Figures de (dé)rangement : de quelques tropes relationnels chez Jacques Delille

Abstract

In L’Homme des champs (1800) and Les Trois Règnes de la nature (1808), Jacques Delille draws multiple parallels between beings who appear to occupy diametrically opposed places on different scales, his animal classification criteria taking into account the anatomy of the limbs, the charm or the speed of various species. However, the use of other stylistic devices makes this attempt to survey nature through comparisons between antagonistic couples more complex. Parallelisms and syllepsis develop other analogies and thus maximize the “bundles” of relations, an ambition that Buffon considers forbidden to his own prose, but that Dellile’s poetics may achieve. 

Keywords: Delille, Buffon, descriptive poetry, natural sciences, tropes.