Abstract

Mallarmé's reputation as a seminal thinker has steadily grown, yet his literary theory has received little attention and the great theoretical articles of his later years have never been properly studied. This book represents the first attempt to examine the later Mallarmé's extraordinary and systematic literary idealism through a careful scrutiny of his work. Dayan makes selective use of the textual approaches of certain post-structuralist theorists, especially Derrida, pointing out the many similarities between their positions and Mallarmé's, but also noting the vital differences. These differences, Dayan argues help to explain not only Mallarmé's continuing elusiveness, but also the failure of modern literary theory to face the question that Mallarmé always considered central: What is good poetry?