Title: Un coup de dés jamais n’abolira le hasard
Artist: Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898)
First published by: Cosmopolis: A Literary Review, 1897
First book version: La Nouvelle Revue Française, 1914
ISBN: none
Stéphane Mallarmé worked on his long poem, which consists of ten printed pages, for thirty years. The first printed version that approximately conformed to his wishes was begun in 1897, shortly before his death, and thus can be considered definitive only in a limited sense. The status and esthetic intention of the work go far beyond classic pattern poetry: the main phrase—Un coup de jamais dés n’abolira le hasard [A throw of the dice will never abolish chance]—is strewn across the entire text in the largest typeface. The spaces in between have subordinate clauses using nine other typefaces and types of highlighting. The intention was to enable a reading on several levels, similar to that of a score. Large blanks spaces and entirely blank pages allow the reader to experience his or her own shipwreck (naufrage). Particularly easy to understand in French, the phonetic equivalence of, for example, maître (master) and mètre (meter) or coup de dés (throw of the dice) and coup d’idées (spontaneous insight) permit many associations.