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School of Modern Languages

French Poetry Transpositions Colloquium

Nineteenth-Century French Poetry: Transpositions of Thought and Form in the Nineteenth Century and Beyond

One-day colloquium at Bangor University, Saturday 21 February 2009

Nineteenth-century French poetry has inspired writers and thinkers in a whole range of domains, affecting artistic and theoretical production not just in nineteenth-century France itself, but throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and in countries beyond France. The aim of the one-day colloquium held in Bangor on Saturday 21st February was to explore the key questions that arise as the poetry of this period is transposed into different modes of thought and form that reach into our own century: 

  • What domains does nineteenth-century French poetry infiltrate and influence?

  • What does this mean for the status, or ‘life’, of poetry?

  • What are the extent and modifications of the poetic model?

  • Why is the influence so far-reaching?

Specialists in nineteenth-century French poetry presented working papers grouped under four different domains, namely the Official, the Ethical, the Visual and the Musical. A wide range of poets’ work was discussed during the day, including the work of Banville, Baudelaire, Gautier, Hugo, Lamartine, Lefèvre, Mallarmé, Mendès, Moréas, Quillard, Régnier, Rimbaud, Verlaine and Villiers de l’Isle-Adam. Each session concluded with a table ronde discussion which teased out responses, overlaps, and tensions, and further questions. Contributors broached topics such as the over-institutionalisation of poetry, the non-normative linguistic and ethical space of poetry, the destablising aesthetic experience of poetry, the relationship between ‘high art’ and popular culture, national and formal boundaries and the role of interart relationships.

The day culminated with a musical soirée presented by the Bangor Artist in Residence, pianist Sholto Kynoch (funded by the Leverhulme Trust), together with soprano Rhona McKail, whose programme focused solely on settings of nineteenth-century French poetry.

Following on from the colloquium, the organisers Dr Helen Abbott (Bangor University) and Dr Bradley Stephens (University of Bristol), together with Prof. Patrick McGuinness (University of Oxford), are co-editing a volume on the status of nineteenth-century French poetry (due for publication in 2010), and coordinating a research network, including an email discussion list with subject threads derived from the agendas raised during the colloquium to enable further dialogue.

Download the flyer (MS Word). Programme & Abstracts (MS Word).

For further information, contact: Dr Helen Abbott: h.abbott@bangor.ac.uk