Description:In this concise and illuminating study, Jacques Rancire, one of the world's most popular and influential living philosophers, examines the life and work of the celebrated nineteenth-century French poet and critic, Stphane Mallarm. Ranciere presents Mallarm as neither an aesthete in need of rare essences and unheard-of words, nor the silent and nocturnal thinker of some poem too pure to be written. Mallarm is the contemporary of a republic that is seeking out forms of civic worship to replace the pomp of religions and kings. If his writing is difficult, it is because it complies with a demanding. Read more... Content: Table of contents; Notes on the translation; Foreword; The foam of the poem; The poetics of mystery; The hymn of spiritual hearts; The duty of the book; Appendix: selected texts; Notes; Index. Abstract: In this concise and illuminating study, Jacques Rancire, one of the world's most popular and influential living philosophers, examines the life and work of the celebrated nineteenth-century French poet and critic, Stphane Mallarm. Ranciere presents Mallarm as neither an aesthete in need of rare essences and unheard-of words, nor the silent and nocturnal thinker of some poem too pure to be written. Mallarm is the contemporary of a republic that is seeking out forms of civic worship to replace the pomp of religions and kings. If his writing is difficult, it is because it complies with a demanding