The Arcades Project - Operi

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Allegory, as the sign that is pointedly set off against its meaning, has its place in
art as the antithesis to the beautiful appearance in which signifier and
signified flow into each other. Dissolve this brittleness of allegory, and it forfeits
all authority. That, in fact, is what happens with genre. It introduces "life" into
allegories, which in turn suddenly wither like flowers. Sternberger has touched
on this state of affairs (Panorama , p. 66): "the allegory that has
become a semblance of life, that has given up its lastingness and its rigorous
validity for the red pottage" oflife,458justly appears as a creation of the genre. In
Jugendstil, a retrogressive process seems to set in. Allegory regains its brittleness.
[J83a,3]
On the foregoing remarks by Lotze: the idler, the flilneur, who no longer has any
understanding of production, seeks to become an expert on the market (on
prices). [J83a,4]
'The chapters 'Persecution' and 'Murder' in Apollinaire's Poete assassine contain
the famous description of a pogrom against poets. Publishing houses arc
stormed, books of poems thrown on the fire, poets beaten to death. And the same
scenes are taking place at the same time all over the world. In Aragon, Imagination,'
in anticipation of such horrors, marshals its forces for a last crusade,·"
Walter Benjamin, "Del' Siirrealismus/' Die literarische Welt, 5, no. 7 (February
15, 1929).459 [J84,1]
"It is hardly a coincidence that the century which has long been that of the
strongest poetic langnage, the nineteenth century, has also been that of decisive
progress in the sciences:' Jean-Richard Bloch, "Langage d'utilite, langage
poetique" (Enryclopedieftan,aise, voL 16 [16-50], p. 13). Indicate how tl,e forces
of poetic inspiration, having been driven from their earlier positions by science,
were compelled to make inroads into the commodity world. [J84,2]
On the question raised by J .-R. Bloch, the question of the development of science
and of poetic language, Chenier's (,Invention" :
All the arts conjoin, and human science
Could not extend the bounds of its alliance
Without enlarging thus the scope for verse.
What long travail to win the universe!
A new Cybele and a hundred different worlds befall
Our J asons first delivered from the ocean's thrall:
What a wealth of worthy scenes, of images sublime,
Born of those great subjects reserved for our time! [J84,3]
On "Les Sept Vieillards:' The very fact that this poem stands isolated within
Baudelaire's oeuvre fortifies the assumption that it occupies a key position there.
If this position has remained UlIDoticed until now, this may have to do with the