Une « impatience de plumes vers l'idée » : la métaphore chez Stéphane Mallarmé

After a brief survey of the main studies dealing with the figure of metaphor in Mallarmé’s poetry, the article analyses the way metaphor works in context, becoming what Mallarmé defines “un instrument direct d’idée”. The poet states the function and role of metaphor in the famous Billet to James Whistler, where the metaphor-dancer, with her “tourbillon de mousseline” and animated by her “fureur éparses en écumes”, literally carries away the verse into a frenzied and elegant movement towards a further space, the space of pure Idea.