Le regard et la connaissance : victor hugo, poete- ''voyant''

Sight and knowledge : victor hugo, the poet - ''seer

• Auteur / Autrice : GEUM-JU JEON
• Direction : Claude Gély
• Type : Thèse de doctorat
• Discipline(s) : Littérature française
• Date : Soutenance en 1994
• Etablissement(s) : Montpellier 3

Résumé

Le but de ce travail est d'aborder l'univers imaginaire de victor hugo a travers le theme du poete- ''voyant''. Le voyant est celui qui voit et sait l'invisible, le theme du poete- ''voyant'' implique deux sujets essentiels ; d'autre part le lien unissant le regard a la connaissance sacree, et d'autre part la fonction de la poesie en tant que connaissance. L'histoire de la pensee est liee a la metaphore de l'oeil, on remarque le passage de l'oeil, organe de la perception, a l'oeil, instrument de la connaissance intellectuelle ; le theme du poete-''voyant'' se rapporte alors au probleme du visible et de l'invisible. Cela revient a dire qu'il y a deux sortes d&oeil, -l'oeil du corps et l'oeil de l'ame, et deux actes differents de voir, -percevoir et contempler. Donc il y a deux degres differents de voyant, le voyant du visible et le voyant de l'invisible ; si le poete- ''voyant'' est celui qui voit ce que les autres ne voient pas, l'invisible, les hommes ordinaires qui sont les voyants du visible, sont aveugles. Or le poete-''voyant'' occupe une place a part, etant l'intermediaire entre la voyance et la cecite.

The aim of this work is to enter victor hugo's imaginary world through the theme of the poet - ''seer''. The seer is one who sees and knows the invisible, the poet-seer theme includes two essential concepts ; one is the relationship linking sight and sacred knowledge, and the other is the function of poetry as knowledge. The history of thought is linked to the metaphor of the eye. We notice that there is a transition from the eye as an organ of perception, to the eye as a tool of intllectual knowledge ; the poet-seer theme therefore relates to the problem of the visible and the invisible. This means to say that there are two kinds of eye, - the physical eye and the souls'eye, and two different ways of seeing, which are to percieve and to contemplate. Therefore there are two different types of seer - the seer of the visible and the seer of the invisible. If the poet-seer is one who sees that which others do not - the invisible, ordinary men who are the seers of the visible, are blind. So the poet-''seer'' is set apart in an intermediary world between sight and blindness. Our work is divided into 3 parts. The first part describes the world of the eye, while the second part describes the world of the blind, and the third the character of the poet-seer. This process allows us to better analyse the characteristics and extent of the poets' projets ; and according to v. Hugo, the role of the poet is to assist in the raising of all beings to the luminous world sight.