The hermeneutical lesson of “L’Alchimiste”

Every reader of Gaspard de la Nuit must read “L’Alchimiste” if he or she wants to understand both the place occupied by hermeticism in the collection and the role that Bertrand grants to the hermeneutist. After attempting to show that analyzing the poem allows us to set limits for the interpretation of the collection as a whole, this article focuses on the numerological dimension of Gaspard de la Nuit in order to illustrate the hermeneutical issues previously highlighted.