Fragmentary Writing

Abstract

The forms which are characterized at the same time by their non-fulfilment and their brevity are called fragmentary forms. Defined as a piece of a thing which was broken, in glares, and, by extension, an incomplete work parcelled out, the fragment, appeared at the XVIIth century in France and which was a great success in the second half of the XVIIIth century in Germany, is however an essential feature as traditional and old texts as modern texts, and even post moderns, where it fulfills various functions. The renewal of interest for all that is fragmentary is undoubtedly ascribable with the obsessions of the society confronted with explosion and dispersion. Without making a socio-historical debate of the question, this work proposes to reveal, starting from some writers set on fragmentary writing, the few functions of this form and its possible relationships with the other forms - in particular, aphorism - often joined together in the short forms.