Kâli décapitée à la rencontre de la prose et de la poésie

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Catalogue identifier

klm000093

Alternate titles and import identifiers

KLM000093; Kâli Beheaded at the Meeting of Prose and Poetry

Author or attribution

Stéphanie Smadja

Record type

Article

Language

French

Date / edition

2000

Source / repository

Société Internationale d’Études Yourcenariennes

Access

Open access

Subjects

KLM Research Sources — Second Set, 5 November 2026; Academic Research and Peer-Reviewed Articles; Philosophy Theology and Comparative Religion; Modern Literary Reception

Description and curator notes

Smadja offers a sustained formal reading of Yourcenar’s Kâli décapitée, asking whether its narrative belongs to the short story or to the prose poem. She examines white space, repetitions, sound patterns, syntax and the larger arrangement of the text. The recurring name Kâli functions as a refrain and helps organize a sequence that moves between narrative development and poetic amplification. Comparison of revisions supports her argument that the work deliberately sustains both generic possibilities. This is a direct study of the goddess as a literary figure in modern French writing. It helps readers understand how a recognizable divine name is transformed through rhythm and genre, while leaving historical questions about Indian traditions to other sources. The article should therefore be cataloged as scholarly reception rather than as an account of Hindu ritual or an ancient mythological witness.

Curator research source KLM000093, second set dated 5 November 2026. Verification, chronology, completeness, access and licence statements below are supplied by the curator, not a new independent audit by this library. Full texts are linked, not reproduced. Abstract languages do not change the full work's language label.

Kâli décapitée à la rencontre de la prose et de la poésie

Author and date: Stéphanie Smadja • 2000

Publication: Société Internationale d’Études Yourcenariennes. Bulletin de la SIEY 21 (December 2000), pp. 53–71; complete 19-page article. Issue metadata confirms Tours, SIEY, ISSN 0987-7940.

Language: French

English title: Kâli Beheaded at the Meeting of Prose and Poetry

Smadja offers a sustained formal reading of Yourcenar’s Kâli décapitée, asking whether its narrative belongs to the short story or to the prose poem. She examines white space, repetitions, sound patterns, syntax and the larger arrangement of the text. The recurring name Kâli functions as a refrain and helps organize a sequence that moves between narrative development and poetic amplification. Comparison of revisions supports her argument that the work deliberately sustains both generic possibilities. This is a direct study of the goddess as a literary figure in modern French writing. It helps readers understand how a recognizable divine name is transformed through rhythm and genre, while leaving historical questions about Indian traditions to other sources. The article should therefore be cataloged as scholarly reception rather than as an account of Hindu ritual or an ancient mythological witness.

Kali relevance: Entire article analyzes Kâli décapitée and the literary construction of its goddess protagonist.

Read the complete text

Publication or repository record

Subjects: Academic Research and Peer-Reviewed Articles; Philosophy Theology and Comparative Religion; Modern Literary Reception

Dates: 2000 scholarly article examining Yourcenar’s twentieth-century Kâli décapitée and its revisions; Publisher-hosted scan of the 2000 article; 2023 upload directory is not its publication date

Rights: Free to read on the scholarly society’s website. No open reuse license verified; link to the article rather than reproducing it.

Verification and limits: Complete 19-page scan and representative formal analysis checked. OCR has errors, but print is legible. This is modern literary reception, not ancient scripture or evidence of an unchanged Hindu myth.

Source and alternate access links:
Read the complete text: https://www.yourcenariana.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Smadja.pdf
Publication or repository record: https://www.yourcenariana.org/bulletin/bulletin-n-21/

Source access

Read or locate the original source at Société Internationale d’Études Yourcenariennes

Rights and reading conditions

Free to read on the scholarly society’s website. No open reuse license verified; link to the article rather than reproducing it.

Citation

Stéphanie Smadja. Kâli décapitée à la rencontre de la prose et de la poésie. Société Internationale d’Études Yourcenariennes. Bulletin de la SIEY 21 (December 2000), pp. 53–71; complete 19-page article. Issue metadata confirms Tours, SIEY, ISSN 0987-7940. 2000. https://www.yourcenariana.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Smadja.pdf

This page supplies catalogue metadata and links. It does not reproduce the underlying source text. Historical, religious, healing and interpretive claims belong to the cited sources, not to an independent verification by this catalogue.