“Those,” said Michael, “are only experiments.”

“Precisely.  They are experiments that have succeeded.  That is why they are good.  Art is always experiment, or it is nothing.  Do not publish these poems yet.  Wait and see what happens.  Make more experiments.  And whatever you do, do not go to Germany.  That School of Forestry would be very bad for you.  Why not,” said Reveillaud, “stay where you are?”

Michael would have liked to stay for ever where he was, in Paris with Jules Reveillaud, in the Rue Servandoni.  And because his conscience kept on telling him that he would be a coward and a blackguard if he stayed in Paris, he wrenched himself away.

In the train, going into Germany, he read Reveillaud’s “Poemes” and the “Poemes” of the young men who followed him.  He had read in Paris Reveillaud’s “Critique de la Poesie Anglaise Contemporaine.”  And as he read his poems, he saw that, though he, Michael Harrison, had split with “la poesie anglaise contemporaine,” he was not, as he had supposed, alone.  His idea of being by himself of finding new forms, doing new things by himself to the disgust and annoyance of other people, in a world where only one person, Lawrence Stephen, understood or cared for what he did, it was pure illusion.  These young Frenchmen, with Jules Reveillaud at their head, were doing the same thing, making the same experiment, believing in the experiment, caring for nothing but the experiment, and carrying it farther than he had dreamed of carrying it.  They were not so far ahead of him in time; Reveillaud himself had only two years’ start; but they were all going the same way, and he saw that he must either go with them or collapse in the soft heap of rottenness, “la poesie anglaise contemporaine.”

He had made his own experiments in what he called “live verse” before he left England, after he had said he would go to Germany, even after the final arrangements had been made.  His father had given him a month to “turn round in,” as he put it.  And Michael had turned completely round.

He had not shown his experiments to Stephen.  He didn’t know what to think of them himself.  But he could see, when once Reveillaud had pointed it out to him, that they were the stuff that counted.

In the train going into Germany he thought of certain things that Reveillaud had said:  “Nous avons trempe la poesie dans la peinture et la musique.  Il faut la delivrer par la sculpture.  Chaque ligne, chaque vers, chaque poeme taille en bloc, sans couleur, sans decor, sans rime."...  “La sainte pauvresse du style depouille."...  “Il faut de la durete, toujours de la durete.”

He thought of Reveillaud’s criticism, and his sudden startled spurt of admiration:  “Mais!  Vous l’avez trouvee, la beaute de la ligne droite.”

And Reveillaud’s question:  “Vraiment?  Vous n’avez jamais lu un seul vers de mes poemes?  Alors, c’est etonnant.”  And then:  “C’est que la realite est plus forte que nous.”