THE TOTALITY OF THE WORKS OF THE THEATRICAL SYMBOLISM, in contrast to the solid whole of romantic theater, is a fragmented galaxy of works that emphasize language, particularly poetic language, texts rich in analogies, metaphors, similes, texts that revolve around the text, texts that Paul Fort attempted to highlight and disseminate to a broader audience in the 1890s at the Theatre d’art.

The theater of transcendence, with its bold and clear outlines, whose heroes aim and endeavor for transcendence while attempting to provoke transcendence in the audience, pushing them towards a transcendent reality, in an idealized universe.

Maeterlinck's Pelléas and Mélisande is one of the most representative works of symbolic theater. The relatively simple plot is set in an indeterminate time and in the realm of myth. It is a deep exploration into the very essence of life. The language flows gracefully, suggestively, implicitly, obeying a vision that emerges through words and silences.

The closeness of Maeterlinck and Mallarmé is established, as is their friendship. The plot of the work, popularized by Debussy's opera of the same name (1902), is a typical story of unfulfilled love between Mélisande and Pelléas, as Mélisande is married to Golaud, Pelléas's brother by marriage. Their love is virginal, innocent, adolescent by the standards of medieval and Shakespearean traditions of love that is crushed by the families of the lovers who are driven by opposing interests.

The second work in the volume, The Gold Head, was written in 1889 by Claudel at the age of twenty-one, greedy for freedom and power, as well as greedy for the Truth, which was revealed to him on Christmas Eve of 1886, and was rewritten in 1894. A truth forbidden for the stage by the poet himself until the play was requested by Jean-Louis Barrault in 1939.

This extremely important work of the French repertoire would wait until 1959 to be presented on stage in a production matching its high quality, at the inauguration of the "Odéon," by Jean-Louis Barrault with Alain Cuny and Laurent Terzieff, with music by Honnegger under the direction of Pierre Boulez, in sets by André Masson, in the presence of General de Gaulle and André Malraux. It was a mythical evening for French theater.