The Mystery of the Holy Innocents and Other Poems

CHARLES PEGUY is the only poet of consequence during the last fifty years in France whose work has failed to arouse the smallest critical interest in this country. Compared with Claudel or Valery to mention two of his contemporaries he has simply fallen flat. It almost seems as though the term poetry were out of place or as though and this is perhaps nearer the truth the conception of poetry his work implied placed it outside the pale of contemporary criticism. There seems to be nothing for criticism to get its teeth into. Everything is plain sailing. There is no shell to crack no secret to explore no difficulty of language no impenetrable thought no interplay of images to be unraveled. In whatever direction the critic looks whether at the technique the ideas the images of the psychological sphere there is nothing to be done or at any rate nothing worth doing.--From the Introduction