To mark the centenary of his death, Jacques Rivière is included in the Bouquins collection with a volume illuminating his work as a writer, critic, and essayist, edited by Robert Kopp in collaboration with Ariane Charton, with a preface by Jean-Yves Tadié. Jacques Rivière (1886–1925), often described as a “critic of genius” who “lived through others,” was a central figure in French literature of his time. Gide said of him that he lived through others. He reviewed Proust and Artaud, and Debussy as well as Stravinsky. As a driving force of The New French Revue As a contributor to the National Radio and Television Broadcasting Corporation (NRF) and an observer of the literary, artistic, and musical avant-garde movements of the 20th century, Rivière significantly shaped the intellectual landscape. His engagement with Arthur Rimbaud and his work "Introduction à une métaphysique du rêve" exemplify Rivière's approach: a blend of profound fascination, rigorous analysis, and a constant search for his own identity through the works of others. He died at the age of 38, leaving little time to compile his writings. The thousands of pages he contributed to journals—primarily La NRF—form an entire continent that remained unexplored for a century after his death. This has now been accomplished with the present volume, which contains a selection of articles on literature, painting, music, and politics, as well as his own writings.
Content
Rivière's role in the context of the Nouvelle Revue française
Rivière was secretary of the NRF from 1911 to 1914 and, after his imprisonment as a prisoner of war and demobilization, its director from 1919 until his early death in 1925. He was considered the journal's "true driving force" (cheville ouvrière) and decisively shaped its modern, sophisticated character. He saw his task as refocusing the NRF on literature and the arts after the First World War, understanding them as universal and not appropriating them for national purposes.
Rivière had the gift of recognizing and promoting "what was truly new in literature, painting, and music." He knew how to distinguish between what "had a future and what was merely vain posturing." The NRF positioned itself against Symbolism and strove for a renewal of objective literary forms such as the novel and theater. Rivière himself sought new values in literature, painting, and music. He was open to new ideas but simultaneously respected tradition. A central concern of Rivière's was the autonomy of art from political or moral purposes. He emphasized the need to clearly separate literature and politics.
Rivière was not only a critic but also a dedicated editor who cared for the publication and dissemination of important works. He intensively supported authors like Marcel Proust by reviewing manuscripts, making corrections, and advocating for the publication of their works, even when this involved considerable effort and conflict. He firmly believed in the potential of authors like Antonin Artaud and gave them a platform to publish their struggles with writing as a "poetics of creation."
Jacques Rivière's contribution to French literature and literary criticism
Rivière was a "critic of genius" whose unique characteristic lay in his ability to "adapt perfectly to any artist." He saw himself as someone who "has nothing to do but understand" and who offered himself "emptily to any invasion" in order to then penetrate the other and detach himself from them again. His criticism was not merely about literature, but was itself literature, characterized by a "passionate clairvoyance" and the desire "to rediscover other consciousnesses through sensations and words." For Rivière, criticism was a path to self-knowledge. He used engagement with others to understand himself and to discover "truths." His texts are thus also "self-portraits of Jacques Rivière."
Rivière diagnosed a "crisis of the novel" and called for a new "adventure novel." He advocated a departure from the psychologically analytical novel and a turn toward works that explored "space and the future." He considered Symbolism obsolete and urged the revival of more objective forms of the novel and theater. Rivière was a pioneer in recognizing new literary movements. He saw the forerunners of Surrealism in the early stages of Dadaism, particularly in the method of automatic writing.
Rivière's own style was characterized by lyrical language and the ability to combine philosophical reflection with imaginative poetry. He often focused on the "formula" and the condensation of thoughts, frequently using metaphors and imagery to suggest deeper meanings. Jacques Rivière's engagement with Rimbaud and his "Introduction to a Metaphysics of Dreams" exemplify the working method of a critic who arrived at new insights through his willingness to be influenced by others. The volume Criticism and Creation This is a crucial step in making Rivière's comprehensive and groundbreaking work accessible to the public and in reaffirming its importance for 20th-century French literature and criticism.
Rivière and Rimbaud
Jacques Rivière's engagement with Arthur Rimbaud and his text "Introduction à une métaphysique du rêve" are central aspects of his critical and creative work, illuminating his intellectual development and his attitude towards literature. Rivière found in Rimbaud both a source of profound fascination and intellectual torment.
Fascination and intellectual engagement
Jacques Rivière felt an intense fascination for Arthur Rimbaud, which was, however, accompanied by a certain incomprehension. He described how Rimbaud, in writing his hallucinations, threatened to be "sublime or incomprehensible" (to Rivière himself). He saw these visions as "transformations of reality by a fevered brain," behind which the real forms were perceptible as a principle, resulting in the "transfiguration of the true world into dreams." Nevertheless, some poems remained "irrevocably closed" to him. In contrast to his friend Henri Fournier, who used Rimbaud as inspiration for his future novel and saw a path he himself wanted to follow, Rivière was rather "tormented" by Rimbaud.
Claudel, who described Rimbaud as "the decisive influence" in his life, encouraged Rivière to study Rimbaud's work, especially the Illuminationsto reread it and let oneself be carried away by it. Claudel himself experienced through Rimbaud a "revelation of the supernatural" and saw in it genius as an "inspiration that truly came from nowhere." This metaphysical and mystical vision was also temporarily transferred to Rivière's own study. Rivière saw Rimbaud's rebellion not primarily as social, but as a "metaphysical revolt." Rimbaud refused to accept the human, indeed even the physical and astronomical existence of the universe. Rivière quoted him as saying: "To be alive: that is the horror! To be there, to suffer, to accept, to endure: that is what cannot happen without shame, without cursing, without revenge!"
Rimbaud's face was guarded by Rimbaud for a bohemian; il ne faut pas le croire lorsqu'il se peint lui-même dans ses premiers verse « débraillé comme un étudiant » ; It's also something you chose qu'un voyou. Le visage ébouriffé et désordonné que lui prête Fantin-Latour, s'il n'est pas sans vraisemblance, cependant risque de suggestérer une fausse interpretation de sa révolte. The bohème is a protest against the society and its usages, against the hierarchy of classes, against the organization that les hommes se sont eux-mêmes imposée ; Elle prétend renverser tout ce qu'il ya d'artificiel dans la vie, tout ce qui est surajouté à la simple nature. Mais elle accepte certains commencements, les fondations de l'édifice et all au moins l'existence ici-bas. Rimbaud refuses all in one block: this is against the human condition of the world, but it is against the physical and astronomical condition of the Universe. Là est l'insupportable: dans all. Être vivant: voilà l'horreur! Here you go, come back, get there: voilà ce qui ne se peut faire sans honte, sans exécration, sans vengeance! Il ya quelque chose qui vous tient à la gorge, qui vous étouffe. It has an impossibility of being positive and aggressive like « être au monde ». The color of Rimbaud, it is a intolerance, au sens médical du mot. Il ne peut rien « to keep », this organism is in defense and in a state of malaise and rejet primitif, fundamental, permanent. Il suffoque, il se tourne et se retourne indéfiniment ; in vain toujours. These fugues continuelles sont les sursauts de this intolérance métaphysique. L'endroit où il se trouve a pour lui quelque chose de brûlant, la place qu'il occupe le chasse comme avec une main ; It's not worth it, for you can rest, from the machine of men ; Le seul fait d'y être situé, la simple station en ce point sont en eux-mêmes assez épouvantables pour l'obliger à fuir. D'un bout à l'autre de this lettre à Delahaye dont nous avons déjà cité plusieurs passages, on sent bien l'espèce de Folie que la presence en un lieu donne à Rimbaud, on sent peser this masse invisible qui, partout où il se tient, l'écrase, contre laquelle il n'a pas trop de toute sa fureur: « Mais ce lieu-ci ; distillation, composition, all étroitesses… »
One must not consider Rimbaud a bohemian; one must not believe him when he describes himself in his opening verses as “sloppy like a student“describes; he is much more than a rogue. The disheveled and unkempt face that Fantin-Latour gives him, while not improbable, carries the risk of misinterpreting his rebellion. Bohemia is a protest against society and its customs, against the class hierarchy, against the organization that people have imposed upon themselves; it wants to overturn everything artificial in life, everything that has been added to simple nature. But it accepts certain beginnings, the foundations of the edifice, and at least existence here on earth. Rimbaud rejects everything categorically: he rebels against human existence, or rather, against the physical and astronomical existence of the universe. That is the unbearable thing: in everything. To be alive: that is the horror! To be there, to endure, to accept, to exist: that is impossible without shame, without contempt, without revenge! Something grips the throat, suffocates one. There is a positive and, like an aggressive, impossibility, “to be in the worldRimbaud's anger is an intolerance in the medical sense of the word. He can do nothing “keep“His entire organism is on the defensive, in a state of discomfort and primitive, fundamental, permanent rejection. He suffocates, twisting and turning incessantly; always in vain. His constant attempts to escape are the outbursts of this metaphysical intolerance. The place he is in has something burning about it for him; the space he occupies drives him away as if by a hand; he doesn't need the malice of people to be unable to stay there; the mere fact of being there, the mere presence in this place, is in itself terrible enough to force him to flee. From the beginning to the end of this letter to Delahaye, from which we have already quoted several passages, one clearly senses the kind of madness that overcomes Rimbaud by being in a place, one senses the weight of this invisible mass that crushes him wherever he is and against which all his rage is powerless: “But this place; distillation, composition, all narrowness…”
The Bohemian set rejects social conventions, class hierarchies, and artificial ways of life, but accepts the fundamentals of existence. According to Rivière, Rimbaud's revolt rejects not only society, but the entire human and cosmic condition. His rebellion is directed against mere "Être vivant"—against existence itself, which he finds unbearable. Rivière describes this as a kind of "allergy to being"—a fundamental, physical and psychological incompatibility with simply existing in the world. It manifests as shortness of breath, as a permanent malaise that makes him restless and untenable. Rimbaud's constant escapes are an expression of this metaphysical intolerance. It is not the malice of people that compels him to leave places, but the mere fact of having to be somewhere. Every place becomes burning, unbearable, oppressive for him. Rivière interprets Rimbaud's "révolte" not socially or politically, but as an ontological rebellion against the fact of existence itself, an unquenchable feeling of suffocation that drives him restlessly about.
Key concepts in Rivières Rimbaud analysis
Rivière saw the “idea of innocence” as the key to Rimbaud’s work and his poetry. For Rimbaud, writing was a means of “drowsing” himself of the innocence that stifled him. His work was a kind of “body” he gave to his unblemished soul, a “region” he opened to his innocence.
Rivière analyzed Rimbaud's style as objective, impersonal, and characterized by a profound passion that was indifferent to its object. Rimbaud did not seem to address the reader, as his aim was "selfish" and immediate. The "incoherence" of Rimbaud's language, for Rivière, reflected his ignorance of what he was saying. Rimbaud did not know in advance what he would say but learned it in the moment of utterance. Rivière described this with Rimbaud's own words: "For I is another; when the copper awakens as a fanfare, it is not his fault. This is obvious to me: I am present at the genesis of my thought; I see it, I hear it; I draw the bow: the symphony moves in the depths, one leaps onto the stage."
Rimbaud n'a pas de système. Il ne cherche pas à imposer à ses sensations une forme arrêtée. Il ne cherche même pas à s'y reconnaître lui-même. Il s'y livre all entier, et all ce qu'elles entraînent de lui passe dans ses verse. Everything is developed freely, without preview, without control. This is a point of volunteering to organize poetry.
The style of Rimbaud is objectif, impersonnel and d'une passion profonde qui ne s'occupe pas de son object. On ne sent pas qu'il parle pour un lecteur, son but est égoïste et immédiat. The incoherence of the language is the image of the ignorance of this. Il ne savait pas d'advance ce qu'il allait dire, il l'apprenait au moment où il le prononçait. This is it: Car Je est un another. If the cuivre s'éveille clairon, il n'y a rien de sa faute. Cela m'est évident: j'assiste à l'éclosion de ma pensée: je la regarde, je l'écoute: je lance un coup d'archet: la symphonie fait son remuement dans les profondeurs, ou vient d'un bond sur la scène.
This passivité devant son inspiration est ce qui donne à son style this apparence de désordre et de brusquerie. Mais en réalité ce désordre est plein de vie. The exact surprise corresponds to the surprise that is revealed in a real genius. This pourquoi sa poetry a cet air de nouveauté absolute, de fraîcheur intacte, comme si elle venait d'un monde où rien n'avait encore été dit.
Jamais poet n'a été plusvierge que lui devant les choses. The sincérité n'est pas tant de dire que qu'il pense que de se laisser traverser par ce qu'il voit. Il ne juge pas, il ne conclut pas, il laisse venir. Ainsi ses images ont une violence incomparable, parce qu'elles sont la chose même, saisie dans l'instant où elle frappe l'âme, sans intermédiaire, sans preparation.
This may be spontaneous but there are also dangers. Elle exposes to the incoherence, to the obscurity, to the dispersion. Rimbaud n'a pas toujours échappé à ces périls. Parfois son poème is défait avant même d'avoir trouvé sa forme, il se perd dans son excès d'intensité. Mais même dans ses échecs, on sent la grandeur d'un être qui n'a jamais triché avec lui-même, qui a voulu se donner tout entier, sans calcul, sans réserve
Rimbaud has no system. He doesn't try to impose a fixed form on his feelings. He doesn't even try to recognize himself in them. He surrenders himself completely to them, and everything they bring forth from him flows into his verses. They develop freely, without predictability, without control. He has no intention whatsoever of organizing his poetry.
Rimbaud's style is objective, impersonal, and marked by a profound passion that is not concerned with its subject. One does not sense that he is speaking for a reader; his aim is selfish and immediate. The incoherence of his language reflects his ignorance of what he is saying. He did not know in advance what he would say; he learned it the moment he uttered it. He said: Because "I" is another. When the brass awakens to the horn, it's not his fault. For me, it's obvious: I am witnessing the unfolding of my thought: I observe it, I listen to it: I draw the bow: The symphony moves in the depths or leaps onto the stage.
This passivity towards his inspiration lends his style an air of disorder and suddenness. But in reality, this disorder is full of life. It corresponds precisely to the surprise he himself felt when he discovered his own genius. That is why his poetry has this appearance of absolute novelty, of untouched freshness, as if it came from a world where nothing had yet been said.
No poet has ever been more untouched by things than he was. His sincerity lies less in saying what he thinks than in allowing himself to be permeated by what he sees. He doesn't judge, he doesn't draw conclusions, he simply lets it happen. Thus, his images possess an unparalleled power, because they are the thing itself, captured in the moment it touches the soul, without intermediaries, without preparation.
But this spontaneity also harbors dangers. It exposes one to the risk of incoherence, ambiguity, and distraction. Rimbaud did not always escape these dangers. Sometimes his poetry disintegrates before it has even found its form, losing itself in its excessive intensity. But even in his failures, one senses the greatness of a man who never deceived himself, who wanted to give himself completely, without calculation, without reservations.
Rivière highlighted the brevity and condensation of Rimbaud's style, particularly through a comparison of drafts and final texts of the Season in hellHe noted that Rimbaud, through the reduction and condensation of words, sought a deeper “truth” and followed “instinctive rhythms”.
Rivière also attempted to explain the mysterious, sudden poetic silence of the nineteen-year-old genius. He saw it as rooted not only in Rimbaud's biography, but in the very nature of his work. As soon as Rimbaud had conquered the "vision of paradise," literature, in his eyes, lost its meaning. The publication of the Season in hell He threw it aside as if it were an instrument no longer needed. Through writing, he had known everything he wanted to know. Rivière also attributed this silence to the "instability of direct knowledge, of pure intuition."
Rivière's later distancing himself from Rimbaud
After the war, his reading of Freud, and the rise of Dada and Surrealism, Rivière's view of Rimbaud changed. He abandoned the idea that Rimbaud's visions were an "external sign" and suggested that they stemmed more from his unconscious. Rivière continued to call Rimbaud an "unparalleled monster," but emphasized that one had to "get out of this mess" and "rediscover human proportions." For him, Rimbaud was a "past step." This development was also evident in a handwritten but unpublished conclusion to his 1914 Rimbaud study, in which he attempted to heal the "wound" in his intelligence left by Rimbaud through Catholic dogma. This passage sparked controversy after his death.
In the appendix of Criticism and Creation The account is documented as follows: When Rivière's handwritten passage circulated, many were shocked that Rivière described Rimbaud as an "incomparable monster" but simultaneously demanded: "to get out of this affair" and to rediscover "human proportions." For the young Surrealist authors, it seemed like a betrayal that Rivière—who had enthusiastically defended Rimbaud early on—now dismissed him as "outdated" and pointed to Catholic dogma as a remedy. Breton and Aragon reacted coolly and distanced themselves from Rivière. On the other hand, Catholic intellectuals welcomed this turn of events. They saw in Rivière's manuscript the rehabilitation of a poet they otherwise tended to reject and interpreted Rimbaud's "wounds" as a sign of the necessity of dogmatic truth. Later, literary historians debated whether Rivière ever truly intended to publish this conclusion or whether it was merely a private note. Some saw it as a symptom of Rivière's postwar search for intellectual order; others viewed it as a break with his earlier closeness to Rimbaud and a sign of his growing distance from the avant-garde. Thus, Rivière's relationship with Rimbaud retrospectively became a political and cultural point of contention between Catholics, Surrealists, and critics who preferred to see him as a humanist.
“Introduction to a Métaphysique du Rêve”: context and content
The text “Introduction à une métaphysique du rêve” was written by Jacques Rivière in 1908, revised in 1909, and published in the The New French Revue (NRF) published. It is dedicated to the “memory of Jean-Arthur Rimbaud.” This dedication is significant because, by his own admission, Rivière’s “mind was tormented by Rimbaud.” The “foreign” element in Rimbaud’s work profoundly influenced Rivière and inspired him to create this “most unexpected” text. Rivière presented his project to Claudel in 1908, describing it as “a good way of making fun of philosophy professors while saying serious things.” This reveals a playful yet profound intention that went beyond purely academic reflection.
In his “Introduction to a Metaphysics of Dreams,” Rivière attempts to explore the supernatural or parallel reality perceived by Rimbaud, which can be accessed through dreams. He intends to “light the lamp of dreams” and “descend into the abyss” to find a “great sleeping being” and a “muted acclamation,” thus formulating a metaphysics of dreams that transcends purely religious or conventional philosophical explanations. This method emphasizes the exploration of dream experience as a path to plumbing spirituality beyond traditional dogmas and discovering the deepest, hidden truths of the human soul.
The text treats topography as the starting point for reflection. This reflects Rivière's general interest in places and spaces, as also expressed in other fictional works of his (e.g., "Les Beaux Jours," "Le Chemin de fer"), where space is often a metaphor for the search for the authentic self. A central motif is the search for a higher power and the exploration of spirituality beyond the religious sphere. Rivière saw in dreams the possibility of finding "the words of eternal life," thus establishing a connection between dream activity and key formulas of Christianity. Reflection on dreams also reappears in his later articles on Freud and Proust and can be traced back to the beginning of Proust's In Search of Lost Time. can be associated with it, which also originated around 1908-1909.
The text opens with an atmospheric, somber, and surreal description of a landscape encompassing a "chain of hills of darkness" and a "talus that dissolves into the soft, silent river." The speaker describes fleeting visions such as "masked assassins" and an uneasy pilgrimage to a "very tired god," gripped by a sense of uncertainty and mystery. This topographical introduction serves as a starting point for reflection, conveying to the reader a dreamlike or supernatural atmosphere that prepares the ground for the subsequent exploration of dream metaphysics.
The central idea of the essay is Jacques Rivière's endeavor to formulate a "metaphysics of dreams," to find a "great sleeping being," and to listen to a "muted acclamation" emanating from unseen mouths. This project, dedicated to Rimbaud, aims to explore a supernatural or parallel reality accessible through dreams, transcending purely religious or conventional philosophical explanations to probe spirituality beyond traditional dogma. A preparatory note to this text suggests that dreams might contain "the words of eternal life."
Stylistically and methodologically, Rivière combines philosophical reflection with an imaginative, almost narrative style in this essay, whereby the speculative dimension recedes in favor of the metaphor of the dream as a "land" or "dream narrative." The text can be considered a precursor to Surrealism, both thematically and stylistically, as Marcel Raymond noted. The lyrical, sometimes disorienting language, the dissolution of reality into dream images, and the emphasis on the inner world, as described in the incipit, are clear indicators of this.
Rivière's revision aimed to minimize the speculative dimension in favor of the metaphor of the dream as a landscape and the dream narrative. The passage from the incipit, which speaks of a "hilltop of darkness," a "silent, soft tide," and an "indeterminate field strewn with traps," bordered by a bloody line at the edge of the cloud cover, evokes a surreal landscape.
Sous this colline de ténèbres, sur ce talus qui s'effrite dans la molle rivière muette, des tréteaux où se joue ma tragédie. The sky descends loudly in a balcony with sombre sous les étoffes. Toute this foule naine innombrablement accroupie s'ébranle par moments d'un rire minutieusement idiot et content. Je sortirai. – Le sombre courant sans remous où plongea la parade se dissipe en vapeur ; an instant, fleet au travers, et déjà voici present une plaine indéfinie, bossuée de broussailles qui sont des embûches, cernée d'un trait sanglant au ras du couvercle des nuages ; je tressaille, frôlé par l'un des assassins masqués qui rampent et convergent vers ce cri plus étouffé que la chute d'un corps sans vie dans le silence de tentures. – Aube lente, aigreur de la brise ; J'accompagne un pèlerinage menu, piétinant, inquiet vers je ne sais quel dieu très las qui siege derrière cet horizon. The celui que j'ai saisi par la Manche auprès de moi, je fais le tour sans découvrir un visage. Il n'en a pas. The tree is not the same as in the outside world of the evening parties, which are dénoue là-bas dans la lassitude de ses drames et de ses barques.
Beneath this hill of darkness, on this precipice that breaks into the gentle, silent river, stand the scenery against which my tragedy unfolds. The sky descends heavily like a balcony sinking beneath the fabrics. This dwarfish, countless crouching crowd erupts from time to time into a meticulously idiotic, restrained laugh. I shall go out. – The dark, eddy-free stream into which the parade plunged dissolves into vapor; for a moment it floats through, and already an indeterminate plain is visible, hilly with brambles that form snares, bounded by a bloody line at the edge of the cloud cover; I flinch as one of the masked assassins brushes against me, creeping and moving toward this scream, duller than the fall of a lifeless body into the silence of the curtains. – Slow dawn, sharp breeze; I am accompanying a small, clattering, restless group of pilgrims on their way to an unknown, very weary God who sits enthroned beyond this horizon. I turn the man I have grasped by the sleeve next to me, without seeing a face. He has none. He is only the tree against which I lean to listen to the last gasps of the night's celebration, which dissolves there in the exhaustion of its dramas and boats.
The description of a pilgrim crowd approaching a “very tired God” without a face becoming visible underscores the search for the invisible and the enigmatic experience of the world. Rivière saw Rimbaud as a disturbing catalyst for his own intellectual and spiritual quest. His interpretation of Rimbaud’s “metaphysical revolt” and the concept of “innocence” was original, and “Introduction à une métaphysique du rêve” is a text that not only marks Rivière’s own intellectual development but also foreshadows new literary currents in his work.
Rivière's "Introduction to a Metaphysics of the Dream" reveals the fundamental tension in his interpretation of Rimbaud: the fascination with states in which consciousness is permeated by something alien and uncontrollable, and simultaneously the search for a way to tame this experience. The dream appears to him as a realm in which the self is not master of itself, but passively receives something it barely understands—this is precisely how Rivière describes Rimbaud's poetic practice: "he didn't know in advance what he was going to say; he learned it the moment he spoke it." The poetics of incoherence and sudden images that Rivière admires in Rimbaud corresponds to his early theory of the dream as an experience in which the subject is overwhelmed by forces that transcend its intentions. At the same time, the “métaphysique du rêve” is an attempt to reduce this anarchic experience to a system, to give it a metaphysical meaning. This also contains the seed of Rivière's later distancing himself: for him, Rimbaud remains the poet who embodies the dream state in its purest form – an “incomparable monster” – but because Rivière remains convinced that one must return from the dream and rediscover “human proportions,” he ultimately sees Rimbaud only as a transitional figure. Introduction This provides a double lens: it explains why Rivière initially celebrated Rimbaud as an authentic "voyant," but also why he dismissed him after the war as a step that had been overstepped—because for him the dream could never be the ultimate goal, but rather a passage to a higher, ordered truth.
This article is written in German and can be found at https://rentree.de. Automatic translations into English and French are available. English, French.
