Idee Fixe

An informal dialogue of ideas in which Valery paints a witty portrait of himself

Offhand, personal, and amusing, Paul Valery's Idee Fixe is an informal imaginative dialogue of ideas in which two men vacationing at the sea seek refuge from boredom by engaging in intellectual banter about human nature, the mind, and the haphazard relationship between humans and the world. Since the first-person speaker is unmistakably Valery, the dialogue is perhaps more than anything else a wry self-portrait of a spare, dapper, and nervous figure whose feverish mind seldom allows him to rest-or anyone else to talk.

The Collected Works of Paul Valery, the first collected edition of the writer in English, features new translations, the original French on facing pages for poetic works, and editorial notes.