Furious Handicraft Pierre Boulez and Le Marteau sans maître
Johannes Knapp
On the banks of the river Seine between Pont Marie and the Louvre and along the Quai de la Tournelle and Quai Voltaire, bibliophile bon vivants—known to Parisians as bouquinistes—run an impressive open-air bookstore. Novels, philosophical essays, biographies, volumes of poetry, post cards, historical etchings and art catalogues (and today also refrigerator magnets, Eiffel Tower replicas made in China, and other souvenirs) wait in hundreds of dark green folding boxes for browsing passers-by—nearly regardless of the weather. According to his own recollection, it was in the spring of 1946 that Pierre Boulez, just turned 21, saw a name wink at him from one of the stalls that he recognized from a literary journal: René Char. It was Seuls demeurent, a volume of poetry published a few months before the end of the war in Gallimard’s famous Collection blanche. To Boulez, who had left the Paris Conservatoire shortly before to become music director of the Renaud-Barrault theater troupe, reading Char’s poetry felt like the revelation of his own identity. Fascinated by the novelty of the concentrated, yet abundantly free poetic language, he quickly set to work composing. This soon bore its first fruits: Le Visage nuptial (1946/47), a cantata for soprano, contralto, two ondes martenot, piano, and percussion. The central focus of this youthful work is the eponymous love poem from Seuls demeurent. Usually rendered in English as The Nuptial Face, the poem oscillates between free verse and alexandrine meter. The music under scores the tale; it was clearly invented to suit the text, leaning upon it and following its course.
