SOURCE: Vigny: Chatterton, Grant & Cutler Ltd., 1984, 78p.

In the following excerpt, Buss considers Chatterton as a dramatic defense of the poet and his purpose in an otherwise materialist society, and continues by assessing the influence of this “drama of ideas” on subsequent literature.

‘La maladie est incurable’, remarks the Quaker and, when Chatterton asks: ‘La mienne?’, replies:

Non, celle de l'humanité.—Selon ton cœur, tu prends en bienveillante pitié ceux qui te disent: Sois un autre homme que celui que tu es;—moi, selon ma tête, je les ai en mépris, parce qu'ils veulent dire: Retire-toi de notre soleil; il n'y a pas de place pour toi.

(p. 54)

But Chatterton, throughout his answer, carries on speaking quietly to Rachel: it is not the place of the mythical hero to understand his own role in the myth.

The Quaker's reply not only points to the social...