Based on or after the antique? André Chénier's "Hermes" and "America" or Epic at the risk of Philosophy

Abstract

Generally seen as poet of the return to Antiquity that swept across Europe at the end of the 18^th century, André Chénier was also the author of two “modern” epics in which he saw his major realisations, Hermès and L’Amérique. Under his pen, the epic becomes an exploration of knowledge, without being confused with didactic poetry. With a philosophical outlook inherited from the Enlightenment, these two works shift the boundaries of the genre, potentially redefining its content and codes. Potentially, since they have never been completed, proof of the contradictions in which they are caught and that perhaps made them difficult to achieve. Indeed, while the poet’s objective was resolutely modern, the reference to texts from Antiquity remained inescapable in his eyes, as generic models and sources of inspiration on which Moderns must lean on. But can ancient epic define the epos to which modernity aspires?