Description

Autograph letter signed to Max-Pol Fouchet about a poem to be published in the magazine Fountaindirected by the latter.

"L'Isle-sur-sorgue - Vaucluse
29 sept. 47

Dear Max-Pol,

Here is a text for "Fontaine". Nothing is left to chance except the great chance itself. Please make sure we take care of the composition: large characters, large spaces between paragraphs. This poem is a kind of "lung to intrigue or enthrall faces". But does it succeed? Here it is!
A word from you will please me: for you were lost [*and you lost me] in the summer.

Sincerely
René Char

René Char joined the Resistance in 1942 under the name of "Capitaine Alexandre". Revolted by the censorship of Vichy and Berlin, he vowed not to publish his poems in occupied France. Nevertheless, from 1944 he contributed to the review Fountain led by Max-Pol Fouchet, based in Algiers and resolutely hostile to the Vichy regime. Char remained loyal to Fountain when, after the Liberation, the magazine moved to Paris, and contributed to 5 of its issues, not only as a poet but also as a columnist. Fountain published, among other things, the first extracts from Hypnos Leaves (1945) and The pulverised poem (1947).
Max-Pol Fouchet, with whom Char kept up an extensive correspondence, described him as "a great poet, a master of dignity, freedom and rectitude, a master whose morals married his poetry and whose poetry married his morals" (Jacques Chirac, "René Char"), La revue des deux mondesJuly 1989, p. 17)