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De la Littérature considérée dans ses rapports avec les institutions sociales by Madame de Staël; Paul Van Tieghem Review by: F. G. Healey The Modern Language Review, Vol. 54, No. 4 (Oct., 1959), pp. 609-610 Published by: Modern Humanities Research Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3721148 . Accessed: 28/06/2014 07:48 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. . Modern Humanities Research Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Modern Language Review. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 141.101.201.103 on Sat, 28 Jun 2014 07:48:15 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

De la Littérature considérée dans ses rapports avec les institutions socialesby Madame de Staël; Paul Van Tieghem

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De la Littérature considérée dans ses rapports avec les institutions sociales by Madame deStaël; Paul Van TieghemReview by: F. G. HealeyThe Modern Language Review, Vol. 54, No. 4 (Oct., 1959), pp. 609-610Published by: Modern Humanities Research AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3721148 .

Accessed: 28/06/2014 07:48

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Modern Humanities Research Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend accessto The Modern Language Review.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 141.101.201.103 on Sat, 28 Jun 2014 07:48:15 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Reviews 609

long-awaited these principale. It is a study of quite remarkable scope and achieve- ment, which, exploring week by week, almost day by day, the books and periodicals which Henri Beyle had read (or else claimed to have read, but in fact had not) over a period of some twenty years, reaches the eventual conclusion that 'il n'y a pas un seul 6lement de l'esthetique stendhalienne dont on ne puisse retrouver l'origine' (p. 687).

The outcome is a seemingly boundless wealth of information, not merely in the limited field of 'source-hunting', but covering almost every aspect of the writer's formative period, which ended with his final expulsion from Milan. New areas of experience are uncovered; old misapprehensions are corrected. At the original soutenance, M. del Litto was reproached by M. Dedeyan 'd'avoir voulu enfermer Stendhal dans une bibliotheque'; yet what emerges again and again from this study is how essentially bookish was every stage of Stendhal's intellectual progress; on each occasion (cf. pp. 113, 278, 330-1, 407, 625, etc.) when he set out resolved to observe some new facet of the world about him, he found little or nothing that he could use directly, and was driven back willy-nilly towards the shelves of his library. 'Sa forma mentis', declares M. del Litto, 'a ceci de particulier qu'elle a toujours besoin d'un guide, d'un aiguillon, d'un excitant' (p. 689); and the evidence furnished is both ample and convincing. Here, in fact, is final proof of what has long been suspected: that Stendhal's 'creative imagination' was set in action by transposing into a new context elements found ready-formed elsewhere, just as his style was evolved by translating Carpani or Sismondi or Rousseau 'en style a moi'.

In a study of such massive dimensions, it is inevitable that there should be occasional weaknesses; now and then an error of fact (p. 309: confusion between Clement de Dijon and Clement de Geneve) or of transcription (M. del Litto's English is scarcely less chancy than that of his hero); more seriously, a certain laxness in the handling of abstract ideas. The reader might be forgiven for wonder- ing at the power exercised by Destutt de Tracy over the mind of Henri Beyle, when, in M. del Litto's summary of the former's Ideologie (pp. 165-6), there appears little, if anything, which might not already be discovered in Helv6tius. From the same causes, the picture of Cabanis emerges somewhat reduced and distorted. These, however, are insignificant flaws in the light of the total achievement. Above all, it is M. del Litto's exhaustive knowledge of both the French and Italian literary and historical backgrounds which gives the third section of the work (1814-21) its depth and originality. The loneliness and misery of Stendhal's first two years in Milan; his debt to Ludovico di Breme, to Compagnoni and to Ermes Visconti in the slow for- mulation of his theories of romanticism; his ambitions to contribute to il Conciliatore; above all, his concern with the details of political life in Italy-a concern which points ultimately to a suggestive new interpretation of Rome, Naples et Florence en 1817-this section alone would serve to, set the book apart as one of the major factual contributions to the understanding of Stendhal which have appeared in recent times. R. N. COE LEEDS

De la Litterature considere dans ses rapports avec les institutions sociales. By MADAME DE STAIL. Edited by Paul Van Tieghem. Geneva: Droz; Paris: Minard. 1959. 2 vols. lxvi+444pp. S.fr. 14.

Madame de Stael belongs to that distinguished body of writers who are more revered than read, writers who point a way forward, but who remain chiefly of interest to the literary historian. This is partly due to the general neglect of all that was written in France during the Revolution and Empire, a result of the arbitrary

Reviews 609

long-awaited these principale. It is a study of quite remarkable scope and achieve- ment, which, exploring week by week, almost day by day, the books and periodicals which Henri Beyle had read (or else claimed to have read, but in fact had not) over a period of some twenty years, reaches the eventual conclusion that 'il n'y a pas un seul 6lement de l'esthetique stendhalienne dont on ne puisse retrouver l'origine' (p. 687).

The outcome is a seemingly boundless wealth of information, not merely in the limited field of 'source-hunting', but covering almost every aspect of the writer's formative period, which ended with his final expulsion from Milan. New areas of experience are uncovered; old misapprehensions are corrected. At the original soutenance, M. del Litto was reproached by M. Dedeyan 'd'avoir voulu enfermer Stendhal dans une bibliotheque'; yet what emerges again and again from this study is how essentially bookish was every stage of Stendhal's intellectual progress; on each occasion (cf. pp. 113, 278, 330-1, 407, 625, etc.) when he set out resolved to observe some new facet of the world about him, he found little or nothing that he could use directly, and was driven back willy-nilly towards the shelves of his library. 'Sa forma mentis', declares M. del Litto, 'a ceci de particulier qu'elle a toujours besoin d'un guide, d'un aiguillon, d'un excitant' (p. 689); and the evidence furnished is both ample and convincing. Here, in fact, is final proof of what has long been suspected: that Stendhal's 'creative imagination' was set in action by transposing into a new context elements found ready-formed elsewhere, just as his style was evolved by translating Carpani or Sismondi or Rousseau 'en style a moi'.

In a study of such massive dimensions, it is inevitable that there should be occasional weaknesses; now and then an error of fact (p. 309: confusion between Clement de Dijon and Clement de Geneve) or of transcription (M. del Litto's English is scarcely less chancy than that of his hero); more seriously, a certain laxness in the handling of abstract ideas. The reader might be forgiven for wonder- ing at the power exercised by Destutt de Tracy over the mind of Henri Beyle, when, in M. del Litto's summary of the former's Ideologie (pp. 165-6), there appears little, if anything, which might not already be discovered in Helv6tius. From the same causes, the picture of Cabanis emerges somewhat reduced and distorted. These, however, are insignificant flaws in the light of the total achievement. Above all, it is M. del Litto's exhaustive knowledge of both the French and Italian literary and historical backgrounds which gives the third section of the work (1814-21) its depth and originality. The loneliness and misery of Stendhal's first two years in Milan; his debt to Ludovico di Breme, to Compagnoni and to Ermes Visconti in the slow for- mulation of his theories of romanticism; his ambitions to contribute to il Conciliatore; above all, his concern with the details of political life in Italy-a concern which points ultimately to a suggestive new interpretation of Rome, Naples et Florence en 1817-this section alone would serve to, set the book apart as one of the major factual contributions to the understanding of Stendhal which have appeared in recent times. R. N. COE LEEDS

De la Litterature considere dans ses rapports avec les institutions sociales. By MADAME DE STAIL. Edited by Paul Van Tieghem. Geneva: Droz; Paris: Minard. 1959. 2 vols. lxvi+444pp. S.fr. 14.

Madame de Stael belongs to that distinguished body of writers who are more revered than read, writers who point a way forward, but who remain chiefly of interest to the literary historian. This is partly due to the general neglect of all that was written in France during the Revolution and Empire, a result of the arbitrary

39 39 M.L.R. LIV M.L.R. LIV

This content downloaded from 141.101.201.103 on Sat, 28 Jun 2014 07:48:15 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

610 Reviews

divisions imposed upon literature by its theorists. In recent years there have been signs of a renewal of interest under the stimulus of such works as Paul Van Tieghem's own Le Prgromantisme, and now at last we see the publication of some of the crucial texts of Madame de Stael.

De la Litterature is indeed a seminal text, full of ideas to be developed elsewhere by the author herself as well as by others, including, as the Introduction shows, the rancorous Chateaubriand. It expresses for the first time much that had been half- apparent in late eighteenth-century literary theory, and strikes many a blow in the cause of feminism, both social and literary. However, the major importance of the book lies in its main thesis, the relationship between literature and social and political conditions, in other words the application of Montesquieu's theories to literary history. In stating her view Madame de Stael was, as Van Tieghem shows, not only boldly original, she was also laying the foundations upon which most nineteenth- and twentieth-century literary historians were to build. If the Dis- cours Preliminaire, in which she deals with such matters as 'la litterature dans ses rapports avec la vertu', is very reminiscent of the eighteenth-century approach, and of Montesquieu in particular, this is more than balanced by the penetrating novelty of much that follows. Judgements and ideas which seem startling for the period bear out Van Tieghem's view that the book appeared almost too soon. In spite of the numerous faulty conclusions the work contains, its main drawback for the modern reader is stylistic. The author was clearly speaking from conviction when she said, in ch. vii, 'la concision ne consiste pas dans l'art de diminuer le nombre des mots'.

Since De la Littgrature is an early essay in comparative literature no scholar is better suited to edit it than Paul Van Tieghem. His Introduction places the work both in its time and in the body of Madame de Stael's thought, showing how it recapitulates her ideas up to 1800. Much work remains to be done on the sources of these ideas, since no full and authoritative study has yet been produced of this book. It is for such a study that this Introduction will serve as an indispensable basis.

Van Tieghem's observations are particularly valuable when dealing with con- temporary reactions, especially those of Fontanes and Chateaubriand, clearly bringing out the political and ideological nature of these essentially unliterary criticisms. The positions of Madame de Stael and Chateaubriand relative to religion and the philosophes are here seen in a light which will be new to many. It is perhaps a little disappointing that the tempestuous relationship between the femme- philosophe and Napoleon around 1800 is rather summarily dealt with in one short paragraph.

Following normal practice the text is based on that of the last edition during the author's lifetime, that of the second edition (An Ix), the basis of all subsequent French editions. Variants in the first (An vIII) edition are given in footnotes. The critical apparatus is entirely adequate but never submerges the text itself. There is a useful index and a good working bibliography. F. G. HEALEY

F. Gr. HEALEY BIRMINGHAM

Trois Essais sur Paul Valery. By LUCIENNE JULIEN CAIN. Paris: Gallimard. 1958. 197 pp. 600 fr.

The author of these three essays, 'Valery et l'utilisation du monde sensible ', 'Edgar Poe et Valery', and 'L'etre vivant selon Valery', was personally acquainted with him, and they are perhaps best understood as yet another demonstration of the fact that his works all tended to converge on the same object: that of establishing,

610 Reviews

divisions imposed upon literature by its theorists. In recent years there have been signs of a renewal of interest under the stimulus of such works as Paul Van Tieghem's own Le Prgromantisme, and now at last we see the publication of some of the crucial texts of Madame de Stael.

De la Litterature is indeed a seminal text, full of ideas to be developed elsewhere by the author herself as well as by others, including, as the Introduction shows, the rancorous Chateaubriand. It expresses for the first time much that had been half- apparent in late eighteenth-century literary theory, and strikes many a blow in the cause of feminism, both social and literary. However, the major importance of the book lies in its main thesis, the relationship between literature and social and political conditions, in other words the application of Montesquieu's theories to literary history. In stating her view Madame de Stael was, as Van Tieghem shows, not only boldly original, she was also laying the foundations upon which most nineteenth- and twentieth-century literary historians were to build. If the Dis- cours Preliminaire, in which she deals with such matters as 'la litterature dans ses rapports avec la vertu', is very reminiscent of the eighteenth-century approach, and of Montesquieu in particular, this is more than balanced by the penetrating novelty of much that follows. Judgements and ideas which seem startling for the period bear out Van Tieghem's view that the book appeared almost too soon. In spite of the numerous faulty conclusions the work contains, its main drawback for the modern reader is stylistic. The author was clearly speaking from conviction when she said, in ch. vii, 'la concision ne consiste pas dans l'art de diminuer le nombre des mots'.

Since De la Littgrature is an early essay in comparative literature no scholar is better suited to edit it than Paul Van Tieghem. His Introduction places the work both in its time and in the body of Madame de Stael's thought, showing how it recapitulates her ideas up to 1800. Much work remains to be done on the sources of these ideas, since no full and authoritative study has yet been produced of this book. It is for such a study that this Introduction will serve as an indispensable basis.

Van Tieghem's observations are particularly valuable when dealing with con- temporary reactions, especially those of Fontanes and Chateaubriand, clearly bringing out the political and ideological nature of these essentially unliterary criticisms. The positions of Madame de Stael and Chateaubriand relative to religion and the philosophes are here seen in a light which will be new to many. It is perhaps a little disappointing that the tempestuous relationship between the femme- philosophe and Napoleon around 1800 is rather summarily dealt with in one short paragraph.

Following normal practice the text is based on that of the last edition during the author's lifetime, that of the second edition (An Ix), the basis of all subsequent French editions. Variants in the first (An vIII) edition are given in footnotes. The critical apparatus is entirely adequate but never submerges the text itself. There is a useful index and a good working bibliography. F. G. HEALEY

F. Gr. HEALEY BIRMINGHAM

Trois Essais sur Paul Valery. By LUCIENNE JULIEN CAIN. Paris: Gallimard. 1958. 197 pp. 600 fr.

The author of these three essays, 'Valery et l'utilisation du monde sensible ', 'Edgar Poe et Valery', and 'L'etre vivant selon Valery', was personally acquainted with him, and they are perhaps best understood as yet another demonstration of the fact that his works all tended to converge on the same object: that of establishing,

This content downloaded from 141.101.201.103 on Sat, 28 Jun 2014 07:48:15 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions