Yves Bonnefoy Critical Essay | Critical Essay by James McAllister

Critical Essay by James McAllister

SOURCE: McAllister, James. “Metonymy and Metaphor in Yves Bonnefoy's Poetry.” French Forum 19, no. 2 (May 1994): 149-60.

In the following essay, McAllister contends that Bonnefoy favors metonymy over metaphor in his verse.

Yves Bonnefoy's conception of writing as un-writing (désécriture) fosters poetic texts in which metonymy intertwines with metaphor so that metonymic processes both extend and subvert analogical associations. Denouncing metaphor as the stuff of esthetic lies, he turns to metonymy to tear through the opaque fabric of analogy for an authentic approach to reality. His comments on the genesis of “A San Francesco le soir” exemplify his antagonistic interpretation of the two rhetorical figures:

Par exemple, j'ai intitulé un poème d'Hier régnant désert, jadis, “A San Francesco le soir,” sans dire qu'il s'agissait là d'une des églises de Ferrare. … Pourquoi cette forclusion, en l'occurence délibérée, d'un élément signifiant? … eussé-je nommé Ferrare, dans le poème, ce nom...
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