Search

The article focuses on author and sinologist Launcelot Cranmer-Byng's contribution to Symbolist literature, emphasizing his cosmopolitan approach. Topics discussed include his engagement with multiple cultural literatures, particularly Chinese and Portuguese; his role in the transnational development of Symbolism; and his efforts to provide an optimistic, spiritually-oriented alternative to materialistic modernity through translation and creative practice.

The Metropolitan Police Act of 1829 created a centralized police force in London, formally ending the tenure of the parochial watchman—a recognizable figure in the capital for centuries—and replacing him with the uniformed "bobbies" still visible today. This change, however, was far from an inevitability. The proto-centralization embedded in the Middlesex Justices Act of 1792, and the various textual and pictorial works defending the watchman's role as a local guardian, reflect the conflicting approaches to policing London's spaces which competed in the decades preceding 1829. This essay explores points of interaction between these debates and the works of William Blake. After examining Blake's 1807 letter to publisher Richard Phillips, which condemns the activities of the Hatton Garden Police Office, I probe how a distrust of centralized authority manifests itself within Blake's work through the figures of the "Watch-fiends." From here I explore how Blake's depiction of Los as "Albions Watchman" in Jerusalem (c.1804–20) shares similarities with contemporary works celebrating the symbolic opposition of the parochial watchman to central tyranny. Ultimately, I show that Blake's utilization of a recognizable London type allows us to draw productive parallels between his works and the city spaces in which they were formed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a survey of Italian critical studies on Russian Symbolism and its reception in Italy over the last thirty years (1994-2022). The paper reconstructs the evolution of this tradition through the analysis of three main streams: 1. works on literary theory and philosophy 2. the study of the 'Italian' text on the basis mainly of archival documents and biographical texts, and 3. the study, based on comparisons and parallels with other literary movements, of Russian Symbolism as a supracultural and supranational movement. In the final part, the paper proposes an overview of current research perspectives on the topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The plot of Andrei Bely's magnum opus, Petersburg, turns on a certain "terrible promise" made by a young student of Neo-Kantian philosophy. Despite its important function for the plot, no critical literature has examined the promise itself, perhaps because viewed from within the framework of the Russian Symbolist project writ large, the significance of a promise appears not only irrelevant to but even essentially in conflict with its concerns. This paper attempts to complicate the predominant account of the modernist aesthetics of Petersburg and of Bely's theory of Symbolism on which it is based. I argue that the promise, as a fundamentally communicative speech act, makes visible the ethical and intersubjective aspects of Symbolist creation. I read the promise through the critical lenses of Stanley Cavell, J. L. Austin, Elizabeth Anscombe, and finally Mikhail Bakhtin to articulate the ethical and creative dimensions of the promise as a performative speech act, and consequently I propose a reevaluation of Symbolist zhiznetvorchestvo: the force of "living speech" does not inhere in the free play of a singular creative consciousness, but in its speaking in the world, in its capacity to generate and structure relations between speaking subjects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the novella Stereoskop (1905), written by the art historian Aleksandr Ivanov, who was closely associated with the Russian Symbolists. I argue that through the metaphor of stereoscopy Ivanov expresses two fundamental concepts introduced in Symbolist aesthetics: the ability of verbal art to become reality, and the significance of tradition that underlies the very originality of a literary work. Ivanov realizes the metaphor of stereoscopy by creating his novella as a literary analogue of a real optical device--the double "stereo photo" inside the "viewing instrument." He forms the "double photo" for his Stereoskop by re-recreating Pushkin's Bronze Horseman (1833), "Queen of Spades" (1834), and "Monument" (1836) and Gogol's "Portrait" (1842)--the works of authors who both believed in the power of the word, thought about this power through visual metaphors of sculpture and paintings/icons, and profoundly influenced the Symbolists. Placed in Stereoskop, this photo of the "literary past" (Pushkin's and Gogol's works) and the photo of the "literary present" (Ivanov's own work) appear to the readers as a three-dimensional fictional world. By directly addressing the readers, referring to well-known Petersburg landmarks with "photographic" accuracy, and engaging the readers' senses, Ivanov additionally simulates the visual experience of looking into a stereoscope. As it mimics the construction and the functions of a real device, Stereoskop demonstrates the two concepts of Symbolist aesthetics "in action"; the novella becomes a nearly tangible "optical instrument" that contains the immortal world of cultural memory and actively encourages its readers to explore it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The vast collection of the Gruuthusemuseum in Bruges has long encapsulated the city's rich decorative arts traditions. And after a five-year restoration project, this mansion-turned-museum has never looked so resplendent [...]

PESSOA, Fernando (2017). Teatro Estático. Edição de Filipa de Freitas e Patricio Ferrari; com a colaboração de Claudia J. Fischer. Lisboa: Tinta-da-china, 419 p. [ISBN: 978‐989‐671‐388‐1].

Pessoa Plural—A Journal of Fernando Pessoa Studies, No. 14 (A New Act in Pessoa's Drama). Brown University, Warwick University, Universidad de los Andes, Fall 2018.

This essay explores the impact and influence of the Symbolist theatre and, in particular, of the dramas of Maeterlinck and Villiers de L’Isle-Adam, on Fernando Pessoa and W.B. Yeats. It examines the way in which the principles underlying the theatre produced by those playwrights and that movement met with the aesthetic aspirations and philosophical inclinations of the two poets, which led them to engage with those principles and their enacting dramatic devices in their poetic drama. It also analyses points of contact between their works and works by those playwrights, their critique of their practices and efforts to surpass what they perceive as being their limitations and to make original contributions to the development of that strain of Symbolist theatre in the twentieth century.

Na década de 1910, Fernando Pessoa desenvolve dois grandes projetos literários: o teatro estático e o heteronimismo. A fase crucial da teorização e prática literárias do autor é marcada pela descoberta da obra de Maurice Maeterlinck, fortemente ancorada na noção de théâtre statique. O contato com o teatro simbolista franco-belga influenciaria, de forma decisiva, não somente a prática do escritor português, mas também a sua conceção do heteronimismo, percebido como um drama em gente: uma variante extradiegética do teatro estático.

Late 20th and early 21st century Latin American literature rereads and problematizes late 19th-century Latin American Modernism. This article examines some of these genealogies in order to analyze the significance of this literary dialogue in our present time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article informs on Guido Gozzano's poems. It mentions "Oh! Questa vita sterile, di sogno!" is one of the most famous verse of a Gozzano's poem, it expresses the reaction of the Crepuscolarismo movement against Symbolism. It also mentions that this reaction is founded on an imaginary which is explained thorough the work of Vittorio Pica, critic and essayist who have diffused the Symbolist and Decadent movement in Italy.

The article discusses the cover art for the issue, which consists of a symbol for the Skorpion (Scorpio) Publishing House, founded in 1899, and the force for the success of the symbolist movement from approximately 1899 to 1910. It notes that the Russian symbolist movement began in the 1890s as a reaction to the dominant positivist philosophy and artistic realism of the time. Sources of its inspiration cited include the French decadent and symbolist poets as well as German and Russian philosophy and a mystical element. The movement is noted as a major force in the so-called silver age of Russian culture, from the last years of the 19th century through 1917. Its founders, financial backer Sergey Polyakov and poet and managing editor Valery Bryusov, are cited.

The article provides information on the papers of the late Jean-Louis Debauve, focusing on small letter from Camille Claudel to Armand Dayot and letters of symbolist writers. Topics include various manuscripts of Sarah Bernhardt, poems by Lord Alfred Douglas and recent biography of Sylvain-Christian David.

In this article the authors offer an illustration of a pedagogical routine designed to support students' critical consciousness and literacy learning through the collective examination of shared texts. Topics include considering the subject matter of English and its relation with goals of critical consciousness and civic engagement, and literary practices include framing interpretive questions, closely reading the text by analyzing literary devices (example imagery, symbolism, litotes).

The attempts to disclose some unity of human existence and being in European culture of modern times are characterized by the disillusionment with regard to the opportunities provided by the mainstream forms of cultural endeavor (cognition, religion and morals). The major projects in the 19th and 20th centuries were myth- making and art, both seeking new forms of establishing the unity of subject and object. The artisticmythology of Romanticism, Symbolismand Avant-garde represents different forms of the anthropological and ontological wholeness: in Romanticism through spiritual experience of the universe by the artist's individuality, in Symbolism through the reunion of artistic consciousness with the irrational creative energy of the supra-individual subject, in early Avant-garde -- through the involvement of man-cum-artist in the process of creating a total harmony of existence. Early Avant- garde became the apex of artistic myth-making in European culture of the 19th-20th centuries approaching the ideal of endowing the union of man and existence with ontological reality in the act of artistic endeavor. Myth-making came to its end in the late 20th -- early 21st century with the emergence of the concept of intensification of man's life by means of artistic build-up of his sensual and physical presence in reality. The refusal from the concept of culture, nature, metaphysical meaning of existence, creativity, symbolical language of art means that the potential of anthropological and ontological artistic myth-making within Moderne has exhausted itself. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on the contribution of scholar, Anthony Smith in nationalism. It mentions that Smith has managed to create a number of innovative concepts and analytical approach, ethno-symbolism. It focuses on developing the organisational and ideational foundations for the interdisciplinary field of nationalism studies.

An interview with French writer and publisher, Noel Arnaud is presented. When asked about founding principles of Oulipo, he refers to change in literature through romance, symbolism, futurism and surrealism. When asked about his relationship about concept of pataphysics, he answer with emergence of different literary movement.

The article discusses the publication of various edition of the book "Fleurs du Mal" by Charles Baudelaire first published in 1857 ant then in 1861 is a collection of poems that deals with themes related to decadence and eroticism. Topics include it importance in symbolist and modernist movements and literary criticism of the poems.

Copyright of Études Stéphane Mallarmé is the property of Classiques Garnier and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Études Stéphane Mallarmé is the property of Classiques Garnier and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Études Stéphane Mallarmé is the property of Classiques Garnier and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Études Stéphane Mallarmé is the property of Classiques Garnier and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

With a common Jewish heritage and a personal relation to the Holocaust, both Primo Levi and Hélène Cixous have a desire, even a craving, to write. They aim to hear the unheard and to re-present the 'unheard' in different but distinct ways. Levi uses animal symbols and Cixous not only uses her 'magical animots' but creatively elaborates on human and animal differences through what could be called her 'animal thinking'. I argue that Levi's animal symbols and Cixous' animal thinking can prompt a constructive reimagining of how we re-present self and other beyond the confines of the 'human'. In this article I explore Levi's and Cixous' way of interacting with animals and animality in their writings, and relate it to Walter Benjamin's thinking on human language. Following my discussion of Levi and Cixous, Benjamin's writing on language is instructive in considering the possibilities and limits to hear the (what seems to be) unheard and its importance to the potentiality of creating conditions for a greater inclusivity in our daily lives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

В предлагаемой статье драма Валерия Брюсова «Земля» (1905), достаточно малоизвестная на данный момент, рассматривается в контексте символистской полемики автора с Андреем Белым о предпосылках апокалиптической теургии. Понятие теургии у символистов предполагало, что искусство способно создавать или изменять феноменальную реальность, а у некоторых символистов «теургия» явно вызывала ассоциации с пророчеством. Незадолго до публикации «Земли» Брюсов прилюдно оспорил взгляды Белого на искусство как поэтическое пророчество, при этом отстаивая работу таких поэтов, как Бальмонт, о которых Белый отзывался пренебрежительно из-за их эстетизма. Эта полемика проявляется и в «Земле»—в таких ключевых элементах драмы как действие, окружающая обстановка и качества героев. Брюсов использовал теософические идеи об утраченном континенте Атлантида для критики позиции Белого. Как Брюсов, так и Константин Бальмонт увлекались идеей Атлантиды и считали ее отправной точкой для искусства и культуры. Теософы утверждали, что культура Атлантиды была сохранена в ацтекской цивилизации; именно по этой причине персонажи Брюсова названы именами из ацтекского наречия «науатли». К этим отсылкам на культуру ацтеков Брюсов добавил элементы теософических историй Атлантиды, а также мифа ацтеков, предлагая свою версию эсхатологии, конкурирующую с христианским описанием апокалипсиса, типичным для Белого. В «Земле» Брюсов представляет эсхатологическую модель, предшествующую христианству, подводя все истории мира под единый основополагающий сюжет. Так он исправляет апокалиптические предсказания Белого о «Жене, облечённой в солнце», исполняя, хотя и в драматической реальности, оккультное пророчество о конце света. Нам представляется, что «Земля» не построена на теургии Белого, а является редким примером оккультной теургии. Брюсов также защищает своего друга и энтузиаста теургии Бальмонта, который во время публикации «Земли» путешествовал по Мексике в поисках таинственных связей с цивилизацией Атлантиды. В заключение следует отметить, что взгляды Брюсова на апокалипсис укоренены в «Земле». В этой драме тяготение к тайне мирового культурного и исторического наследия побеждает страх перед потусторонним судом—ощущение, широко распространённое в апокалиптических произведениях символистов. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

В своей пьесе «Заложники жизни» (1912) Федор Сологуб хотел показать, что движение символистов в России процветало, и его драматурги создавали пьесы, достойные театральной сцены. В начале своей карьеры Сологуб славился скептическим отношением к жизни и тем, что он воспевал смертькак способ избежать реальность. Однако к 1910 году он изменил свой взгляд и старался оставаться активно вовлеченным в жизнь с целью изменить ее с помощью искусства. В «Заложниках жизни» заключено множество ссылок на другие тексты, которые демонстрируют, что персонажи пьесы, как и сами символисты, активно стараются улучшить жизнь, а не избегать ее. Тем не менее, критики, как и сподвижники-символисты, отнеслись к пьесе так, как будто ее написал прежний, солипсический, Сологуб. Они не заметили изменения в сологубовском мировоззрении, которое отчетливо можно было проследить в написанных в то время других работах, как например, в «Творимой легенде». В силу этого «Заложники жизни» способствовали разрыву между Сологубом и Дмитрием Мережковским и подтвердили общее мнение о том, что движение символистов было слишком отдалено от жизни и уже приближалось к своему концу. Несмотря на это, Федор Сологуб продолжал попытки убедить публику в том, что с помощью искусства можно изменить мир. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The connotations of religion and literature of the Bible have been greatly expressed by the image of water which contains multiple meanings and fickle qualities. There are lots of forms of water, such as the drop, vapor, river and ocean, presented in the British and American literary works. Although different forms of water in different works are endowed with all kinds of implications due to the writers' unique creative backgrounds and purposes, they are based on the implications or symbolic meanings of the water in the Bible. This paper, based on the implications of the image of water in the Bible, by horizontal contrast and longitudinal comparison, is going to analyze the image of water in Robinson Crusoe, Moby Dick and The Life of Pi which contain similar psychology, religion concept and social problems with the Bible, and the symbolic meanings of image of water in (early) modern British and American literary works under the influence of the Bible is going to be explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between music and literature is a continuous topic among poets, and a key subject for the Symbolists. From the mid-19th century on, the French Symbolist theories on music, which largely regard music as the superior form of art, have influenced the modern ideology of both the literary and artistic worlds. French Symbolists have even been considered the pioneers of literary Modernism. Undoubtedly, French Symbolism came into China along with other literary trends during the early 20th century and influenced modern Chinese literature. Modern Chinese writers, in turn, developed their own thinking on music and literature, a thinking which reflected its French roots. Therefore, an examination of their ideas can offer a viewpoint for us to understand the diverse routes of the importation of ideas into China. This article will read into the words of three distinctive modern Chinese writers, to have a glimpse of how they viewed the relationship between music and literature, as well as the inter-relationship between their ideas and the connection with French Symbolism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Even more than in his Mémoires, Bussy-Rabutin gives the summary of his life and loves by collecting in his castle portraits and devises during the exile. The essay focuses on this figurative autobiography, paying attention to contemporary symbolic theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the seemingly paradoxical role of dance when the aesthetics of a literary movement such as Symbolism aspires to a wordless genre—a paradox articulated by Stéphane Mallarmé in his famous coinage "corporeal writing." I propose a reevaluation of Symbolist thought on the musicality of language as a possible means of reconciling the disparity between pure words and pure movement. A Symbolist conception of the arts as analogous to one another allowed for poetic writing, through the intervening medium of sound, to approach dance through an integration of meaning and movement. Using the ballet-pantomime La Tragédie de Salomé (1907) as a case study, I argue that Florent Schmitt's score transfers the essence of language into music that, when accompanied by the synesthetic performance of Loïe Fuller, evoked the multisensory theatrical experience to which Symbolist dramaturgy aspired. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article uses the poem "La belle dame sans merci," by Valerii Briusov as rich test case to examine how Russian Symbolist poets delineated poetic propriety in their verse. Topics mentioned include occupation of the study of intertext with the distinguishing of subtextual allusions, convergence of imagery and topoi within the older decadent and younger mythopoetic camps, and an instance of territorial anxiety and the workings of poetic propriety in Russian Symbolism.

This study of French symbolist petites revues of the 1890s analyses two trends in discourse on poetry. First, I show that, consistent with traditional generic hierarchies, critics of the movement deemed symbolist theory futile without masterpieces to back it up, while even its own theorists like Charles Morice said the same. This poetic interre`gne (Mallarme''s term) following Hugo's death will be familiar to specialists, but I provide new evidence of the polemical nature of these debates: theorists might appear as 'eunuques', 'prophe`tes', or both. Second, after demonstrating this repurposing of the poet-prophet figure within a polemical context, I demonstrate that numerous writers responded by predicting a poetic 'messiah'. That is, they prophesied that a transcendent, messianic poet's masterpiece would eventually vindicate his predecessors' work. I argue for the ambivalence of this messianic trope, which both concedes to critics' accusations and takes deferred credit for the ineluctable, glorious triumph of literary progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates a forgotten essay contest proposed by Gershom Scholem to Werner Kraft in the wake of Walter Benjamin's seminal text "On Language as Such and On the Language of Man" (1916). Intent on completing Benjamin's language essay by focusing on the relationship among language, symbolism, and mathematics, the contest and conversation sparked by Benjamin explores the enigmatic proposition with which his essay leaves off: that language is both communication of the communicable and a symbol of the incommunicable. The effects of Benjamin's "On Language" can thus be found in Scholem's formulation of a privative structure of communication in mathematics, lament, and his translations of the Book of Lamentations that-negatively-communicates language's own limits. That Scholem locates in mathematics such an aesthetic strategy, while Kraft's responses remain ambivalent about mathematics, indicates a growing concern over mathematics' supposed opposition to language and representation, which prefigure Benjamin's and the Frankfurt School's later polemics against mathematics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A popular practice in France at the end of the nineteenth century was the creation of mélodies by French composers. Ernest Chausson was one such composer who excelled in this area. Having a fervent interest in all the arts, he was particularly attracted by the symbolist movement in poetry. In 1896, Chausson selected three poems to set to music from the repertoire of the poet, Camille Mauclair, resulting in the composer's opus 27. This article briefly outlines the periods when Chausson concentrated on mélodie writing, the importance Mauclair placed on musicality in his poems and then illustrates the effectiveness of Chausson's music in capturing the essence of three very different poems, Les Heures, Ballade and Les Couronnes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the secrets hidden in the two lockets in Charles Dickens' novel "Oliver Twist." It presents a new way of thinking of the symbolic functions of the lockets based on the subject-object explorations in Bill Brown's essay "Thing Theory." It concludes that the tale of the two lockets highlight the entanglement of objects and subjects in webs of Dickensian social relations while recovering the myriad hidden stories that inanimate objects can reveal, reconstruct and retell.