June 30, 2024 • 20 mins
Known for his masterful blend of realism and romanticism, Stendhal is one of the greatest novelists of the 19th century, and his works offer profound psychological insights and sharp social critiques. His unforgettable characters, such as Julien Sorel in Le Rouge et Le Noir, navigate themes of love, ambition, and identity that remain timeless and relevant. Today on the Global Novel podcast, we will dive into Stendhal's world and discover his novelistic artistry that continues to influence literature today. With me is the distinguished American literary theorist Dr. Peter Brooks. Dr. Brooks is Sterling Professor Emeritus of Comparative Literature at Yale University. His interdisciplinary research cuts across French and English literature, law, and psychoanalysis.
Recommended Reading:
Stendhal, Le Rouge et Le Noir (1830)
Peter Brooks, Reading for the Plot (1984)
Peter Brooks, Seduced by the Story (2023)
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Stendhal's Masterful Blend of Realism and Romanticism
.
Known for his masterful blendof realism and romanticism,
stendhal is one of the greatestnovelists of the 19th century,
and his works offer profoundpsychological insights and sharp
social critiques.
His unforgettable characters,such as Julien Sohel in Le Rouge
(00:23):
, illinois, navigate themes oflove, ambition and identify that
remain timeless and relevant.
Today, on the Global NovelPodcast, we will dive into
Stendhal's world and discoverhis novelistic artistry that
continues to influenceliterature today.
Hello, I'm your host, claireHennessey.
With me is the distinguishedAmerican literary theorist, dr
(00:44):
Peter Brooks.
Dr Brooks is a startingprofessor emeritus of
comparative literature at YaleUniversity.
As many of you may already know, his interdisciplinary research
cuts across French and Englishliterature, law and
psychoanalysis.
Welcome to the show, peter.
(01:12):
Thank you very much, clara.
I know you've recentlypublished a sequel to reading
for the plot.
This time is titled seduced bya story which was a finalist for
the 2023 national book criticscircle award.
In Congratulations, could youshare with us the main takeaway
from this new book?
Speaker 2 (01:29):
Well, it's a reflection on narrative, the
analysis of narrative, lookingback at my earlier work, but
also a kind of cry of alarmabout the way story is taken
over in our culture and beingused in kind of mindless ways.
(01:49):
I talk about the storificationof reality and how in politics,
in public affairs, corporations,publicity, all turn to stories
without thinking at all abouttheir value or how to criticize
(02:10):
them.
I mean it's as if someone saysto you let me tell you my story
and you're supposed to acceptthat as something valuable and
something that you have to agreeto and think will somehow
change your opinion of thespeaker.
Stories are not alwaysbeneficial and if you look at
(02:35):
the American political climateat the moment, you can see that
some stories, particularly onesbased on a sense of resentment
or exclusion, can lead to direresults.
I mean stories can turn intomyths that animate and mobilize
large sectors of the populationto take over what they see as a
(03:01):
misshapen reality.
So I think we need to approachstories with a great deal of
critical caution.
I mean, stories are important.
I believe in them, I thinkthey're part of our cognitive
toolkit for dealing with reality.
I think they're particularlyimportant because they're about
meanings that develop in timeand humans are time-bounded.
(03:23):
In a way they're notplace-bounded, but they're not
to be accepted uncritically.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Well, you dedicated an important chapter on Stendhal
in Reading for the Plot.
To study the Stendhalian plotand narrative, perhaps we should
begin with his approach torealism, right?
Stendhal refers to a novel as amirror being carried in a
basket to describe thelimitations of realistic novels.
(03:51):
He emphasizes that a mirrorcannot fully capture reality and
that an artist must carefullyselect what to portray.
How does this metaphor shapeour understanding of Stendhal's
approach to realism and his useof selection to achieve unity,
coherence and typicality in hiswork?
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Well, as I remember that quotation, he says that a
novel is like a mirror beingcarried along a road.
And then he goes on to say uh,the mirror carried along the
road is going to reflect mud aswell as reflecting the sky and
prettier things.
And I think that's, uh, if youwill, a justification, uh, for
(04:35):
some of the unpleasant aspectsof reality that he has to deal
with, and he's always veryconscious of that.
There's also another famousmetaphor of speaking politics in
a novel is like a pistol shotin a concert.
But then he goes on to say buthere we are in modernity, in the
(04:55):
19th century, and my charactershave to talk politics because
that's what life has come to beabout.
And Stendhal, you know, bornbefore the French Revolution,
was very much conscious of how,post-revolution, no one is in
agreement anymore.
Right, no one is in agreementanymore.
(05:16):
There are different parties,there are different opinions,
and everyone has the right tospeak his mind or her mind.
And so there is no coherentaudience, no unified audience,
the way there was once under theold regime, where everyone
shared the same value,essentially.
So he's very much consciousthat his realism is a matter of
(05:40):
conflict and showing differentpoints of view, in dialogue and
in dissension with one another.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
Right?
Well, it is said that Stendhalwas a dandy and an obsessive
womanizer.
What does his love experiencespeak of his philosophy of love
conveyed in many of his novels?
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Well, stendhal is a womanizer.
It's an interesting topic.
I mean, as he says himself, hewas in love with many women, but
not successful with most ofthem, and his greatest love,
matilda Demboski, in Milan.
He never became her lover aftermany, many attempts.
(06:23):
So a great deal of Stendhal'swomanizing is in his imagination
.
It's reveries about women anddesires for them, and then
creating ideal women in hisnovels.
As for being a dandy, thatstrikes me as a slightly
(06:45):
different issue.
The dandy is someone who tries,through his own personal style,
to abstract himself from thehistorical moment.
Sandal is someone who feels,particularly after the fall of
Napoleon, that he's living atthe wrong moment of history.
(07:05):
To become a Dandy is to createa personal style, which means
you're immune to the historicalcontingencies.
Of course you aren't really,but it's an illusion.
It's something that Baudelairealso picks up later.
If you're a dandy, you createyour own rules and your own
(07:30):
atmosphere around you.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
How do you think his analytical approach to love and
the theme of triangular desireinfluenced the later realist?
Because that someone is beingdesired by someone else.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
I think it's not so much a theme as a dynamic that
you see playing out very oftenthroughout the 19th century
novel, but I think the nature ofthe desire is somewhat
different.
The nature of the desire issomewhat different.
I mean, desire in Stendhal isvery mobile and imaginative.
(08:21):
Desire in someone like Balzacis almost like a primitive
appetite.
It's wanting to devour theworld.
And in Zola desire can be sortof like a house on fire, a
conflagration burning up theworld, whereas I think in
(08:43):
Flaubert, who's the mostcomplicated case, in a way,
desire almost seems to beimmobilizing.
It doesn't get you anywhere, itbecomes inward turning and
inarticulate and doesn't projectitself onto the world, whereas
earlier in the century, inStendhal and Balzac, desire is
(09:07):
your meeting with the world,right, it's what connects you to
the world and the objects youwant to possess.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
I think exploring desire is such a fascinating and
important aspect of reading thenovel.
So how do the plots of the 19thcentury novels reflect our
reading desires?
What are the definingcharacteristics of the modern
novel, in other words, whatdrives the plot going?
Speaker 2 (09:36):
the defining characteristics of the modern
novel, in other words, whatdrives the plot going?
Well, I mean, I think plots areerotic.
I mean I think they are aboutwanting and having, and I think
that takes place on severallevels.
I mean, in one sense they'reabout wanting to understand and
to command the reality thatyou're seeing in a fictional
(10:05):
world, and so plots are alwaysto some extent end-driven.
It's a point I made in readingfor the plot that you want to
know where you're going to comeout.
It doesn't mean that you knowwhat the end is or the end is
already determined.
It's that by the time you getto the end, it creates some
(10:28):
retrospective illumination ofwhat you've read up to that
point.
So it's a dynamic of wishingfor the end and then the end
showing you the meaning of thejourney that you've been on.
I think Right.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Well, what about female plots, and how do these
characteristics compare to thoseof earlier narratives?
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Female plots, you mean the plots concerning women
in Stendhal in particular.
I mean Stendhal created anextraordinary set of female
characters, such as MathildeLamolle or Gina Sanseverina, who
(11:14):
seemed to refuse to accept thelimitations placed upon them by
their sex and by the rolethey're supposed to play in
society.
And in Mathilde's case, itinvolves this reference to her
16th century ancestor and hisheroism, and casting aside all
(11:38):
the conventions which controlher and therefore falling in
love with a plebeian, invitinghim up to her bedroom on a
ladder and so on.
Where, sanseverina, she justwon't play by any of the rules
of the court of Parma.
She insists on making her ownrules and she has everyone
(11:59):
eating out of her hand.
And if you get to the very endof Stendhal's writing career,
you have this strange characternamed Lamiel in the novel he
never finished, who reallyundertakes to behave completely
contrary to the limits dictatedon her sex.
(12:23):
For instance, when she wants tofind out about sexuality, she
hires a young peasant man tohave sex with her.
Then afterwards she says sex isthat all it is?
There's this constant strivingto get rid of the conventions
(12:45):
that are supposed to governproper young women in the 19th
century, and Stendhal finds thata very seductive notion
seductive notion Right.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
Well, to sum up, how does Le Houdi Le Noir typify the
desires and themes dynamics?
Speaker 2 (13:03):
of the 19th century plots, oh, wow.
Well, in a way, it's the firstright.
I mean, it is 1830.
It really sets the tone for thecentury of, first of all, an
ambitious young man who wants torise above his condition and
succeeds in doing so, but thenencounters disaster, as many
(13:28):
commentators have always said,disaster that he probably could
have avoided, except that hedoesn't want to.
In a sense, the nature of hisheroism is such that he breaks
with all the conventions thathe's mastered and, as a result,
goes to the guillotine, and it'sat his trial for shooting
(13:52):
Madame de Renal.
And let me just step back a bit.
Why does he shoot Madame deRenal?
Well, that's always been amystery, because he's deeply in
love with her, but she haspresented an image of him, a
negative image, a kind ofmonster image that he can't live
with.
And I think in shooting herhe's trying to sort of shoot
down that image.
(14:13):
But then he goes to trial andhe does the one thing that he
must not do, this absolutelysuicidal, which is referred to
class warfare, right and says Iam a peasant who has dared to
rise in the world and join thebourgeoisie.
And that's exactly what hisjurors do not want to hear and
(14:37):
the reason they condemn him todeath.
So at the very end, this notionof class warfare, which is going
to be so important throughoutthe 19th century, comes up.
And there's this how should Isay this political side of
Julien, which often seems to beabout to be covered over,
(14:58):
because he is very successful,he makes it in society, mathilde
becomes pregnant and he getsengaged to her.
He's given a new name, julienthe Chevalier, julien Sorel
Laverney.
But then he throws it all upand the class identification as
a peasant in revolt against thelowness of his condition comes
(15:22):
back up again.
So I think you've gotenormously rich material here
which is going to be exploitedall the length of the 19th
century.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Right.
Well, Stendhal admired Napoleon, and Le Rouge et le Noir is
often seen as a kind of literarytribute to the emperor.
How do you think Stendhal'sadmiration for Napoleon
influenced the themes andcharacters in the novel?
Speaker 2 (15:52):
Well, I think Napoleon is an enormously
important figure and image toStendhal.
He started to write two booksabout Napoleon and wrote many
pages but never finished either.
For him, napoleon splits in two.
There's the heroic younggeneral who inherits the ideas
(16:12):
of the French Revolution andexports them throughout Europe,
and he was actually part of thatcampaign.
I mean, he actually was part ofthe disastrous Russian campaign
once, so far as Moscow withNapoleon.
But then there's the Napoleonwho had himself crowned emperor
and created a new court and newtitles of nobility, who, to
(16:34):
Stendhal, was a betrayal of thegreat Napoleon.
So there's this double image ofNapoleon, and Julien Sorel
imitates Napoleon and he keeps aportrait of Napoleon hidden in
his straw mattress.
On the other hand, he says oneday the memory of Napoleon is
going to make young men like meperpetually unhappy in the 19th
(16:56):
century because it's a model ofa career that none of the rest
of us can have.
And you know, the Napoleonicideal was that career would be
open to your talents, no matterwhere you came from.
And to some extent that wastrue, particularly in the army.
(17:18):
I mean, the slaughter ofNapoleonic officers was such
that you could become a generalor even a marshal of France.
From you know, you could gofrom peasant to marshal of
France in a matter of a fewyears, like Murat who then
became king of Naples.
(17:39):
So there was this sense ofinfinite possibility, and with
the fall of Napoleon and therestoration of the monarchy,
that's been shut down, and sothat's part of what Julien is
talking about.
So Napoleon is both an heroicimage and a sense of lost
(18:00):
possibility, I would say at thesame time.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
Well, it is easy for most critics to observe
Stendhal's non-retrospective useof narrative, which you
mentioned in reading for theplot, and which very much aligns
with the author's time, as youjust talked about, when writers
and thinkers resisted lookingback at an old regime or
(18:24):
ideology before the FrenchRevolution.
And it is in this context thathere I quote you, the
Stendhalian protagonist everlooks ahead, planning the next
moment, projecting the selfforward through ambition.
Unquote.
However, you also argue thatsuch a non-retrospective use of
(18:46):
narrative is essentially aretrospective mode and it tends
toward an ending that offersretrospective illumination of
the whole.
Given the Stendhalian time,which is momentary, abruptive
and discontinuous, how should weunderstand the dramatization of
his future-orientated desire inrelation to his political views
(19:11):
?
Speaker 2 (19:14):
Ah well, you know, Stendhal famously said I buy a
little lottery ticket to be runto be read 50 or 100 years from
now, and that turned out to bepretty close to accurate.
Uh, he was not a popular writerin his time and he sees himself
as as writing to, to those whowill understand it the happy few
(19:39):
, as he calls them and creatingthis audience of very special,
intelligent people he can talkto long.
(20:01):
Usually he starts with someanecdote or some outline that he
can work with.
In the Red and the Black, Rougeet le Noir, it's this story of
Antoine Bertet.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
If you have enjoyed this episode so far and want to
complete the entire episodewhere Professor Peter Brooks
discusses narrative agency andfeminism in stand-all, be sure
to subscribe attheglobalnovelcom slash
subscribe.
Thank you so much for listening.
Stendhal's Masterful Blend of Realism and Romanticism
.
Known for his masterful blendof realism and romanticism,
stendhal is one of the greatestnovelists of the 19th century,
and his works offer profoundpsychological insights and sharp
social critiques.
His unforgettable characters,such as Julien Sohel in Le Rouge
(00:23):
, illinois, navigate themes oflove, ambition and identify that
remain timeless and relevant.
Today, on the Global NovelPodcast, we will dive into
Stendhal's world and discoverhis novelistic artistry that
continues to influenceliterature today.
Hello, I'm your host, claireHennessey.
With me is the distinguishedAmerican literary theorist, dr
(00:44):
Peter Brooks.
Dr Brooks is a startingprofessor emeritus of
comparative literature at YaleUniversity.
As many of you may already know, his interdisciplinary research
cuts across French and Englishliterature, law and
psychoanalysis.
Welcome to the show, peter.
(01:12):
Thank you very much, clara.
I know you've recentlypublished a sequel to reading
for the plot.
This time is titled seduced bya story which was a finalist for
the 2023 national book criticscircle award.
In Congratulations, could youshare with us the main takeaway
from this new book?
Speaker 2 (01:29):
Well, it's a reflection on narrative, the
analysis of narrative, lookingback at my earlier work, but
also a kind of cry of alarmabout the way story is taken
over in our culture and beingused in kind of mindless ways.
(01:49):
I talk about the storificationof reality and how in politics,
in public affairs, corporations,publicity, all turn to stories
without thinking at all abouttheir value or how to criticize
(02:10):
them.
I mean it's as if someone saysto you let me tell you my story
and you're supposed to acceptthat as something valuable and
something that you have to agreeto and think will somehow
change your opinion of thespeaker.
Stories are not alwaysbeneficial and if you look at
(02:35):
the American political climateat the moment, you can see that
some stories, particularly onesbased on a sense of resentment
or exclusion, can lead to direresults.
I mean stories can turn intomyths that animate and mobilize
large sectors of the populationto take over what they see as a
(03:01):
misshapen reality.
So I think we need to approachstories with a great deal of
critical caution.
I mean, stories are important.
I believe in them, I thinkthey're part of our cognitive
toolkit for dealing with reality.
I think they're particularlyimportant because they're about
meanings that develop in timeand humans are time-bounded.
(03:23):
In a way they're notplace-bounded, but they're not
to be accepted uncritically.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Well, you dedicated an important chapter on Stendhal
in Reading for the Plot.
To study the Stendhalian plotand narrative, perhaps we should
begin with his approach torealism, right?
Stendhal refers to a novel as amirror being carried in a
basket to describe thelimitations of realistic novels.
(03:51):
He emphasizes that a mirrorcannot fully capture reality and
that an artist must carefullyselect what to portray.
How does this metaphor shapeour understanding of Stendhal's
approach to realism and his useof selection to achieve unity,
coherence and typicality in hiswork?
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Well, as I remember that quotation, he says that a
novel is like a mirror beingcarried along a road.
And then he goes on to say uh,the mirror carried along the
road is going to reflect mud aswell as reflecting the sky and
prettier things.
And I think that's, uh, if youwill, a justification, uh, for
(04:35):
some of the unpleasant aspectsof reality that he has to deal
with, and he's always veryconscious of that.
There's also another famousmetaphor of speaking politics in
a novel is like a pistol shotin a concert.
But then he goes on to say buthere we are in modernity, in the
(04:55):
19th century, and my charactershave to talk politics because
that's what life has come to beabout.
And Stendhal, you know, bornbefore the French Revolution,
was very much conscious of how,post-revolution, no one is in
agreement anymore.
Right, no one is in agreementanymore.
(05:16):
There are different parties,there are different opinions,
and everyone has the right tospeak his mind or her mind.
And so there is no coherentaudience, no unified audience,
the way there was once under theold regime, where everyone
shared the same value,essentially.
So he's very much consciousthat his realism is a matter of
(05:40):
conflict and showing differentpoints of view, in dialogue and
in dissension with one another.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
Right?
Well, it is said that Stendhalwas a dandy and an obsessive
womanizer.
What does his love experiencespeak of his philosophy of love
conveyed in many of his novels?
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Well, stendhal is a womanizer.
It's an interesting topic.
I mean, as he says himself, hewas in love with many women, but
not successful with most ofthem, and his greatest love,
matilda Demboski, in Milan.
He never became her lover aftermany, many attempts.
(06:23):
So a great deal of Stendhal'swomanizing is in his imagination
.
It's reveries about women anddesires for them, and then
creating ideal women in hisnovels.
As for being a dandy, thatstrikes me as a slightly
(06:45):
different issue.
The dandy is someone who tries,through his own personal style,
to abstract himself from thehistorical moment.
Sandal is someone who feels,particularly after the fall of
Napoleon, that he's living atthe wrong moment of history.
(07:05):
To become a Dandy is to createa personal style, which means
you're immune to the historicalcontingencies.
Of course you aren't really,but it's an illusion.
It's something that Baudelairealso picks up later.
If you're a dandy, you createyour own rules and your own
(07:30):
atmosphere around you.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
How do you think his analytical approach to love and
the theme of triangular desireinfluenced the later realist?
Because that someone is beingdesired by someone else.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
I think it's not so much a theme as a dynamic that
you see playing out very oftenthroughout the 19th century
novel, but I think the nature ofthe desire is somewhat
different.
The nature of the desire issomewhat different.
I mean, desire in Stendhal isvery mobile and imaginative.
(08:21):
Desire in someone like Balzacis almost like a primitive
appetite.
It's wanting to devour theworld.
And in Zola desire can be sortof like a house on fire, a
conflagration burning up theworld, whereas I think in
(08:43):
Flaubert, who's the mostcomplicated case, in a way,
desire almost seems to beimmobilizing.
It doesn't get you anywhere, itbecomes inward turning and
inarticulate and doesn't projectitself onto the world, whereas
earlier in the century, inStendhal and Balzac, desire is
(09:07):
your meeting with the world,right, it's what connects you to
the world and the objects youwant to possess.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
I think exploring desire is such a fascinating and
important aspect of reading thenovel.
So how do the plots of the 19thcentury novels reflect our
reading desires?
What are the definingcharacteristics of the modern
novel, in other words, whatdrives the plot going?
Speaker 2 (09:36):
the defining characteristics of the modern
novel, in other words, whatdrives the plot going?
Well, I mean, I think plots areerotic.
I mean I think they are aboutwanting and having, and I think
that takes place on severallevels.
I mean, in one sense they'reabout wanting to understand and
to command the reality thatyou're seeing in a fictional
(10:05):
world, and so plots are alwaysto some extent end-driven.
It's a point I made in readingfor the plot that you want to
know where you're going to comeout.
It doesn't mean that you knowwhat the end is or the end is
already determined.
It's that by the time you getto the end, it creates some
(10:28):
retrospective illumination ofwhat you've read up to that
point.
So it's a dynamic of wishingfor the end and then the end
showing you the meaning of thejourney that you've been on.
I think Right.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Well, what about female plots, and how do these
characteristics compare to thoseof earlier narratives?
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Female plots, you mean the plots concerning women
in Stendhal in particular.
I mean Stendhal created anextraordinary set of female
characters, such as MathildeLamolle or Gina Sanseverina, who
(11:14):
seemed to refuse to accept thelimitations placed upon them by
their sex and by the rolethey're supposed to play in
society.
And in Mathilde's case, itinvolves this reference to her
16th century ancestor and hisheroism, and casting aside all
(11:38):
the conventions which controlher and therefore falling in
love with a plebeian, invitinghim up to her bedroom on a
ladder and so on.
Where, sanseverina, she justwon't play by any of the rules
of the court of Parma.
She insists on making her ownrules and she has everyone
(11:59):
eating out of her hand.
And if you get to the very endof Stendhal's writing career,
you have this strange characternamed Lamiel in the novel he
never finished, who reallyundertakes to behave completely
contrary to the limits dictatedon her sex.
(12:23):
For instance, when she wants tofind out about sexuality, she
hires a young peasant man tohave sex with her.
Then afterwards she says sex isthat all it is?
There's this constant strivingto get rid of the conventions
(12:45):
that are supposed to governproper young women in the 19th
century, and Stendhal finds thata very seductive notion
seductive notion Right.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
Well, to sum up, how does Le Houdi Le Noir typify the
desires and themes dynamics?
Speaker 2 (13:03):
of the 19th century plots, oh, wow.
Well, in a way, it's the firstright.
I mean, it is 1830.
It really sets the tone for thecentury of, first of all, an
ambitious young man who wants torise above his condition and
succeeds in doing so, but thenencounters disaster, as many
(13:28):
commentators have always said,disaster that he probably could
have avoided, except that hedoesn't want to.
In a sense, the nature of hisheroism is such that he breaks
with all the conventions thathe's mastered and, as a result,
goes to the guillotine, and it'sat his trial for shooting
(13:52):
Madame de Renal.
And let me just step back a bit.
Why does he shoot Madame deRenal?
Well, that's always been amystery, because he's deeply in
love with her, but she haspresented an image of him, a
negative image, a kind ofmonster image that he can't live
with.
And I think in shooting herhe's trying to sort of shoot
down that image.
(14:13):
But then he goes to trial andhe does the one thing that he
must not do, this absolutelysuicidal, which is referred to
class warfare, right and says Iam a peasant who has dared to
rise in the world and join thebourgeoisie.
And that's exactly what hisjurors do not want to hear and
(14:37):
the reason they condemn him todeath.
So at the very end, this notionof class warfare, which is going
to be so important throughoutthe 19th century, comes up.
And there's this how should Isay this political side of
Julien, which often seems to beabout to be covered over,
(14:58):
because he is very successful,he makes it in society, mathilde
becomes pregnant and he getsengaged to her.
He's given a new name, julienthe Chevalier, julien Sorel
Laverney.
But then he throws it all upand the class identification as
a peasant in revolt against thelowness of his condition comes
(15:22):
back up again.
So I think you've gotenormously rich material here
which is going to be exploitedall the length of the 19th
century.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Right.
Well, Stendhal admired Napoleon, and Le Rouge et le Noir is
often seen as a kind of literarytribute to the emperor.
How do you think Stendhal'sadmiration for Napoleon
influenced the themes andcharacters in the novel?
Speaker 2 (15:52):
Well, I think Napoleon is an enormously
important figure and image toStendhal.
He started to write two booksabout Napoleon and wrote many
pages but never finished either.
For him, napoleon splits in two.
There's the heroic younggeneral who inherits the ideas
(16:12):
of the French Revolution andexports them throughout Europe,
and he was actually part of thatcampaign.
I mean, he actually was part ofthe disastrous Russian campaign
once, so far as Moscow withNapoleon.
But then there's the Napoleonwho had himself crowned emperor
and created a new court and newtitles of nobility, who, to
(16:34):
Stendhal, was a betrayal of thegreat Napoleon.
So there's this double image ofNapoleon, and Julien Sorel
imitates Napoleon and he keeps aportrait of Napoleon hidden in
his straw mattress.
On the other hand, he says oneday the memory of Napoleon is
going to make young men like meperpetually unhappy in the 19th
(16:56):
century because it's a model ofa career that none of the rest
of us can have.
And you know, the Napoleonicideal was that career would be
open to your talents, no matterwhere you came from.
And to some extent that wastrue, particularly in the army.
(17:18):
I mean, the slaughter ofNapoleonic officers was such
that you could become a generalor even a marshal of France.
From you know, you could gofrom peasant to marshal of
France in a matter of a fewyears, like Murat who then
became king of Naples.
(17:39):
So there was this sense ofinfinite possibility, and with
the fall of Napoleon and therestoration of the monarchy,
that's been shut down, and sothat's part of what Julien is
talking about.
So Napoleon is both an heroicimage and a sense of lost
(18:00):
possibility, I would say at thesame time.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
Well, it is easy for most critics to observe
Stendhal's non-retrospective useof narrative, which you
mentioned in reading for theplot, and which very much aligns
with the author's time, as youjust talked about, when writers
and thinkers resisted lookingback at an old regime or
(18:24):
ideology before the FrenchRevolution.
And it is in this context thathere I quote you, the
Stendhalian protagonist everlooks ahead, planning the next
moment, projecting the selfforward through ambition.
Unquote.
However, you also argue thatsuch a non-retrospective use of
(18:46):
narrative is essentially aretrospective mode and it tends
toward an ending that offersretrospective illumination of
the whole.
Given the Stendhalian time,which is momentary, abruptive
and discontinuous, how should weunderstand the dramatization of
his future-orientated desire inrelation to his political views
(19:11):
?
Speaker 2 (19:14):
Ah well, you know, Stendhal famously said I buy a
little lottery ticket to be runto be read 50 or 100 years from
now, and that turned out to bepretty close to accurate.
Uh, he was not a popular writerin his time and he sees himself
as as writing to, to those whowill understand it the happy few
(19:39):
, as he calls them and creatingthis audience of very special,
intelligent people he can talkto long.
(20:01):
Usually he starts with someanecdote or some outline that he
can work with.
In the Red and the Black, Rougeet le Noir, it's this story of
Antoine Bertet.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
If you have enjoyed this episode so far and want to
complete the entire episodewhere Professor Peter Brooks
discusses narrative agency andfeminism in stand-all, be sure
to subscribe attheglobalnovelcom slash
subscribe.
Thank you so much for listening.
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