Abstract: We examine the situation of Western man in his past, present and future existence as presented in André Malraux’s L’Homme précaire et laLittérature (1977). We also analyse the forms in which he appears in literature, together with the concepts of the “sacré” [sacred, holy, religious], “permanence”, metamorphosis and the “aléatoire” [aleatory] regarding the life of works of art that underpin Malraux’s magisterial, multidisciplinary essay on literature and the arts.
