Bonnefoy and Shakespeare PDF

Ever Faithful to Presence: Yves Bonnefoy on Delacroix's Hamlet and on Shakespeare
Author(s): Robert W. Greene

Source: The French Review, Vol. 74, No. 3 (Feb., 2001), pp. 506-517
Published by: American Association of Teachers of French
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THE FRENCH REVIEW, Vol. 74, No. 3, February 2001 Printed in U.S.A.
Ever Faithful to Presence:

Yves Bonnefoy on Delacroix's
Hamlet and on Shakespeare
by Robert W. Greene
YVES BONNEFOY'S TRANSLATIONS Of Shakespeare have been appearing

regularly for decades, almost as steadily as his essays on art. In both do-
mains, nearly everything the poet seeks to accomplish is carried out
under the sign of what he calls "la presence." In this article, I shall exam-
ine Bonnefoy's idea of presence, as that notion informs the introductions
he wrote for several of his translations of the bard. I shall also inspect the
role of presence in "La Couleur sous le manteau d'encre,"'1 Bonnefoy's
study of Delacroix's lithographs for Hamlet, an extension, so to speak, of
the poet's work on Shakespeare.
Since the 1950s, Bonnefoy has brought over into French ten Shake-
speare plays and a large selection of the sonnets. In that time, he has also
written five substantial introductions to the plays, plus as many inquiries
into issues related to translating Shakespeare into French. In 1998, these
texts were collected in Th&itre et podsie: Shakespeare et Yeats,2 a publishing
event that, among its other achievements, served to remind Bonnefoy's
readers of his abiding interest in Shakespeare.
If one posits a continuity of concern and a measure of synergy across
Bonnefoy's diverse writing practices, which comprise, principally, poet-
ry, art criticism and translation, it follows that his close readings of
Shakespeare's theater will illuminate his art criticism, and vice-versa. To
verify this hypothesis, one has only to scrutinize "La Couleur sous le
manteau d'encre," Bonnefoy's 1993 commentary on Delacroix's litho-
graphs inspired by Hamlet, which attests two quite different sources, the
poet's long commerce with the bard and his intimate knowledge of the
plastic arts, including Delacroix. A line of descent, moreover, running
from Shakespeare through Delacroix to Bonnefoy, may be glimpsed in
Bonnefoy's passion for Shakespeare and his eschewing in his art criticism
virtually all nineteenth-century artists save Delacroix.
References and allusions to "la presence," the notion that seems to per-
meate Bonnefoy's oeuvre, turn up repeatedly in his art criticism and his
studies of Shakespeare. It is clear from these utterances that Bonnefoy
conceives of presence as a primordial stance. From time to time, usually
506
BONNEFOY ON DELACROIX AND SHAKESPEARE 507
in interviews, he ventures to state explici

ence." He is particularly forthcoming on t
gave for the catalog of an exhibit of his w
held at Tours in October-November 1993:
La presence, dans ce qui est, la pleine presence sensible qui sature les
mots de son silence, est-ce une chaine de montagnes qui peut la d~ployer
devant nous, en nous plut6t, oui, sans doute. Mais plus encore le chemin
qui s'engage entre deux des pentes, et plus encore, sur le chemin, cet
arbre, et plus encore, dans l'arbre, ses branches qui bougent, son &corce:
c'est vraiment 1l, c'est dans la pure et pleine imm~diatet6 sensorielle
qu'elle a son lieu.... Et les grands peintres font apparaitre cet imm~diat
cette plenitude sensible, ils en sont comme les prophites.3
Presence is thus at once epiphanic, being that is disclosing itself, and uni
tary, communion among beings. Elsewhere the poet describes presence
as "cet 6lan vers autrui" (Entretiens 227). For Bonnefoy, presence is thus
the experience of leaping out of oneself to something or someone else. It
reflects a dream shared by many, realizable at least in theory he hints, th
wish "to step barefoot into reality," in Wallace Stevens's yearnful phrase
to leave the self by filling the other or, contrariwise, to let the other flow
into the self. Bonnefoy also suggests, we note in the quotation from the
1993 interview, that great painters make the experience of presence avail-
able to us. That the poet would number Delacroix among such painters,
we gather from perusing "La Couleur sous le manteau d'encre."
Bonnefoy's approach to Delacroix's series of lithographs on Hamlet is
governed by the provocative question with which his essay begins: "Pour
quoi l'auteur de ... tableaux de mouvement, de couleur... pourquoi ce
peintre qui se vouera bientit aux grandes lumibres de la peinture mu
rale, a-t-il voulu ... s'enfermer dans le r6duit aux tentures noires de la
pierre lithographique" (DCL 209)? Precisely, why in this instance did
Delacroix choose lithography, thereby forgoing one of his most reliable
resources, color, along with the dynamism that this resource so consis-
tently afforded him elsewhere? The short answer to this question lies in
"Hamlet et la couleur," Bonnefoy's 1988 essay on Laforgue:
C'est dans des lithographies que Delacroix s'est le plus profond~ment

approch6 du grand sens qu'il pressentait dans Hamlet. Car ce "noir sur
blanc" dans l'oeuvre d'un peintre si ardemment coloriste, ces signes,
cette abstraction qui demeurent hant&s par la chaleur et la lumikre du
monde, c'est bien la mdtaphore la plus intense de sa voisine, de la podsie,
que puisse imaginer la peinture. (Hiddleston 182)
In an important sense, with "La Couleur sous le manteau d'encre" in

1993, Bonnefoy simply elaborates on this statement, while once again ex-
ploring what he means by "podsie."
Bonnefoy attributes Delacroix's urgent if covert attraction for black to
the influence of Goya and G6ricault, and to Alois Senefelder's invention
of lithography. Recalling Delacroix's admiration for Gdricault, the poet
508 FRENCH REVIEW
notes in "La Couleur

dans ces [i.e., G~ricau
bonds Gdricault and
Danish prince's emb
shroud of a garment
cault's and, later, to
invention, it permits
spread ink directly
color, "sans le bouil
new and peerless mea
per au vertige de son
argues, Delacroix is ab
The subtle case the p
croix merits summar
es and his journal rev
drunk on it, to his la
ponent of his work. T
mally did just that, b
scopophilia that conf
that these same impu
stinct, 1l oi0 il fait n
can detect "un dichirem
croix subit la force d
qu'elle dichaine dans l'existence," he also "s'4meut de l'idde d'une
maitrise de soi, qui calmerait ses orages." In a word, "il veut dominer ce
qui le domine" (DCL 215-16).
Like Titian and Rubens before him, Delacroix knows how to tame
color, how to control his refractory urges as an artist. He appreciates the
countervailing power of drawing, that "le dessin . . . demande au d~sir
de rifrdner son bond sur la proie, afin que celle-ci soit vue, reconnue non
comme proie mais comme 6tre," that the act of drawing forces artists to
respect the autonomy of their subjects. Moreover, Delacroix "espbre que
son dessin . .. va diff~rer son d~sir jusqu'I ce que celui-ci reconnaisse le
bien-fond6 de pulsions plus hautes, et se sublime." Sublimating eros,
however, truly dominating color, is a task Delacroix can never finish, in-
asmuch as he will always gravitate to color, "parce qu'elle est la vie, tout
de mime." Drawing, he realizes, can assist him as he grapples with pig-
ment, with his palette, but he knows too that he labors under a crushing
lucidity, that his is "une conscience qui souffre" (DCL 216-17).
Surveying Delacroix's production as a whole, Bonnefoy notes tersely in
"La Couleur" that "cette couleur est douleur." Delacroix's pain, the poet
specifies, flows from the artist's sense that he lacks, and desperately
needs, "la capacit6 de s'attacher A de l'@tre autrement que pour le pos-
sdder, le d~truire," the ability to feel "un peu d'attachement A un autre
8tre que soi," to partake of a true exchange, of presence. To breach the
self, to reach the other, unremitting effort alone w

er, like color and shape, locked in mortal comba
within the artist. Bonnefoy concludes on this p
n'est pas bonheur, mais travail" (DCL 217-18).
Delacroix's lifelong obsession with Hamlet led h
paintings on the subject (the first in 1825, the la
thirteen lithographs he completed between 1834
Goya or Gdricault, Bonnefoy surmises (and here
poet's foundational inference), Delacroix learn
descendre en des puits oit la couleur est comme
plus li le trait qui observe les formes mais l'aile
de tout, couvrant le ciel, ne laissant visible des
dans leur Ame." Bonnefoy speculates that at a ce
Delacroix, consciously or not, opted for lithogra
bilit& d'une introspection" that it offered him
um, unfortunately, would prove to be less conge
artist had expected it to be.
By selecting Hamlet as the subject of his lithog
chose a figure close to his heart. (Bonnefoy obser
jours vu en Hamlet" [DCL 221].) On the other
subject in the new medium, he produced only "
ture" (DCL 220), in Bonnefoy's tart phrase. Also
ink, Delacroix did not abandon cruelty for pity
pected on the basis of the transformation Goya u
cumstances. For Bonnefoy, the Hamlet series im
look within on the part of its creator, but an in
sured. (The word "censure," it may be pointed o
in the last six pages of Bonnefoy's essay, an ind
which the poet's approach to Delacroix reflects F
Bonnefoy finds it significant that the illustrat
an edition of Faust represent the artist's other m
phy. As the poet reminds us, Goethe's hero, opp
eventually accepts the notion that he must learn
damnation. Faust thus dramatizes the absolute n
connection in human relations, which, for Bonne
onist as an ideal choice for Delacroix. That the art
ventional and instantly dated results with his
deathless paintings of the same period (e.g., La M
Femmes d'Alger), simply confirms the poet's beli
the subject and the inappropriateness of the med
To support his contention that Delacroix chose
lithographic series on Hamlet, Bonnefoy adduces
He juxtaposes the artist's painting and his lithog
in the tragedy: Hamlet and Horatio's encounter w
Bonnefoy's eyes, an ambience of censure muffles
510 FRENCH REVIEW
impact, especially in co
ty of the painting. It
in broad, predictable
grips with the scene's
the poet sees the arti
Ever the monitor of
doubles back on his a
denying censure in D
sex and violence by m
"La Couleur." In Dela
of Hamlet, in the co
spurs Bonnefoy's rec
him what he is readi
croix lithographs, Bo
and his child's face,
pubbre" (DCL 222-23)
repression, that hol
Delacroix in "Poloniu
of life. His readings (
tect him from corrupt
If in prospect lithog
of peering more deep
cum-death-dealing de
ries taught him some
the enterprise, he ev
gine oit il avait redou
The moment before t
ening itself. In this s
accessible after all: "L
de la pierre lithograp
Ultimately, Delacroix
"une censure, au tot
previously hidden w
what his actual altern
raphy "jusqu'aux inhi
la pauvret6 de regar
present, qui est si emp
son obscure douleur"
od, at the Palais-Bour
juncture in his caree
dictions of creativity
good and evil, coher
his colossal, intricat
Hamlet miniatures, h
Harnessed horses fly
lunging, demons twisting and clawing, ch

archer-god drawing his bow, a monstrous n
pain--behold the clashing forces in Apollon
the vast ceiling painting that Delacroix com
The battle's outcome surely cannot be in dou
as much. Delacroix believed, moreover, to
"l'art doit pouvoir chasser les tinibres, di
maine des pulsions primaires mauvaises."
had misgivings about the outcome of all ep
Delacroix realized, the poet adds, that in hi
semble tourmenti de la mime ardeur qu
(DCL 225).
Delacroix knew that he was condemned to
and creating without hope of enlightenm
pinceau mime, tremp6 de nuit 6paisse autan
se perpitue" (DCL 225). What the artist ac
was to capture subliminal sightings of irrem
of dawn piercing the night sky; color start
cloak; the look of terror invading an uptur
pheline au cimeticre [1823], with its grief-s
scream); and, by extrapolation, all of the po
ency and flux that mark our days. To fly ou
ceptions, to touch what throbs beyond th
Artists register this experience, with its fr
the call for poetry in our lives, a call to
throughout his career like a champion of o
bow of his entire ceuvre, his "agitation de l'6
black-on-white lithographs, haunted as the
light, by both the memory and the prophe
painting's most intense metaphor for poetry
"La Couleur sous le manteau d'encre" (19
foy's third (if not necessarily his last) treatm
"Transposer ou traduire Hamlet" (TP 187
upon problems he faced and solutions h
Shakespeare's most famous play into Fre
ripeness: Hamlet, Lear" (TP 69-86) in 1978
edition of his translations of the two tra
edition preface reveals that, unlike Delacr
Lear more than he does Hamlet, as moved a
Danish prince. Quite simply, he believes tha
pletes the earlier one (Hamlet). At the same
Delacroix before him, Bonnefoy seems dr
drawn to a flame, inexorably.
For Bonnefoy, Hamlet's detachment, his la
ers, hence his rejection of presence, bespeak
512 FRENCH REVIEW
readily associated
gland. The charac
temporizes. Throu
participate fully
around him. In vi
the character's fa
times impulsive co
centuries on, will
paragons of abulia
Hamlet's agonized
his awareness that
the dynastic thro
Logically, then, in
do the one thing r
pation from fixed
his immobility,
assume a stance o
lows: "C'est de s'a
lusion, et i 6tre
essence de toute v
of passivity that m
adds that "cette 'd
nique de survie de
Though impresse
prince lacking the
In a conspectus of
(TP 78), which Bon
probably his favor
ethical choices dra
counterparts in Ha
swear the human
Rather, he instinc
qu'en travaillant
go'isme, de sa d
reprenne." For his
sins, pride. Yet if
also exhibits anoth
the struggle to ac
gras spirituel, c'es
s'oublier disormai
According to Bon
says all as regard
and the sense in w
ond of the two tr
"la maturation," m
world's indifference, a key theme in the

tragedies (TP 82). Rather, "ripeness" in Le
humans to survive their having been for
storm-tormented world. As recharged by
that we can counter our state of bereftne
but adequate shelter of "l'6change humai
nuit d'orage nous parle d'aube. La brutali
fragilitd de la vie, n'y sont rien contre u
tive qui rassemble et qui r~conforte." In
in this regard, in Hamlet "tout du rappo
sans joie" (TP 83-84). Conversely, as Bo
the king in Lear press on past the moral
deem themselves, by reaffirming thei
their fellows, including, eventually, the p
Sustaining such connectedness requires
to be taken up day after day for the sak
formula for what Delacroix sought in hi
peu d'attachement A un autre @tre que s
of King Lear, spoken by Edgar, come to m
will be recalled, as follows: "The weight
Edgar accepts both his place in the hu
struggle in which he is engaged. Just as
half centuries later, Edgar, only a charac
but as admirable in his fashion as the hist
accepts "la difficultd de sa tache, et qu
(DCL 225). Fidelity to the task of opening
no doubt absurd, of achieving communion
defines the mission of Shakespeare, Delac
Toward the close of "Readiness, ripeness
serts that The Winter's Tale is a "drame e
A Hamlet" and that The Tempest is the "d
85-86). In the 1990s, a decade and a half
first published (in 1978), the poet follow
lengthy prefaces to his translations of th
main purpose of "'Art et nature': l'arri
87-113), the first of the two prefaces to
The Winter's Tale in its capacity as Sh
"Florizel voit Perdita ... non comme la be
une beautd de tout l'8tre" (TP 101). Such
Bonnefoy.
The poet concludes "'Art et nature'" by asserting that The Winter's Tale
is "un retracement, au travers des atteintes qu'y porte la societ6, de la
v~riti de la vie, en son essence qui est l'amour . . . la confiance entre
homme et femme ... en son lieu qui est 'la grande nature cr~atrice.' " He
contrasts the comedy with Hamlet, "oi Shakespeare avait propos4 l'idde
514 FRENCH REVIEW
d'un theatre miroir

quer quelques d~tou
l'6chec de la 'piice da
son auteur, empach6
where in Bonnefoy, t
nature," to connect w
Shakespeare play and
is the great enabler, t
"Une Journme dans l
to his translation of
speare, occupying some
composed on the dram
eral respects a summa
ideas about Shakespea
cluding Bonnefoy, to
haps natural for the p
well as his own perenn
Prospero, the dominan
model for Bonnefoy,
whose vocation is "d
seeks "l'abaissement
miques" (TP 133), an
Bonnefoy glosses as
word, Prospero is gu
human ties and all thi
as so many obstacles o
As Bonnefoy observ
"thing of darkness,"
love, he demonstrates
vais instructeur," tha
ment erron6 qui cens
l'8tre de finitude" (TP
pero's dream-memory
critique du mage" (TP
made had he lived, ha
crimes would pardon
everything that prece
reconciliation, qualifi
"double lumineux" of
There are further re
Prospero" as climactic
poet situates his view
ferring to the scholar
work of F. A. Yates, D
118). Furthermore, h
Shakespeare sought to create a character

bale blanche" (TP 122-23). Taking an oppo
society as an idea, not persons in the fle
renders his magic meaningless.
In "Une Journde," Bonnefoy's many com
The Winter's Tale, redounding always to
nal that he is less inclined than ever to t
rately from one another. Two distinct co
a dramatic ensemble: e.g., "Et dans Le Co
sent A travers les situations et les perso
grandes exclues de La Tempete et surt
Also, when he held Hamlet to the stan
nounced his intent in the title: "Readiness
as here any preference, any subordinatio
unheralded, as if unexpected.
Bonnefoy's growing tendency to gauge
Tempest) against one he has already exam
with his evident willingness in "Une Jou
earlier texts, underscores the essay's rec
ceuvre. Prospero is chided for his "incapa
ment" (TP 143), words that echo the poet
first book of essays: "Je d6die ce livre i l
est" (dedication page). As for Prospero
clares dismissively that "c'est encore du
he speaks derisively of "le ndoplatonis
cultes" (TP 162). Finally, the fact that th
the rubric for the opening section of Du
Douve,4 Bonnefoy's epoch-making first
that his hostility to Platonism goes back
dans la vie de Prospero" proposes a partic
also offers a schematic retrospective of Bon
As is by now apparent, Bonnefoy's ceuvr
his work on Shakespeare, revolves arou
presence.5 An elusive notion, the mention
ence that dot the poet's essays and interv
lowing: presence involves full communic
the ephemeral experience of mutuality be
sient feeling of cohabitation in an ever-c
genuine oneness with that world, a radia
within finitude. This centripetal swirl o
leverages the world, shapes his approach
through his art criticism.
In Rome, 1630: l'horizon du premier baroqu
phie d'une ceuvre,' his most ambitious effor
cism, Bonnefoy speaks evocatively of pre
516 FRENCH REVIEW
for example, as
nin . . . converti
monde n'est pas
amour" (1994, 139
Synthi~se de la pr
life's work: "que
d'autre, n'est qu'
l'art . . . un rapp
autrui et le mond
just quoted, altho
timents that animate these monumental studies.
All of the texts cited above, whether Bonnefoy is discussing Shake-
speare, Bernini, Delacroix, or Giacometti, recount, with appropriate vari-
ations each time, a quest for exchange, for love, for presence. For
Bonnefoy, if Hamlet and Prospero hang back from connection with their
fellows, if they linger in a state of moral autism, Edgar and Lear-and
Delacroix-hunger for the redemption that the act of stepping out of
themselves toward another might grant them. Thus, in contemplating
The Winter's Tale, which, we remember, Bonnefoy characterizes as the
bard's "drame . . . solaire qui se superpose i Hamlet," the poet glimpses
prefigurations of Bernini, Delacroix, and Giacometti. In this sense, Shake-
speare's sunniest comedy, in tandem and a contrario with his gloomiest
tragedy, anchors Bonnefoy's faith in presence to the very base of modern
European art and thought.
UNIVERSITY AT ALBANY, STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK
Notes
1Originally published in 1993; reprinted in Bonnefoy, Dessin, couleur et lumibre 209-25

Page references to "La Couleur," as reprinted in this volume, appear in the body of t
present essay, in parentheses, preceded by DCL.
2It is worth noting that most of this volume is taken up by the poet's work on Shake
speare; his piece on Yeats occupies only about one-tenth of the volume. Page references
texts reprinted in this volume appear in the body of the present essay, in parentheses, pr
ceded by TP.
3Ragot and Lanlon, 59; interview conducted by Franloise Ragot, Daniel Lanlon, and
Alain Irelandes.
4Bonnefoy's first collection of poetry has been reprinted in Pokmes. For "Anti-Platon," see
9-19.
5Bonnefoy spoke tellingly of presence in the address he gave on being admitted to the
Collbge de France on 4 December 1981. His address, "La Presence et l'image," published in
1983, has been reprinted in Entretiens 179-202. For insightful comments on the meaning of
this concept for Bonnefoy, see Naughton; and Stamelman, esp. 129-30, 186.
6For an illuminating survey of Bonnefoy's writings on art up to 1977, including, notably,
Rome, 1630, see Esteban 165-211. For a more recent and more comprehensive study of
Bonnefoy's writings on art, see Pearre.
TFor a probing analysis of this work, see Thdlot.
Works Cited
Bonnefoy, Yves. Alberto Giacometti: biographie d'une ceuvre. Paris: Flammarion, 1991.
SDessin, couleur et lumibre. Paris: Mercure de France, 1995.
SEntretiens sur la podsie (1972-1990). Paris: Mercure de France, 1992.
"Hamlet et la couleur." Hiddleston 167-83.
SL'Improbable. Paris: Mercure de France, 1959.
SPokmes. Paris: Mercure de France, 1978.
SRome, 1630: l'horizon du premier baroque. Paris: Flammarion, 1970. Rev. ed., 1994.
SThi~tre et podsie: Shakespeare et Yeats. Paris: Mercure de France, 1998.
Esteban, Claude. L'Immidiat et l'inaccessible. Paris: Galilee, 1978. 165-211.
Hiddleston, James, ed. Laforgue aujourd'hui. Paris: Jose Corti, 1988.
Naughton, John. "The Notion of Presence in the Poetics of Yves Bonnefoy." Studies in Twen
tieth-Century Literature 13 (Winter 1989): 43-60.
Pearre, Anja. La Prisence de l'image: Yves Bonnefoy face ii neuf artistes plastiques. Atlanta, G
Rodopi, 1995.
Ragot, Franloise, and Daniel Lanlon, &ds. Yves Bonnefoy: &crits sur l'art et livres avec le
artistes. Paris: Flammarion, 1993.
Stamelman, Richard. Lost Beyond Telling: Representations of Death and Absence in Mode
French Poetry. Ithaca, NY: Cornell UP, 1990.
Thdlot, Jr~6me. "Yves Bonnefoy devant Alberto Giacometti." Critique 48 (Octobre 1992)
777-89.

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Ever Faithful to Presence: Yves Bonnefoy on Delacroix's Hamlet and on Shakespeare

Author(s): Robert W. Greene

Ever Faithful to Presence:

YVES BONNEFOY'S TRANSLATIONS Of Shakespeare have been appearing

in interviews, he ventures to state explici

C'est dans des lithographies que Delacroix s'est le plus profond~ment

In an important sense, with "La Couleur sous le manteau d'encre" in

notes in "La Couleur

self, to reach the other, unremitting effort alone w

lunging, demons twisting and clawing, ch

world's indifference, a key theme in the

d'un theatre miroir

Shakespeare sought to create a character

UNIVERSITY AT ALBANY, STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK

1Originally published in 1993; reprinted in Bonnefoy, Dessin, couleur et lumibre 209-25

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