(1823-1891)
héodore Faullain De Banville is best known as a very skillful maker of polished artificial verse. His poetry stands high; but it is the poetry not of nature, but of elegant society. His muse, as Mr. Henley says, is always in evening dress. References to the classic poets are woven into all of his descriptions of nature. He is distinguished, scholarly, full of taste, and brilliant in execution; never failing in propriety, and never reaching inspiration. As an artist in words and cadences he has few superiors.
De Banville.
These qualities are partly acquired, and partly the result of birth. Born in 1823, the son of a naval officer, from his earliest years he devoted himself to literature. His birthplace, Moulins, an old provincial town on the banks of the Allier, where he spent a happy childhood, made little impression on him. Still almost a child he went to Paris, where he led a life without events,--without even a marriage or an election to the Academy; he died March 13th, 1891. His place was among the society people and the artists; the painter Courbet and the writers Mürger, Baudelaire, and Gautier were among his closest friends. He first attracted attention in 1848 by the publication of a volume of verse, 'The Caryatids.' In 1857 came another, 'Odes Funambulesque,' and later another series under the same title, the two together containing his best work in verse. Here he stands highest; though he wrote also many plays, one of which, 'Gringoire,' has been acted in various translations. 'The Wife of Socrates' also holds the stage. Like his other work, his drama is artificial, refined, and skillful. He presents a marked instance of the artist working for art's sake. During the latter years of his life he wrote mostly prose, and he has left many well-drawn portraits of his contemporaries, in addition to several books of criticism, with much color and charm, but little definiteness. He was always vague, for facts did not interest him; but he had the power of making his remote, unreal world attractive, and among the writers of the school of Gautier he stands among the first.
LE CAFÉ
From 'The Soul of Paris'
Imagine a place where you do not endure the horror of being alone, and yet have the freedom of solitude. There, free from the dust, the boredom, the vulgarities of a household, you reflect at ease, comfortably seated before a table, unincumbered by all the things that oppress you in houses; for if useless objects and papers had accumulated here they would have been promptly removed. You smoke slowly, quietly, like a Turk, following your thoughts among the blue curves.
If you have a voluptuous desire to taste some warm or refreshing beverage, well-trained waiters bring it to you immediately. If you feel like talking with clever men who will not bully you, you have within reach light sheets on which are printed winged thoughts, rapid, written for you, which you are not forced to bind and preserve in a library when they have ceased to please you. This place, the paradise of civilization, the last and inviolable refuge of the free man, is the café.
It is the café; but in the ideal, as we dream it, as it ought to be. The lack of room and the fabulous cost of land on the boulevards of Paris make it hideous in actuality. In these little boxes--of which the rent is that of a palace--one would be foolish to look for the space of a vestiary. Besides, the walls are decorated with stovepipe hats and overcoats hung on clothes-pegs--an abominable sight, for which atonement is offered by multitudes of white panels and ignoble gilding, imitations made by economical process.
And (let us not deceive ourselves) the overcoat, with which one never knows what to do, and which makes us worry everywhere,--in society, at the theatre, at balls,--is the great enemy and the abominable enslavement of modern life. Happy the gentlemen of the age of Louis XIV., who in the morning dressed themselves for all day, in satin and velvet, their brows protected by wigs, and who remained superb even when beaten by the storm, and who, moreover, brave as lions, ran the risk of pneumonia even if they had to put on, one outside the other, the innumerable waistcoats of Jodelet in 'Les Précieuses Ridicules'!
"How shall I find my overcoat and my wife's party cape?" is the great and only cry, the Hamlet-monologue of the modern man, that poisons every minute of his life and makes him look with resignation toward his dying hour. On the morning after a ball given by Marshal MacMahon nothing is found: the overcoats have disappeared; the satin cloaks, the boas, the lace scarfs have gone up in smoke; and the women must rush in despair through the driving snow while their husbands try to button their evening coats, which will not button!
One evening, at a party given by the wife of the President of the Chamber of Deputies, at which the gardens were lighted by electricity, Gambetta suddenly wished to show some of his guests a curiosity, and invited them to go down with him into the bushes. A valet hastened to hand him his overcoat, but the guests did not dare to ask for theirs, and followed Gambetta as they were! However, I believe one or two of them survived.
At the café no one carries off your overcoat, no one hides it; but they are all hung up, spread out on the wall like masterpieces of art, treated as if they were portraits of Mona Lisa or Violante, and you have them before your eyes, you see them continually. Is there not reason to curse the moment your eyes first saw the light? One may, as I have said, read the papers; or rather one might read them if they were not hung on those abominable racks, which remove them a mile from you and force you to see them on your horizon.
As to the drinks, give up all hope; for the owner of the café has no proper place for their preparation, and his rent is so enormous that he has to make the best even of the quality he sells. But aside from this reason, the drinks could not be good, because there are too many of them. The last thing one finds at these coffee-houses is coffee. It is delicious, divine, in those little Oriental shops where it is made to order for each drinker in a special little pot. As to syrups, how many are there in Paris? In what inconceivable place can they keep the jars containing the fruit juices needed to make them? A few real ladies, rich, well-born, good housekeepers, not reduced to slavery by the great shops, who do not rouge or paint their cheeks, still know how to make in their own homes good syrups from the fruit of their gardens and their vineyards. But they naturally do not give them away or sell them to the keepers of cafés, but keep them to gladden their flaxen-haired children.
Such as it is,--with its failings and its vices, even a full century after the fame of Procope,--the café, which we cannot drive out of our memories, has been the asylum and the refuge of many charming spirits. The old Tabourey, who, after having been illustrious, now has a sort of half popularity and a pewter bar, formerly heard the captivating conversations of Barbey and of Aurevilly, who were rivals in the noblest salons, and who sometimes preferred to converse seated before a marble table in a hall from which one could see the foliage and the flowers of the Luxembourg. Baudelaire also talked there, with his clear caressing voice dropping diamonds and precious stones, like the princess of the fairy tale, from beautiful red, somewhat thick lips.
A problem with no possible solution holds in check the writers and the artists of Paris. When one has worked hard all day it is pleasant to take a seat, during the short stroll that precedes the dinner, to meet one's comrades and talk with them of everything but politics. The only favorable place for these necessary accidental meetings is the café; but is the game worth the candle, or, to speak more exactly, the blinding gas-jets? Is it worth while, for the pleasure of exchanging words, to accept criminal absinthe, unnatural bitters, tragic vermouth, concocted in the sombre laboratories of the cafés by frightful parasites?
Aurélien Scholl, who, being a fine poet and excellent writer, is naturally a practical man, had a pleasing idea. He wished that the reunions in the cafés might continue at the absinthe hour, but without the absinthe! A very honest man, chosen for that purpose, would pour out for the passers-by, in place of everything else, excellent claret with quinquina, which would have the double advantage of not poisoning them and of giving them a wholesome and comforting drink. But this seductive dream could never be realized. Of course, honest men exist in great numbers, among keepers of cafés as well as in other walks of life; but the individual honest man could not be found who would be willing to pour out quinquina wine in which there was both quinquina and wine.
In the Palais Royal there used to be a café which had retained Empire fittings and oil lamps. One found there real wine, real coffee, real milk, and good beefsteaks. Roqueplan, Arsène Houssaye, Michel Lévy, and the handsome Fiorentino used to breakfast there, and they knew how to get the best mushrooms. The proprietor of the café had said that as soon as he could no longer make a living by selling genuine articles, he would not give up his stock in trade to another, but would sell his furniture and shut up shop. He kept his word. He was a hero.
BALLADE ON THE MYSTERIOUS HOSTS OF THE FOREST
From 'The Caryatids'
Still sing the mocking fairies, as of old,
Beneath the shade of thorn and holly-tree;
The west wind breathes upon them pure and cold,
And still wolves dread Diana roving free,
In secret woodland with her company.
'Tis thought the peasants' hovels know her rite
When now the wolds are bathed in silver light,
And first the moonrise breaks the dusky gray;
Then down the dells, with blown soft hair and bright,
And through the dim wood, Dian thrids her way.
With water-weeds twined in their locks of gold
The strange cold forest-fairies dance in glee;
Sylphs over-timorous and over-bold
Haunt the dark hollows where the dwarf may be,
The wild red dwarf, the nixies' enemy:
Then, 'mid their mirth and laughter and affright,
The sudden goddess enters, tall and white,
With one long sigh for summers passed away;
The swift feet tear the ivy nets outright,
And through the dim wood Dian thrids her way.
She gleans her sylvan trophies; down the wold
She hears the sobbing of the stags that flee,
Mixed with the music of the hunting rolled,
But her delight is all in archery,
And naught of ruth and pity wotteth she
More than the hounds that follow on the flight;
The tall nymph draws a golden bow of might,
And thick she rains the gentle shafts that slay;
She tosses loose her locks upon the night,
And through the dim wood Dian thrids her way.
ENVOI
Prince, let us leave the din, the dust, the spite,
The gloom and glare of towns, the plague, the blight;
Amid the forest leaves and fountain spray
There is the mystic home of our delight,
And through the dim wood Dian thrids her way.
Translation of Andrew Lang.
AUX ENFANTS PERDUS
I know Cythera long is desolate;
I know the winds have stripped the garden green.
Alas, my friends! beneath the fierce sun's weight
A barren reef lies where Love's flowers have been,
Nor ever lover on that coast is seen!
So be it, for we seek a fabled shore,
To lull our vague desires with mystic lore,
To wander where Love's labyrinths beguile;
There let us land, there dream for evermore,
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle."
The sea may be our sepulchre. If Fate,
If tempests wreak their wrath on us, serene
We watch the bolt of Heaven, and scorn the hate
Of angry gods that smite us in their spleen.
Perchance the jealous mists are but the screen
That veils the fairy coast we would explore.
Come, though the sea be vexed, and breakers roar,
Come, for the breath of this old world is vile,
Haste we, and toil, and faint not at the oar;
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle."
Gray serpents trail in temples desecrate
Where Cypris smiled, the golden maid, the queen,
And ruined is the palace of our state;
But happy loves flit round the mast, and keen
The shrill winds sings the silken cords between.
Heroes are we, with wearied hearts and sore,
Whose flower is faded and whose locks are hoar.
Haste, ye light skiffs, where myrtle thickets smile
Love's panthers sleep 'mid roses, as of yore:
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle."
ENVOI
Sad eyes! the blue sea laughs as heretofore.
Ah, singing birds, your happy music pour;
Ah, poets, leave the sordid earth awhile;
Flit to these ancient gods we still adore:
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle."
Translation of Andrew Lang.
BALLADE DES PENDUS
Where wide the forest bows are spread,
Where Flora wakes with sylph and fay,
Are crowns and garlands of men dead,
All golden in the morning gay;
Within this ancient garden gray
Are clusters such as no man knows,
Where Moor and Soldan bear the sway:
This is King Louis's orchard close!
These wretched folk wave overhead,
With such strange thoughts as none may say;
A moment still, then sudden sped,
They swing in a ring and waste away.
The morning smites them with her ray;
They toss with every breeze that blows,
They dance where fires of dawning play:
This is King Louis's orchard close!
All hanged and dead, they've summonèd
(With Hell to aid, that hears them pray)
New legions of an army dread.
Now down the blue sky flames the day;
The dew dies off; the foul array
Of obscene ravens gathers and goes,
With wings that flap and beaks that flay:
This is King Louis's orchard close!
ENVOI
Prince, where leaves murmur of the May,
A tree of bitter clusters grows;
The bodies of men dead are they!
This is King Louis's orchard close!
Translation of Andrew Lang.