This document provides a comparative analysis of the poems 'Good Evening' by Tristan Corbières and 'An Evening' by Guillaume Apollinaire, exploring their use of metaphor, punctuation, and lyrical subjectivity in the context of the twilight theme.
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[...] The Yellow Loves, Good Evening - Tristan Corbières (1873) ; Alcools, An Evening - Guillaume Apollinaire (1913) - Comparative Analysis We will study the poems 'Good Evening'1 by Tristan Corbières, and 'An Evening'2 by Guillaume Apollinaire. The coherence of the corpus is first justified by the common theme - the twilight, but also by the types of chosen versifications by the two poets, which can be compared - in the disorganization of the classical verse. Tristan Corbière is a poet of the late 19th century, close to the symbolist and decadent movements: although he had little recognition in his time, he was brought to light in 1884 by Verlaine, in his anthological collection The Accursed Poets3. [...]
[...] The classical rhythm of the alexandrine is disrupted. Apollinaire is a poet of the early 20th century, considered a precursor to modernity, pre-surrealist, he proposes, in Alcohol, a free verse poetry, without punctuation, made of juxtapositions. The poem 'One Evening' is a modern fresco, although it respects a norm of regular strophes; in which it describes, by colors and impressions, the twilight that falls on the city. The text seems to be composed of an enumeration of remarks and sensations without semantic coherence, like in the fourth stanza: ghost has committed suicide/The apostle at the fig tree hangs and slowly drools'. [...]
[...] In contrast, in both texts, the lyrical is present implicitly in the apostrophe, the 'you' in Corbière, and the 'you' and 'you' in Apollinaire. Thus, the poet subject is present, for one and for the other, as a structure in the poem, but the proposal is rather distant, even if Apollinaire's text approaches traditional lyricism. Finally, to what extent does Corbière's poem 'Good Evening' present a reflection on the fantasmagory of the twilight? On the one hand, we will study the use of metaphor as a semantic and symbolic detour, and on the other hand, the use of strong punctuation as a deconstruction of the verse and its meaning. [...]
