JOUVE (Pierre Jean). - Lot 130

JOUVE (Pierre Jean). Born in Arras. 1887-1976. French poet and novelist. Manuscript A.S. "Pierre Jean Jouve", entitled A propos du XXe siècle. S.l.n.d [circa 1950]. 10 folio pages on heavy laid paper, blue and red inks. MAGNIFICENT TEXT ON ART AND MODERNITY IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY: Starting from his considerations on modern art and the way we perceive art, Jouve praises Alban Berg's opera Wozzeck (Jouve, who was an unconditional admirer of Berg, had written several articles on the Austrian composer):...In 19th-century Paris, Wagner, Baudelaire, Courbet, Mallarmé and Cézanne were booed by the public, devoted to "clichés"... Today, modern art should ...reach vast communities, respond to the democratic evolution towards numbers... Yet, he deplores, we have never known ...a greater isolation of art, a similar adaptation of art to the qualities of a restricted spiritual life, those of an elite whose face is not known... He is delighted that the exhibition "Works of the 20th Century", which took place in Paris last May, showed the best of contemporary creation and ...Without paradox, we can say that "the work of the 20th century", in opera, we have heard: Wozzeck. The importance of the Paris appearance of Alban Berg's Wozzeck cannot be underestimated. The deep impression this brilliant work has made on all minds [...], the overwhelming success of the two performances directed by Karl Böhm and phenomenally embodied in the two protagonists Christl Golz and Joseph Hermann, affirm that something truly new has happened in France... Jouve has studied the score carefully and is preparing ...a highly developed critical work on Wozzeck: I say that it is impossible to conceive of a science of form more profound, more thorough, more total, and that this form, in which every note has a rigorous meaning, is placed by prodigy at the service of gushing invention and dramatic truth... He then asks why the French public ignored this prodigious opera for so long. Then, returning to the music on offer at the exhibition, he evokes Stravinsky: ...It can be said that Igor Strawinsky's Rite of Spring has not aged in its brute force as a great obsessive myth, and that the extraordinary block of sonority and rhythm still possesses its mystery... He believes that only Belà Bartok's 2nd Concerto for piano and orchestra can equal the Rite... and concludes ...Art is a long battle [...] the most rigorous and sovereign innovation of modern music will, in one way or another, have a real influence...The poet offers this manuscript to Théo Léger, ...in memory of Sils, last year...