An Approach to Valry's Leonardo

Author(s): Glenn S. Burne

Source: The French Review, Vol. 34, No. 1, (Oct., 1960), pp. 26-34
Published by: American Association of Teachers of French
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/384114
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An Approach to Valery'sLeonardo
by Glenn S. Burne

O NE OF THE BEST WAYS to approach Valery's writings on

Leonardo da Vinci is through certain key terms of Valery's rather special
vocabulary. The following words and phrases, which recur at "points of
emphasis" in several of his studies of Leonardo, seem to carry the main
burden of significance, and, when juxtaposed, provide a relatively clear
view of Valery's intentions.
I. Universalitd
1. la conscience pure
2. rigueur obstinee (or "hostinato rigore")
3. continuite (or unite)
4. liberte
5. pouvoir (or puissance)
II. Construction
1. les resistances exterieures (or Leonardo's term: experience)
2. 'imprevu
Paul Valery confesses in his "Note et Digression" that his portrait of
Leonardo written in 1894 bears but occasional resemblance to the his-
torical Leonardo. Many of his critics assert, and Valery admits, that
his Introduction a la Methode is but a pretext for reconstructing a
"universal" man, a Valerian "hero" possessed of superlative intellectual
power, a master of both himself and his means of production. The term
"universal," however, does not mean to Valery merely the ability to
function in several capacities, or to be widely informed, but rather to
possess a mind characterized by a singular balance of faculties, a mental
breadth and control which would enable one to discover universal
laws common to art and science: what Valery in his "Note et Digression"
calls "l'attitude centrale a partir de laquelle les entreprises de la con-
naissance et les operations de l'art sont dgalement possibles." In his
study of Leonardo Valdry recreated an intellect of extraordinary flexi-
bility, which had acquired an astonishing knowledge of the world and
of the natural laws that govern it; a mind which observed and recorded
with equal precision in a multiplicity of fields and was capable of "vast
synthetic conceptions."'
1 Raoul Pelmont, Paul Valery et les beaux-arts
(Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 1949), p. 39.
26
VALERY 27

At the same time, however, Valiry's Leonardo was a "complete" man,

in the sense that he had developed an equilibrium of faculties, a har-
mony of thought and action; he had achieved an almost god-like degree
of consciousness and therefore was "maitre de lui," one who "de recherche
en recherche, se fait tres simplement toujours plus admirable ecuyer de
sa propre nature."
To a man in such complete control of his own faculties, the per-
sonality, as it is commonly conceived, must be discounted in favor of
a maximum detachment; all the processes of normal existence must be
subordinated to the rigorous quest for "total consciousness." Therefore,
for a Leonardo, even "living" is unimportant, except as a mere means;
"action" is but an exercise; and both are subservient to the attainment
of "universality," which begins with the possession of full consciousness
of oneself. But not of the individual or idiosyncratic self: the superior
man moves toward that state of pure consciousness, "le moi pur," which
is associated, as we shall see, with knowledge of universal "laws of
continuity." Hence, personality, which is usually considered a primary
element of human nature, is completely negligible: it is accidental and
transitory, a mere "event"; it is but an aggregation or "encrustation"
of disparate elements-reactions, feelings, tendencies, habits-fashioned
by the external world, subject to the external world, and lacking in
permanence and stability. The personality is, however, susceptible to
being observed and analyzed by the "pure consciousness": consciousness
which is pure because it consists of nothing but itself, for it has rigor-
ously and progressively stripped itself of all that is observable and
therefore "other" than itself.
Desires, feelings, and thoughts, therefore, though seemingly part of
the inner life, are viewed by the hyperconscious mind as strange crea-
tures possessing independent existence: they are phenomena. And all
phenomena-elements of the personality as well as objects of the physical
world-appear to pure consciousness in a certain equivalence; that is,
all things observable by the mind have an equal value and are "inter-
changeable": "Toutes choses se substituent."
Valery explains that to possess such an awareness of one's thoughts
is to recognize a sort of homogeneity among them; it is to feel that
combinations of any kind are legitimate and natural, and that "la
m6thode consiste a les exciter, a les voir avec precision, a chercher
ce qu'elles impliquent."2 In a lecture on Leonardo
(January 13, 1940)3
2 Ibid., p. 43.
3 One of Valery's twice weekly lectures
(unpublished) in his "Cours de Poetique"
given at the College de France between late 1937 and spring, 1945.
28 FRENCH REVIEW

Valery observed, "Rien par consequent du reel, rien de ce qui est

observable, faisable ne lui paraissent indigne de cette puissante et extra-
ordinaire attention." Hence, there is no such thing in nature, in reality,
as "details." It is the infirmity of our minds which obliges us to abstract,
to simplify, to generalize: "c'est-a-dire,a confondre des etres parfaitement
differents et innombrables sous quelques noms, sous quelques categories
du concept." Our minds cannot bear to consider with any sustained
precision each element of our perception. Hence, most of us are forced
to lump things together into conventional classifications.
In the mind of a Leonardo, on the other hand, as Valery explains
in his "Introduction a la Methode," there takes place a sort of "drama,"
whose actors are made up of mental images. These images are watched
by the consciousness which sits as in a darkened theatre, observing
without itself being observed. The images thus perceived can be com-
bined in many ways, and form an infinite number of possible "systems"
or "constructions," by means of a process of analogy: i.e. ". . . facult6
de varier les images, de les combiner, de faire coexister la partie de l'une
avec la partie de l'autre et d'apercevoir, volontairement ou non, la
liaison de leurs structures."
Thus "genius" and its seemingly miraculous or prodigious activities
are only the result of the "logique" which presides over original com-
binations of this kind, and if such great minds as those of Leonardo
or Bonaparte seem astonishing, it is because they have the ability to
discover relationships "entre des choses dont nous echappe la loi de
continuite." And what exactly is this "logique"? It is defined as "la
conscience des operations de la pensee." In other words, it is a result
of this hyperconsciousness which we have been discussing-a state which,
incidently, is found but rarely even in the greatest minds, because to
the natural power of the mind must be added an awareness and under-
standing of that power, which alone can render it effective. This knowl-
edge, or consciousness, in assuring control over the formation of new
structures, stimulates the mind, provokes the birth and abundance of
new thoughts. It only remains, then, to develop this faculty, to make
a habit of this mode of consciousness.
Furthermore, this heightened awereness of self serves another purpose:
it is our own functioning, alone, which can tell us anything about
the external world. Our knowledge of the universe about us is limited
by our knowledge of our own beings, perhaps of our own bodies: "C'est
avec notre propre substance que nous imaginons et que nous formons
4 "Note et Digression," p. 220. Also, "Au sujet d'Eureka," Variete,
pp. 121-145
passim.
VALERY 29

une pierre, une plante, un mouvement, un objet: une image quelconque

n'est peut-etre qu'un commencement de nous-meme..."
Thus we find that our conception of unity in the universe stems from
our conception of our own unity.
Another result of this method, in addition to power (which will be
discussed later), though intimately related to it, is freedom. The prac-
tice of a mental "rigueur obstinee," and the resulting degree of order,
makes possible an unprecedented liberty of mind, in contradistinction
to the apparent liberty of the average person, who has the freedom only
to obey each chance impulse from within or without: the more we
possess of this latter kind of freedom, says Valery, the more we are
chained to the same point. To use his simile, we are like a cork on
the open sea, which is attached to nothing, which is attracted by every-
thing, and over which all the forces of the universe contest and neutralize
one another.
This freedom from one's personality produces thoughts that are truly
universal, in the sense that they belong to no particular ego: they are
the product not of a personal but of a transcendent, "free-wheeling"
consciousness, and so are independent of habit and convention. One is
free to see things in themselves and in their true relationships, to per-
ceive the logical and emotional affinities of things, their essential con-
tinuity, beneath the deceptive and chaotic surface of phenomena.
Charly Guyot, in his article on Valery,5 sees Baudelaire as a precursor
in this quest for universality and continuity. He points out that in
the essay on Wagner, apropos of the theory of correspondences, Baude-
laire says "les choses [se sont] toujours exprimees par une analogie
reciproque, depuis le jour ou Dieu a prof6re le monde comme une
complexe et indivisible totalitY..." Guyot concludes that Baudelaire
glimpses the concept of "un pouvoir supreme de l'esprit" which would
enable him to attain, by force of concentration ("rigueur obstinee), that
universality which Valery sought to define.
Baudelaire also anticipates Valery's interest in "la conscience seule,
a l'etat le plus abstrait" when, in his essay on Gautier, he defines the
true critic as "celui qui cherchera dans un livre de poesie les moyens
de perfectionner la conscience." Other examples could be quoted from
Mallarme and Rimbaud to indicate that Valery differed principally
in degree from his Symbolist forebears in his determination to transcend
the limitations of the individual personality.
Philip Blair Rice, in his discussion of this subject, finds Valery "torn
by two perhaps irreconcilable lures": on the one hand, the desire for
5 In Paul Valery, Marc Eideldinger (ed.)
(NeuchAtel: La Baconniere, 1945), p. 87.
30 FRENCH REVIEW

action-the fulfillment achieved in shaping matter into some concrete

embodiment of universal laws which have been discovered by the
artist; but on the other hand, the discovery of these laws itself seems
at times to be the ultimate fulfillment. After a long and rigorous toil,
the artist's pure consciousness, "this clear flash of a universal law from
the hidden bosom of reality brings an exaltation to which the making
of any individual thing, however splendid, seems an anticlimax." Which
is the universal man, Rice asks: the builder or the pure mind?6
With regard to Valery himself this ambivalence does exist; he does
seem at times to be primarily interested in method-in means rather
than ends. He is concerned with creative thought, with the origin and
elaboration of works of art. He possessed a great desire to create; but
also he was possessed by a desire no less great to survey all the operations
of thought, to perceive as clearly as possible the functionings of the
mind in the act of creation.7 This results naturally in questions of
method, in "la recherche de la Methode." Valery admits that he was
fascinated by "la methode dans l'industrie intellectuelle. Est-elle possible?
Que serait-elle? Est-elle souhaitable? Ce sont des questions que je passe
encore mes loisirs a me preciser."8
Perhaps it is necessary at this point to make a distinction between
Valery and his Leonardo. If at times Valery seems content with the
study of means, he makes it very clear in his lecture on Leonardo that
what he admires in the great artist is the close relationship-in fact,
the interdependence-of thought and action, of theory and practice,
of "universality" and "construction," both of which result from the
general principles which originate all creations of the mind, whether
in mathematics, science, or art. For Leonardo, the distinctions that
we make between theory and practice, between analysis and synthesis,
between the methods of art and the methods of science-"ces distinctions
pour lui sont en quelque sorte tout exterieures, elles n'existent pas
en realite quand vous y reflechissez dans l'activite intime de 1'esprit."
In this respect Valery believes Leonardo to be very modern in his
scientific mode of thought, in that "il ne consoit pas de savoir veritable
auquel ne corresponde pas un pouvoir d'action exterieure." For Leonar-
do "la question d'action exterieure, de crder quelque chose de verifiable
dtait indivisible de la notion de connaitre et de comprendre." Hence
6 "Valery," in Literary Opinion in America, M. D. Zabel
(ed.), 1951, p. 317.
7
Jackson Mathews singles out "sensibility" and "act" as the major terms in Val6ry's
theory of the creative process. See "The Poietics of Paul Valery," Romanic Review,
XLVI, 5 (Oct. 1955), 203-217.
8 Valery, Lettre i Victor Cambon, 29
Sept. 1915, in Reponses (Saint-Felicien-en-
Vivarais: Au Pigeonnier, 1928), p. 11.
VALUIRY 31

Leonardo was more "modern" than the intervening thinkers of the

seventeenth through the nineteenth centuries; for, like our scientists of
today, "l'application pour lui etait une chose essentielle. Le vrai savoir
se v&rifiait."9
Knowledge, then, must be verified, it must result in some kind of
action, it must involve construction. It is this fact that separates Leonardo
from the ordinary philosopher, whose goal is the expression, by means
of discourse, of the results of meditation: the philosopher tries to formu-
late a body of knowledge entirely expressible and transmissible by
language.10 Although Valery pays tribute to Leonardo's Notebooks as
a masterpiece of verbal art, he recognizes that language is not an end
for Leonardo, nor is knowledge, as we have seen: they are but means
to power. The term "pouvoir" (or "puissance") turns up repeatedly
in Valhry's discussion of Leonardo's method. Speaking of the Notebooks
he observes that "il [Leonardo] y poursuit je ne sais quelle voie de
progres inddfini dans la connaissance et le pouvoir: ces termes pour
lui inseparables." Leonardo was possessed by "... une fureur sacree
de comprendre pour faire et de faire pour comprendre qui passe toute
philosophie. Que savons-nous? Nous savons ce que nous pouvons. Tout
le reste n'est qu'echange de discours."ll We know, then, only what we
can do.
The great quantity of precise observations which Leonardo had gath-
ered together did not, therefore, remain a mere mass of distinct and
separate items; the intellectual power over phenomena gained by this
method of thought enabled him to combine these elements, as we have
seen, into new and "imprevue" structures: "on peut dire d'un pouvoir
intellectuel central, c'etait un homme centralise, un pouvoir intellectuel
central qui &tait capable des applications les plus pr6cises dans les
divers ordres, et des creations les plus imprevues." There is, however,
some ambiguity in the use of the term "construction" which should be
noted: creations may be entirely mental, and remain so-sort of blue-
prints fashioned of the raw materials of thought; on the other hand,
they may be externalized, as objectified patterns of thought-either verbal
or plastic.
This brings us to another of Valery's key terms, which appears in a
central role in Ldonardo et les philosophes: "les resistances ext6rieures,"
or, to use Leonardo's word, "experience." Knowledge must be tested,
verified, embodied in physical (or in the poet's case, verbal) structures
9 See also ValMry'sVues (Paris: La Table ronde, 1948), p. 219.
10 Valery, Ldonardo et les philosophes (Paris: Kra,
1929), p. 47.
11 Vues, pp. 227, 228.
32 FRENCH REVIEW

in the face of the "resistances" of the external world. This process of

construction may be defined as involving the problem of the relation-
ships of the total activity of the mind to the mode of expression which
it adopts; that is, the relationship of the whole mind "avec le genre
de travaux qui lui rendra la plus intense sensation de sa force, et avec
les resistances exterieures qu'il accepte."
This reference to external resistances that the mind "accepts" is re-
lated to ideas advanced in Valery's essay on La Fontaine, "Au sujet
d'Adonis," in which he stresses the salutary results of the artist's working
in hard, resisting material-the sculptor and his marble, and the poet's
voluntary imposing upon himself certain arbitrary rules of prosody.
For Valery believes that thoughts, if left to themselves, are apt to remain
in a state of chaos and futility: thoughts need the discipline of an
opposing, or at least resisting, force which will test their validity, elimi-
nate their flaws, evoke their strengths, shape them into significant and
durable forms.
In his contest with "les rdsistances exterieures" Leonardo sought ob-
jective standards for construction, standards which would clarify "the
problem of human intervention into things of the world," as Valery
puts it, such as principles of perspective, of light and shade, balance and
motion. He aimed at total possession of his "machine a agir": "I1 se
rend maitre du concours de ses sens et de ses mains... et sa pensee
se developpe de plus en plus sous le controle perpetuel des resistances
exterieures."
But the external world was not just a source of productive
opposition;
it was also the model which Leonardo studied closely, both as
painter
and inventor. In his Notebooks he counsels the young artist to go to
nature for his material, and not to rely upon books, ancient authorities,
or other works of art. The only true knowledge is derived from ex-
perience, from "la nature vivante," and that nature is to be studied
by every means available. Valery explains that painting, for Leonardo,
was an operation which required "toutes les connaissances, et
presque
toutes les techniques. Geometrie, dynamique,
geologie, physiologie."
Here we see in action, in concrete form, the "method" we have been
trying to define in general terms.
Leonardo painted only after having observed closely and
grasped the
basic laws of his subject. He was interested in all
aspects of phenomena;
he was attracted at once by forms, actions, attitudes, internal structure,
organic functioning of animal and man, which he sketched and dissected;
he measured systems of muscle and bone,
composed expressions of
diverse moods and temperaments, studied equilibrium as well as sources
VALERY 33

of beauty in the human figure. To him, a person was a synthesis of

researches which extended from physical dissection to abnormal psy-
chology. He noted precisely the attitudes of human bodies according
to age, sex, and even occupation. He moved beyond mere appearances;
he tried to reduce morphological characteristics to a system of "forces,"
and these systems, known, reasoned, and felt, are re-created in the com-
position of the painting. Leonardo reproduced, or projected, by means
of "une analyse en profondeur," the peculiar properties of the species
(which in some ways anticipates the anti-Aristotelian theory of "the
characteristic" to be advanced by nineteenth-century artists).
But this calculated, hyperconscious approach to a subject is not in-
tended, of course, to produce an "unemotional" work of art. While
Valery, and presumably Leonardo, oppose the Romantic conception of
emotionalism and inspiration as central to the creative process, they
nevertheless aim at reproducing in their work, by conscious manipulation
of materials, the native affective values of those materials. As Valery
says of Leonardo, "...il nous enseigne par ses exemples que l'acte de
l'artiste sup6rieur est de restituer par voie d'operations aussi conscientes
que possible la valeur de sensualite, la valeur de puissance 6motive des
choses."
In Leonardo da Vinci, Valery discovered the universal genius who
more than any other man embodied what he considered to be the only
-in fact, the inevitable-method of transcending personal limitations
to the point where conscious creative thought may become one with
conscious creative action. This method may be summarized as follows:
By a prolonged, rigorous study of one's mental processes, by precise
observation and disciplined meditation, a superior intellect may in time
acquire the power to distinguish its center of consciousness from its
habitual encrustations of personality. One may thus escape from the
confining necessity of being somebody and thereby realize the relative
freedom of being only a "suspended point of total awareness" (or an
approximation thereof) to which all things, whether of one's own being
or of the external world, become observable and "equal" as separate
entities, independent of one's mind, yet susceptible to being manipulated
into new and unforeseen structures. From its transcendant vantage point
the consciousness can perceive affinities and analogies, universal laws of
continuity, which man's mind, by nature undisciplined and conventional,
fails to see. The intellectual power gained by this "rigueur obstinee"
renders the mind "universal," in that it can, by the application of
these basic laws, operate and synthesize with equal facility in the seem-
ingly disparate areas of art, technology, and science; and by verifying
34 FRENCH REVIEW

its discoveries and constructs in the face of the disciplining opposition

of "les resistances extdrieures," it can produce original creations of an
unprecedented degree of order and significance.
KENT STATE UNIVERSITY