The false ceiling

The Counter-Sky, a collection of poems compiled and published during the author's lifetime, speaks to us of the possibility of a programmed death, in order, from this, to understand what the subject and Life are. In some of his poems we experience a place as unrecognisable as it is mysterious: the absolute and fleeting limit of discontinuity that separates life from death.

In this book, Daumal invites us to enter a process of regeneration through negation so that we may reach the Primordial Word. Written when he was 22 and published in 1936, The Counter-Sky was immediately acclaimed by critics, leading him to win the Jacques Doucet Prize, awarded by André Gide, Paul Valéry and Jean Giraudoux.  

I was hesitant to publish this collection. I know that one does not learn to swim from one moment to the next, that before knowing that there are rivers to cross, one must splash about, for pure fun, to manage to move forward through water. But there is no need to turn this learning of ours into a spectacle. However, some people I hold in high regard assure me that real backs are already visible in these writings of mine, that they no longer belong to me and can be useful to others. I agree to publish them then, but with some precautions. (…) Unlearning to daydream, learning to think, unlearning to philosophise, learning to say, are not things that are done from one day to the next. However, we only have a few days left to do so.

René Daumal (1936), "Warning" in The Counter-Sky.