THE FRENCH NOVEL

Among English speaking communities the French novel is universally regarded as the type of all that is bad and terrible. It is true, indeed that its popularity is not so much affected by this as might be thought likely. Men condemn the French novel; but they take care to read it first. This is probably done in order to avoid all appearance of injustice, such as might be rendered possible if the condemnation were not the outcome of experience. PLATO was of opinion that for a ruler, who should be able successfully to combat vice, it would be desirable to find someone who was not without some knowledge of vice, derived from the practice of it in his own person. This is, perhaps, going rather further than would be approved of nowadays. But the principle, in a restricted form, may still be properly applied to criticism. And so it comes about that the French novel, though generally reprobated, still occupies a prominent, if not an honourable, place in the library of most men who read anything at all.

At the same time there is one French novelist whose works are almost as completely tabooed by society, as, by a recent decision of the English Courts, they have now been banned by the law. It is generally felt, even by persons whose taste in novel-reading is none too squeamish, that ZOLA is a little more than anyone can stand. L'Assomoir, the first of his publications to create a stir, was a grievous trial to most English readers; Nana and Pot Bouille were veritable offences and stumbling blocks ; and more recently La Terre has practically placed its author, so far as English people are concerned, outside the range of their sympathy and their tolerance. Yet against this must be placed the fact that in his own country ZOLA is pre-eminently the novelist of the day, and that some of his books—and those often the most offensive—have had a success which is almost unprecedented in the history of the literature of fiction. Arising out of this rather startling anomaly there are two considerations which naturally suggest themselves. Are the French people to be regarded as abnormally depraved ? And is ZOLA quite as bad as he is painted ? With the first of these points it is hardly possible, even if it were altogether becoming, for anyone belonging to another nation to deal satisfactorily. With regard to the second, of course, everyone can form an opinion of his own, and is entitled to express it. In a recent number of an English magazine Mrs CRAWFORD, the Paris correspondent of Truth and the Daily Telegraph, devotes an article to a chatty and exhaustive notice of the novelist. The authoress makes no avowed declaration of her intention to whitewash her subject ; but her desire to make him appear in as favourable a light as possible is as obvious as it is also natural in the circumstances. Yet all that can be said in extenuation amounts practically to this. ZOLA did not start the naturalist school, which was initiated by FLAUBERT in Madame Bovary. He is no worse than any of his colleagues or disciples ; and better than some, inasmuch as he has not " lived " the vices which he describes. His publications do less harm in France, where the young of both sexes have not the same independence or freedom of intercourse that they enjoy in England. His fondness for filth is due in a great measure to his Italian blood, poisoned by the corrupt atmosphere of a French lyceum. His writings, from their very coarseness and beastliness, are less depraving than the " poisonous confectionery" of writers like THEOPHILE GAUTIER. With the exception of the last, however, none of these extenuating circumstances can be considered to have much weight in modifying our estimate of the author, or of the harmfulness of his works. They only tend, at best, to show that he might have been worse, not that he is in fact, any better. But with regard to the consideration mentioned last, there is this much to be said, that in ZOLA'S works vice is represented, not under an alluring aspect, but in its native hideousness. Now so far as this quality may tend to prevent persons from reading the books in question at all, this consideration is justly entitled to considerable weight. It is fortunately true that it is not everyone who has the stomach to tackle one of ZOLA'S horrible works, and few of them are otherwise. But if the repulsive aspect of vice, as portrayed by him, is not sufficient to deter the reader from hearing what he has to say about it then the beastliness, which is stated by his admirers to be wholesome, only serves to aggravate the evil. An offence against delicacy is almost as bad as an offence against morals ; and when the two are combined the latter is made not less, but immeasurably more, depraving and demoralising. The works of THEOPHILE GAUTIER are not such as could properly be entrusted virginibus puerique. But if the morality is bad, there is at least nothing to outrage the taste and shock the sensibility as well. In the charms of a style, which is of the highest literary quality, readers of GAUTIER may ignore or forget the immorality which forms but a very subordinate and accidental element in the romances of that accomplished stylist.

It will be difficult, indeed for anyone to maintain that the substitution of the "naturalist" for the "romantic" school of fiction has been anything but a very bad thing for French Literature. ZOLA'S apologists will say that he is not the worst offender. This is true enough. But writers like DUBUT DE LAFOREST, and others even worse, are beyond the pale of notice or criticism. ZOLA, by the position which he occupies, demands and requires both. And it is because of this that regret will be more keenly felt at the influence which he has exercised over French fiction of to-day. In spite of the bad name, which it may truly be said to enjoy, the French novel will probably always be popular with English readers. In the terrible dearth of good modern works of fiction in our own tongue, it fills a place which cannot well be otherwise supplied. However feeble or unnatural may be the story, the French novel is rarely dull or badly written. It is nearly always good reading, if only on account of the style, and a certain alert criticism of everyday things which is essentially Gallic. Nor is it right to place overmuch stress on the dubious moral tone which has done so much to bring it into disgrace. What may seem to one person very immoral, may appear to another person as something of surpassing merit. When ALPHONSE DAUDET startled and shocked some of his English admirers by launching Sappho upon the world, the author thought he was doing a very good work indeed. The novel portrayed vice in clear and life like colouring. All the better would it serve as a timely warning to his two sons. It is unreasonable for one nation to lay down the law to another nation as to what is moral and what is not. French novels, it must be borne in mind, are written primarily for French and not for English readers. And if we are tempted to pride ourselves overmuch upon the purity of our own fiction, it may not be amiss to remember that, for sheer villainy of imagination, few French novels surpass, or even equal, the Romance of the Nineteenth Century, by Mr. W. H. MALLOCK, published only a few years ago. Yet the author of this still flourishes at home, and has never been prosecuted, as was GUSTAVE FLAUBERT for publishing Madame Bovary, and as it is possible that EMILE ZOLA would also have been, if he had lived in any other time but the present.

Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957), Saturday 2 March 1889, page 8