PARTISAN REVIEW
anguish of Tintoretto became a yellow sky. It is no longer a signifi–
cation, but a substance. It is seen from the outside, and Rimbaud
invites us to see it from the outside with him. Its strangeness arises
from the fact that, in order to consider it, we place ourselves on the
other side of the human condition, on the side of God.
If
this is the case, one easily understands how foolish it would
be to require a poetic engagement. Doubtless, emotion, even passion–
and why not anger, social indignation, and political hatred-are at
the origin of the poem. But they are not
expressed
there, as in a
pamphlet or in a confession. Insofar as the writer of prose exhibits
feelings, he illustrates them; whereas, if the poet injects his feelings
into his poem, he ceases to recognize them; the words take hold of
them, penetrate them, and metamorphose them; they do not signify
them, even in his eyes. Emotion has become thing; it now has the
opacity of things; it is compounded by the ambiguous properties of
the vocables in which it has been enclosed. And above all, there is
always much more in each phrase, in each verse, as there is more.
than simple anguish in the yellow sky over Golgotha. The word, the
phrase-thing, inexhaustible as things, everywhere overflow the feeling
which has produced them. How can one hope to provoke the indigna–
tion or the political enthusiasm of the reader when the very thing one
does is to withdraw him from the human condition and invite him to
consider with the eyes of God a language that has been turned inside
out? Someone may say, "You're forgetting the poets of the Resistance.
You're forgetting Pierre Emmanuel." Not a bit! They're the very ones
I was going to give as examples!
But even
if
the poet is forbidden to engage himself, is that a reason
for exempting the writer of prose? What do they have in common?
It is true that the prose-writer writes, and so does the poet. But there
is nothing in common between these two acts of writing except for
the movement of the hand which traces the letters. Otherwise, their
universes are incommunicable, and what is good for one is not for
the other. Prose is, in essence, utilitarian. I would readily define the
prose-writer as a man who
makes use
of words. M. Jourdan made
prose to ask for his slippers, and Hitler to declare war on Poland.
The writer is a
speaker;
he designates, demonstrates, orders, refuses,
interpolates, begs, insults, persuades, insinuates.
If
he does so without
18
