Transformations in Victor Hugo's Cosmic Poetry

Abstract

Victor Hugo's verse draws on ideas about reincarnation, future harmony, the chain of being, and the rejection of hell set out by contemporaries such as Ballanche and Reynaud. This article shows how two related poetic texts by Hugo, ‘Ce que dit la bouche d'ombre’ from Les Contemplations and the end of the ‘L'Océan d'en haut’ section of Dieu, not only transpose such ideas into visionary images but also use the resources of poetry to enact the very transformations and movements that are their subject matter. Close analysis of key passages shows how Hugo describes the structure of the cosmos in terms of motion, uses verbal metaphors to emphasize change as process, and plays on organic metaphors to suggest that evil will inevitably turn into good. He thus transposes into verse the Romantic tendency to privilege the idea of life and, in versifying movement, he dynamizes poetry.