French Poetry

Professor Phillipson said that France had for a long lime been the intellectual centre of Europe, her language had been the diplomatic language of the world, and her literature had exercised a great influence upon Europe, from the middle ages to modern times. The predominating characteristics were clearness and directness of expression, and harmony in construction. Behind the seeming gaiety and lightness of the French people there was a solid basis, serious, heroic, magnanimous, chivalrous, and their domestic life was by no means truly depicted, in the "triangular" novels. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, thanks to foreign influence, the romantic period in poetry was inaugurated with the publication of the first notable works of Lamartine and Hugo. The new spirit, subjection, lyrical, attached to the strange and even grotesque, was a revolt against the classical attitude, reserved, objective, disciplined, guided by reason. About the middle of the century a new movement— realism— set in, which was influenced by the science of the day, was inclined to scepticism, and believed in work and polish, instead of imagination and inspiration. Poetry was represented by the Parnassiens, whose motto was "Art for Art's sake"— but, said the lecturer, art for life's sake would be better. Gautier was a carver of "enamels and cameos;" Leconte de Lisle, a master of verse, inclined to Buddhistic pessimism, and fond of enotic subjects; Heredia, supreme in the sonnet, and possessed of a wonderful plastic art. Other poets, partly Parnassien and partly independent, were Bonville, with his ingenious and charming ballads; Baudelaire, whose strange subjects scandalized the "bourgeois;'' Sully-Prudhomme, the philosopher of the group, expressing disenchantment and resignation, and seeking truth which constantly escaped him; and Coppee, a sentimentalist, charming, picturesque, and fond of describing the life of the humbler classes. By 1880 the Decadents, afterwards termed the Symbolists, appeared: they cultivated the musical side of poetry, and tried to express by suggestion, symbol, and impression, what was fugitive and intangible, and were often obscure and dreamy, and sometimes eccentric. The leading representatives were Verlaine, whose life was a strange mixture of rough and sordid Bohemianism, remorse, repentance, and sickness, but who was a supreme master of magic song; and Mallarme, the theorist of the school, often obscure and unintelligible. The latest development, beginning with the present century, followed various currents. There was the neo-Catholic movement, headed by such men as Brunetiere, Peguy, Claudet, Jammes, who brought a deep religious spirit into their work, and emphasized the need for action and duty. There were also a classic revival, against the vers libre, and the unanimist school, celebrating the social life of mankind. On the outbreak of the war, a certain feeling of despair was manifested in the work of some poets; but now all those schools existed side by side, and, on the whole, they revealed the true genius of French poetry, which stood for clearness, directness, sanity, and mutual expression. The professor concluded by urging the cultivation of poetry, which, he said, was an expression of the best of life, a glorification of human ideals, and a crystallization of beauty.

The Register 17/7/1922,