«is there anything to say?

Tuesday's books - Jonas Follonier

This column will be accompanied by a contradictory article and two poems from the collection ciao scales in our February issue, Order here. You, dear readers, will be invited to give your own opinion on this poetry.

What's on your mind? Should I lie? Le Regard Libre, the bearer of French-language literature? The bearer of what speaks to us, above all, both good and bad. For my part, there have been many times when I've found myself disappointed by works that I'd either considered in the mishmash of bobo-helvetic-serious globalization, or that I'd appreciated «in spite of myself». This time, there's no need to be picky. What we have here is pseudo-poetry of no real interest.

André Petitat tells us basclues ciao (no capital letters in the title! yes, it's not me), his collection of poems recently published by Editions de l'Aire, which are nonetheless appreciable and even exemplary in our country's publishing landscape. I read it. I cried. What qualities must a text possess to be considered a poem? Rhyme, a classic would say. Rhythm, would say a laxist. Soul, says a metaphor enthusiast.

«I am you are
several in the same
a mishmash
a clear thread in the labyrinth
cuts and knots».»

And what are you, French literature? Mediocrity, for the most part. Just like painting in French-speaking Switzerland. So is French-language music. What medium can say what needs to be said? What magazine to establish the truth? Enough blandness, enough smoothness, enough caresses. Let's dare to assert that what is presented to us most of the time is to be discarded. Self-proclaimed authorship is not enough. It takes know-how. It takes know-how. It takes knowledge, if nothing else.

I'm the one and only.
the singular and the series
the industrial madeleine

I am everything, I am nothing, I am contemporary French literature in all its splendor. I am mediocre. Ah! the indignation! What audacity! Yes, it's easy to string words together. But inventing a story, arranging sentences, programming sounds, playing with genre - that takes more work. Work that exists in France, that sometimes exists in our countries. But I didn't see it this time. And needless to say, I had no’a prioriI had them, and they were confirmed.

A cliff silence.
My belief is my crime
crank, brain, bleach.

Brain? Beyond the problem of comprehension posed by such a collection, which I believe is its major flaw, we must question the form and, even more, the author's intentions. After all, Rimbaud's poetry tends towards an undeniable hermeticism, but there remains something fundamentally beautiful, in a much broader sense than mere aesthetics: a work of literature must speak to the reader, to give him something. That's what's missing from ciao scales. Or maybe I've missed the point and, if so, you'll have to be lenient with me.

Write to the author: jonas.follonier@leregardlibre.com

Photo credit: © Jonas Follonier for Le Regard Libre