Philippe Beck’s art of poetry

Abstract

Contemporary French poet Philippe Beck through his intriguing poetic project Opéradiques (2014; which has yet to be translated into English) demonstrates a new understanding of writing poetry through the deconstructive, reconstructive, boustrophedon process. Beck finds the foundation of his art of poetry in the "ruins" of existing written poems, stories, texts of all genres and forms. When it seems that writing poetry has lost all direction, and almost become irrelevant, Beck's work shows us the "cracks in the wall". Is it that these "cracks in the wall" should be received as a bold attempt to secure a new enthusiasm for the future, to form a stronger poem able to say that which cannot be said? Does Beck's work tell us that poetry must be the answer to the question "what is poetry?" The works of Derrida, Walter Benjamin, and Jean-Luc Nancy, provide an opening through which to grasp Beck's poetics.