the miracle of analogy is the first of a two-volume reconceptualization of photography. it argues that photography originates in what is seen, rather than in the human eye or the camera lens, and that it is the world's primary way of revealing itself to us. neither an index, representation, nor copy, as conventional studies would have it, the photographic image is an analogy. this principle obtains at every level of its being: a photograph analogizes its referent, the negative from which it is generated, every other print that is struck from that negative, and all of its digital "offspring."

photography is also unstoppably developmental, both at the level of the individual image and of medium. the photograph moves through time, in search of other "kin," some of which may be visual, but others of which may be literary, architectural, philosophical, or literary. finally, photography develops with us, and in response to us. it assumes historically legible forms, but when we divest them of their saving power, as we always seem to do, it goes elsewhere.

the present volume focuses on the nineteenth century and some of its contemporary progeny. it begins with the camera obscura, which morphed into chemical photography and lives on in digital form, and ends with walter benjamin. key figures discussed along the way include nic phore ni pce, louis daguerre, william fox-talbot, jeff wall, and joan fontcuberta.

in the nineteenth century, the french lyric poets imposed their diction on the theatrical genre and thus illuminated the essence of both poetry and theatre. ten plays by victor hugo, the standard-bearer of the french romantic theatre, and alfred de musset, the romantic playwright most frequently performed in france today, are analyzed by charles affron to answer the question, "can the dialetic form of the theatre accommodate the solitary elan of the lyric poet?"

as a functional point of departure, he considers those characteristics of lyric poetry--time, voice, and metaphor--which bring us closest to the singular attitudes of hugo and musset. then, examining the texts of hernani, les burgraves, torquemada, fantasio, and lorenzaccio as well as several lesser known plays, mr. affron discusses such topics as poetic time, the scope of analogy, theatrical and poetic rhetoric, the guises of the poet-hero, and the manner of sounding the poet's voice upon the stage.

originally published in 1971.

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