PAGNOL, Marcel (1895-1974)

PAGNOL, Marcel (1895-1974)

First draft poetic autograph notes
N.p.n.d, 3 p. in-4° on school paper
Small fold in the lower margin of the second sheet
Some corrections by the author

Precious preparatory notes for a poem

« Les fleurs si riches
Les fleurs si claires
Les voici mortes de ton mépris

L’ombre s’
Mais toi rieuse tu danses au château
Les pentes du coteau
Le soir remonte au flanc des coteaux
mais toi sans honte tu danses au château
d’un cœur épris
Les fleurs si claires, d’une si grand prix
Les voici noires de ton mépris…
La boue épaisse est leur linceul
[…]
La robe infâme
Fit naître ton émoi
Ainsi ton âme
Ne fut jamais à moi !

Adieu ma vie, adieu beaux jours
[…]
Adieu moulin d’un bel amour
Qui est fini !
Pourtant peut-être
[Etc..] »

The manuscript presented here consists of two preparatory versions of the same poem, which seems unpublished.
Pagnol detaches himself here from any poetic academics, laying down verses according to his inspiration, and resuming himself many times.

Very few poems of the writer are known, which he composed especially in his youth at the Lycée Thiers in Marseille. The present folios could date from this period.
In January 1914, he published some of his poems in the magazine Fortunio, co-founded with friends.

He later said: “What I admired in poetry was the difficulty overcome, and I simply thought that the prose writers had resigned themselves to writing in prose because they were not able to find rhymes.”