La “biographie de l’œuvre” de Christian Dotremont, questionnée par Yves Bonnefoy

The critical and poetic dialogue between Yves Bonnefoy and Christian Dotremont was fundamental because the two writers were able to profoundly question the boundaries between literature and the arts. Bonnefoy traced, in his writings, a “biography of the work” of his Belgian friend. This study begins with an analysis of the first exchanges between the two poets who, in the same years, investigated the potentialities and risks of the linguistic sign; it moves on to the moment of “slipped” understanding revolving around the Préface written by Bonnefoy in 1971, on the occasion of the exhibition of Dotremont’s logograms; it examines the French poet’s writings on logograms after 1971; and finally, it puts forward the hypothesis that in Bonnefoy’s collaborative, aesthetic, and literary research with Pierre Alechinsky, signs of Dotremont’s legacy and fruitful dialogue with him can be discerned.