Mallarme Quotes
It is wrongly held by many that to be happy one must have the admiration and respect of a great many people; but the esteem of one's own circle is essential. Stéphane Mallarmé, deeply beloved by a few disciples, was far happier than a celebrated man who knows that his reputation is questioned by those whom he admires. The monastery had brought peace to innumerable souls through its singleness of thought and purpose.
André Maurois
We write in the language of Dryden and Addison, of Milton and Shakespeare, but the intellectual world we inhabit is that of Flaubert and Baudelaire; it is to them, and not to their English contemporaries, that we owe our conception of modern life. The artist whose reward is perfection and where perfection can be obtained only by a separation of standards from those of the non-artist is led to adopt one of four rôles: the High Priest (Mallarmé, Joyce, Yeats), the Dandy (Firbank, Beerbohm, Moore), the Incorruptible Observer (Maugham, Maupassant) or the Detached Philosopher (Strachey, Anatole France). What he will not be is a Fighter or Helper.
Cyril Connolly
Degas was discussing poetry with Mallarmé; "It isn't ideas I'm short of... I've got too many" [Ce ne sont pas les idées qui me manquent... J'en ai trop], said Degas. "But Degas," replied Mallarmé, "you can't make a poem with ideas. ... You make it with words." [Mais, Degas, ce n'est point avec des idées que l'on fait des vers. . . . C'est avec des mots.].
Stéphane Mallarmé
