Marthe - J K Huysmans

 Marthe is the debut novel of Huysmans, the ultimate novelist of French decadence at the end of the nineteenth century, so bad, so obscene that no British publisher dared issue a translation.   Actually, one publisher, Kegan Paul, did dare, but only the late 'Catholic' novels and only when he was at death's door and it didn't matter any more.

Pompous bluestockings are always on the lookout for something to ban.   The fact is Huysmans was a realist.   He was enthused by Zola's pseudo-scientific theories of experimental realism but he, in practice, led the way with Marthe.   Zola blatantly copies Marthe in Nana but does not dare to go as far as Huysmans.   Zola's heroine starts off in the theatre and rises from there.   Marthe is first seen in the theatre but that is the highpoint of her career.   She is and remains a whore.   Her young lover finds normalcy after leaving her.   Her elderly actor lover ends up on the mortuary table after she dumps him.   Inbetween Marthe is the kept mistress of a married man she cares so little about that his name is never mentioned.

Huysmans had to self-publish Marthe in Belgium.   Imports were banned in France, any copies seized and destroyed as obscene.   The truth is, the characters are immoral but there is no obscenity.   We are given reality, sordid, sad, but ultra real, even down to the details.  The actor beats Marthe, showing off to his drunken mates.   The married man who keeps her wears pink silk tights.

It sounds grubby and depressing.   It might be a shortcoming on my part, but I found it fascinating, thrilling and restorative.   I enjoyed it more than the better known Down There (reviewed here in 2021) because the core subject (unsuitable passion, the degradation of poverty, and indeed debased theatricals) are themes I have encountered and witnessed.   I bought the book for a research project, started reading as a chore, only to be swept away by Huysman's brilliant technique.   I have become a Zola fan over recent years but Huysmans intrigues me more.

Les Diaboliques - Barbey D'Aurevilly

 

Latest stop on my tour of decadent French fin de siecle literature is Barbey D'Aurevilly's collection of scandalous short stories from 1874 - so scandalous that it was confiscated by the Ministry of Justice.  You might think, so what?  Victorian sensibilities, even across the Channel, were very different to ours.  But no, the fate of the promiscuous woman in 'At a Dinner of Atheists' is horrific bordering on pornographic in any era.  Likewise the nature of the 'Woman's Revenge' in the final story.

It's called The She-Devils in most English translations but I think that leads to misconceptions of misogyny.  Each of the six stories features a strong, transgressive woman but I don't think for a moment that Barbey D'Aurevilly looks on them with contempt or disgust.  On the contrary, I believe he is fascinated by them - aroused, certainly, but also intrigued.  The stories are long - forty to fifty pages - and he gives himself plenty of time to probe their psychology and motivation - in itself a counter to any she-devilishness, because of course devils do devilish things for the sheer hell of it.

The authorial style, especially the at-one-remove (recit parle) storytelling, is not to everyone's taste but it is of its time - the parallels with Huysmans are obvious - and I was held spellbound.  Very dark material, not for beginners, but I want more.

Down There - J K Huysmans

 

The ultimate fin de siecle degenerate novel, so they say.  In fact La Bas is an academic discussion about the state of French literature at the end of the Nineteenth Century.  It was decadent, certainly, but that does not make a book about it decadent.  Durtal, our unheroic hero, is a middleaged novelist who has followed the naturalism of Zola about as far as it will go and found it lacking substance.  What he misses is the human soul.  So he sets out to bring naturalism and psyche together in a historical study of Gilles de Rais, the notorious 'Bluebeard' of medieval France.

Gilles de Rais interests Durtal because he started out as a pious soldier, the most important ally of Joan of Arc.  But after Joan's execution and the end of the war with England he becomes dissolute, debauched and appallingly depraved.  After he has defiled, butchered and discarded countless young children he is finally brought to book.  At his trial he confesses everything but recovers his Christian faith to such an extent that the parents of his victims escort him to his death, praying for his salvation.

Durtal wants to wallow in faith of the medieval kind.  He befriends the bellringer of St Surplice and through him an eccentric astrologer who claims he is being murdered remotely by a priest who has gone rogue and now celebrates the Black Mass.  It is the Black Mass which Durtal ultimately witnesses that gives the book its reputation.  Actually, this is nothing at all alarming, more childish than satanic.  What really did raise my eyebrows was what startled me a couple of years ago when I read Zola.  It's the sex.  Durtal finds himself being seduced by the wife of another dining companion and sleeps with her only because she can get him admitted to the Black Mass.

The end of the novel is something of an anticlimax.  The rest of it is absolutely fascinating.