SOURCE: Balakian, Anna. “From Mallarmé to Breton: Continuity and Discontinuity in the Poetics of Ambiguity.” In Writing in a Modern Temper: Essays on French Literature and Thought in Honor of Henri Peyre, edited by Mary Ann Caws, pp. 118-34. Saratoga, CA: Amna Libri, 1984.

In the following essay, Balakian traces the path of modern French poetry with an examination of the works of Stéphane Mallarmé and André Breton.

Separated by half a century, Stéphane Mallarmé and André Breton follow each other like two milestones on the path of modern poetics, and their roles as heads of literary schools, symbolism and surrealism, invite comparison. Their positions as masters in the throes of the poetic activities of the avant-garde of their respective times had gained for them a cosmopolitan following in Paris, clusters of poets who were as much affected by the stature of their two personalities as by...