Hardcover
-
PICK UP IN STORECheck Availability at Nearby Stores
Available within 2 business hours
Related collections and offers
Overview
To show the working-out of these ideas there is a detailed analysis of one novel, Robert Challe's Les Illustres Francoises, which can be precisely located in the chain of literary influence. Its central theme of the individual in conflict with society was well suited to the forms available to the eighteenth century novelist. Consequently it appears repeatedly in important novels of the period, showing that the evolutionary process worked to some degree even on subject matter.
Originally published in 1972.
The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780691646404 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Princeton University Press |
| Publication date: | 04/19/2016 |
| Series: | Princeton Legacy Library , #1602 |
| Pages: | 382 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.40(w) x 9.40(h) x 1.10(d) |
Read an Excerpt
The Evolution of the French Novel
1641-1782
By Elaine Showalter
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS
Copyright © 1972 Princeton University PressAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-691-06229-7
CHAPTER 1
Romans, Romances, Nouvelles, and Novels
In the introduction to his thirty-year-old but still highly regarded List of French Prose Fiction 1700-1750, S. Paul Jones observed: "It is noteworthy that the word roman which was frequently used in the titles of works of fiction of the seventeenth century has almost disappeared in the eighteenth century. Only four or five works bear the word in the title or subtitle." More recent scholars echo the remark: "Le souvenir du roman baroque et de ses formes abâtardies hante si continuellement les esprits que le terme de roman n'est presque jamais employé par les romanciers pour désigner leurs reuvres. ..." Thus it would appear that in France, as in England, the emergence of a new genre led to a change in terminology, at least temporarily. This in turn implies considerable self-consciousness on the part of the novelists, and supports the argument that a sharp break occurs between the romance and the novel.
Unfortunately, Jones' remark is misleading and even inaccurate. It is true that his list of some 950 works contains only four indisputable instances of the word roman in a title or subtitle. There are, however, four more questionable works, and seven others in which some variant such as romanesque or Romancie occurs. For the seventeenth century, R. C. Williams gives, in a bibliography of some six hundred novels, twenty-four titles which begin with the word roman or romant, plus nineteen in which the word is used in the subtitle. Many of these, however, are not fiction; R. W. Baldner's later revision rejects nine of the fifteen which are titled roman, on miscellaneous grounds. Since Baldner's work is not very reliable, it might be preferable in comparing to use Williams' figure; even so, there are just twenty-two instances per half-century between 1600 and 1700, as opposed to fifteen from 1700 to 1750. This is a relatively trifling difference, at best; the term was not so frequent in the seventeenth century as Jones claimed, nor so rare in the eighteenth.
It is dangerous to rely on statistical evidence in such matters, in any event. Probably none of the bibliographies is complete, and there are numerous inaccuracies. Even if there were neither omissions nor errors, a mere count of titles equates books of vastly differing worth.
The most famous romans of the seventeenth century do not in fact use the term; generally, the title simply names the hero: Cassandre; Cléopâtre; Almahide, ou l'esclave Reine; Artamène, ou le grand Cyrus, etc. La Calprenède gave Pharamond the alternate title ou Histoire de France; Mlle de Scudery's Clélie bore the subtitle histoire romaine. On the other hand, the most famous uses of roman in titles are all satirical, like Furetière's Le Roman bourgeois, Scarron's Le Roman comique, and Sorel's L'Anti-Roman, or again, his Le Berger extravagant, où parmi des fantaisies amoureuses on void les impertinences des Romans et de la Poësie.
If we look beyond the titles, evidence is everywhere that roman remained the standard term to designate a work of prose fiction. The well informed Lenglet-Dufresnoy published an eight-volume collection under the title Recueil de romans historiques in 1746. Clearly he intended to attract buyers, not deter them. Furthermore, in the general preface and in the individual prefaces, the editor makes liberal use of the term: "... on se souviendra toujours que ce sont des Romans, et non pas des Histoires que je publie. ..." On La Comtesse de Montfort: "Il n'y a peut-être à reprendre dans cet Ouvrage qu'un ton trop historique, qui l'écarte un peu du Roman." To be sure, Lenglet-Dufresnoy could be accused of bias, because he had written a defense of the genre, under the title De l'usage des romans (1734); but he had written on the other side of the question, too, and he is not by any means the only eighteenth-century writer to use the term without apologizing.
In the early years of the eighteenth century, several collections of works by Mlle de la Roche-Guilhem appeared. She herself belonged to an earlier age, but it is the 1711 editor who begins the Avertissement: "Void quelques nouveaux Romans: c'est-à-dire des Ouvrages, où la fiction est brodée sur un fond vrai...." Challe, whose preface reveals a thoughtful and innovative author, refers to Les Illustres Françoises (1713) as "mon roman ou mes histoires, comme on voudra les appeller...." Marivaux's first novel, Les Avantures de ***, ou les Effets surprenans de la sympathie (1713), appeared with a long preface which defended the roman and did not hesitate to name the genre: "Mais après tout, diront-ils, ce Roman n'est qu'un Roman ..." or again, "Ainsi j'abandonne ce Roman à ses risques et fortunes ..." or again, "Mais avant de finir, j'ai envie de dire un mot sur la maniere dont est composé ce Roman...." In a 1702 edition of Catherine Bédacier's Anecdotes galans, the preface remarks, "C'est une grande témérité, ce semble, que de choisir des Papes et des Cardinaux pour en faire les sujets de ce que l'on appelle Roman...." The same volume contains a nouvelle entitled La, Marquise d'Urfé, which purports to be a key to d'Urfé's "inimitable Roman," L'Astrée; Jones himself recorded a number of reprints and continuations of the famous seventeenth-century romans, including L'Astrée, Cassandre, Ibrahim, Polexandre, and Clélie. Another quotation from Catherine Bédacier shows that even though tastes and styles were changing, the prestige of the roman survived: "Quoique l'histoire qu'on va lire ne soit point Romanesque, elle ne laisse pas d'avoir tous les agrémens du Roman le plus ingenieusement inventé...."
Marie Jeanne l'Héritier de Villandon, a prolific author of about the same era, defends the genre in the preface to La Tour ténébreuse et les fours lumineux, contes anglois (1705): "j'aime mieux qu'on me reproche de m'attacher trop scrupuleusement à l'Histoire dans un Ouvrage que je ne donne que comme une espece de Roman, que de me voir accusée, ainsi que certains Historiens, de falcifier impitoyablement l'Histoire; je croy qu'on est moins blâmable de faire des Romans historiques, que de composer des Histoires romanesques." An enemy of the genre, Bruslé de Montpleinchamp, pays it the homage of imitation, explaining in the preface to Le Diable bossu (1708): "Pour étouffer les Romans qui ne disent agreablement que des bagatelles, et au même terns pour ne pas effaroucher entierement les esprits qui en sont leurez, on a pris l'air de Roman, mais on s'en est distingué en racontant de pures veritez sous quelques voiles dessennuians." The anonymous Histoires galantes de diverses personnes (1709) begins with a debate on the merits of the roman, to conclude "La Philosophie et la Religion sont pour vous, l'usage du monde est pour moi: Mais tous les trois me convainquent que nous faisons un plus grand mal, vous et moi de disputer ensemble que nous n'en ferions à lire mon Roman."
Equally convincing proofs can be found in the writings of critics and theorists. The vogue of the old heroic romances ended around 1660. The change in taste was evident almost at once, and seventeenth-century commentators usually credit Mme de Lafayette with having "killed" the old roman; certainly she was the most brilliant practitioner of the shorter genre which then came into fashion, even though Segrais or Mme de Villedieu may have precedence chronologically. Mme de Lafayette, however, saw nothing paradoxical in having the erudite Bishop Huet append to her Zayde à Lettre à M. de Segrais sur l'origine des romans (1670), nor did anyone for centuries afterwards. It is only the twentieth-century scholar, with three hundred years of tradition behind him, who might feel bound to object. Some thirteen years later, the obscure sieur du Plaisir published a perceptive "Art of the Novel" under the title Sentimens sur les Lettres et sur L'Histoire avec des scrupules sur le stile (1683). Like everyone at the time, Du Plaisir affirms that "Les petites Histoires ont entièrement détruit les grands Romans"; but a few lines later he remarks that "Ce qui a fait haïr les anciens Romans, est ce que l'on doit d'abord éviter clans les Romans nouveaux." Fontenelle, writing in 1687 on Eléonore d'Yvrée, praises it as a worthy descendant of La Princesse de Clèves; Coulet cites the letter as showing "ce que le public attendait de la nouvelle psychologique ..." but Fontenelle said "... je suis beaucoup plus touché de voir régner clans un Roman une certaine science du creur, telle qu'elle est, par exemple, clans la Princesse de Clèves," and "... on voit bien que la personne qui a fait ce Roman-là a plus songé à faire un hon Ouvrage, qu'un Livre. ..." Surely if the term roman implied any opprobrium, Fontenelle would have used another. I have already mentioned Lenglet-Dufresnoy's defense of the roman, De l'usage des romans (1734). D'Argens likewise states: "Il faut peut-être autant d'esprit, d'usage du monde et de connoissance des passions pour composer un Roman, que pour écrire une Histoire."
Many more quotations could be brought forward, but I have perhaps already overdone the proof. At no time in the late seventeenth or early eighteenth centuries did novelists or their friendly critics consistently find it necessary, or even desirable, to disguise the fact that works of prose fiction were romans. This is so obvious in the passages I have quoted that some explanation for the prevalence of the contrary opinion seems to be called for. Jones's error results from an improper use of statistics. Roman was never a popular word in titles or subtitles; but at the same time, it was always the most popular generic term for works of prose fiction. One reason for its rarity on title pages may well be its generality; it covered too many subgenres to be useful in attracting readers.
In fairness, though, it must be said that Jones would never have fallen into the error, had the impression not been strong anyway that the roman had become disreputable. Quotations to this effect are also numerous; the first line I quoted from Du Plaisir can serve as a typical example. As I have already intimated, an important change in taste did occur, and I hope in subsequent pages to shed some light on the nature and causes of it; but for the moment let me observe only that in some contexts the term roman has the special sense of "long, heroic romance" such as La Calprenede or the Scudérys wrote. Mlle de la Roche-Guilhem, for instance, begins the preface to Hieron, roi de Syracuse by saying: "Quoy que les Romans ne soient plus à la mode ...," and it is clear that she means the old romans romanesques; for elsewhere in the same collection, as in the preface to Agripine, histoire romaine, she calls her own work a roman, meaning simply a work of fiction.
A second reason for believing that the roman had come into discredit is the appearance of explicit denials in prefaces, and even in the works themselves. Thus in Grandchamp's La Guerre d'ltalie (1710) : "A l'égard des Avantures Galantes qu'on trouvera ici, elles ne doivent rien à mon imagination; je les raporte telles qu'elles sont arrivees; et la maniére simple et naïve dont je les décris, sufit seule pour faire voir que mon dessein n'est pas d'en faire un Roman." From Mlle de la Roche-Guilhem's Histoire des Favorites (1703): "On verra dans six Histoires succintes des évenemens qui n'ont rien du merveilleux des Romains [sic] parce qu'elles tiennent toutes de la vérité, les faits y sont incontestables, et on n'y poura blâmer que la foiblesse des expressions." From Olivier's L'lnfortuné Napolitain (1704): "... je n'écris pas un Roman — ni ne me pique pas d'exprimer ce que l'amour fit dire de tendre, et de passionné aux deux personnes du monde les plus spirituelles et les plus amoureuses. ..." From Choisy's Le Prince Kouchimen (1710): "Ce ne sont point ici des Contes de Fées, ni des Avantures de Roman; on n'y verra ni Enchantemens, ni Machines, ni Enfers, ni Champs Elisées; on y suivra les regles ordinaires de la Nature...."
One must read these disclaimers with both eyes open, however. To deny that what follows is a roman is in part to promise that it will resemble a roman. Indeed, all the passages just cited take some pains to specify just what aspect of the roman will not appear in the text: the elevated style, the merveilleux, the epic conventions, the long amorous conversations. Lesage, in a more flippant manner, has Gil Blas use the same device: "Si j'imitais les faiseurs de romans, je ferais une pompeuse description du palais épiscopal de Grenade." The architectural descriptions, like the pseudo-epic style and devices, were commonplaces of the old romans. Furetière satirizes them in Le Roman bourgeois, Bougeant in Fan-Férédin. The rejection of these artifices does not, however, imply any rejection of the genre as a whole. Indeed, the persistence of satires demonstrates the continuing vigor even of the poorest elements of the roman, while the basic concept of the novelist's art remains unchanged. The novelist wants to make the reader take an interest in his story, and the roman never lost the power to do that.
Furthermore, the denials served with many another device to invite the reader to believe. One of the changes in fashion that is most elusive is the precise relationship of the fiction to reality. The authors of the old romans did not set out to be incredible; quite the opposite. But as time passed — a relatively short time, in fact — the artifices they had utilized to gain acceptance marked their works as false. New devices, like the pseudo-memoir, replaced the pseudo-epic. The new novel, as it seems always to do, started off by reacting against its immediate ancestor. But the authors betray themselves in the very act of protesting. To say "This work is a true story" differs from saying "This work is not a novel," in that the latter speaker is most assuredly hoping to be mistaken for a novelist.
The third and final reason for the misunderstanding of the roman concerns the polemical use of the term toward the middle of the eighteenth century. Enemies of the novel, like Bruzen de la Martinière or the abbé Jaquin, go out of their way to define the roman in the most old-fashioned and pejorative fashion. But Denis Diderot probably has done more harm than anyone else with the opening sentence of his ecstatic Eloge de Richardson (1762): "Par un roman, on a entendu jusqu'à ce jour un tissu d'événements chimériques et frivoles, dont la lecture était dangereuse pour le goût et pour les mœurs. Je voudrais bien qu'on trouvat un autre nom pour les ouvrages de Richardson, qui élèvent l'esprit, qui touchent l'âme, qui respirent partout l'amour du bien, et qu'on appelle aussi des romans." Thus Diderot announces his entry into the ranks of the novel's defenders, and because of his point of view, and his authority, it is easy to take his comment as definitive.
Diderot, however, wrote to persuade, and did not scruple at giving a small turn to the truth. Only a few years before, he had promoted his new dramatic theories as being entirely original; their only anticipation or even inspiration came from an obscure little play called Silvie, which Diderot had seen in 1742 and was almost alone in remembering. Yet in the interim, Nivelle de la Chaussée, Mme de Graffigny, and even Voltaire in Nanine had obviously been working toward what Diderot formulated; and the critics did not fail to point it out. The situation was similar with Richardson. Pamela had been translated in 1742, Clarissa in 1751, and Sir Charles Grandison in 1755, the latter two by the popular Prévost. The press had reviewed them extensively, and the first two at least appear to have been among the best selling novels of the two decades. As Paul Vernière remarks in his introduction, Diderot's entry into the quarrel is belated. All the more reason to make it with as much flourish as possible.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Evolution of the French Novel by Elaine Showalter. Copyright © 1972 Princeton University Press. Excerpted by permission of PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
- Frontmatter, pg. i
- Preface, pg. v
- Contents, pg. vii
- Introduction, pg. 1
- I. Romans, Romances, Nouvelles, and Novels, pg. 11
- II. Purposes of the Novel, pg. 38
- III. Techniques of Realism in Early Fiction, pg. 67
- IV. Robert Challe's Les lllustres Francoises, pg. 196
- V. The Individual Against Society in the Eighteenth- Century French Novel, pg. 262
- VI. The Emergence of the Novel, pg. 348
- Index, pg. 353