Mallarmé et le livre-fétiche (Variations sur un sujet)

The aim of the present article is to examine a few “variations” on Mallarmé’s idea of the “Livre”: not from the point of view of his “rêve” as expressed in his letter to Verlaine, but through some more concrete examples. These include the still life book, which seems to take inspiration from painters in Divagations; the book in the prosaic format of the fashion magazine; the illustrated book or artist’s book; the book-object; and the typographic poem, as projected by Un coup de dés. Added to these various material avatars of the ideal “Livre,” I propose the notion of the “livre-fétiche,” which preserves the Book’s sacred dimension, while inscribing it in the one-dimensional universe of things: as an anthropological enigma through which the poem questions the human condition. (in French)