René Émile Char (; 14 June 1907 – 19 February 1988) was a French poet and member of the

French Resistance The French Resistance (french: La Résistance) was a collection of organisations that fought the German occupation of France during World War II, Nazi occupation of France and the Collaborationism, collaborationist Vichy France, Vichy régim ...

Biography

Char was born in

L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue (; oc, L'Illa de Sòrga or ) is a town and commune on the Sorgue river in Southeastern France. Politically, the commune is in the arrondissement of Avignon within the department of Vaucluse, in the région of Provence-Alpes ...

in the

Vaucluse Vaucluse (; oc, Vauclusa, label= Provençal or ) is a department in the southeastern French region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur. It had a population of 561,469 as of 2019. the youngest of the four children of Emile Char and Marie-Thérèse Rouget, where his father was mayor and managing director of the Vaucluse plasterworks. He spent his childhood in Névons, the substantial family home completed at his birth, then studied as a boarder at the school of

Avignon Avignon (, ; ; oc, Avinhon, label=Provençal dialect, Provençal or , ; la, Avenio) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Vaucluse Departments of France, department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur Regions of France, region of So ...

and subsequently, in 1925, a student at ''L'École de Commerce de Marseille'', where he read

Plutarch Plutarch (; grc-gre, Πλούταρχος, ''Ploútarchos''; ; – after AD 119) was a Greek Middle Platonist philosopher, historian, biographer, essayist, and priest at the Temple of Apollo in Delphi. He is known primarily for his ''P ...

François Villon François Villon (Modern French: , ; – after 1463) is the best known French poet of the Late Middle Ages. He was involved in criminal behavior and had multiple encounters with law enforcement authorities. Villon wrote about some of these ex ...

Racine Jean-Baptiste Racine ( , ) (; 22 December 163921 April 1699) was a French dramatist, one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France, along with Molière and Corneille as well as an important literary figure in the Western traditio ...

, the German Romantics,

Alfred de Vigny Alfred Victor, Comte de Vigny (27 March 1797 – 17 September 1863) was a French poet and early French Romanticist. He also produced novels, plays, and translations of Shakespeare. Biography Vigny was born in Loches (a town to which he never r ...

Gérard de Nerval Gérard de Nerval (; 22 May 1808 – 26 January 1855) was the pen name of the French writer, poet, and translator Gérard Labrunie, a major figure of French romanticism, best known for his novellas and poems, especially the collection ''Les Fil ...

and

Charles Baudelaire Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poetry, French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist and art critic. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticis ...

. He was tall (1.92 m) and was an active

rugby Rugby may refer to: Sport * Rugby football in many forms: ** Rugby league: 13 players per side *** Masters Rugby League *** Mod league *** Rugby league nines *** Rugby league sevens *** Touch (sport) *** Wheelchair rugby league ** Rugby union: 1 ...

player. After briefly working at

Cavaillon Cavaillon (; Provençal: ''Cavalhon'') is a commune in the Vaucluse department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of Southeastern France.

, in 1927 he performed his military service in the artillery in

Nîmes Nîmes ( , ; oc, Nimes ; Latin: ''Nemausus'') is the prefecture of the Gard department in the Occitanie region of Southern France. Located between the Mediterranean Sea and Cévennes, the commune of Nîmes has an estimated population of 148,5 ...

. His first book, ''Cloches sur le cœur'', was published in 1928 as a compilation of poems written between 1922 and 1926. In early 1929, he founded the journal ''Méridiens'' with

André Cayatte André Cayatte (3 February 1909, in Carcassonne – 6 February 1989, in Paris) was a French filmmaker, writer and lawyer, who became known for his films centering on themes of crime, justice, and moral responsibility. Cayatte began his directoral ...

and published three issues. In August, he sent twenty-six copies of his book ''Arsenal'', published in Nîmes, to

Paul Éluard Paul Éluard (), born Eugène Émile Paul Grindel (; 14 December 1895 – 18 November 1952), was a French poet and one of the founders of the Surrealist movement. In 1916, he chose the name Paul Éluard, a matronymic borrowed from his maternal ...

, who in the autumn came to visit him at L'Isle sur la Sorgue. In late November, Char moved to Paris, where he met

Louis Aragon Louis Aragon (, , 3 October 1897 – 24 December 1982) was a French poet who was one of the leading voices of the surrealist movement in France. He co-founded with André Breton and Philippe Soupault the surrealist review ''Littérature''. He wa ...

André Breton André Robert Breton (; 19 February 1896 – 28 September 1966) was a French writer and poet, the co-founder, leader, and principal theorist of surrealism. His writings include the first ''Surrealist Manifesto'' (''Manifeste du surréalisme'') o ...

, and

René Crevel René Crevel (; 10 August 1900 – 18 June 1935) was a French writer involved with the surrealist movement. Life Crevel was born in Paris to a family of Parisian bourgeoisie. He had a traumatic religious upbringing. At the age of fourteen, h ...

, and joined the

surrealists Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to l ...

. His "''Profession de foi du sujet''" was published in December in the twelfth issue of ''La Révolution surréaliste''. He remained active in the surrealist movement through the early 1930s but distanced himself gradually from the mid-1930s onward. Throughout his career, Char's work appeared in various editions, often with artwork by notable figures, including

Kandinsky Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky (; rus, Василий Васильевич Кандинский, Vasiliy Vasilyevich Kandinskiy, vɐˈsʲilʲɪj vɐˈsʲilʲjɪvʲɪtɕ kɐnʲˈdʲinskʲɪj; – 13 December 1944) was a Russian painter a ...

Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...

Braque Georges Braque ( , ; 13 May 1882 – 31 August 1963) was a major 20th-century List of French artists, French painter, Collage, collagist, Drawing, draughtsman, printmaker and sculpture, sculptor. His most notable contributions were in his all ...

, Miró,

Matisse Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known prima ...

and

Vieira da Silva Maria Helena Vieira da Silva (13 June 1908 – 6 March 1992) was a Portuguese Abstract art, abstract painter. She was considered a leading member of the European abstract expressionism movement known as Informalism, Art Informel. Her works featu ...

. Char joined the

in 1940, serving under the name of Captain Alexandre, where he commanded the

Durance The Durance (; ''Durença'' in the Occitan classical norm or ''Durènço'' in the Mistralian norm) is a major river in Southeastern France. A left tributary of the Rhône, it is long. Its drainage basin is .atomic weapons A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions ( thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bom ...

Provence Provence (, , , , ; oc, Provença or ''Prouvènço'' , ) is a geographical region and historical province of southeastern France, which extends from the left bank of the lower Rhône to the west to the Italian border to the east; it is bor ...

. He died of a heart attack in 1988 in Paris. The Hotel Campredon (also known as the Maison René Char) in

was a public collection of his manuscripts, drawings, paintings and objets d'art, until 2016. Char was a friend and close associate of the writers

Albert Camus Albert Camus ( , ; ; 7 November 1913 – 4 January 1960) was a French philosopher, author, dramatist, and journalist. He was awarded the 1957 Nobel Prize in Literature at the age of 44, the second-youngest recipient in history. His work ...

Georges Bataille Georges Albert Maurice Victor Bataille (; ; 10 September 1897 – 9 July 1962) was a French philosopher and intellectual working in philosophy, literature, sociology, anthropology, and history of art. His writing, which included essays, novels, ...

and

Maurice Blanchot Maurice Blanchot (; ; 22 September 1907 – 20 February 2003) was a French writer, philosopher and literary theorist. His work, exploring a philosophy of death alongside poetic theories of meaning and sense, bore significant influence on post- ...

, and of the artists

Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...

Joan Miró Joan Miró i Ferrà ( , , ; 20 April 1893 – 25 December 1983) was a Catalan painter, sculptor and ceramicist born in Barcelona. A museum dedicated to his work, the Fundació Joan Miró, was established in his native city of Barcelona i ...

and

Victor Brauner Victor Brauner (, also spelled Viktor Brauner; 15 June 1903 – 12 March 1966) was a Romanian painter and sculptor of the surrealist movement. Early life He was born in Piatra Neamț, Romania, the son of a Jewish timber manufacturer who subseque ...

. He was to have been in the car involved in the accident that killed both Camus and Michel Gallimard, but there was not enough room, and returned instead that day by train to Paris. The composer

Pierre Boulez Pierre Louis Joseph Boulez (; 26 March 1925 – 5 January 2016) was a French composer, conductor and writer, and the founder of several musical institutions. He was one of the dominant figures of post-war Western classical music. Born in Mont ...

wrote three settings of Char's poetry, ''

Le Soleil des eaux ''Le Soleil des eaux'' (''The Sun of Waters'') is a two-movement cantata for soprano, choir and orchestra by Pierre Boulez, based on two poems by René Char, and having a total duration of about nine minutes. Background Boulez first encountered C ...

'', ''

Le Visage nuptial ''Le Visage nuptial'' (''The Nuptial Face'') is a secular cantata for soprano, contralto, choir of women and orchestra by Pierre Boulez. Originally composed in 1946–47 on a poem by René Char for two voices, two ondes Martenot, piano and percu ...

'', and ''

Le Marteau sans maître ''Le Marteau sans maître'' (; The Hammer without a Master) is a chamber cantata by French composer Pierre Boulez. The work, which received its premiere in 1955, sets surrealist poetry by René Char for contralto and six instrumentalists. It i ...

''. A late friendship developed also between Char and

Martin Heidegger Martin Heidegger (; ; 26 September 188926 May 1976) was a German philosopher who is best known for contributions to phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. He is among the most important and influential philosophers of the 20th centur ...

, who described Char's poetry as "a tour de force into the ineffable" and was repeatedly his guest at

Le Thor Le Thor (; oc, Lo Tòr) is a commune in the Vaucluse department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in southeastern France. It has an attractive Romanesque church, Notre-Dame-du-Lac. Population Notable residents *Alexey Brodovitch (18 ...

in the

Vaucluse Vaucluse (; oc, Vauclusa, label= Provençal or ) is a department in the southeastern French region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur. It had a population of 561,469 as of 2019.André Breton André Robert Breton (; 19 February 1896 – 28 September 1966) was a French writer and poet, the co-founder, leader, and principal theorist of surrealism. His writings include the first ''Surrealist Manifesto'' (''Manifeste du surréalisme'') o ...

and

) * ''Le Marteau sans maître'' (1934) * ''Moulin premier'' (1936) * ''Placard pour un chemin des écoliers'' (1937) * ''Dehors la nuit est gouvernée'' (1938) * ''Seuls demeurent'' (1945) * ''Feuillets d'Hypnos'' (1946) * ''Le Poème pulvérisé'' (1947) * ''Fureur et mystère'' (1948) * ''Les Matinaux'' (1950) *''Recherche de la base et du sommet'' (1955) * ''La Parole en archipel'' (1962) * ''L'Âge cassant'' (1965) * ''Dans la Pluie giboyeuse'' (1968) * ''Le Nu perdu'' (1971) * ''La Nuit talismanique'' (1972) * ''Le Bâton de rosier'' * ''Aromates chasseurs'' (1976) * ''Chants de la Balandrane'' (1977) * ''Fenêtres dormantes et porte sur le toit'' (1979) * ''Loin de nos cendres'' (1983) * ''Les voisinages de Van Gogh'' (1985) *''Éloge d'une soupçonnée'' (1988) Char's ''Œuvres complètes'' were published in the prestigious ''

Bibliothèque de la Pléiade The ''Bibliothèque de la Pléiade'' (, "Pleiades Library") is a French editorial collection which was created in 1931 by Jacques Schiffrin, an independent young editor. Schiffrin wanted to provide the public with reference editions of the c ...

'' ( Gallimard) in 1983 with an introduction by

Jean Roudaut Jean Roudaut (born 1 June 1929) is a French writer and professor of French literature who taught in the universities of Thessaloniki, Pisa, and Fribourg. He was born in Morlaix on 1 June 1929. Bibliography *1964: ''Michel Butor ou le livre f ...

. An augmented posthumous re-edition appeared in 1995.

Translations

Among the poets to translate his

hermetic Hermetic or related forms may refer to: * of or related to the ancient Greek Olympian god Hermes * of or related to Hermes Trismegistus, a legendary Hellenistic figure based on the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth ** , the ancient and m ...

works into English are

William Carlos Williams William Carlos Williams (September 17, 1883 – March 4, 1963) was an American poet, writer, and physician closely associated with modernism and imagism. In addition to his writing, Williams had a long career as a physician practicing both pedia ...

Samuel Beckett Samuel Barclay Beckett (; 13 April 1906 – 22 December 1989) was an Irish novelist, dramatist, short story writer, theatre director, poet, and literary translator. His literary and theatrical work features bleak, impersonal and tragicomic expe ...

Richard Wilbur Richard Purdy Wilbur (March 1, 1921 – October 14, 2017) was an American poet and literary translator. One of the foremost poets of his generation, Wilbur's work, composed primarily in traditional forms, was marked by its wit, charm, and gentle ...

, James Wright,

John Ashbery John Lawrence Ashbery (July 28, 1927 – September 3, 2017) was an American poet and art critic. Ashbery is considered the most influential American poet of his time. Oxford University literary critic John Bayley wrote that Ashbery "sounded, in ...

W. S. Merwin William Stanley Merwin (September 30, 1927 – March 15, 2019) was an American poet who wrote more than fifty books of poetry and prose, and produced many works in translation. During the 1960s anti-war movement, Merwin's unique craft was thema ...

, Cid Corman, Gustaf Sobin, Kevin Hart (poet) and

Paul Auster Paul Benjamin Auster (born February 3, 1947) is an American writer and film director. His notable works include ''The New York Trilogy'' (1987), ''Moon Palace'' (1989), ''The Music of Chance'' (1990), ''The Book of Illusions'' (2002), ''The Broo ...

. Translators into German have included

Paul Celan Paul Celan (; ; 23 November 1920 – c. 20 April 1970) was a Romanian-born German-language poet and translator. He was born as Paul Antschel to a Jewish family in Cernăuți (German: Czernowitz), in the then Kingdom of Romania (now Chernivtsi, U ...

and

Peter Handke Peter Handke (; born 6 December 1942) is an Austrian novelist, playwright, translator, poet, film director, and screenwriter. He was awarded the 2019 Nobel Prize in Literature "for an influential work that with linguistic ingenuity has explored t ...

. Translators into Bulgarian include Georgi Mitzkov and Zlatozar Petrov.

References

Selections in English

* * * * * * * * Char, René (1992). ''The Dawn Breakers.'' Translated by Michael Worton. Newcastle upon Tyne, England: Bloodaxe Books. . * * * * Char, René (2010). ''Furor and Mystery & Other Writings.'' Translated by Mary Ann Caws; Nancy Kline. Boston, Massachusetts: Black Widow Press. . * * * Char, René (2014). ''Hypnos.'' Translated by Mark Hutchinson. Calcutta: Seagull Books & York, Pennsylvania: Maple Press. . * Char, René (2015). ''The Inventors and Other Poems.'' Translated by Mark Hutchinson. Calcutta: Seagull Books & York, Pennsylvania: Maple Press. .

Criticism

* * * * * * * * * * * *

External links