The veiled goddess From Nerval’s Isis to Bonnefoy’s Isis

Starting from Yves Bonnefoy’s essay “La poétique de Nerval” taken from La Vérité de parole, we consider the aspects of the Isis of Nerval that may have influenced Bonnefoy. We examine the subject of the veiled Isis, before analysing, in the two poets, the link between the goddess and the “real” mother. Lastly, we study how the Isis of Nerval may have led in Bonnefoy’s poetry to an Isis figure of the gift par excellence which is for the poet the gift of language.