Surrealism Movement
Andre Breton's book Le Manifeste du Surrealisme lead to the founding of surrealism. Surrealism's techniques were automatic writing, self-induced hallucinations and word games. By the time surrealism was at its final stage, at the end of World War II, it had already spread around the world.
The Absence by Paul Eluard
PoemI speak to you across cities
I speak to you across plains My mouth is upon your pillow Both faces of the walls come meeting My voice discovering you I speak to you of eternity O cities memories of cities Cities wrapped in our desires Cities come early cities come lately Cities strong and cities secret Plundered of their master's builders All their thinkers all their ghosts Fields pattern of emerald Bright living surviving The harvest of the sky over our earth Feeds my voice I dream and weep I laugh and dream among the flames Among the clusters of the sun And over my body your body spreads The sheet of it's bright mirror. |
AnalysisThe title "The Absence" implies that the poem is about somebody missing someone in their life because they're absent. The poem is about two people and one of those people's feelings, and both of their connections with one another. Eluard stated "I speak to you across cities, I speak to you across plains. My mouth is upon your pillow". Eluard is basically saying that he talks to this other person as though they're far away (possible because they're distant?) although they're in each others presence apparently face to face. "And over my body, your body spreads. The sheet of its bright mirror." Eluard is painting a picture of beautiful physical love. A picture of two bodies pressed together sharing emotions through movement. The poem is written in the form of a fantasy. It's almost as though the writer is fantasizing about this person, or maybe not but they're not with him at that point in time.
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Literary DevicesThe literary devices that are used within this poem are repetition and analogies. For example "I speak to you across cities, I speak to you across plains... I speak to you of eternity" is an example of repetition because I speak to you is being repeated constantly."My mouth is upon your pillow" is an example of an analogy because it helps the reader understand the difficult idea of him trying to say he's right there with the person who's supposedly absent. The literary devices are being applied throughout the poem by emphasizing how much the writer is speaking to this person to show that no mater how much absence there is between them he will always speak to this person or in other words, dream and think of them.
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