but these are not unique in his disposition, and while he favours an impersonal rather than a personal form after 1840, he uses the personal without scruple whenever it may seem to aid in the expression of the beautiful. In the midst of his greatest realism, he becomes romantic if his general object can be furthered by this mingling of forms. Clément de Ris writes that his form is not that of a picture, but "une palette chargée au hasard de couleurs brillantes et incohérentes," and that if this be style, then, “oui, Monsieur Théophile Gautier a un style des plus remarquables et des plus expressifs (92). Whatever the critical opinion of this form may be, there is no doubt that it reflects the author's organized emotional preferences as well as certain technical interests.

99

Gautier's emotional tendencies are thus evident in the atmosphere or background, in the protagonists and even in the form of his work. This work, however, is not wholly consistent with his sentiments, and while the latter have obviously had a powerful determinative influence, they have not succeeded in compelling the author to follow a single line of thought, to confine himself to a single kind of production. The influence of his drives to action is noticeable in each genre which he employs, and in a measure his literary works are a fulfilment of his desires, the practice corresponds to the theory. There are inconsistencies, nevertheless, and it does not appear that the creative imagination which brings about the finished product is equivalent merely to the intentions or interests of the author. Gautier's literary work, dependent in some degree upon his emotional tendencies for its form and development, is likewise determined by his especial technique, by his habits of work, and a study of the actual process of composition is necessary in order to distinguish further characteristics of the artist's imagination.

1. Article which appeared at the end of 1838 in the Galerie de la Presse, de la littérature et des beaux-arts, quoted by LOVENJOUL, Histoire des I, 175-180.

œuvres

2. Les Grotesques, p. 189.

3. Mademoiselle de Maupin, p. 17.

4. Spirite, p. 110. This point of view is still further developed, ibid., p. 112, when Spirite states that she deduced Guy's character entirely from her reading; that her judgment of him whom she had seen only once, but whose work she knew, coïncided completely with her later actual experience.

Cf. Ermatinger, who goes into this question from the point of view of literary psychology:

"Die innere Form des Dichtwerkes ist ein seelisches Leben, das die individuelle organische Gestalt bedingt. Es ist innere Form, weil es zwar formbildend ist, aber im Innern unsichtbar wirkt und erst durch eindringende Analyse erkannt wird. Ihre Quelle ist die Weltanschauung des Dichters. Bedeutet diese Ideendynamik als allgemeine geistige Richtung, so ist die innere Form das besondere Wirken dieser Ideendynamik im einzelnen Werke. Der blosse Stoff ist dadurch gekennzeichnet, dass ihm dieses individuelle innere Leben, diese Beseelung fehlt. Form ist dagegen beseelter Stoff. Es ist das Wesen der Ideendynamik, dass sie am Stoff Form hervorbringt.

"Das Wirken der Idee im Stoffe äussert sich nun nach drei Richtungen: I, als allgemeine seelische Atmosphäre oder Lebensgefühl ; II, als innere Triebkraft oder innere Motivierung; III, als Symbolik. . . ERMATINGER, Das dichterische Kunstwerk, p. 206.

For other expressions of Gautier's opinion in regard to the documentary value of the work of art, see Histoire du romantisme, p. 82; L'Art moderne, pp. 152, 165.

5. Letter from the Abbé de Montesquiou to Gautier's father, January 5, 1823; Lovenjoul, C-505-60.

6. Letter to Théophile Gautier, March 5, 1829; Lovenjoul, C-505-87. To the painter's father at this date, he says rather moderately that there are "de très bonnes choses dans ce tableau." Ibid., C-505.

7. BOUCHER, Une Visite à Mauperthuis, p. 308.

8. Lovenjoul, C-516-bis. Cf. the catalogue of M. Charavay, which shows two or three caricatures, a drawing of a young woman crowned with roses, another of a nymph seated near some old trees, a portrait of "la Brambilla," Italian singer, another Italian head,-as having passed through various sales in Paris. Acknowledgment is due to M. Charavay for his kindness in giving access to these records.

9. Lovenjoul, C-404-8, 20.

10. BERGERAT, Théophile Gautier, peintre, dans son Théophile Gautier. p. 241-272.

11. V. BOCCHER, Iconographie générale

no. 1, and the frontispiece to

the 1874 edition of the Portraits contemporains (Charpentier). 12. V. le Théâtre romantique of Paul Ginisty, plates 46 and 42, respectively. 13. Les Vignettes romantiques, p. 280. Cf. Gassicourt, Une visite à l'exposition..., p. 7:

"Au nombre de ces documents (appartenant à M. Maurice Dreyfous) est un joli dessin à la mine de plomb, omis dans la liste de M. Bergerat et représentant une jeune fille sur les genoux d'un jeune homme; il porte la date du 17 novembre 1831. Le trait est malheureusement un peu effacé et le papier jauni; mais, tel qu'il est, ce croquis montre que Gautier avait la main sûre et devait exceller dans ces petites compositions. L'originalité n'en est cependant pas très grande, car la tête de la femme a quelque ressemblance avec la physionomie que l'auteur prêta dans la suite à Musidora, l'une des héroïnes de son Fortunio;

on peut en juger en comparant le petit groupe au fac-simile du portrait, publié en frontispice dans une réimpression du roman, éditée en 1878 par la maison Charpentier.

14. JASINSKI, Des documents sur Th. Gautier.

15. Portraits contemporains, p. 5 (article of 1867). Cf. Histoire du romantisme, pp. 3-5, 18.

16. Histoire de l'art dramatique

IV, 129; 20 octobre 1845.

17. Letter to Vatry, of December 16, 1849; Lovenjoul, C-485-372.

18. Letter to Xavier Aubryet, June 20, 1857; Lovenjoul, C-486-22.

19. Letter to Sainte-Beuve, October 12, 1857; quoted by Lovenjoul, Histoire I, xix. For Gautier's hesitations in the choice of

des œuvres

vocation, v. also Histoire du romantisme, pp. 17, 18, 93.

20. Cf., among many possible examples:

VICTOR HUGO Odes, préface de 1822; Préface aux Orientales, paragraphs 5 and 7; Odes, p. 106; Préface de Cromwell, p. 319.

THEOPHILE GAUTIER-Les Jeunes-France, p. 194; Préfaces à Albertus, à Fortunio, p. 6; Poésies complètes, II, 84, 134; Préface aux Grotesques, P. xii.

21. Cf. Poésies complètes, I, 68, 103; II, 167; Albertus, strophes L and LI. 22. Cf. Mademoiselle de Maupin, p. 97; Poésies complètes, I, 198; II, 60. 23. Cf. Mademoiselle de Maupin, p. 13; Poésies complètes, I, 10, 35, 48, 283. 24. Poésies complètes, I, 41, 38; II, 11, 14; Albertus, strophe LIV; la Toison d'or, p. 202; l'Ame de la maison, p. 246; l'Enfant aux souliers de pain, p. 372, 375; le Capitaine Fracasse, I, 219; le Roman de la momie, p. 180. 25. Albertus, strophes XLVII, LV; Poésies complètes, I, 254, 294, 341; Mademoiselle de Maupin, pp. 105, 202, 228, 411; Une larme du diable, p. 42.

26. Poésies complètes, I, 30. Cf. ibid., pp. 103, 198, 208, 236; Albertus, LXXII; Mademoiselle de Maupin, p. 178; les Grotesques, p. 14.

27. Cf. "Nostalgies d'Obélisques," Emaux et Camées, p. 65.

28. Cf. further, Poésies complètes, I, 57, 65, 190; II, 10, 16, 125.

29. La Morte amoureuse, p. 295; Poésies complètes, II, 105.

30. Poésies complètes, II, 256; le Capitaine Fracasse, I, 122; cf. various descriptions in the Voyages which portray cemeteries, and the author's reactions to their sight. Cf. also Paris futur, loc. cit., with its recommendation of a subterranean city of the dead.

31. Les Deux Etoiles, I, 78-79.

32. Quoted by Lovenjoul, Lundis d'un chercheur, p. 188, from an article by Victor Hugo which was to appear in the Vert-Vert of December 15, 1835.

33. POULAIN, Traces de l'influence allemande

., p. 56.

34. David, in his study of the sources of this story, quotes parallel passages which demonstrate Gautier's interest in the supernatural features in his source; see no. 49.

35. Histoire de l'art dramatique

36. Op. cit., p. 59.

.

III, 80; 25 juillet 1843.

37. Cf. in le Roi Candaule, pp. 368, 389, 388, 391, 400, 413, 416, 418. In Arria Marcella, beside the basic phantasy of the story, other indications of Gautier's preoccupation with the mysterious are present; see pp. 277, 289, 292, 294, 296, 303, 308.

38. Poésies complètes, I, 87.

39. "Le chant du grillon," ibid., I, 297; for the doves, see ibid., I, 188, 403; Mademoiselle de Maupin, p. 62.

40. Emaux et Camées, p. 57.

41. Ibid., p. 173; le Capitaine Fracasse, I, 9, 10.

42. Cf. Poésies complètes, I, 22, 74, 313; Mademoiselle de Maupin, pp. 197, 199. 43. Constantinople, p. 132ss.; cf. the descriptions of dances in Algeria, Loin de Paris, p. 115ss.

44. Cf. le Roi Candaule, p. 414; cf. the figures of the scholars in Fortunio and in Avatar.

45. Cf. la Comédie de la mort, with its demonstrations of the horror beneath ordinary life; note also Mademoiselle de Maupin and la Chaîne d'or, with their treatments of extraordinary and perverted passions.

The existence of these two types of grotesque atmosphere as literary possibilities is pointed out in the Préface de Cromwell, when Victor Hugo writes that the grotesque is abundant in life: 'il y est partout: d'une part il crée le difforme et l'horrible; de l'autre le comique et le bouffon." It should be noted that in les Grotesques, where Gautier chooses a subject within this whole atmosphere, the actual work which he does serves to bring out the characteristics of his heroes which are, as a matter of fact, farthest removed from the grotesque, and that he emphasizes the freedom and the beauty of their occasional productions rather than their usual curious characters. Cf. op. cit., p. vi. 46. Cf. Caprices et Zigzags, pp. 106, 135; Loin de Paris, pp. 223, 224, 225, where Gautier's idea of the beauty of the grotesque appears in contrast to the romantic tradition of the grotesque as 66 ' repoussoir of the beautiful. Gautier believes also in the latter doctrine: cf. Loin de Paris, pp. 150, 289.

47. LARSSON, op. cit., pp. 101, 102.

48. Emaux et Camées, p. 15.

49. Cf. "Les vendeurs du temple," Poésies complètes, I, 237; "Versailles," ibid., p. 280; Mademoiselle de Maupin, p. 27; Une Nuit de Cléopâtre, pp. 353, etc., etc.

50. MontÉGUT, Nos morts contemporains, II, 36. Cf. BALDENSPERGER, Goethe en France, p. 150; chapter entitled "Autour de Faust."

51. POULAIN, op. cit., p. 51.

52. These two sketches are published in the Peau de tigre of 1866.

53. In la Chronique de Paris, 3 juillet 1836.

54. "Salon de 1836," Cabinet de lectures, mars-avril 1836.

55. Cf. the typically romantic Arabian steeds of the early works, Poésies complètes, I, 85, 116; Mademoiselle de Maupin, p. 55; Albertus, CVIII, etc.; the little negro in scarlet livery who appears in Albertus, LXXXVII; Fortunio's tigress, and his passionate Javanese, SoudjaSari, etc., etc.

56. Cf. FEYDEAU, Souvenirs intimes.

57. Histoire de l'art dramatique, II, 176, 177; 8 novembre 1841.

58. Un Repas au désert de l'Egypte, quoted by Lovenjoul, Histoire des œucres, I, 8, as appearing in the Gastronome of March 24, 1831. The tale has little local colour, and inclines to the frénétique rather than to the exotic. It is none the less a transposition in space.

59. CHAMPFLEURY, les Vignettes romantiques, note to p. 317, where Gautier's interest in La Bruyère and classic style in general is pointed out. The same author also notes Gautier's interest in the 18th century, his early recognition of the merits of the rococo, of Watteau, etc. Cf., in Gautier's work, le Petit chien de la marquise, Jean et Jeannette, and various poems where 18th century art is celebrated.

60. FEYDEAU, Souvenirs intimes, p. 87.

61. SCHWOв, loc. cit., pp. 1-18, quoting Gautier's source in ATHÉNÉE, livre xiii, chapitre lxvi.

62. Op. cit., I, 52–53, 57.

63. Emaux et Camées, p. 131.

64. Cf. Histoire de l'art dramatique

IV, 8-9; 6 janvier 1845.

65. D. M., Critique littéraire, Une larme du diable, p. 136.

66. Gavarni (in the Œuvres choisies de Gavarni, t. I).

67. De l'Originalité en France, 14 juin 1832; in Fusains et eaux-fortes, p. 11.

68. Compte-rendu de la Péri, 25 juillet 1843; Histoire de l'art dramatique,

72. Albertus, LXXVII; cf. strophes LXIX, LXXV; Poésies complètes, I, 70, 80, 87, 91, 283; II, 98, 147, 155; les Grotesques, p. 304, where Gautier praises Scudéry for his "ingenious idea" of making of a gallery of art-objects the subject for poetry.

73. La Toison d'or, p. 183; Emaux et Camées, p. 9.

74. Poésies complètes, I, 297. The present notation of Gautier's use of pictorial or sculptural allusions in his work is made simply for the purpose of demonstrating his plastic atmosphere. The question of his dependence on such developments, and that of their significance for the characterization of his creative imagination, will be taken up in detail in the consideration of the author's actual process of composition.

75. Pochades et Paradoxes, in the Caprices et Zigzags, p. 162.

76. Le Roi Candaule, pp. 373, 378, 379, 399; Arria Marcella, pp. 286, 282, 294, 295, 303, 309.

77. SPRONCK, Les Artistes littéraires, p. 77. The change from actual feminine beauty as a preoccupation to an absorption in the formal qualities of such beauty is of much interest for the designation of the place of the sentiments in Gautier's literary production. As might have been expected, in the case of an author endowed with a high degree of sexual and tender feelings, there are in his work many appearances of the women whom he loved (cf. BLANGUERNON, Une amie inconnue pp. 123–133), and in the same way, various physical attributes of beauty are incorporated in the poems and stories. The general impression of his writing, however, is not one of passion: the author does not seem to be preoccupied with the expression of his own varied feelings, but rather with the representation of the objective beauty which may, incidentally, have aroused in him other than æsthetic response. He agrees with the current opinion that the relation between the true plastic artist and his models is a contemplative one (cf., for example, le Portrait de Madame Jabulot, in la Peau de tigre, p. 209, with AmauryDuval's accounts of the attitude of his associates, in l'Atelier d'Ingres, pp. 75-77), and by the progression in his writing from an emphasis on the sensual to the accentuation of æsthetic characters, he demonstrates his dependence on feminine form as a means for Gestaltung, and as an occasion for the approach to absolute Beauty in his literary product. (Cf. MARCEL, Essai sur Th. Gautier, p. 22, who sees in Mademoiselle de Maupin, as in Avatar, Spirite, and the Roman de la momie the expression of the joys of immaterial love rather than the "intoxication with a physical Venus"; for the progression toward emphasis on the plastic