Ben Fisher
208
thor or artist’s work with more personal allusions to the hospitality of
the ruler of each isle; the visits to almost all are celebratory and gregarious, with the exception of the scatological vilification of the publisher Louis Lormel embodied in the first island.
6 There appears to be
no particular order within the visits to the islands, except that they are
clearly framed within the literary and artistic orbit of the Mercure de
France. The embarkation is dedicated to the review’s co-founder and
publisher Alfred Vallette, and the last island visited is ruled over by a
king who represents his novelist wife Rachilde. At the time, the Mercure was still based in its original premises in the rue de l’Échaudé,
approached via the boulevard St-Germain, which is transformed thus:
Ayant passé le fleuve Océan, qui est fort analogue, pour la stabilité de sa surface, à
une vaste rue ou boulevard, nous arrivâmes au pays des Cimmériens et des Ténèbres
hermétiques, qui en diffère comme peuvent différer deux plans non liquides, par la
grandeur et la division. (I, p. 693)
7
There are functional variations in the systems of imagery from
which the islands are constructed, determined by the images available,
and with each variation having its own peculiar richness. The island
dedicated to poet Gustave Kahn is a good example of one based on
both artistic and personal references; the “château-errant, qui est une
jonque” itself draws on Kahn’s Les Palais nomades and maritime poems from other of his collections, but the landscape in which this
strange ship appears, disappears and reappears is clearly that of
Kahn’s holiday retreat at Sint Anna on the Belgian coast, which Jarry
had visited in 1896:
Hespaillier infatigable, je tirai les avirons plusieurs heures, sans que Faustroll parût
découvrir l’abord enfin proche du château fuyant selon des mirages; après des rues
étroites de maisons désertes espionnant notre venue par les yeux à facettes de
compliqués miroirs, nous touchâmes de la fragilité sonore de notre proue l’escalier
de bois ajouré du nomade édifice. […]
Le palais était une bizarre jonque sur une eau calme ouatée de sable […]
___________________________
6 The reasons for Jarry’s rupture with Lormel (pseud. of Louis Libaude), who had
published some of his earliest work, remain obscure.
7 The “Ténèbres hermétiques” of the chapter are of course an allusion to Hermes/Mercury/Mercure, as well as to hermeticism.
208
thor or artist’s work with more personal allusions to the hospitality of
the ruler of each isle; the visits to almost all are celebratory and gregarious, with the exception of the scatological vilification of the publisher Louis Lormel embodied in the first island.
6 There appears to be
no particular order within the visits to the islands, except that they are
clearly framed within the literary and artistic orbit of the Mercure de
France. The embarkation is dedicated to the review’s co-founder and
publisher Alfred Vallette, and the last island visited is ruled over by a
king who represents his novelist wife Rachilde. At the time, the Mercure was still based in its original premises in the rue de l’Échaudé,
approached via the boulevard St-Germain, which is transformed thus:
Ayant passé le fleuve Océan, qui est fort analogue, pour la stabilité de sa surface, à
une vaste rue ou boulevard, nous arrivâmes au pays des Cimmériens et des Ténèbres
hermétiques, qui en diffère comme peuvent différer deux plans non liquides, par la
grandeur et la division. (I, p. 693)
7
There are functional variations in the systems of imagery from
which the islands are constructed, determined by the images available,
and with each variation having its own peculiar richness. The island
dedicated to poet Gustave Kahn is a good example of one based on
both artistic and personal references; the “château-errant, qui est une
jonque” itself draws on Kahn’s Les Palais nomades and maritime poems from other of his collections, but the landscape in which this
strange ship appears, disappears and reappears is clearly that of
Kahn’s holiday retreat at Sint Anna on the Belgian coast, which Jarry
had visited in 1896:
Hespaillier infatigable, je tirai les avirons plusieurs heures, sans que Faustroll parût
découvrir l’abord enfin proche du château fuyant selon des mirages; après des rues
étroites de maisons désertes espionnant notre venue par les yeux à facettes de
compliqués miroirs, nous touchâmes de la fragilité sonore de notre proue l’escalier
de bois ajouré du nomade édifice. […]
Le palais était une bizarre jonque sur une eau calme ouatée de sable […]
___________________________
6 The reasons for Jarry’s rupture with Lormel (pseud. of Louis Libaude), who had
published some of his earliest work, remain obscure.
7 The “Ténèbres hermétiques” of the chapter are of course an allusion to Hermes/Mercury/Mercure, as well as to hermeticism.