Abstract: Georges Lys’s short story “Affaire d’honneur” (Le Journal illustré, June 1896) playfully illustrates a discussion on the nature of poetry, which fails to impress the archetypal poète maudit, the Saturnian Névérail. The latter leaves the café, leaving the theorists to pay his check; the swindled theorists’ insults then provoke the anger of Buridan, Névérail’s friend, and a duel ensues, which ends when the headstrong young poet soon surrenders to tend to his wounds.
