ninon") acquire his fortune abroad? What was the occupation of the dying roue who makes out his "Testament?" What do the personages of either the urban or rustic pieces really look like? Above all, Murger is classical because, whatever the vein he works, what he says is said with propriety. The vocabulary of Les Nuits is as devoid of slang terms and terms evoking the nude body (sein,flancs) as it is of terms depicting work in the fields (soc. charrue). As in matters of vocabulary he steers a middle course between the learned on one hand and the vulgar on the other, with regard to form the poet seeks to avoid the obtrusive by steering a course between the epic and the epigrammatic. It seems, with a few exceptions, to be his aim not to shock, not to offend. From an aesthetic as well as a moral standpoint, then, Murger is clearly possessed of a temperament that is at heart classical. We have discussed here and there Murger1s affinities with various contemporaries, especially Banville, Sainte- Beuve, Musset and Heine. It is the last two poets that the Parisian poems of Les Nuits d'hiver particularly recall, through the wistful, macabre irony common to Murger and them. Yet a definitive placing of Les Nuits d'hiver in the broad spectrum of writings found in the 217 mid-nineteenth century requires a value judgment: which are the best pieces in the volume, the ones by which one should seek to categorize the collection? Contrary to the opinion of his contemporaries, whose judgment was perhaps influenced by their friendship with the poet, and who were as a result most smitten by the macabre and pessimistic p o e m s ,27 a modern reader might prefer the familiar bucolics in which the poet, shunning the mythological trappings borrowed from Chenier, Horace, and Ronsard, sings of innocent love (or innocence alone) in a decor that is vaguely Ile-de-France: "Dimanche Matin," "Ma Mie Annette," "Cousine Angele," "La Menteuse," and the prose poem, "Marie Berthe" typify the manner. These are the works which seem to us the most basically poetic, because the poet's inspiration seems spontaneous, sincere, and immediate, in contradistinction to the ironic musings of other pieces. By virtue of these poems, Murger belongs in the same famille spirituelle (to use Sainte-Beuve1s convenient term) as Auguste Brizeux (1803-1838), Maurice de Guerin (1810-1839), Hegesippe Moreau (1810-1838), and Arsene Houssaye (1815-1896). Despite minor differences, all the poets of this "spiritual family" have in common several characteristics: (1) the insistent return to the joys of childhood, as if to a "Paradise Lost" or "Anterior Life"; (2) the celebration of an adolescent, fraternal or filial affection which seems to compensate for the absence of parents in these "orphans"; 218 (3) the calm and usually joyous lyricism of brief pieces— often dialogued— expressing delicate thoughts amidst the throbbing pulse of a vibrant, minute nature; and (4) a constant spiritual elevation which admits nothing base. The judgment of Saint-Ren£ Taillandier on Brizeux might well apply to the whole group: Brizeux n'appartient pas^seulement a la Bretagne; il appartient a la France entiere, a tous les coeurs Spris du bien et du beau, a tous ceux gui savent gouter la delicatesse des sentiments, 1’elevation de la pensee, le charme et la melodie du langage. II y a dans notre poesie du XIXe siecle des imaginations plus variees, plus eclatantes; il n'en est de plus pures. Connaissez-vous beau- coup de poetes qui puissent se dire a l'heure supreme: "Je n’ai chante gue la religion, la patrie, l1 amour de la nature et de l'art, les meilleures, les plus saines emotions de l'ame humaine. Jamais je n'ai prSte ma voix aux accents du desespoir, aux seductions de la volupte, aux entralnements de l'orgueil. Epurer les coeurs et consoler les ames, c'etait la toute ma poetique."28 Barbey d'Aurevilly terms Maurice de Guerin "ce reveur O Q triste, chaste et doux, mais si personnel..."^ Sainte- Beuve, speaking of Moreau's "purs et irreprochables" Contes a ma soeur. underscores certain qualities which also mark Moreau's better poems: "On y voit a nu le fond de son ame et de son imagination aux heures riantes et aux saisons heureuses. Tel il etait aupres de sa soeur, i a seize ans, avant d'avoir laisse introduire dans son ame rien d'amer et d'insultant...La pitie, le sentiment fraternel port6 jusgu'au culte, la compassion feminine la 219 plus exquise, respirent dans le Gui de chene.1 1 3^ In short, the same terms recur frequently in the writings of critics on each of the poets in the famille spirituelle: delica- tesse. bon gout, purete. elevation, bonheur. chastete. ame pure de seize ans. One may seek to compare Murger1s rustic songs with only certain works of Brizeux, Guerin, Moreau, and Houssaye. In Brizeux, it is in Marie, the Ternaires. the Histoires poetioues. and Cycle, and not in the epic Bretons or the dialectal Telen Arvor. that one will find the measured expressions of friendship and love that resemble Murger's; in Houssaye, one must consult La Poesie dans les bois. Le Foin et le ble. and Les Paradis perdus. not the Lesbian modes of the verse play, Sapho. nor the Cent et un sonnets, which are often as learned in inspira- O I tion as irregular in form; in Moreau's Mvosotis. the distinction between the political mode ("Vive le roii"; "Diogene") or the Bohemian mode ("Nicolas"; "Un Souvenir a l'Hopital") and the manner which interests us, is clear.32 Finally it is primarily by his Correspondance litteraire33 and a few verse pieces like Au Grillon that the author of Le Centaure can be related to Murger. The title of Houssaye's collection, Les Paradis perdus. underscores the notion common to all our poets, that one's native hamlet, his mother's voice, his cherished river, his first love, are all part of a blissful childhood 220 toward which one would return, if possible.jn La Poesie dans les bois. Houssaye offers advice "Aux Poetes" to leave Paris to become rejuvenated by a return to familiar provincial haunts: Fuyez ce vain renom qui se paie a la ligne, Aller reposer votre esprit Au bord de quelque bois, au pied de quelque vigne, Ou Zeus, le grand poete, ecrit. Although in the opening piece ("Adieu a Paris") he had foreseen difficulty in evoking the "Visions tant aimees," Houssaye triumphs in "Les Vingt Ans retrouves": Lorsque je vais revoir la fontaine qui coule, Le bois et le ravin ou tout chante et roucoule, L'herbe drue et fleurie ou dansent les amants; La pervenche, oeil des bois, que le buisson protege, Le soleil qui sur l'eau seme des diamants, Je revois mes vingt ans dans leur divin cortege. (Houssaye's mention of the pervenche recalls that delicate blue flowers are important for him, as they were to Murger and the author of Mvosotis. The pastoral scene called "Les Moissoneurs" Q<e Foin et le ble^ has an animated debate between the peasants, Hyacinthe and Suzanne, on whether or not to pick a bleuet: "Rien qu'a voir un bleuet," says Suzanne, "je me sens tressaillir.") Moreau's famous elegy on "La V o u l z i e , " 3 5 like his "Souvenirs d'Enfance," is a clear wish to return to the hope-filled days when the poet was a school-boy. In "Un Jour" (Marie), Brizeux maintains that we all have in our distant memory, a day that stands out as more beautiful than all the others and is irretrievable— Mais qui survit dans l'ame et dont le souvenir, Delice du passe, charme aussi l'avenir: Jour d'innocente joie et pur de tout nuage, Dont une amitie douce a marque le passage...36 The piece before the last one in Marie, entitled "Le Retour," does indeed sing of all the signs which pacified the Armorican bard on his return from Paris; in addition to the islands, vallies, ponds, and woods, he would conjure up a vision of the blue-eyed girl he loved when he was twelve: Entends aussi ma voix qui te chante, o MarieI 0 tendre fleur cachee au fond de ma patrie, Montre-toi belle et simple, et douce avec gaite... Viens sous ta coiffe blanche et ta robe de toile... And the poem to "Marie" which begins, "Un jour que nous etions assis au pont Kerlo," illustrates all the themes: the delicate concept of nature, the chaste, fraternal vision of love, and the longing for a return to a happy childhood.37 Murger, disowned by his father, had found solace in his "Cousine Angele;" Brizeux, whose father died early, composed affectionate verses for the man who taught him Virgil, the curate of Arzanno, as well as for Marie, the "ange du Moustoir," and for his mother (there are two poems in Marie entitled "A ma Mdre"). The tender letters which Guerin wrote to his sisters (especially to Eugenie) 222 from La Chenaie and Paris have become well known in recent years, as has the poem, "Ma soeur Eugenie"; Elle aimait mes reves Et j'aimais les siens Divins; Et nos heures brieves Passaient sans temoin Au soin De faire l’echange De biens entre nous Si doux... (Part III) Moreau, a natural son who lost both parents at an early age, addressed tender letters as well as verse to his "sister," (Madame) Louise Jeunet, whom he loved from afar,3® and to Madame Guerard, who received as one year's sole etrennes, the lilting "La Fermiere: Romance": Amour a la fermiere! elle est si gentille et si douce! C'est l'oiseau des bois qui se plait Loin du bruit dans la mousse; Vieux vagabond qui tends la main, Enfant pauvre et sans mere, Puissiez-vous trouver en chemin La ferme et la fermiere. There are, of course, differences in temperament and circumstances between the writers of the famille spirituelle we have suggested. Moreau and Houssaye, by occasional but virulent anticlericalism, are as distinguishable from Murger as are Guerin and Brizeux by their professions of faith. And while Guerin and Brizeux made poetic use of their respect for the sea, while Moreau sang the valley of the Voulzie, Houssaye the brooks of Champagne, Murger's nature was rather devoid of water, as we have observed. 223 Brizeux and Moreau often tend more toward the elegy than the "song," which we have found to be Murger's pre ferred form. (It is in fact because Marceline Desbordes- Valmore and Barbier remain in the sober, post-classic realm of elegy that they, among other poets, have been excluded from our "spiritual family.") But anyone familiar with the bantering dialogue of "Le Chemin du Pardon" (Marie), which recalls Murger's "Menteuse," knows that Brizeux 39 worked many veins beside that of the elegy. Then too, all the poets in the group— except Murger and Guerin— were capable of mild gauloiseries. In a piece whose title is the same as that of a prose collection of Murger's, Houssaye, for example, offers a hand-bridge to a young girl who is picking cherries— so that he might see "Le Dessous du Panier" (Cent et un Sonnets. L). If Moreau is fairly coarse in certain Parisian poems (like "L'Amante timide," "Les Modistes hospitalieres," and "Le Joli Costume"), his better bucolic verse ("Sur la Mort d'une cousine de sept ans," "Souvenirs d'enfance," "L'Incendie") remains pure; in Brizeux, the "licentious” pieces are but accurate vignettes of provincial morals and manners.4® All in all, the differences seem less salient than the affinities. By their tendencies to idealize the countryside and the peasantry, but their desire to remain on elevated, optimistic spiritual planes while seeking delicate manners of expression, these writers form a 224 neglected literary school, the continuation of which would be found in later poets such as Francis Jammes and Juan Ramon Jimenez. Taking into account all his verses, Murger must remain in the support ranks, far behind luminaries like Hugo, Vigny, and Baudelaire. As Barbey d'Aurevilly has said, "il n'y a que deux Ecoles, ou pour mieux parler, „ .*41 deux Vocations en poesie, les Volontaires et les Inspires. It must be avowed, by the number of borrowings, by the dearth of imagery, by the slenderness of a volume that represents a life-time of poetic output, that Murger was not an "inspired" poet, but a "worker." The vein he worked was decent and, in the better verse at least, genuinely lyrical, at a time when decency and lyricism were not p a y i n g . His classical tastes, his ultimate propriety and measure, constitute the weakness as well as the charm of Les Nuits d'hiver. for one sometimes wishes that the author had pushed his themes to their end, and gone "Any where, Out of this World." But it is futile to condemn Murger for what he is not. He cones through as a decidedly secondary poet, but as a poet who occupies a respectable place among a small group that, taken together, expressed a significant "moment" in French poetic sensibility. Moreover, Murger has been unjustifiably neglected as a poet; and even if he were not the interesting minor poet he turns out to be, it would still have been necessary to establish what the 225 relationship of his poetry to the rest of his work is. It is our hope that the present dissertation has done just that. 226 ^■"Preface" to Gaspard de la Nuit (p. 39). 2See supra, pp. 82-83. 3pe Telemaaue a Candide (Paris: del Duca, 1958), see pp. 8-9. ^Henri Lemaitre, La Poesie depuis Baudelaire, p. 19. ^Cited by Rene Wellek, "Romanticism Re-Examined," in Concepts of Criticism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1963), p. 202. ^Les Vacances de Camille, p. 23. ^See Potez, L'Elegie en France, p. 288. ®Robert Burnand (Vie 1830. pp. 164-65) says that the sight of the nomadic chemineau on the highway was common. Wending his way in search of odd-jobs from "village to village, from farm to farm, sleeping as chance would have it, in a barn, a hayloft, a ditch," the "pauvre diable de vagabond...faisait peur, avec ses vetements crottes a toutes les boues du chemin, sa barbe longue et ces facons d'arriver le soir, en mSme temps gue les ombres, ef'de frapper a la porte pendant la veillee. Du coup, les conversations s'arretaient, les belles histoires, les chansons." 9Parnasse et Svmbolisme. p. 6. l^Having asserted that Sainte-Beuve and George Sand best exemplified the ecole intime. Martino maintains that Hugo's Orientales best define the ecole pittoresaue: "...couchers de soleils...fonds de ciel tout en or sur lesguels se profilent d1imaginaires villes d'Orient; des nuees de feu y galopent a travers l'espace; des incendies s'allument sur l'eau; des pavilions aux couleurs eclatantes se refletent dans la mer...Tous les rythmes s'y essaient, anciens et nouveaux...Le vers et la strophe s'enflent ou se rapetissent..." (Parnasse et Svmbolisme. p. 10.) H"Romanticism Re-Examined," p. 161. l2Ibid.. see pp. 218-19. l2See "The Concept of Romanticism," in Concepts of Criticism, p. 173. 14"Balzac est peut-etre moins un grand anatomiste physiologigue gu'un grand peintre d'interieurs. Il me 227 semble parfois qu'il a plus observe les mobiliers que les caracteres." (Goncourt, Journal. 6 oct. 1861.) 15Vie 1830. pp. 91-92. l^See Georges Poulet, "Baudelaire and the Real World," in Baudelaire, ed. Robert Kopp (Geneva: Skira, 1969) pp. 130-31. ^Barbara Seward maintains, debatably, that one of the main differences between a symbol, on the one hand, and a metaphor or simile, on the other, is that "a literary symbol contains within itself a multiplicity of meanings and can therefore be employed to suggest either a complex of concordant ideas or a fundamental harmony beneath apparent discords. Beyond this, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts." (Symbolic Rose, p. 3.) Murger's metaphors seem only equal to their original counterparts, and seldom go beyond that. l®See also Jean-Paul Weber, Gen<Sse. who says (p. 237), "...ce qui interesse MallarmeT ce n'est point la forme apparente de l'oiseau, qu'il ne decrit presque jamais, ni son chant...mais bien son mouvement, son vol..." (p. 231). "II est un^mouvement— vertical et, par la, approprie, apparente a l'oiseau et a l'aile— auquel Mallarme temoigne une dilection singuliere: le mouvement de chute." ^Quoted from L'Air et les sonqes by Michel Mansuy in Gaston Bachelard. p. 236. 20see, on the pre-symbolist nature of Gautier's imagery, Pierre Martino, Parnasse et Svmbolisme. pp. 19-20. 2^Henri Lemaitre sees Nodier, Nerval, and Hugo (especially) as precursors of the symbolists: "Hugo enfin, l'enorme Hugo, par le dechainement de l'ivresse verbale, mais aussi, et peut-etre surtout, par la liberation des puissances de l'antithese epique et symbolique, a pu porter son langage et son rythme jusqu'a figurer efficace- ment l'inoui dont le romantisme avait cree la tentation sans toujours en decouvrir le langage." (Poesie depuis Baudelaire, p. 16.) 22See supra, p. 176; p. 198, note 49. 22The sonnet for Marie, "HaJ que ie porte et de haine et d'envie...,' and the "Stances" for Cassandre, "Quand au temple nous serons...," both were reproduced by Sainte-Beuve in the Tableau. 1838 (see II, 11, 35), yet they seem not to have affected Murger at all. 228 24p0gsie completes. II, 348. 25see "The Faux Devot." in Mimesis (Garden City, New Yorks Doubleday, 1957), esp. pp. 323-26. 2^The two innocuous occurrences of the word sein (1, 63) hardly constitute an exception, as they refer to a maternal and to a virginal bosom. 2^See the various critical Etudes appended to the Nuits d'hiver. 2®"Notice sur Brizeux," in Oeuvres (4 vols.; Paris: Lemerre, 1884), Vol. I, p. 6. Sainte-Beuve says, similarly, "Son bon gout autant gue sa pudeur l1avertit frequemment de choisir entre ses emotions, ou m&ne de se taire et de se voiler." ("Brizeux et Auguste Barbier," in Portraits Contemporains Q vols.; Paris: Garnier, 188^], II, 223.) Barbey d'Aurevilly speaks of "la modestie du poete et la chastete de son talent...un talent d'une delicatesse presque fragile..." ('^Brizeux," in Les Poetes geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 196(y, pp. 76-77.) 2®"Maurice de Guerin," Poesie et Poetes (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1968), p. 154. 30"Hegesippe Moreau," Causeries du lundi (15 vols.; Paris: Garnier, n.d.) XV, 68. 31we have counted, in the Cent et un sonnets. 41 different rhyme-schemes; 17 rhyme schemes begin with rimes embrassees in the initial quatrains although the first and second quatrains may differ from one another (ABBA BAAB); 15 types are based on crossed rhymes in the quatrains; 5 types employ combinations of couplets (the arrangement of Sonnet LIV is AABB CCDD EFF EGG), while only 2 types depend upon "continuous rhyme" (Sonnet LXXX is arranged AAAA BBBB CCC DDD. Sonnets IV and XIV rhyme AAAA BBBB CCD DEE). Some of Houssaye's crossed-rhyme sonnets may have been written early enough to have influenced Murger, but most have the ring of the mature, "pagan" poet. ■^Moreau's multiple inspiration was much like that of Murger: "Trois^imitations chez lui sont visibles et se font sentir tour a tour: celled^Andre Chenier dans les iambes, celle surtout de Barthelemy dans la satire, et celle de Beranger dans la chanson." (Sainte-Beuve, "Hegesippe Moreau," p. 63.) S^Barbey d'Aurevilly, explaining that "[Andre Chenie^, le poete du fini par la mieux la langue des vers, 229 qui est le langage du fini, fjtandis que GuerinJ] le poete de 1'infini, parla mieux la langue de la prose, went on to state flatly that "la prose de Guerin est infiniment superieure a ses vers." ("Maurice de Guerin," pp. 162-63.) 34In the first three of a group of essays entitled Mvth. Dreams, and Mysteries. Mircea Eliade points out that nostalgic and idealized recollections of childhood, dreams of an "anterior life," and meditations on the "noble savage" all spring from the same fundamental mythic revery of a glorious beginning. Prom the notion that things were— or will be--somehow better at the outset comes not only the ancient myth of the Golden Age, but also modern rites such as New Year's celebrations and housewarmings, all of which celebrate an "incipit vita nova" (p. 28), a new (and better) life which is beginning. It is interesting to compare the rather pagan sensuality of Baudelaire's "J'aime le souvenir de ces epoques nues" (Fleurs du Mai. V) or Auden's "Wandering lost upon the mountains of our choice" (In Time of Wart Sonnet XXVIII) with the "recollections" in Murger's group to see once more how the latter poets— inspired by essentially the same psychological impulsion as the former two— stay within the safe confines of (dis torted) biography and remain wholly decorous in treating the "retqrn." (In Eliade's Myths [New Yorks Harper and Row, 1967J, see Chapter I: "Myths of the Modern World," esp. pp. 33-34; Chapter II: "The Myth of the Noble Savage or the Prestige of the Beginning," esp. pp. 39-43; Chapter Ills "Nostalgia for Paradise in the Primitive Traditions," esp. pp. 67-72.) 3^Mais j'aime la Voulzie et ses bois noirs de murs, Et dans son lit de fleurs ses bonds et ses murmures. Enfant, j'ai bien souvent, a 1'ombre des buissons, Dans le langage humain traduit les vagues sons; Pauvre ecolier reveur, et qu'on disait sauvage, Quand j'emiettais mon pain a l'oiseau du rivage L'onde^semblait me dire: "Esperei..." (Oeuvres completes, ed. R. Vallery-Rabot 2 vols.; Paris: Lemerre, 1890 .) 3®A11 quotations from Brizeux are from the 1884 edition simply entitled Oeuvres (4 vols.; Paris: Alphonse Lemerre). 3?Un jour que nous etions assis au pont Kerlo Laissant pendre, en riant, nos pieds au fil de l'eau... C'etait plaisir de voir sous l'eau limpide et bleue 230 Mille petits poissons faisant fremir leur queue, Se mordre, se poursuivre, ou, par bandes nageant, Ouvrir et refermer leurs nageoires d'argent; Puis les saumons bruyants; et, sous son lit de pierre, L'anguille qui se cache au bord de la riviere; - Des insectes sans nombre, ailes ou transparents, Occupes tout le jour a monter les courants, Abeilles, moucherons, alertes demoiselles... Bien des jours ont passe depuis cette journee, HeIasi et bien des ansi Dans ma quinzieme annee, Enfant, j'entrais alors; mais les jours et les ans Ont passe sans ternir ces souvenirs d'enfants... 38in his "Introduction" to the Oeuvres completes of Moreau, R. Vallery-Radot gives many letters; their general tenor is typified by the opening of an undated letter sent from Paris to Madame Jeunet, who lived near Provins: "Grand merci, ma soeur, de vos excellentes dragees; mais vos lettres, que vous accusez de negligence, sont pour moi mille fois plus delicieuses. Apres un travail penible, apres des demarches inutiles, vous ne pouvez vous imaginer combien il est doux de trouver au logis quelque chose de ma soeur, de la seule personne qui m'aime." (I, 75.) 39consider for example the verve of the pastoral "Chemin du Pardon": Un ieune homme: Ou courez-vous ainsi, pieuses jeunes filles, Qui passez deux a deux sous vos coiffes gentilles? Ce tablier de soie et ce riche cordon Disent que vous allez toutes quatre au Pardon. Une ieune fille: Laissez-nous, laissez-nous^poursuivre notre route, Jeunes gensi Nous allons ou vous allez sans doutei Et ces bouquets de mil au bord de vos chapeaux Disent assez pourquoi vous vous faites si beaux. Un ieune homme: Eh bien! tout en causant, Gait, si bon vous semble, Jusqu'a Saint-Matelinn nous marcherons ensemble;... Une ieune fille: Non! Suivez votre route, et nous suivrons la notre: D'un cote les gar^ons, et les filles de l'autre... 40"Les Pelerins" (Cycle. I, ii) is typical of Brizeux' charming treatment of earthy peasant mores. 4^Quoted from Les Oeuvres et Les Hommes by Gerald Antoine, Joseph Delorme, p. LVI. 231 42ln an essay of 1851, Sainte-Beuve excused himself for having not devoted more of his recent criticism to poetry, in particular, on the grounds that "les productions de ces derni&res annees ont ete faibles, surtout dans l'ordre lyrique, la meme ou l'on avait vu le plus de nouveaute et de richesse il y a vingt ou trente ans. II semble qu'apres l'heure de^l1eclosion et celle de^ 1'epanouissement, on soit a une fin de saison ("Hegesippe Moreau," p. 51)." Appendices 232 233 APPENDIX I Selected Vocabulary The bulk of the Murgerian stock of words is listed below to facilitate the verification of comparisons made or suggested in the preceding chapters. One may wish to check the key terms of other poets (for example, gouffre. abime, amer. tenebre, words dear to Baudelaire) with their frequency in Murger's verse. The list comprises nouns, adjectives, and verbs; those which occur in adverbial locutions (rabais in au rabais, prix in a tout prix) have not been counted, nor have a number of terms in each category whose use is primarily (or often) functional. Similarly, many of the frequent verbs denoting (1) movement, (2) perception, (3) physical attitude, or (4) 'static' gestures, have been omitted, as have (5) the commonest auxiliaries. Exemplary of exclusions in each of the three classes would be the following terms: Substantives Adjectives Verbs le dernier premier (1) aller/venir (tous) les deux quinzieme (2) entendre/voir celui ce (3) s'asseoir/attendre le mien mon (4) prendre/porter appeler/dire (5) avoir/Stre pouvoir/fa ire Each entry is followed by a number or group of numbers indicating the first page of the poem from which 234 the entry came. To facilitate the reader's translating of poems to pages, a Table of Contents precedes the word-list. (The three titles in brackets were not included in the Table of any edition.) Where a word appears several times in a single piece, the total number of instances is given, following the page number, in parentheses. On rare occasions, the grammatical part of speech is denoted by an abbreviation in parentheses to eliminate confusion (usually over homographs). 235 Table Sonnet au lecteur .................................... 1 Dedicace de la Vie de Boheme.......................... 3 A Ninon .............................................. 7 Ophelia............................................... 11 Madrigal............................................. 15 Chanson............................................... 17 Renovare............................................. 19 Le Requiem d'amour................................... 23 La chanson de Musette................................. 35 Au mur de ma cellule................................. 39 La chanson d'hiver................................... 41 La jeunesse n'a qu’un temps........................... 45 La dimanche matin..................................... 51 Ma mie Annette....................................... 57 La menteuse........................................... 63 Les abeilles......................................... 67 Les corbeaux......................................... 71 Le chien du braconnier............................... 75 Marguerite........................................... 83 Printaniere........................................... 87 A ma cousine Angele................................... 91 Antithese............................................. 95 Le plongeur........................................... 99 Au balcon de Juliette................................ 101 Pygmalion............................................ 103 La rosee............................................ 105 A Helene............................................ 107 A une etrangere....................... ..............109 [Trainant, trainant ta chetive existencej .......... .111 A G. D. .......................................... 113 Si tu veux etre la Madone............................ 115 Le vin bleu.......................................... 119 A. une dame inconnue..................... 121 MCelui-la, dont je veux dire la triste fin] . . . . . .127 Qlais Chenier n'est pas le premier qu'il ait luj. . . .133 Lettre a un m o r t .................................... 137 Ultima spes mortuorum................................ 143 A la fontaine de Blandusie.......................... 151 A un adolescent...................................... 155 Les emigrants........................................ 159 Courtisane.......................................... 165 Le testament........................................ 169 La ballade du desespere.............................. 175 236 (abaisser) aigu 23 abaisse 71 aigue 95 (abandonner) aiguille 51, 121 abandonnant 127 aiguillon 101 abandonnent 71 (aiguiser) (abattre) aiguisant 101 abat 67 aile (n.) 35, 91(2) (aborder) ailes 51, 87 aborde 51 ailee (a.) 113 (aboyer) (ailer) aboie 75 ailes 155, 159 (abriter) aimer 41 abriterai 175 aima 23, 35, 127 abeille 67(7), 83 aimais 23(2) abimes 143 aimait 23, 127 abri 159 aimant 83, 143 abondance 71 aime 15(2), 45, (accepter) 151, 169 acceptant 151 aimeriez 7 acclamation 137 aimes 35 accord 113 aimons 45(4), 143 accordeur 121 ainee 63 accouplement 165 air ("song") 23(4) accoutumee 95 air ("sky") 35, 51, 67, (accrocher) 87(2), 127 (2 X accroche 39 155, 159 accueillir 51 air ("demeamor") 35, 51 (acheter) aise 51 achete 1 (ajouter) achete 165 ajouta 165 (achever) alarme 75 achevent 23 albatre 151 acier 67 alcool 165 acre 165 alcove 51, 83(2) adieur 35, 143, 175 allees 143 adieux 67, 101 alerte 17 (admirer) Allemands 23 admire 115 (allumer) adolescent 151, 165 allume 67, 95, 113 adoree 7, 35 allumee 87 a f fame 127 almanach 35 affames 71 almee 169 affamee 71 alouette 51, 101 affreux 137 amandier 51 Africaine 169 amant 63, 95(2), age^ 23, 57' , 75, 155(2) 105, 165 ages 159 amants 67, 143 agile 51 amante 103, 151, 155 agonie 143, 151 amantes 143 a'ieules 159 Amarillys 127 aigre 165 ambassadrice 87 237 ambition 137 antiquite 133, 155 ambre 95 (apitoyer) ambree 7(2) apitoie 165 ame 101, 113, 121(2), (appareiller) 143, 155 appareille 67 ames 143 apparition 155 amere^ 119, 169 (apprendre) ameres 143 apprend (s'apprSter) 127 ami 1, 3, 51(2), 75 amie 57, 121, 127 apprSte 155 amis 35, 137, 143(3), apprete 155 169 (approcher) (amonceler) approche 71, 87 amoncele 95 aquarelle 169 amour 7, 15(2), 17, 19, 23 arabesque 95 (5), 35(2), 39, 41 arachneen 23 (3), 67(2), 105, 107, (arborer) 113, 127(2), 151(2), arbore 45 155, 165(2), 175 arbre 109(2) amours 7, 17, 23(2), 35, arbuste 109 54, 57, 115(2), 155, archange 109, 137 175 archet 23 Amour 101 architecte 169 amoureux 23, 57, 105, 151, architecture 101 155 ardents 169 amoureuse 23 arene 133 (amuser) argent 1, 67, 127 amuse 40 argente 23, 159 Amymone 133 armoirie 75 an 23, 57, 87, 91, 127 armoiries 169 ans 7, 15, 39, 45(2), armome 105 67, 75, 91(2), 127 (arracher) ancetres 127 arrache 127 ancienne 7 art 3, 101, 113, 137, anciens (n.) 57 175 (and see obiets) ancien (a.) 35 artiste 101, 103(3) ange 83(2), 91, 155, 175 Asie 23 Angele 91(10) asile 95, 115, 127, 143 Anglais 169 aspect 165 angle 175 (aspirer) (Ancrleterre: see point) aspire 109 animaux 71, 175 (astre) animer 103 astres 159 anima 103 atelier 159 animant 143 Athene 133, 155 anneaux 17, 19 athenien 103 annee 35, 87, 109, 127 atmosphere 121 Annette 57(5) a tour 83 annoncer 143 atours 23 annonce 75 atre 40, 67, 87, antique 1, 23, 91, 103, 133, 169 95, 121 238 (attacher) barbare 7 attachee 151 barbe 115 (atteindre) BarSme 127 atteint 71, 101 barriSres 119 attiedi 71 bas 83 Attique 127 basse 15 (attirer) basse (n.) 23 attire 11, 101 basse-cour 71 attires 71 bassin 19, 151 aubaine 71 baton 3, 159 auditoire 67 battements 87 (augmenter) (battre) augmente 87 bat 17, 23, 137 aurore 67, 83, 165 battant 57 austere 95 beau 7, 11, 23, 35, 57, austeres 155 75, 127, 133, 151(3) auteurs 155 155 autel 115, 151 beaux 7, 17(3), 35, 51, autels 113 57(5), 109, 127, (avancer) 155 avance 3, 11 bel 51 avant-poste 71 belle 3, 7, 19, 35(2), avenir 41, 43(2), 175 45, 57, 91, 107, aveugle 91 115, 133, 151, 155 avril 19, 67 belles 17, 45, 175 azur 17, 23 beaute 45, 99, 103, 169 (azurer) bee 71 azure 51 beche 51 bedeau 169 belements 151 baccarat 121 Bellini 121 bagatelle 91 beni (a.) 1, 35 baigner 105, 151 benite 83(2) baigneuse 151 benir 143 bains 23 benie 143 (bailler) benis 91, 155 bSillant 51(2) ben it 107 baiser 91, 115(2), 151 bercees 143 baisers 35, 127(2), 155 besace 159 baissSe (a.) 105 besides 23 (baisser) besoin 121 baissons 7 bete 7 bal 23(2), 39, 41, 63, 169 biche 67 balancer 169 bien (n.) 75, 169 balcon 23, 101(2), 155 biens 107, 169(2) balustre 101 bien-aimee 169 banal 165 bien-etre 41 banc 127 bijou 11, 63, 91, 99 bancs 127 bijoux 169 bandeau 99, 127 billets (de faire part) 169 bandeaux 83 biographe 169 bise 95 239 bises 143 bosquets 35 (blafarder) bouche 7(3) , 15, 23, 119 blafarde 165 137 blanc (n.) 83 boudin 41 blancheur 23, 115 boudoir 19, 121 (blanchir) (bouillir) blanchi 71 bouillira 41 blanchis 75 bouquet 40, 63(2) blanchit 71 (bourdonner) Blandusie 151(2) bourdonne 67 blason 113 bourgeon 87 ble 107 bourgeonner 67 bles 133 Bourgogne 119 blesse 169 bourreau 115 bleu 51, 119, 143, 165 bourse 91 blessure 101 boutique 1 blond 7 bracelet 23 blonds 17 bracelets 39 blonde 11, 57, 91, 99(2), braconnier 75 151 braise 41 (blondir) brancard 51 blondissant 23 branche 51(2), 67, 87 bluet 107 (branler) bluets 17 branle 57 bocage 151 bras 23, 103, 127, 151 boeufs 51, 71 155, 159(3), 175 Boheme 3 bravos 151 bohemien 3 brelan 1 boire 127 brevetee 169 boirons 35, 41 (briller) bois 175 brilla 11 boit 121 brille 67 buvais 35 brise 75(2), 151 buvalent 119 (briser) buvant 133 brise 23, 75 bois 19, 23(3), 35, 57, brisSe 105 75, 91, 165 brodequins 23 boiteux (see Grand) broder 121 boiteuse 95 brouillard 71, 159 bon 1, 51(2) , 71, 75 bruit 41(2), 51(2), 143 (4), 83, 155 brumeux 143 bonne 51, 75(2), 107, 127 (brun) bonnes 40 bruns 109 bon (n.) 121 brune 57 bonbons 91 brunes 23 bond 169 bruyantes 119 bondissant 151 bruyeres buche 67 bonheur 23(2), 41, 87, 127 41, 95 bonjour 51 bucher 87 bonnettes 159 buee 71 bord 11, 51, 119, 133 buis 51 240 bure 127 cave 169 burin 1 caveaux 175 (buriner) ceinture 175 burinant 95 celebrant 41 burine 40 cellier 1 but 109, 127 Cellini 91 butin 67 cellule 39 cendre 35, 87, 95, 143 cendres 23, 41 cabaret 119 Cendrillon 23 cacher 155 cent 169(2) cachee 151 cents 1 cadavre 175 cercle 23 cadeau 91 cercueil 127, 137, 143 cadeaux 51 certain 19 cahiers 127 certaine 121 Caire (le) 169 (cesser) calcinees 67 cesse 113 calendrier 35 cesse 51, 165 calmes 137 chaise 155 cambres 23 chale 23 Camille 127 chambre 19, 23(3) campagne 51 chambrette 35, 51 campagnes 159 champagne 23 canevas 121 champetre 105 cantil^ne 155 champs 17, 159, 169 capitale 169 chanson 17, 23, 35, 51, 57 capitaux 169 chansons 67, 133, 155 Capitole 137 chant 3, 87, 155 caprice 23, 95, 99 chants 45 caprices 41 chanter 23, 41, 121, captive 99 151, 155, 175 cara mia 7 chanta 57 (carcasse) chantant 83, 91 carcasses 71 chante 11(2), 51(2), (caresser) 95, 99, 101 caresse 23, 39, 41, 103, chante 83 151 chantent 155 caresse 151 chantais 23 carillon 41, 127 chan ta it 23 carmin 83 chantaient 23 carnaval 35, 41, 169 chantons 23, 45(3) Carrare 1 chantres 133 carreaux 41 chapeau 23, 57, 67 carriere 7 chapelet 95 cas 7 charbon 41 cascade 23 chardon 107 (casser) chardonneret 41 casse 75, 121 charmante 35 cause 67 charrue 41 causes 23 chasse 115 241 (chasser) chasse 75 chasse 143 chasseur 71 chStiment 165 chatte 121 chaud 75 chauffant 23 chausse 23 chef-d'oeuvre 23 chemin 3, 15, 83, 105, 127(3), 143, 175 chemins 137 cheminee 87, 175 chene 51, 67 chenes 63 chenet-sphinx 95 Chenier 133 chenil 169 cher 41, 175 chere 7(3), 23 (2), 35(2) chercher 99, 63(2), 115, 143 cherchaient 19 cherchant 105 cherche 165 cherchee 137 chetive 111 cheval e chevet 169 cheveux 11, 17, 23, 39, 83, 109, 151, 159, 169 (2) chevre 151 chevreau 151 Chevreuil 169 chevrons 75 chien 75(3) , 121, 175 chiens d'elite 75 chiens de race 75 chiffonner 169 chiffre 75 chignon 165 chimere 103 Chine (see encre) choeur 23 chose 155 choses 45, 127 chreme 143 Christ 143 Christine 19(3) chute 151 choisir choisi choisle choisis choisissez choisissons chomer cigale cigales ciel 23, 127, 165 75 23, 45 115, 137 51, 155 23 159 67, 83 133 11, 19, 23, 51, 87, 105, 109(2), 113, 127(2), 133, 137, 143(4), 155, 159, 169(2) cieux 109, 155 cimes 133 cimetiere 23, 127 ciseau 115(2), 137 (ciseler) cisele 23, 91 clair 11(2), 35, 151 claire 169 claires 11(2), 19 clameurs 57 clarte 95 classe 91, 127(2) clavier 121 clef 35 clefs 175 clerge 169 client 169 climats 159(2) Clinias 133 cloche 87, 127(2) clocher 57 clochers 143 Clodion 39 (clore) clos 95 (clouer) cloue 169 clou6 39 club 121 code 7 coeur 7, 15, 17, 23(6), coeurs cognee 35, 39, 91, 103, 107, 111, 113, 115, 119(2), 127(2), 137 143(2), 169 143(2) 67 242 coin 19, 121, 127, 143 coq 51 col 23 coquets 23 colere 23 coquette 11 co11ateraux 169 coraux 99 college 127(3), 155 corneille 67 colline 23, 151 corps 103, 121, 127, 151 colombes 159 corset 63 coloree 67, 113 cSte 95, 151 comete 1 cou 165 commande 169 coucher 127 (commencer) couche 169 commence 95, 144, 159 couches 143 compagnie 121 couler 137 compagnon 91 couleurs 105 compagnons 3 coup 11, 75(2) compere 75 coupe 133 complies 57 (couper) (composer) coupes 91 composai 23 couple 113 compromettre 121 (cour) compter 7, 127 une cour 23 compte 87 courage 3, 45, 159(2), 175 concupiscent 169 courant 11 (condamner) couronne 17(2), 63, 107, condamne 7, 121 115, 143 conduire 127 . courre 75(2) conduisait 143 courir 23, 35, 121, 127 (confier) courGmes 23 confie 169 cours 127 connaitre 121 courts 7, 127 connait 133 cousine 91(10) connu 127(3), 133 (couter) conseil 155 coutait 91 (conseiller) coutume 41 conseille 169 (couvrir) (consentir) couvre 91 consentira 169 craindre 143 (conserver) craignant 83 conserve 91, 127, 151 crainte 41 constell€e 133 craintive 141 (consumer) creature 35 consume 41 creche 41 conte 67 creer 137 (contenir) * cree 121 contenu 91 crepe 23, 127, 143 contenus 35 crespeles 23 content 51 cretin 169 contents 23 (creuser) conter 15 creusa 137 contours 115(2) creusera 137 convaincus 143 creuset 7 243 creux 165 denouer 151 cri 41, 121(2) depart 35 cris 3, 87 depecher 57 cristal 11, 23, 87, 151 (depenser) cristaux 119 depense 15 croisSe 51, 57 depeupl&es 159 croix 127, 143 (depouiller) croque-mort 23 depouillez 155(2) croyant 127(2) De Profundis 23 croyait 127 derisoire 175 cruelle 23 derober 155 cueillir 11, 17, 99(2) derouler 23 cueille 99 descendre 71, 137, 143 cueilli 41 descendu 137 cuirasses 45 deserte (a.) 127 culte 137 deserts (n.) 159 cure 57 desirs 155 curieux 67, 133 d£solees 143 cygne 151 (dessiner) cynique 165 dessine 169 Cypres 169 destin 45, 109 destinee 165 dette 7 dame 121 deuil 23, 35, 127, 143 danser 57(2), 91 169 dard 101 deux 19, 23(3), 87, 113 (dater) (6), 121(2), 127, date 101 137(3) debauche 19, 51 Deux-Amis 159 debauches 165 devait 57 debris 39 deviner 137 decembre 23 devine 23, 151 deception 143 devine 155 dechirer 169 (deviser) dechire 127 devisent 57 (decouvrir) devis 169 decouvert 169 diable 91 decouvrirez 169 diademe 133 deesse 103, 133(2) Dieu 23, 35, 57(2), 75 defiants 71 (2), 83, 91, 107, (deflorer) 113, 143(2), 159, deflorez 155 175 defunt 7 dieux 103, 115, 133 defunts 23 dimanche 35, 51(6) deguise 41 diner 121 (demeurer) discobole 151 demeure 169 discretion 169 (dent) (discuter) dents 75 discuteraient 155 delicieux 67(7) (disparaltre) dentelle 23, 63 disparaissent 159 disparalt 143 244 disparus 23 echeveau 121(2) (dissiper) echo 63 dissipe 87 echos 41 distraction 121 eclair 67, 87 distraire 109 £claircie 69 divan 23 (eclairer) divin 103, 137, 155, 169 eclaire 95 divine 95(2) , 107, 115 eclairent 23 divinites 113 eclatant 91 dore 63, 151 eclats 23, 91, 95 doree 7, 127 ■feclore 39 dormir 41, 51, 137 eclore 45(2) dormant 75 £close 17 dorment 51 ^closes 51 dormirons 143 ecoliers 91, 127 dors 175 Sconome 1 dort 51, 95, 143 Ecosse 121 dortoir 155 £cot 175 dos 159 (eerier) double 133(2) Scriant 127 douce 151 6crie 143 douleur 105, 143 ecrin 99 douloureux 119 ecrins 155 doux 41, 87, 127(2) ^crire 127 douce 23, 83(2), 91 ecrit 7, 23, 155, 169 douteux 121 ecrivais 23 drap 57 Scrivait 7 drapeau 45 ^crivant 23 drapeaux 57 6cu 1, 7 (dresser) §cuelle 75 dresse 75 ecume 159 dur 57 ecumer 41 dure 7 ecuries 169 duvet 159 (effacer) duvete 41 effa^aient 23 efface 109 effeuille 17, 41 eau 7, 11 (2), 41, 83(2), effleurer 83 159 egal 7 eaux 11(2) , 23, 67, egare 63(2) 71, 151 eglise 114 ebauchee 137 eglogue 133 (ecarter) €go*isme 41, 143 ecarte 23 (egrener) Schange 19 egrenent 95 (echanger) elegamment 23 echanges 15 (elever) (echapper) 6leve 127 echappe 151 elite (see chien) echappes 91 eloigner 127 echelle 155 ^loigne 109 245 elu 169 (enhardir) emaille 23 enivre (emaner) enivrent emane 113 (enlever) (embarquer) enleve embarqua 159 ennui 109, embarquent 159 ennuis (embaumer) enrhume embaume 155 (ensemoncer) embaument 91 ensemonce (embrasser) (ensevelir) embrassant 35 enseveli embrasses 143 ensevelie embrassez 23(2) ensommeilles (emerveiller) (enterrer) emerveille 67 enterre (emigrer) enterree emigrant 159(2) enterres emoi 19, 35 enthousiasme (emouvoir) (entrainer) emeut 137 entralne emouvait 137 entrainee emouvant 127 entresol (emporter) (entr'ouvrir) emporte 23 entr1ouvre emporteras 175 (envelopper) emporteront 143 envoloppait (emrunter) enveloppe emprunte 1 enveloppe (encadrer) envie 111 encadraient 23 (envier) encensoir 113 envie enclume 51 envieux encre de Chine 169 envoler endorml 51 envoie endormie 57 envolees (endormir) epagneule endort 137 epais enfance 91, 127 epaisse enfant 3, 11(2), 51(3), 63 (epaisser) (2), 127(3), 151(2), epaissait 155, 159(2), 165(2) (ipargner) enfantin 155 epargnes (enfermer) epaule enfermons 41 epeler epele enflammee 95 (enfler) Epicure enflant 57 epier enfuir 71 ^pistole engager 7 epithalame £pitre engourdis 41 41, 133 23 127 121, 127, 165 39 121 71 23 23 23 23 35 23 137 67, 99 83 87 159 23 7 107 , 137(2), 175 127 107 35, 143 91, 151 159 75 165 107, 119 41, 95 143 23(2), 155 127 127 155 143 7 155 7 fabuleuse 133 feuillage 95, 109 faience 119 feuille 87 faim 127 feuilles 63 faite 133 feuillet 127 falaises 159 (feuilleter) familier 41 feuilletant 23 familie 89, 91, 127, fiancee 105 159(2) fideles 143 families 51 fier 51 (faner) fievre 39, 75 fane 17 fievreux 137 fane 39 fifre 23 fanee 63, 109 figure 101, 103 fanfares 45 (filer) fantome 23, 143, 155, filant 127 175 filets 23 fantomes 143 fille 83 farouche 119 fille (de joie) 165 (fatiguer) filles 51 fatigues 23, 165 fils 127 faucheuse 67 fin (n.) 75 (fausser) fin (a.) 63, 71, 75(2), fausse 121 127(2) Faust 83 (2) fine 7 fauteuil 23 finir 51 fauve 121 fini 7, 23, 35, 169(2) faux (a.) 155 fioriture 23 faux (n.) 67 flacons 51 feconde 159 (flairer) feerique 95 flairent 71 felure 95 f lamme 11(2), 101 femme 11 (3), ' 127, 155 flammes 45 femmes 127, 159, 169 flanc 75, 159 fenStre 23, 87, 95 Flandre 23 ferme 51, 75(2) flanelle 107 ferme (a.) 127 flatte 1 fermes 121 fleur 11(3), 17, 23, 57 fermee 71 63(2), 67(2), 105 (fermer) (3), 109, 121 ferma 7 fleurs 17(2), 39, 45, 51 fermais 23 57, 67, 75, 133, fermee 105 143, 151(2), 155 festin 63 fleurie (a.) 155 fete 35 fleurir 39, 41, 45 fete 40, 57, 137 fleuri 19 fStes 127 fleurirent 23 jour de fete 51, 57(10) fleuris 91, 127 fStide 23 fleurisse 23, 109 feu ("decede") 75, 119 fleurit 109, 113 feu ("fire") 137 fleuronner 67 feux 67(2) fleuve 11 247 flore 23, 95 fraternel 113 flotter 11 fraternelle 91 flottant 17, 151 fraude 165 flotte 23 (fredonner) flot 3, 11, 41, fredonneront 41 99, 151, 159 fremissement 23 flots 119, 151(2) frere 127, 169 flottants (a.) 57 frileux 41, 95, 107, 159 flutes 51 frileuse 23, 87 folns 57 frisson 159 fois 57, 75, 91, 113(2), 127 frissons (frissonner) 95 folle 11(3) frissonnant 143 folle 11 froid 57, 95, 127, folles 155 137, 175 fond 35, 41, 99, 119, 143 Froment 23 (fondre) front 11, 83, 91, 109, fond (melt) 23, 95 113, 115(3), 133, fonds (melt) 7 151, 155(2) fondu (melt) 7 (frotter) fontaine 19, 133, 151 frotte 51 fontalnes 155 fruit 1 foret 75(2) fuir 111 Fornarine 115 fuit 11, 151 forme (n.) 101 fuyant 39 (former) fuyez 39 forme 23 (fumer) forme 95 fume 95 formait 23 fument 159 formuler 137(2) fumier 81 fortune 7, 75, 169 funebre 143, 169 forum 133 funebres 143 fosse 127, 143(2) funeraire 23 fou 23 fusil 75 (fouiller) futaille 51 fouillant 35, 71, 133 futaie 67 (fouler) (futur) foule 127 future 71 fourmis 169 (fournir) fournl 41, 75, 169 (gager) fourrure 95 gage 144 foyer 23, 41, 75, gai 17, 23, 41 91, 137, 175 gais 41 fragile 159 gaSte 23(3), 35, 87, 91 frais 63(2), 75 falants 23 fraiche 11, 83, 151, 155 gamme 11(3) France 169 gants 39 franchir 143 (garder) (frapper) garde 35, 75 frappais 35 gSteaux 51 frappe 51, 67, 175 Gavarni 41, 87 248 geante 133 guide 155 gendarme 75 guider 115 genets 67 guides 115 genie 115 guipure 23 genoux 19(2), 103, 105, 161 gens 15, 41, 119, 169 gibier 75 habile 127, 169 girouettes 87 (habiller) gite 75 habillait 83 givre 41, 95 habille 51 glacees 143 habit 51, 127(2) (glisser) habits 57(5) glisse 95 habiter 159 gloire 175 haine 23 gordien 121 (hair) gosier 165 hais 169 gothique 23 haleine 165 grace 115, 127 hameaux 17 graminees 67 hangar 51 grand 3, 23(2), 35, 51, harmonie 143, 151 57(6), 67, 127, harmonieuse 113 133, 137, 143 hasard 3, 23, 45, 137 grands 91 hatives 165 grande 63(2) haut 23 grandes 87 hauts 133 Grand Messaqer boiteux 67 Hebrus 151 grand'voile 159 Helene 107 grave 23 herbe 11, 75, 105, 15 (graver) hereditaire 169 grava 113 heritage 127 (gravir) h^ritier 7, 137 gravissant 133 hermine 41, 95 gre 41, 45, 115 heros 133 grec 103 heure 17, 51, 101(2), Grece 151 121(2), 127(4), grelots 41 137, 155 grenier 51 heures 39, 107, 175 Greuze 87 heureux 7, 23, 111 griffon 75, 121 heureuse 23, 51, 83, griller 41 91, 119 grillon 41, 95 (heurter) grippe 121 heurte 143 gris 23 hie iacet 1 grise 115 hirondelle 35 grossiere 127 hirondelles 51 groupe 169 Hiroux (Hean) 165 (guerir) hiver 23, 41, 71, 75, guerirez 101 83, 87(2), 121, guerison 175 137, 159 guerre 71 hochets 39 gueule 75 homerique 133 249 hommage 151 (imprimer) homme 1, 7(2), 39, 57, 75, imprime 169 127, 143(2), 155, imprime 75 159i , 165 imprudent 127 hornmes 137, 169 impurete 83 honneur 121, 169 inanime 103 honore 165 incertaine 71 honteux 165 (incliner) Horace 133 inclineront 115 horizon 51 incompris 39 hospitalite 23, 175(2) inconnu 137 hote 95(2) inconstant 23, 151 houille 23 Indes 7 huile 23 indienne 23 huis 51 indigence 127 Hubert (saint) 75 indigente 126 humain 143 indigne 111 humains 113 indiscret 133 humaine 143 industrie 159 humble 19, 82, 105, 127 industrieux 67 (humer) infection 169 huma 7 infidele (a.) 45 humeur 45 infidele (n.) 35, 151 humide 99, 121, 137 infidelite 35 humilite 127 ingenus 151 hyacinthe 23 innocence 83 hymen 143 inquiete 119 hypocrisie 111 inquietes 143 insoucieuse 45 inspire 133 ideale 95 (inscrire) idoles 113 inscrive 1 idylle 27, 133, 155 instinct 151 if 137 instruments 137 ifs 143 insulte 137, 175 ignorant 127 (interrompre) (ignorer) interrompit 143 ignorant 165 invisibles 143(2) ignore 15 (inviter) Iliade 133(2) invitee 169 (illuminer) irise 95 illumine 95 ironie 143 image 115(2), 151 isole 159 immense 159 (isoler) immobile 103 isole 127 (immoler) isolement 137 immole 151 ivoire 23 immortalite 115, 175 ivresse 119(2), 165 immortelle (a.) 143 immortelles (n.) 143 impatience 155 250 jabot 23 Jacqueline 57 jaloux 103 jalouse 115 jardin 19, 23, 51, 109, 127 jardins 23 jaune 11 jaunes 95 jaunis 67, 133 (jeter) jete 67 jetons 23 jette 23, 51, 111, 113 j eune 7, 39, 57(2), 87, 133(2), 151(2), 155, 159 jeunes 51, 127 jeunesse 15, 23(3), 35 (2), 45(5), 91, 175 jeux 121, 127(2) jolie 23 jouer 155 joug 51, 83 jour 1, 17, 23(3), 71, 87, 91, 95, 127(4), 137, 143(2), 151, 165 jours 7, 17, 19, 35, 39(5), 63, 87, 91, 101, 127(3) journee 35, 51, 175 jouvenceaux 23 joyeux 23, 67, 97, 91, 159 joyeuse 45, 119 joyeuses 57 juin 67 Julietta 155 Juliette 101 j umeaux 113 justice 165 keepsake 91 labeur 83, 159 laboureur 127 laid 57, 169 laide 57 laine 121 laisser 127 laisse laisses laissez lambeaux lamentable lamenter lampe langage langoureux large larme larmes las lasse latin laudatif laurier laurlers lavis Lazares lecjons lecteur leger (leguer) legue lent lesblennes leste (lever) levers levre levres libations (liberer) libere liberte libre libres Her lieu lieux (lieue) lieues lievre limiers limpidite limpides linceul linceuls 15, 87 137 19, 63 23 121 95 95 83 23, 67 143 105(2), 169 23, 67, 109, 143(2) 51, 175 143 155 23 137 91 169 143 155 1(2) 121 169 105, 127 151 23 87 17, 39, 41 19, 23, 143, 169 151 127 127(2), 151 127 51 41 23(2), 83, 95, 103, 119 19, 83 87 75 75 83 23, 151 39, 127 143 251 linge 1 main 7, 11, 19(3), 23, 1ingot 7 91, 103, 105, 107 liqueur 119, 127 (2), 115, 127, lire 127, 155 133, 137(2) lu 190, 133, 169 mains 17(2), 23(6), 51, lis 23, 45, 105(2) 113, 127(2), 137, lisse 7 151 lit 11, 35, 91, 127, maintien 121, 169(3) 133, 137(2), 143 maitres 127 livre 41, 127(3) maltresse 23,45, 115, 155 livres 169 165, 169, 175(2 locataires 87 mal 23, 155, 165 (loger) maux 175 loge 91 malade 165 loisir 127 malheur 109 long 23, 95 malheureux 101, 143 longs 11, 17, 87 malsain 127 lorsque 39 malsains 165 Louise 19(3) malsaine 71 lourd 71, 155 maman 64 loyers 87 manche 23 lueurs 23 mander 169 lugubre 143 manger 35 (luire) mange 127, 159, 17! luisant 75 manquer 169 luit 75 manquait 137 lumiere 67 manque 119 lumieres 165 manteau 11, 155, 169 lumineux 23, 41, 113 manteaux 95 lune 35 marais 75(2) luth 151 (marauder) (lutter) maraudons 75 lutte 151 marbre 1, 103, 115 luttez 137(2) (4), 151 luxe 23 marchander 1 lyceen 127 (marcher) Lyde 133 marchant 3, 105 lyre 113(2), 133, marche 3, 51, 111, 137 113 marche 175 marchent 3 machine 159 marcher 23, 127 madame 7, 101, 121(2) marchez 23 Madone 115(3) marguerite 17 madre 75 Marguerite 83(2) madrigaux 23 Marie 19(3), 115 magister 127 (marier) mai 19, 45 mariaient 23 maigre 127, 165, 175 mariee 63 252 marine 11 metal 165 marmite 41 metier 165 (marquer) meubles 35 marque 1 Meudon 23 marquent 75 meurtris 3 marronnier 57 meute 23, 75 Mars 67 midi 127, 169 marteau 169 Midi 87 martyre 111 mie 57(6), 175 mate 23 miel 67(7), 133, maternelle 91 169 matin 23(2), 35, 41, 67, Mignon 109(3) 105, 127 mignonne 15, 63 matinal 95, 105 milieu 11, 127, 151 matinale 51, 57, 83 mille 87 matrone 1 million (oncle) 7 mauvais 45 mineur 23 (m^chant) ministere 169 mechants 35 minuit 51, 175 mScontent 57 miracle 103 m^decin 169 mirer 11 medecins 165 mirait 11 (medire) mire 11, 151 medit 107 miree 67 meilleur 75 mirez 133 meilleurs 101 miroir 83, 151(2) (mSlanger) misere 3, 45, 165, 175 mSlangent 165 miseres 119 (meler) mobilier 169 melant 101 mode 7, 23, 151 mele 57 modeste 23 melera 151 modigue moiree 1 meleront 151 23 (menacer) mois 7, 23, 41, menagant 101 51, 67, 87 menace 115 moisson 57, 107, 109, 159 mener 75 moissons 67 mene 175 (moissonner) menitrier 51, 57 moissonne 17 mensonge 141 moitie 87(2) mentir 143, 155 moities 175 mer 159, 169 moment 7 mers 87 monde 127(2), 143 mere 63, 127(4), 133, monsieur 169(2) 159' 165, 169 montagne 51 meres 143 (monter) merveilleuse 101 montait 23 messager (also see Grand) 41 monte 51, 71(2) messe 57(2) monte 133 mesurer 127 (montrer) mesurant 87 montrait 169 253 montrant 169 nacres 99 montre 169 nalade 151 Morale 169 maissant 121 morceau 23, 101 naitre 75, 121 morceaux 23 n£e 165 More 121 nes 121 moribond 169 nature 23, 35 morose 107 naturel 23 mort (a.) 23(2), 35, 95, navire 159 127, 137 navrer 119 morte 23, 35(2) Neere 133 (demi-morte) 105, 127 neige 41, 57, 71, mortes 19 87, 95, 155 mort (n.) 3, 127, 137, 143, Neobule 133, 151(4) 169(2) Nestor 155 morts 143(2) nez 75(3) Mort (pr. n.) 127, 135, 175 nid 41, 51, 87 mortuaire 143 nids 23, 155 mot 115, 165 Nil 169 mots 15, 23 Ninon mouche 67 (diminutives:) (mouiller) Nini 7, 87 mouillait 25, 41 Ninette 7(3) moulin 51 nocturnes 155 mourants 67 Noel 41 mourantes 143 noir 23, 75, 87, mourir 109, 119, 143, 127, 143(2) 169, 175 noirs 23, 83, 119, mort 7(2) 175 morte 19 noire 71 mousse 23, 67 nom 7, 35, 39, 93, 91 mouvements 75 109, 137(2), 151 mouvoir 133 (2), 175(7) meuvent 169 noms 133, 143 muettes 143 nommer 127 mur 17, 39 nomine 7, 121, 127 muraille 39 nommez 121 murir 159 nonchalant 11 (murmurer) nord 175 murmure 11, 23, 41, notaire 23, 169 87, 155 notes 23 murmures 143 nourrir 71, 159 murmurent 133 nourrissaient 67 muse 35, 95, 105, 133 nouveau 7, 11, 23(2), 51, musette 41, 57 67, 91, 109, 143 Musette 35(3) nouveaux 57 Myrto 133 nouvelle 165 mystere 155 nouvelles 41, 127 nouveau monde 159 novembre 95 254 noyer (v.) 119(2) oracle 17 nue 103 orage 3, 169 nues 133 oranger 109 nus 115 orbite 165 nuees 159 orchestre 23 nuit 11(2), 23, 51(2), 75, ordinaire 23 91, 95, 101, 155 oreiller 51, 57 nuits 7, 19(2), 23, 39(3) organdi 23 numerote 83 orgueil 137 nuptial 63(2) orgueilleux 51 nymphes 133 Orient 41, 87, 169 orientale 51 origine 15 objets (d'art) 169 orphelin 127(2) octobre 67 orthographe 169 obe'issant 99 os 71 occasion 169 (oser) Ocean 159 osait 83 odeur 57(2), 91, 165(2) oubli 7, 119, 137 odorante 109 (2), 143(3) odorants 23 oublier 8, 41, 119, 155 oeil 75, 143 oublia 105 oeufs 169 oublie 39, 119, 14: oeuvre 95(2), 103, 137(3) oublie 19(3) offrir 83(2), 91, 115, 159 oublies 41 offrirait 75 oublirez 91 of fre 175 oublieux 41 0 filii 87 ouest 175 oiseau 35, 51, 127, 155, outil 159 159, 169 outre 57 oiseaux 19, 67, 87, 155 ouverts 159 Olympique 103 ouvriers 159 ombrage 127 ouvrir 35, 107, 13' ombre 3, 19, 71, 105, 111,r ouverte 17, 23(2), 127, 143, 155 87, 127 ombres 143(3) ouverts 71 ombreuse 105 ouvre 83, 175(7) oncle 7(2) ouvrez 155(2) (and see million) ouvrit 155 onctueux 23 Ovide 155 onde 11, 41, 151(2) (onduler) ondule 23 pacotille 159(2) (ongle) pactoilen 41 ongles 95 pages 1 Opera 121 pain 35, 41, 45, 107, Ophelia 11 127, 137(3), 159 oppresses 23 (paltre) or 1, 11, 19, 23(3), paissant 151 51, 75, 99(2), 115, paissez 133 137, 169, 175(2) paix 105, 145, 155 255 palais 95, 99 parterre 23 pale 11, 19, 87, pas 23(3), 71(2), 127, 109 133, 137, 143, 155 palette 113, 137 pascal 87 p£leur 11(2), 23 passant 95, 101, 111, 121 palie 39 passage 169 palmes 137 passe 23 (palpiter) passee 51 palpite 169 (passer) (pamer) passant 91 p£me 23 passe 75, 175 pampres 67 passe 7 panache 75 passes 109 Pannychis 133 passions 155 panonceau 169 pasteurs 127 papier 23 pastorale 155 paradis 23, 51, 75, 83(2) pastorales 133 (paraitre) pa tee 75 paraisse 71 paternel 127 paralt 51, 87 patience 45 paraphernaux 169 patre 17 (pardonner) patrie 23, 159 pardonne 175 patronale 57 pareil 7, 75, 115 paupiere 51 pareille 1 paupieres 143 pareils 169 pauvre 7(2), 40, 57, 83, parents 143, 169 87, 91, 95, 127 (parer) (2), 137, 159(2), parais 35 175 pare 63 pauvres 39, 91, 143 paresse 23, 121 pauvrete 95, 175 paresseux 51 pavoisee 57 paresseuse 23, 51 payer 7, 175 parfait 23 payait 1 parfum 7, 23(2), 41, 91, paye 7 133, 143 pays 57(5), 109(3), 169 parfums 23, 109, 113, 165 pays 159 parfume 19, 121 paysage 23 (parfumer) paysan 127 parfuinait 155 peche (n.) 107 parfument 151 pecher 67 Paris 95, 121, 127(3), pedant 127 169 peine 23, 107 parler 109 peint 169 parle 15(2), 121, 127 peintre 109, 113(2) Parnasse 155 pelage 75 parois 95 pelerin 133 parole 23, 91, 137, 151 pelerins 87, 115, 143, paroles 19 pelerinage 159 part 35, 41, 143 23 partage 113 (pencher) 11(2) penche 256 penetrer 143(2) penetre 143 pensee 99 pensif 35 pensive 155 pente 67 perclus 159 perdre 107, 127 perdu 15, 165 perdus 35, 39 pere 51, 75, 127(4) perle 23, 99(2) perles 95 permettre 121 permettez 121 permise 101 (peser) pesait 143 petiller 41 petillait 23 petit 23(2), 25, 57 petits 51, 75 petite 23(2) , 41, 57, 165 (petrir) petrissons 45 peuple 67 piece 75(2) piedestal 115 pied 23(3) , 105(2), 121, 151 pieds 3(2), 7(2), 23(2), 101, 115, 127, 133 pierre 103, 143 pieti 91 pieux 143 piliers 115 (piller) pi lie 169 pillent 71 pinceau 113 pinson 17 pistole 169 pitie 109, 127 place 15, 137 plafond 95 plaindre plaine plainte plaintifs plisir 137 23, 67, 71, 75(2), 155 3, 95, 189 143 127(2) plan 169 planche 41 (planer) plane 39 plante 159 (planter) plante 23 (plat) plats 83 pl£b€'ien 127 plein 1, 19(2), 119 pleine 7, 19,23, 107 pleines 15, 17 (pleurer) pleurait 23, 105, 127,143 pleurant 127, 143 pleure 63, 111,121, 143 pleure 111, 175 pleures 109 pleurent 39 pleurez 137 pleurs 7, 111 plier 169 plis 23, 143 (plisser) plisse 109 plisse 23 (plonger) plonge plongeur pluie plume plumeau Plutus pluvieux poche poeme poesie 99 99(3) 23(2), 75 23(2), 115 169 91 121 51 23, 137 15, 175 poete 105, 113, 127, 169 poetes 115 poil 75 poison 127(2) pompeuse 127 point (d'Angleterre) 23 porte 23, 35, 175 portes 155 portee 75 portiere 169 portique 133, 155 portrait 1, 155, 169 poser 115(2) 257 pose 87 proclame 151 posee 127 prodiguaient 169 postSrite 1 (profiter) pot 57, 119 profitons 107 pouce 159 profonde 127 poudre 71 progres 159 poudreux 155 promener 57 poumons 165 promene 143 pourpre 175, 169 prophetes 143 pourpre 119 (prophetiser) pourpres 99 prophetise 111 poursuivre 143 propre 103, 169 poursuit 137 proprietaire 75 poussiere 39, 143 proprietaires 87 poussiere de riz 165 (proscrire) prairie 19, 133 proscrit 175 prairies 57 prose 107 preference 23 protecteur 115 (preferer) proue 159 prefere 151 Providence 107 prefere 165 prudent 75 preparer 115 prunelle 169 prepare 151 psaume 23 pres 17, 39 pudicite 155 present (n.) 91 pudique 1 presents (a.) 143(2) puissance 175 (presser) puissant 67 pressant 23 pur 23, 75, 93, 109, 115 presse 107 purs 115(2) (pressentir) pure 41 pressentant 121 putrefaction 165 prSt 35 Pygmalion 103 prete 35, 95 (prater) ^prete 1 (queter) pretres 103 quete 75(2) preuve 145 queue 75 prier 143 quitter 127 priaient 143 quitta 127 priant 83 quitte 87, 91, 127, prie 23 137 priee 63 priere 23 prieres 143 race 143 printanier 87 (and see chiens) printani'Sre 23 radieux 115 printemps 17(2) , 23(2), 35, rage 165 45, 67, 75, 87(2), (railler) 127, 169 raillait 23 prix 1, 87 raille 39 prochaines 63 raillerie 23 258 railleur 109, 143 (rajeunir) rajeunissais 23 ramage 51 (ramasser) ramasses 39 rameau 113 rameaux 145 ramee 105 Ramoneau 75(4) (ramper) rampe 71 rancune 35 rangs 159 (ranimer) ranimerait 105 Raphael 115, 169 rapide 67 rare 1 (rassembler) rassemble 159 rayon 23, 95, 165 rayons 51, 113 rayonnant 113 rSaliti 151 recevoir 121 (reclamer) reclame 99 reclusion 121 (reconnaltre) reconnaltras 35 reconnaitrez 169 (reconquerir) reconquis 15 (redescendre) redescend 51 redouter 165 reflet 11 reflets 23 refleurir 19 refrain 23, 41, 83, 165 (refuser) refuse 103, 159 refusera 35 regard 45, 75, 101, 111 127, 155, 165 regiment 7 (regner) regne 23 regret 23, 137, 14! (regretter) regrette 109 regrette 109 regrettes 109 regrettez 121 regulier 23 reine 99 reins 23 rejoindre 63(2), 1 (rejouir) rejouit 23 relache 121 relever 7 relevant 23 releve 95 reliquaire 39 reliure 11, 127 remercier 23 remplacer 127 remplir 41 renaitre 23 renaisse 109 rencheris 87 rencontrer 23 rencontra 133 rencontre 151 rencontre 155 rencontres 133 rendez-vous 19, 155 rendre 23, 35 rendu 15, 75 renouer 121 repandre 151 repand 107 repands 113 repas 75 (respecter) respecte 169 reposer 143 repos 121, 137 reposent 51 resista 165 (ressembler) ressemble 99 (ressusciter) ressusciterait 23 (rentenir) retenu 121 (retirer) retire 151 retouche 1 retour 35, 67, i 259 retraite 95 Romeo 101, 155 (retrouver) (ronger) retrouve 15, 23 ronge 165 retrouveras 35 rose 17, 19, 39 retrouvez 121 67(2), 107 r&vant 133 roses 23 reve 51(2), 37(2) Rose 17(4), 45, reves 39 roseaux 11(2), 151 reveil 51 rosee 105 reveiller 57 rossignol 41 reveillant 51 Rossini 121 reveille 67 roue 51 reveillez 57(5) rougir 151 reveillon rougit 87 (reveler) rouille 165, 169 revele 91 (rouler) revele 155 roule 11 (rever) route 3, 23, 127(2) revant 133 roux 165, 169 rSve 23 ruban 39 rSvons 137 rubans 51 reveur 133 ruche 67 reveuse 133 rude 75 reverdis 23 rudiments 127 riche 23, 83, 91, 101 rue 83, 95 richesse 67, 175 rugir 121 rideau 7 ruine 7(2), 19 rideaux 155 ruisseau 11(2) rigide 87 (ruisseler) rime 99 ruisselait 23 rire (n.) 23 (ruminer) rire 23, 51, 111 ruminent 51 rirez 15 ritournelle 91 rivage 3, 151 sable 11, 151 rivaux 151 sables 99 rive 11 sacre 133, 143 rives 169 sacree 113 (riz: see poussiere) sacrifice 151 robe 23, 35, 51 sage 155 robes 23 sages 155 roches 67 sagesse 155 (roder) saillir 95 rode 75 sain 169 (rogner)^ sainfoin 67 rogne 75 sainte 23, 91 role 155 (and see terre) romain 19 saint 143 roman 23, 109 (and see Hubert) romance 83 saintes 115 Rome 41, 115, 133 Saint-Jean 67 260 saison 45, 107, 155 senieur 107 salamandres 23, 41 senteurs 155 sale 83 sentiers 111, 113 salon 7 (sentir) salons 121 sent 95, 159 saluer 51 sentait 33 samedi 51, 169 senti 35 sang 75, 119, 137, sentions 137 151(2) sepulture 175 sangloter 7 sequins 169 sarrau 127 serrement 91 satyres 133 seuil 143 saules 19 seul 19, 35, 63, 127(3) sauvage 57 seule 63, 121, 127(2), sauveur 115 151 savant 127 seul (n.) 127 savoir (n.) 127 sexe 165 savoir 23, 127 Shakespeare 121 sachant 45, 137 siecle 127 sais 137 siecles 151 salt 111, 127 signal 127 saura 143 signe 7 sauras 111 silence 39, 143 savant 127 silhouette 71 savez 143(4) silion 159 sceau 115 sillons 51, 67, 71, 113 scene 127 simple 27, 83 scelerat 169 sirene 99, 155 (sceller) soeur 51, 63(3), 127 scelle 169 soeurs 105, 143 scle 67 soie 23 science 127 soins 121 (scintiller) soir 11, 19, 35, 39, 41 scintille 67 51, 57, 91, 105, sculpte 155 113, 119, 127, 133 (sculpter) 143, 151, 169 sculpt^ 159 sol 67, 95, 109 sculpture 101 solaire 95 sec 41 soldats 71 secouer 143 soleil 19, 23(2), 45(2), secouant 75 51(2), 75, 87, secret 155 109, 169 secrets 17, 127 solennel 143 seculaire 23 solitaires 143 seigneur 121 solitude 127(2) seigneur 7, 143(5) sombre 3, 143 sein 1, 63 sombres 143(2) semaine 23 sommeil 143 semaison 107 (sommeiller) semer 151 sommeille 67, 75, 95 semait 155 sommets 133 sons 121 statue 103, 115 songes 91, 143 steaple-chease 7 sonner 155, 175 Stella 11, 51 sonne 57, 127 strophes 23 sonnee 51 studieux 127 sonneront 143 suaire 143 sonore 19, 67, 121 subir 165 soprano 23 sublime 133 sottise 111 sucr£s 91 sou 1, 7, 87 sud 175 sous 169 sueur 95 souffle (n.) 87, 137 suivre 143, 175 (souffler) suivant 71 soufflait 23 suive 1 souffle 95, 165 suivez 39(2), 155 souffrir 15, 143 suivi 133 souffrance 143 suivie 143 souffre 137 suivit 127 souffrez 137 suivrons 137 (souhaiter) superbe 75, 105 souhaite 99 superflus 175 souhalts 127 supplie 151 soulever 113 (supporter) soulier 63 supporte 101 (soumettre) (supposer) soumis 159 supposez 121 (soupirer) supposons 121 soupirant 127 supreme 143 soupirs 101 sure 23 souple 23, 95, 169 sureaux 57 sourd 91, 127 surprendre 75 sourire (n.) 155 suprenne 133 sourire 15, 35, 51, 109(2), sursauts 75 119, 137 (survivre) souriais 23 survivront 143 souriait 23 (suspendre) souriant 23, 99 suspendu 151, 155 souvenir (n.) 17, 23(2), 35 sycomores 143 (2), 119, 143 sylphe 105 souvenirs 41 sylvains 133 souvenir (se) 127, 137 symboles 39, 113 souvenez 19(3), 91 Syracuse 133 souvenue 35 souviens 91 souvient 127 table 95 souverain 137 tableau 3, 115 souveraine 99 tache 75, 119 spectre 23, 111 taille 169 sphere 95, 103, 113 tailler 121 spirale 95 tailleur 169 splendeur 23, 103, 155 taire 155 talus 95 262 tambourin 63 tonnelie 35 tapis 1, 23 (tordre) (tarder) tord 95 tardais 169 tordait 95 tardif 71 tordus 165 Tarentine 133 (toucher) temoigner 121 touchaient 19 temple 103, 113, 151 touches 91 temps ("time") 23, 35, 41, 45 tour ("turn") 17, 51 (5), 143(3), tours ("deeds") 35 51(2), 169 tourbillon 23, 71 temps ("weather") 23, 121 tourment 45 tendre 159 (tourner) tend 19 tournent 87 tendresse 41 trace 3, 137 tente 159 traduire 137 tenter 143 (trahir) tenminer 57 trahi 155 terre 67, 71, 75, 137(2), trahis 51 143(2), 159, 169 trainer 169 terre sainte 159 trainant 111(2) testament 169(2) tranche 7 tete 7, 23, 75, 83, tranquille 41, 51 105, 127 transparents 151 the 1 transplant^ 109 theatre 41, 133 trappiste 7 Theos 133 travail 91, 121 Therese 51 (travailler) thermometre 41 travaille 51, 159 Tibre 151 (traverser) tilleul 127 traversa 105 timide 151 traversait 83 tire 51 treille 67 tires 41 trembler 143 tirelire 41 a tremble 23 tisane 121 tremble 35, 159 (tisser) tremblant 83, 133 tisse 159 tremblait 169 toile 23, 115(2), 159 tresor 15, 127 toilette 23, 51, 83 tresser 17 toit 95, 127(2), 137, tresse 17, 107 151, 175 tresses 39, 151 toits 41, 159 (tressaillir) tombe (n.) 137, 143, 175 tressaillirait 23 tombeau 7, 143, 169 treves 39 tombeaux 127, 143 triangles 159 tomber 19, 71 triompher 23 tomba 105 triste 7, ; L05, 111, tombait 87 127(3), 169 tombe 11, 137, 175 tristes 41 tonneaux 119 tristesse 159 263 triton 159 vendredi 23 trois-mats 159 Venelle 57 tromper 143 venerie 75 trompa 127 Venise 41 trompes 137 vent 23(2), 71, 75, 87, trou 23, 87 95, 121, 151, 159 troubler 83, 143(2) vents 143 troupe 71 Venus 103, 151 troupeaux 133 vepres 57 trouver 57, 75, 169 ver 75 trouve 11(2), 67(2), vermeil 87, 115 127, 151, 169 vermeille 67 trouvant 127, 169 vernie 119 trouverons 159 veronaise 155 trouves 169 verre 7, 23, 35 tunigue 133, 169 verrou 41 turbulents 91 vers (verser) verse 1, 91, 99 105, 127 ulcere 111, 143(2) vert 45 uni 23 verts 1 unique 83 verte 23, 87 urnes 155 vdtement 127 usine 159 v^tements (vStir) vetit 155 155 valet 169 vetu 23, 41, 95 vain 57, 143 vStue 57 vaine 155 vice 111, 165 vainqueur 137, 151 victime 151 vainqueurs 143 victimes 143 vaisseaux 159 vide 87, 137 val 23 vie 111# 127(2), 137 Valentin 7(3) (2), 143, 155,165, valet de pique (brun ) 23 175 valet de coeur (blond ) 23 vieillard 165 (valoir) vieillesse 75 vaut 107 vieilli 41 valse 23(2) vierge 115(2) vapeur 71 vieux 19, 35(2), 41, 57 vase (le) 127 (4), 63(2), 75, 83, veille 39, 83, 95 95, 107, 127, 169 veillee 67, 127 vieil 35 (veiller) vieille 75 veille 39, 95 vieille 41, 159 veines 151 Vilhem 51 velin 7, 23 village 51(3), 57, 127 vendange 119 ville 127, 159, 169 vendre 75 vin 1, 35, 41, 119, 151 vend 1 violette 23, 51 vendu 7 violettes 87 264 violents 23 violoncelle 23 violons 51 Virgile 133, 155 virginal 63 virginale 83 virginite 155 visage 11, 165 visages 67 visite 133 vitres 95 vives 165 vivre 137, 155, 165, 175 vecu 7, 83 vecus 137 vit 41, 133 vivait 127 vivant 137, 155 vivants 143, 155 vive 127 vives 41, 105 vivez 137 vivons 137(2) voeux 175 voile 11, 17, 23, 39, 133(2), 151 voiles 19, 133, 1 (voiler) voile 155 voisin 51(2) voisine 19, 87 voix 15, 23, 57, 75(2 91(2), 137(4), 151(3), 165 vol 71 volage 35 (voler) vole 51 volonte 7, 23, 169 volontes 159 Voltaire 169 (voltiger) voltige 23 voltigeaient 23 voltigent 143 voltigeront 143 volume 1 volupte 165 voyage 3, 127 voyageur 175 (vrai) vrais vue vulgaires yeux zele zephyr Zephyre 75 103 137 7, 23(2), 51, 67, 91, 95, 105, 143, 151, 155(3), 159, 165, 169 169 23 151 APPENDIX II Special Vocabulary Groups After a culling of the proper nouns and foreign locutions which may help to illuminate— at a glance— the field of Murger's inspiration, the reader will find several lists of terms which collectively re-create the poet's special conception of "la grande nature." The latter col lection, comprising flowers, shrubs, trees and animals, includes terms indicating (1) types (rose, genets, svcomare. chien). (2) "natural" activity (fleurir, murir, ombrager*. abover). and (3) organic members (petale*. pampres. feujlle, poil), but not related human activity (cueillir. faucher, scier. chasser). "Usage in context" was in each case the basis of inclusion. Thus feuilleter. although etymologi- cally related to feuille. was not included. 266 A. Proper nouns, foreign locutions 1. Parisian Poems Africaine 169 Juliette 101 Allemands 23 Louise 19(3) Amour 101 Marie 19(3) Anglais 169 Meudon 23 Asie 23 Midi 87 Bellini 121 Morale 169 BohSme 3 More 121 Bourgogne 119 Musette 35(3) Caire (le) 169 Nil 169 cara mia 7 Ninon (Nini) 7, 87 Carrare 1 (Ninette) 7(3) Cendrillon 23 Noel 41 Chevreuil 169 0 filii 87 Chine 169 Opera 121 Christine 19(3) Orient 87, 169 Clodion 39 Paris 95, 121, 169 Cvores 169 Raphael 169 De Profundis 23 Rome 41 Dieu 23, 35 Romeo 101 Flandre 23 Rose 45 France 169 Rossini 121 Froment 23 Seigneur 7 Gavarni 41, 87 Shakespeare 121 Greuze 87 steaple-chease 7 Hebrus 151 Valentin 7(3) hie iacet 1 Venise 41 Hiroux (Jean) 165 Voltaire 169 Indes 7 Bucolic Poems Amymone 133 Grand Messaaer Angele 91(10) boiteux 67 Angleterre 75 Grece 151 Anette 57(5) Helene 107 Athene 133 Horace 133 Blandusie 151(2) Hubert (Saint) 75 Cellini 91 Iliade 133(2) Clinias 133 Jacqueline 57 Dieu 57(2), 75(2) keepsake 91 91, 107 Lyde 133 267 3. Bucolic (continued) Mars 67 Saint-Jean 57 Myrto 133 Stella 51 Neere 133 Syracuse 133 Neobule 133, 151(4) Tarentine 133 Orient 51 Theos 133 Pannychis 133 Ther&se 51 Plutus 91 Tibre 151 Providence 107 Venelle 57 Ramoneau 75(4) Venus 151 Rome 133 Vilhem 51 Rose 17(4), 51 Virgile 133 Z6phyre 151 Nondescript or mixed Poems Amarillys 127 Mignon 109 Athene 133, 155 Mort 127, 137, 175 Attique 127 Nestor 155 Bareme 127 Ocean 159 Camille 127 Olympique 103 Capitole 137 Ophelia 11 Christ 143 Ovide 155 Deux-Amis 159 Paris 127 Dieu 83, 113, 143(2) Parnasse 155 159, 175 Pygmalion 103 Epicure 155 Raphael 1 115 Faust 83(2) Rome 115 Fornarine 115 Romeo 155 Julietta 155 Seigneur 143 Lazares 143 Stella 11 Madone 115(3) Venus 103 Marguerite 83(2) Virgile 155 Marie 115 268 B. Plant and animal life 1. Plant life a. flowers, grasses Amarillys 127 herbe 11, 75, 105 151 bluet 107 hyacinthe 23 bluets 17 bouquet 40, 63(2) immortelles 143 bourgeon 87 bourgeonner 67 jardin 19, 23, 51, 109, 127 chardon 107 jardins 23 deflorer 155 marguerite 17 Marguerite 82(2) eclore 39 eclore 45(2) odorants 23 eclose 17 ecloses 51 parfum 7, 23(2), 41, effeuille 17, 41 91, 133, 143 effleurer 83 parfurns 23, 109 epanouir 95 113, 165 par fume 19, 121 (faner) pres 17, 39 fane 17 fane 39 refleurir 19 fanee 63, 109 rose 17 , 19, 39, fleur 11(3), 17, 67(2), 107 23, 57, 63(2) roses 23 67(2), 105(3) Rose 17 (4), 45, 51 109, 121 roseaux 11(2), 151 fleurs 17(2), 39, 45, 51, 57, sainfoin 67 57, 75,133, 143,141(2), violette 23, 51 155 violettes 87 fleurie(a.) 155 fleurir 39, 41, 45 fleuri 19 fleurirent 23 fleuris 91, 127 fleurisse23,109 fleurit 109,113 fleuronner 67 flore 23, 95 269 shrubs, gramineae c. trees arbuste 109 allees 143 amandier 51 bruyeres 67 arbre 109 buis 51 bocage 151 murir 159 bosquets 35 branche 51(2) , 67 pampres 67 87 plante 169 (planter) ch£ne 51, 67 plante 23 feuillage 95, 109 treille 67 feuille 87 feuillet 127 forSt 75 if 137 ifs 143 laurier 137 lauriers 91 marronnier 57 ombrage 127 ombreuse 105 oranger 109 rameau 113 saules 19 sycomores 143 sylvains 133 tilleul 127 270 Animal life duvet 159 (aboyer) duvete 41 aboie 75 abeille 67(7), 83 ecuries 169 aile (n.) 35, 91(2) epagneule 75 ailes 51, 87 ailee(a.) 113 fourmis 169 (ailer) fourrure 95 ailes 155, 159 alouette 51, 101 gibier 75 animaux 71, 175 gite 75 arachneen 23 gosier 165 belements griffon 75, 121 151 grillon 40, 95 biche 67 boeufs 51, 71 hirondelle 35 (bourdonner) hirondelles 51 bourdonne 67 lievre 75 chanson 17(pinson) 23 ("bird") limiers 75 35("bird") meute 23, 75 51(chardonneret) mouche 67 chansons 67 (cigale) chant 155 (oiseau) nid 41, 51, 87 chants 45 ("birds") nids 23, 155 (chanter) chantent 83 (cigale) oiseau 35, 51, 127 chante 51 (alouette) 155, 159, 169 51 (oiseau) oiseaux 19,67, 87 101 (alouette) chantent 155(oiseaux) panache 75 chardonneret 51 pelage 75 chatte 121 pinson 17 chenet-sphinx 95 plume 23(2), 115 cheuil 169 plumeau 169 cheval 3 poil 75 chevre 151 portee 75 chevreau 151 Chevreuil 169 queue 75 chien 75(3), 121, chiens d'elite 175 ramage 51 i 75 (ronger) chiens de racei 75 ronge 165 cigale 67, 83 (ruminer) cigales 133 ruminent 51 colombes 159 coq 51 salamandres 23, 41 coraux 99 corneille 67 vol 71 cygne 151 Animal life (continued) (voltiger) voltige 23 voltigeaient 23 voltigent 143 voltigeront 143 272 APPENDIX III Versification Tables It is upon the following studies of versification and rhyme that various observations and conclusions of Chapter V have been based. Stanza-length Verse-length Rhyne ■v PO SM ■c Son Au Lectour Dedicace A Ninon Ophelia Madrigal (16) 16 Chanson (32) Renovare Requiem 137 128 Chens. Mis Au Mur Chans. d'Hiver 80 80 Ms Mia 64 Menteuse 6:5 Abeilles 56:7 Corbeaux Chlen 66 68 Printaniere 40 40 40 Angele 40 10 (1) I.e., one stanza ot 14 lines. (2) I.e., twenty-four lines of seven syllables. 273 Stansa-length POEM Antithese Son Plongeur Balcon Son Pygaalion Son Son Roaee A Helene Btrangere T.R.1 Tratnant Madone Vin Bleu A une Dane Mala Chenler ltl2 Lettre Utiaa Fontaine (o) Adolescent (P> Courtiaane I. Terza riaa Verse-length Rhpae 28 12i6 18 18 18 18 18 16 16 16 80 16 36 90 20 80 10 68 20:6 50 58 68 26 52 56 IB 18 1* 1* 18 16 16 16 80 16 36 90 36 60 98 SO 68 32 78 56 36 X (8) 6 X (8) 6 X (8) 6 X (8) 6 X 18 X 12 X 16 X 16 X 80 X 16 X 36 X 90 X 36 X 80 X 92 2 8 X so X 58 X 68 X 32 X 26 52 X 56 X t o 275 a. Sonnet disposed abab abab ccd eed. b. Huitains disposed ababcdcd. c. Huitains disposed ababcdcd. Verses 2 and 7 of each stanza are of four syllables. d. Second stanza (sizain) contains 3 alexandrins followed by 3 octosvllabes: stanzas 10 and 23 contain 3 alexandrins followed by a single octosvllabe. Sizain rhymes abaaba. e. Huitains disposed ababcdcd. Stanzas 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 are huitains. f. Five-verse stanzas disposed ababa. g. Sizains disposed ababab. h. The two sizains (stanzas 2 and 9) each comprise five octosyllabic lines followed by a tetrasvllabic line. The sizain alone contain the couplets (rhyming aabbcc). i. Structure of each sizain: (a) dodecasyllabic (a) dodecasyllabic (b) six-syllable (a) dodecasyllabic (a) dodecasyllabic (b) siz-syllable j• Sizains disposed ababab. k. Rhyme-scheme: aba bed cde fef ghhg. 1. Tentative distribution of stanzas: The physical dis position of this poem on its several pages in all editions makes it difficult to ascertain in several places whether or not the stanza is broken by a space. The last fifty-two lines (not shown in the chart) comprise three "stanzas" of 28, 1, and 23 lines. (The rhyme requires the single-line "stanza" to stand with the last stanza.) m. Tentative distribution of stanzas. n. Disposition of sizains: (a) dodecasyllabic (a) dodecasyllabic (b) octosyllabic (c) dodecasyllabic (c) dodecasyllabic (b) octosyllabic Following initial dizain, one 26-syllable stanza and a final one of 14. Stanza-lengths: 1:18, 1:36. Tentative stanza distribution: 1:4, 7:8, 1:4. 1 3 7 11 15 17 19 23 35 39 Rhymes "Sufficient" "Rich" achete/posterite/flatte/the Carrare/rare (none) nom/Ninon moment/regiment claires eaux/roseaux conter/ecouter rose/Rose chanson/pinson Marie/prairie main/romain j adi s/profondis vent/souvent gaite/hospitalite ouverte/verte (Beau) temps/longtemps oppress€s/embrasses pas("step")/pas(negative) Froment/ar ti s tement passe/plisse printemps/(le)temps infide1it£/ga1te depart/part emoi-moi adoree/enterree nuits/ennuis jours/toujours raille/muraille aimer/ecumer cueilli/vieilli carillon/reveillon familier/foyer duvete/ete ecu/vecu rendez-vous/souvenez- repete/ete revenir/souvenir langoureux/amoureux Cendri1lon/tourbi1Ion paresse/caresse creature/nature souvenue/revenue 278 45 vingt ans/temps choisie/poesie beaut€/ete printemps/un temps 51 57 matinale/patronale attend/mecontent pot/chapeau 63 egare/dore mari€e/pri§e 67 Saint-Jean/argent moissons/chansons coloree/miree matin/butin retentissant/puissant eclaircie/scie des eaux/oiseau 71 midi/atti§di 75 foret/arret venSrie/armoirie fin/fin 83 mettant/chantant chante/limpidite annee/entrainee ainsi/voici blanc/tremblant 87 jours/toujours d1ailes/hirondelles temps/printemps verte/ouverte 91 6chappes/coup£s quittee/piite 95 s'amoncelle/etincelle accoutumee/enflammee plafond/fond 99 reine/sirene irez/apporterez beaut€/souhaite oreiller/eveiller pavoisee/croisSe irons/environs or ei 1 ler/e vei Her rappe11e/appe11e bourgeonner/fleuronner calcinees/graminees jadis/paradis (cf. p. 23 j adis/profondis) matinale/virginale allumee/fumee 101 (none) 103 (none) 105 rosee/brisee/fiancee/ baissee main/chemin 107 morose/rose 109 apporte/transplante 111 souvent/devant sottise/prophetise indigne/eloigne envie/vie pitie/moitie 113 mains/humains encensoir/soir sillons/rayons 115 Madone/donne toile/etoile demain/main venus/nus 119 liqueur/coeur 121 127 jours/toujours main/chemin remplacer/laisser fin/faim ecoliers/cahiers sonne/per sonne il a/la solitude/etude 133 visite/monte escarpees/epopees voir/mouvoir rSvant/buvant 137 ambition/acclamation souven t/vi van t chemins/mains saison/semaison constellee/ailee enrhume/parfume Bellini/Rossini permettre/compromettre 143 faites/prophetes chemin/hymen epreuve/preuve emporteront/suivront harmonie/benie ici/aussi vainqueur s/coeur s allees/desolees humain/demain meres/ameres oublie/essuye humaine/promene cendre/descendre 151 sang/bondissant roseaux/limpides eaux Blandusie/poesie bravos/rivaux souvent/vent dore/retire Neobule/envole cSte/realite 155 entre/rencontre vivant/souvent chansons/legons nids/benis apprete/sculpte 159 a mis/Deux-Amis diminuees/nuees immense/commence nourrir/murir 165 nee/destinee prefere/honore chatiment/accouplement 169 savait/chevet notaire/hereditaire moribond/bond voulu/elu almee/bien-airoee concupiscent/pour cent printemps/temps brevetee/invitee devis/lavis marteau/manteau armoiries/ecuries ardents/dedans seulement/testament sonneront/evei1leront adieu/a Oieu ironie/agonie agonie/harmonie su spendu/entendu in genu s/Venu s attachee/cachge biographe/orthographe 175 tombe (v. )/tombe (n.) journee/cheminee Dieu/adieu Non/nom pauvrete/hospitalite j'irai/pleure 281 immorta1ite/hospita1ite ta porte/j'apporte APPENDIX IV Verse Akin to that of Murger The following poems, which are perhaps not to be found in volumes readily at hand, have been referred to X in the foregoing pages as certain or likely sources of Murger's, and are here offered in their entirety for convenience's sake. 283 (1) Johann Peter Hebei, "Sonntagsfruhe" ("Sunday Morning") Der Samstag had zum Sonntag gesagt: "Jetzt habe ich alle schlafen gelegt; Sie sind vom vielen Arbeiten Sehr miide und schlafrig g ewe sen, Und es geht mir fast selber so, Ich kann fast auf keinem Bein mehr stehen." (Saturday said to Sunday:) ("Now I have put all to rest;) (They were, from working hard,) (Very tired and sleepy,) (And I feel almost the same,) (I can hardly stand on a leg anymore.") So spricht er, und als es zwolf Uhr schlagt, So sinkt er ab in die Mitternacht. Der Sonntag sagt: "Jetzt ist es an mir!" Sehr still und heimlich schliesst er die Tvir. Er dost noch hinter den Sternen, Und kann fast nicht abwarts gehen. (Thus he speaks, and when it strikes twelve,) (Then he sinks down into midnight.) (Sunday says: "Now it's up to me!") (He closes the door very quietly and furtively.) (He still dozes behind the stars,) (And can hardly go down.) Doch endlich reibt er sich die Augen aus, Er kommt an der Sonne Tur und Haus; Sie schlaft im stillen Kammerlein; Er klopft an den Fensterladen; Er ruft zur Sonne: "Die Zeit ist da!" Sie sagt: "Ich komme gleich.1 (Yet finally he clears his eyes,) (He comes to the door and house of the sun;) (She is sleeping in her quiet chamber;) (He knocks on the shutter;) (He calls to the sun: "The time has come!") (She says: "I'm coming immediately.") 284 Und leise auf die Wache geht Und heiter auf dem Berge steht Der Sonntag, und ailes schlaft noch; Es sieht und hort ihn niemand gehen; Er kommt ins Dorf mit leisem Tritt, Und winkt dem Hahns "Verrat' mich nicht!" (And quietly goes on guard) (And merrily on the mountain stands) (Sunday, and everything is still asleep;) (No one sees and hears him walking,— ) (He comes into the village treading softly,) (And waves to the cock: "Don't betray me!") Und wenn man endlich auch erwacht, Und geschlafen hat die ganze Nacht, So steht er da im Sonnenschein, Und schaut einem zu den Fenstern herein Mit seinen milden und guten Augen, Und mit einem Maienstrauss am Hut. (And when one also finally wakes up,) (And has slept all night,) (Then he stands there in the sunshine,) (And looks in through the windows) (With his mild and good eyes,) (And a May bouquet on his hat.) Darum meint er's redlich, und was ich sag, Es freut ihn, wenn man schlafen kann, Und meint, es sei noch dunkle Nacht, Wenn die Sonne am heitern Himmel lacht. Darum ist er auch so leise gekommen, Darum steht er auch so lieblich da. (Therefore he truly means it, and what I say,) (It makes him happy when one can sleep) (And thinks that it is still the dark of night,) (When the sun laughs on a serene sky.) (That's why he has come so softly.) (That's why he stands here so charmingly.) 285 Wie glitzert auf Gras und Laub Vom Morgentau der Silberstaub! Wie weht eine frische Maienluft, Voll Weidenkatzchen und Schlehenduft! Und die Bienen sammeln frisch und flink, Sie wissen nicht, dass es Sonntag ist. (How glistens on grass and leaves) (From the morning dew the silver dust!) (How a fresh May breeze does blow,) (Full of pussy willow blossoms and sloe tree fragrance!) (And the bees are collecting lively and nimbly,) (They don't know that it is Sunday.) Wie prangt nicht im Garten Oer Weidenbaum im Maigewand, Narzissen und Tulpen, Und Sternblumen daneben, Und gefullte Nelken blau und weiss, Man meint, man schaue ins Paradeis! (How decked out in the garden) (Is the willow tree in his May dress.) (Daffodils and tulips,) (And close by starflowers) (And filled carnations blue and white,) (One thinks, one is looking into Paradise.) Und es ist so still und heimlich da, Man ist so ruhig und so froh! Man hort im Dorf kein Hu und Hotty Einen Guten Tag, und Dank dir Gott, Und es gibt gottlob einen schonen Tag, Ist ailes, was man horen kann. (And it is so quiet and secretive there,) (One is so clam and so happy!) (No "whoa" and "gee up" is heard in the village;) (A "Good day," and "God bless you,") (And, "It's going to be, thank God, a beautiful day") (Is all that one can hear.) 286 Und das Voglein sagt: "Freilich ja! Potztausend, ja, da ist er schon! Er dringt ja in seinem Himmelsglast Durch Blviten und Laub in Wald und Nest!" Und das Distelfinklein vorne dran Hat das Sonntagsrocklein auch schon an. (And the little bird says: "Yes, indeedJ) (Good gracious, yes, there he is already!) (He penetrates in his heavenly splendour) (Through blossoms and leaves in forest and nest!") (And the goldfinch up there) (Has his Sunday dress already on.) Sie lauten zur Kirche schon, Der Pfarrer, scheint es, wil zeitig kommen. Geh, brich mir eine Aurikel ab, Wisch mir nicht den Staub davon ab, Und Jungling, zieh dich ordentlich an. Du musst doch einen Maitag haben! (They're ringing already to church,) (The minister, it seems, wants to come early.) (Go, greak an auricula for me,) (But don't brush the pollen off,) (And youth, dress yourself up,) (You must have a day in May!) (Allemanische Gedichte. Werke. II, pp. 14-17. The English translation is that of Dr. Uwe Faulhaber.) 287 (2) Pierre de Ronsard, "Ode a la fontaine Bellerie" 0 fontaine Bellerie, Belle fontaine cherie De nos Nymphes, quand ton eau Les cache au creux de ta source Fuyantes le Satyreau, Qui les pourchasse a la course - Jusqu'au bord de ton ruisseau Tu es la Nymphe eternelle De ma terre paternelle: Pource en ce pre verdelet Voy ton Poete qui t'orne D'un petit chevreau de lait, A qui l'vne et 1'autre corne Sortent du front nouvelet. L'Este ie dors ou repose Sus ton herbe, ou ie compose, Cache sous tes saules vers, Ie ne scay quoi, qui ta gloire Enuoira par l'Univers, Commandant a la Memoire Que tu viues par mes vers. L'ardeur de la Canicule Ton verd riuage ne brule, Tellement qu'en toutes pars Ton ombre est espaisse et drue Aux pasteurs venans des pares, Aux boeufs las de la charrue, Et au bestial espars. IoJ tu seras sans cesse Des fontaines la princesse, Moy celebrant le conduit Du rocher perce, qui darde. Avec un enroue bruit, L'eau de ta source jazarde Qui trepillante se suit. Comment of Sainte-Beuve: Imite d'Horace, liv. Ills 0 fons Blandusiae. splendidior vitro. On remarquera le rhythme, qui est de 1'invention du poete; il a quelque chose de courant et de iazard. Cette troisieme rime musculine du dernier vers de chaque stance surprend agreablement l'oreille, ^ui ne s'y attend plus: e'est comme un murmure redouble ou un rejaillissement de l'eau. (Tableau de la Poesie francaise. Vol. II, pp. 116-117) 288 (3) Maurice de Guerin, "Au Grillon du foyer de Rayssac" September 1832 Si comme a toi, douce fortune M'avait donne, petit Grillon, Un petit nid dans ta maison, Point ne suivrais l'erreur commune Qui prend et consume nos jours A poursuivre richesse altiere, Contentement et joie entiere, Loin du pays de nos amours. Envelopp§ dans ma retraite, Assis 1 l1ombre du bonheur, Je voilerais mon humble tete Et je devoilerais mon coeur. Inspire par un doux sourire, Les soirs d'hiver, je chanterais Et doux maintien et doux attraits, Ou regarderais sans rien dire. II ne me faudrait, comme a toi, Qu'un peu de chaleur a la flamme, Et puis un regard pour mon ame, Qui ne veut pas transir en moi 0 bonheur cache sous la cendre. La pale cendre du foyer, Beau rSve si doux a rever, A mon chevet viens te suspendre. Et toi, fortune possesseur Du simple asile que j'envie, Toi qui vis ou vivrait ma vie, Deviens a ton tour voyageur; Voyage par la terre immense: Tu trouveras fleurs et gazon, Et legue-moi, durant 1'absence. Ton petit nid a la maison. (Oeuvres completes. Vol. I, pp. 62-63) 289 (4) Aloysius Bertrand, "La Salamandre" II jeta dans le foyer quelques frondes de houx benit, qui brulerent en craquetant. — Ch. Nodier (Trilby.) Grillon, mon ami, es-tu mort, que tu demeures sourd au bruit de mon sifflet, et aveugle a la lueur de 1'incendie? Et le grillon, quelque affectueuses que fussent les paroles de la salamandre, ne repondait point, soit qu'il dormit d'un magique sommeil, ou bien soit qu'il e&t fantaisie de bouder. "Oh! chante-moi ta chanson de chaque soir dans ta logette de cendre et de suie...derriere la plaque de fer ecussonnee de trois fleurs de lis heraldiques!" Mais le grillon ne repondait point encore, et la salamandre eploree, tantot ecoutait si ce n'etait paint sa voix, tantot bourdonnait avec la flamme aux chan- geantes couleurs rose, bleue, rouge, jaune, blanche et violette. "II est mort, il est mort, le grillon mon ami!" Et j'entendais comme des soupirs et des sanglots, tandis que la flamme, livide maintenant, decroissait dans le foyer attriste. "II est mort! Et, puisqu'il est mort, je veux mourir!" Les branches de sarment etaient consumees, la flamme se tralna sur la braise en jetant son adieu a la cremaillere, et la salamandre mourut d'inanition. (Aloysius Bertrand, Gaspard de la Nuit. pp. 100-101.) Bibliography 290 Bibliography 291 I. Reference texts: poetry and prose. Murger, Henry. Les Nuits d'hiver. Paris: Michel Levy, 1861. Les Buveurs d'Eau. Paris: Calmann-Levy, n.d. Le Dernier Rendez-vous. Paris: Michel Levy, 1856. Le Dessous du Panier. Paris: Michel Levy, "1855. Madame Olvmpe. Nouvelle Edition. Paris: Calmann-Levy, n.d. 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Edited by Bernard d'Harcourt. 2 vols. Paris: Societe les Belles Lettres, 1947. Hebei, Johann Peter. Werke. Edited by Eberhard Meckel. 2 vols. Frankfort on the Main: Insel, 1968. Heine, Henri. Samtliche Sehriften. 4 vols. Munich: Carl Hanser, 1968. Horace. The Odes. Translated by James Michie. New York: Washington Square Press, 1963. Houssaye, Arsene. Poesies. Paris: E. Dentu, 1877. Hugo, Victor. Les Chansons des rues et des bois. Introduction by Jacques Seebacher. Paris: Garnier-Flammarion, 1966. _______. Oeuvres poetiques. Edited by Pierre Albouy. 2 vols. Paris: Gallimard, Bibliotheque de la Pleiade, 1964-67. Lautreamont,^Comte de ^Isidore Ducasse]. Oeuvres completes. Pans: Jose Corti, ”1963. Leconte, de Lisle. Oeuvres. 4 vols. Paris: Alphonse Lemerre, 1942-52. Mallarme, Stephane. Correspondance. Edited by Henri Mondor. 3 vols. Paris: Gallimard, 1959-69. Vol. I. _______. Oeuvres completes. Edited by Henri Mondor and G. Jean-Aubry. Paris: Gallimard, Bibliotheque de la Pleiade, 1945. 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Paris: Nouvelles Editions Latines, 1956. Virgil. The Pastoral Poems. Edited and translated by E. V. Rieu. Baltimore, Maryland: Penguin Books, 1967. II. Historical and Literary Background. Allem [AllemandJ, Maurice. Alfred de Musset. Edition revue et corrigee. Grenoble: B. Arthaud, 1948. _______. La Vie quotidienne sous le second empire. Paris: Hachette, 1948. Bachelard, Gaston. La Psvchanalvse du feu. Paris: Gallimard, Collection Idees, 1949. _______. La Terre et les reveries du repos. Paris: Jose Corti, 1948. Baldick, Robert. The First Bohemian: The life of Henry Murger. London: Hamish Hamilton, 1961. 294 Banville, Theodore de. Petit Traite de poesie frangaise. Seconds Edition, revue et corrig£e. Paris: Librairie de l'Echo de la Sorbonne, n.d. Barbey d'Aurevilly, Jules de. Poesie et Poetes. Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1968. _______. Les Poetes. Premiere Serie. Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1968. _______. Les Poetes. Deuxieme Serie. Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1968. Bernard, Suzanne. 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Creator Herby, Valdo Paul (author)

Core Title The Poetry Of Henry Murger: Themes And Style In "Les Nuits D'Hiver"

Degree Doctor of Philosophy

Degree Program French

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Advisor Knodel, Arthur J. (committee chair), Blake, Robert M. (committee member), Sackett, Theodore A. (committee member)

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c18-794333

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