VIII: 1848. GEORGE SAND AND THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT—
HER PASTORAL NOVELS George Sand; Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings | ||
VIII: 1848. GEORGE SAND AND THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT—
HER PASTORAL NOVELS
IN 1846, George Sand published Le Péché de M. Antoine. It was a very dull story of a sin, for sins are not always amusing. The same year, though, she published La Mare au Diable. People are apt to say, when comparing the socialistic novels and the pastoral novels by George Sand, that the latter are superb, because they are the result of a conception of art that was quite disinterested, as the author had given up her preaching mania, and devoted herself to depicting people that she knew and things that she liked, without any other care than that of painting them well. Personally, I think that this was not so. George Sand's pastoral style is not essentially different from her socialistic style. The difference is only in the success of the execution, but the ideas and the intentions are the same. George Sand is continuing her mission in them, she is going on
We have a proof of this in the preface of the author to the reader with which the Mare au Diable begins. This preface would be disconcerting to any one who does not remember the intellectual atmosphere in which it was written.
People have wondered by what fit of imagination George Sand, when telling such a wholesome story of country life, should evoke the ghastly vision of Holbein's Dance of Death. It is the close of day, the horses are thin and exhausted, there is an old peasant, and, skipping about in the furrows near the team, is Death, the only lively, careless, nimble being in this scene of "sweat and weariness." She gives us the explanation of it herself. She wanted to show up the ideal of the new order of things, as opposed to the old ideal, as translated by the ghastly dance.
"We have nothing more to do with death," she writes, "but with life. We no longer believe in the néant of the tomb, nor in salvation bought by enforced renunciation. We want life to be good, because we want it to be fertile. . . . Every one must be happy, so that the happiness of a few may not be criminal and cursed by God." This note we
George Sand goes on to expose to us the object of art, as she understands it. She believes that it is for pleading the cause of the people.
She does not consider that her confrères in novel-writing and in Socialism set about their work in the best way. They paint poverty that is ugly and vile, and sometimes even vicious and criminal. How is it to be expected that the bad, rich man will take pity on the sorrows of the poor man, if this poor man is always presented to him as an escaped convict or a night loafer? It is very evident that the people, as presented to us in the Mystères de Paris, are not particularly congenial to us, and we should have no wish to make the acquaintance of the "Chourineur." In order to bring about conversions, George Sand has more faith in gentle, agreeable
The parable is clear enough, and the apologue is eloquent. The novel commences with that fine picture of the ploughing of the fields, so rich in description and so broadly treated that there seems to be nothing in French literature to compare with it except the episode of the Labourers in Jocelyn. When Jocelyn was published, George Sand was severe in her criticism of it, treating it as poor work, false in sentiment and careless in style. "In the midst of all this, though," she adds, "there are certain pages and chapters such as do not exist in any languaoe, pages that I read seven times over, crying all the time like a donkey." I fancy that she must have cried over the episode of the Labourers.
I have ventured, to analyze the Comtesse de Rudolstadt and even Consuelo, but I shall not be guilty of the bad taste of telling the story of La Mare au Diable, as all the people of that neighbourhood are well known to us, and have been our friends for a long time. We are all acquainted with Germain, the clever farm-labourer, with Marie, the shepherdess, and with little Pierre. We remember how they climbed the Grise, lost their way in the mist, and were obliged to spend the night under the great oak-trees. When we were only about fifteen years of age, with what delight we read this book, and how we loved that sweet Marie for her simple grace and her affection, which all seemed so maternal. How much better we liked her than the Widow Guerin, who was so snobbish with her three lovers. And how glad we were to be present at that wedding, celebrated according to the custom in Berry from time immemorial.
It is easy to see the meaning of all these things.
We have heard the tune of this song before, and we have seen the blossoming of some very fine pastoral poems and a veritable invasion of sentimental literature. In those days tears were shed plentifully over poetry, novels and plays. We have had Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, Sedaine, Florian and Berquin. The Revolution, brutal and sanguinary as it was, did not interrupt the course of these romantic effusions. Never were so many tender epithets used as during the years of the Reign of Terror, and in official processions Robespierre was adorned with flowers like a village bride.
This taste for pastoral things, at the time of the Revolution, was not a mere coincidence. The same principles led up to the idyll in literature and to the Revolution in history. Man was supposed to be naturally good, and the idea was to take away from him all the restraints which had been invented for curbing his nature. Political and religious authority,
The joy with which George Sand welcomed the Republic can readily be imagined. She had been a Republican ever since the days of Michel of Bourges, and a democrat since the time when, as a little girl, she took the side of her plebeian mother against "the old Countesses." For a long time she had been wishing for and expecting a change of government. She would not have been satisfied with less than this. She was not much moved by the Thiers-Guizot duel, and it would have given her no
"Long live the Republic," she wrote in her letters. "What a dream and what enthusiasm, and then, too, what behaviour, what order in Paris. I have just arrived, and I saw the last of the barricades. The people are great, sublime, simple and generous, the most admirable people in the universe. I spent nights without any sleep and days without sitting down. Every one was wild and intoxicated with delight, for after going to sleep in the mire they have awakened in heaven."
She goes on dreaming thus of the stars. Everything she hears, everything she sees enchants her. The most absurd measures delight her. She either thinks they are most noble, liberal steps to have taken, or else they are very good jokes.
"Rothschild," she writes, "expresses very fine sentiments about liberty at present. The Provisional Government is keeping him in sight, as it does not
She was thoroughly entertained, and that is very significant. We must not forget the famous phrase that sounded the death-knell of the July monarchy, "La France s'ennuie." France had gone in for a revolution by way of being entertained.
George Sand was entertained, then, by what was taking place. She went down into the street where there was plenty to see. In the mornings there were the various coloured posters to be read. These had been put up in the night, and they were in prose and in verse.
Processions were also organized, and men, women and children, with banners unfurled, marched along to music to the Hotel de Ville, carrying baskets decorated with ribbons and flowers. Every corporation and every profession considered itself bound in honour to congratulate the Government and to encourage it in its well-doing. One day the procession
She had the Opera from her windows and an Olympic circus at every cross-road. Paris was certainly en fête. In the evenings it was just as lively. There were the Clubs, and there were no less than three hundred of these. Society women could go to them and hear orators in blouses proposing incendiary movements, which made them shudder delici-
All this was the common, everyday aspect of Paris, but there were the special days as well to break the monotony of all this. There were the manifestations, which had the grcat advantage of provoking counter-manifestations. On the 16th of March, there was the manifestation of the National Guard, who were tranquil members of society, but on the 17th there was a counter-manifestation of the Clubs and workingmen. On such days the meeting-place would be at the Bastille, and from morning to night groups, consisting of several hundred thousand men, would march about Paris, sometimes in favour of the Assembly against the Provisional Government, and sometimes in favour of the Provisional Government against the Assembly. On the 17th of April, George Sand was in the midst of the crowd, in front of the Hotel de Ville, in order to see better. On the 15th of May, as the populace was directing
"If, instead of following Lamartine's stupid, insipid policy," she then wrote, "we had challenged all absolute monarchies, we should have had war outside, but union at home, and strength, in consequence of this, it home and abroad." Like the great ancestors, she declared that the revolutionary idea is neither that of a sect nor of a party. "It is a religion," she says, "that we want to proclaim." All this zeal, this passion and this persistency in a woman is not surprising, but one does not feel much confidence in a certain kind of inspiration for politics after all this.
My reason for dwelling on the subject is that George Sand did not content herself with merely looking on at the events that were taking place, or even with talking about them with her friends. She took part in the events, by means of her pen. She scattered abroad all kinds of revolutionary writings.
In George Sand's piece, Moliere was at work with his servant, Laforet, who could not read, but without whom, it appears, he could not have written a line. He has not finished his play, the actors have not learnt their parts, and the king is impatient at being kept waiting. Moliere is perplexed, and, not knowing what to do, he decides to go to sleep. The Muse appears to him, styles him "the light of the people," and brings to him all the ghosts of the great poets before him. AEschylus, Sophocles, Euripides and Shakespeare all declare to him that, in their time, they had all worked towards preparing the Revolution of 1848. Moliere then wakes up, and goes on to the stage to pay his respects to the king. The king has been changed, though. "I see a king," says Moliere, "but his name is not Louis XIV. It is the people, the sovereign people. That is a word I did not know, a word as great as eternity."
We recognize the democrat in all this. Le Roi
George Sand did much more than this, though. We must not forget that she was an official publicist in 1848. She had volunteered her services to Ledru-Rollin, and he had accepted them. "I am as busy as a statesman," she wrote at this time. "I have already written two Government circulars."
With George Sand's collaboration, the Bulletin de la République became unexpectedly interesting. This paper was published every other day, by order of Ledru-Rollin, and was intended to establish a constant interchange of ideas and sentiments between the Government and the people. "It was specially addressed to the people of rural districts, and was in the form of a poster that the mayor of the place could have put up on the walls, and also distribute to the postmen to be given away. The Bulletins were anonymous, but several of them were
It was much worse on the 15th of May, the day which was so fatal to Barbès, for he played the part of hero and of dupe on that eventful day. Barbès was George Sand's idol at that time.
It was impossible for her to be without one, although, with her vivid imagination, she changed her idols frequently. With her idealism, she was always incarnating in some individual the perfections that she was constantly imagining. It seems as though she exteriorized the needs of her own mind and put them into an individual who seemed suitable to her for the particular requirements of that moment. At the time of the monarchy, Michel of Bourges and Pierre Leroux had been able to play the part, the former of a radical theorician and the latter of the mystical forerunner of the new times. At present Barbès had come on to the scene.
He was a born conspirator, the very man for secret societies. He had made his career by means of prisons, or rather he had made prison his career, In
"I was quite bewildered," he owned later on, "by this idea of leaving prison. I looked at my prison bed, to which I had grown so accustomed. I looked at my blanket and at my pillow and at all my belongings,
GEORGE SAND
(From a lithograph)
[Description:
Greyscale image of George Sand, head and torso, with waved hair and
earring
]
He took part in the affair of the 15th of May, and this is what gives a tragic, and at the same time comic, character to the episode. Under pretext of manifesting in favour of Poland, the National Assembly was to be invaded. Barbès did not approve of this manifestation, and had decided to keep out of it. Some people cannot be present at a revolutionary scene without taking part in it, and without soon wanting to play the chief part in it. The excitement goes to their head. Barbès seems to have been obeying in instinct over which he had no control, for, together with a workman named Albert, he headed the procession which was to march from the Chamber of Deputies to the Hotel de Ville and establish a fresh Provisional Government. He had already commenced composing the proclamations to be thrown through the windows to the people, after the manner of the times, when suddenly Lamartine appeared on the scene with Ledru-Rollin and a captain in the artillery. The following dialogue then took place:
"Who are you?"
"A member of the Provisional Government."
"Of the Government of yesterday or of to-day
"Of the one of to-day."
"In that case I arrest you."
Barbès was taken to Vincennes. He had been free rather less than three months, when he returned to prison as though it were his natural dwelling-place.
George Sand admired him just as much after this as before. For her, the great man of the Revolution was neither Ledru-Rollin, Lamartine, nor even Louis-Blanc; it was Barbès. She compared him to Joan of Arc and to Robespierre. To her, he was much more than a mere statesman, this man of conspiracies and dungeons, ever mysterious and unfortunate, always ready for a drama or a romance. In her heart she kept an altar for this martyr, and never thought of wondering whether, after all, this idol and hero were not a mere puppet.
The skirmish of May 15 undeceived George Sand very considerably. The June insurrection and the civil war, with blood flowing in the Paris streets, those streets which were formerly so lively and amusing, caused her terrible grief. From henceforth her letters were full of her sadness and dis
Francois le Champi appeared as a serial in the Journal des Debats. The dénouement was delayed by another dénouement, which the public found still more interesting. This was nothing less than the catastrophe of the July Monarchy, in February, 1848.
After the terrible June troubles, George Sand had been heartbroken, and had turned once more to literature for consolation. She wrote La Petite Fadette, so that the pastoral romances and the Revolution are closely connected with each other. Beside the novels of this kind which we have already mentioned, we must add Jeanne, which dates from
"It is no use," she wrote about the same time, "if you are born a country person, you cannot get used to the noise of cities. It always seems to me that our mud is beautiful mud, whilst that here makes me feel sick. I very much prefer my keeper's wit to that of certain of the visitors here. It seems to me that I am livelier when I have eaten some of Nannette's wheat-cake than I am after my coffee in Paris. In short, it appears to me that we are all perfect and charming, that no one could be more agreeable than we are, and that Parisians are all clowns."
This was said in all sincerity. George Sand was quite indifferent about all the great events of Parisian life, about social tittle-tattle and Boulevard gossip. She knew the importance, though, of every episode of country life, of a sudden fog or of the overflowing of the river. She knew the place well, too, as she had visited every nook and corner in all weathers and in every season. She knew all the people; there was not a house she had not entered, either to visit the sick or to clear up some piece of business for the inmates. Not only did she like the country and the country people because she was accustomed to everything there, but she had something of the nature of these people within her. She had a certain turn of mind that was peasant-like, her slowness to take things in, her dislike of speech when thinking, her thoughts taking the form of "a series of reveries which gave her a sort of tranquil ecstasy, whether awake or asleep." It does not seem as though there has ever been such an ensemble of favourable conditions.
She did not succeed in her first attempt. In several of her novels, ever since Valentine, she had given us peasants among her characters. She had tried labourers, mole-catchers, fortune-tellers and
When she wrote La Mare au Diable she had found it, for in this work we have unity of tone, harmony of the characters with their setting, of sentiment with the various adventures, and, above all, absolute simplicity.
In Francois le Champi there is much that is graceful, and there is real feeling mingled with a touch of sentimentality. Madeleine Blanchet is rather old for Champi, whom she had brought up like her own child. In the country, though, where difference of age is soon less apparent, the disproportion does not seem as objectionable as it would in city life. The novel is not a study of maternal affection in love, as it is not Madeleine's feelings that are analyzed, but those of Francois. For a long time he had been in love without knowing it, and he is only aware of it when this love, instead of being a sort of agreeable dream and melancholy pleasure, is transformed into suffering.
The subject of La Petite Fadette is another analysis of a love which has been silent for a long time. It is difficult to say which is the best of these delightful stories, but perhaps, on the whole, this last one is generally preferred, on account of the curious and charming figure of little Fadette herself. We can see the thin, slender girl, suddenly appear
The Maîtres Soneurs initiates us into forest life, so full of mysterious visions. In opposition to the sedentary, stay-at-home life of the inhabitant of plains, with his indolent mind, we have the free-and-easy humour of the handsome and adventurous muleteer, Huriel, with his love of the road and of all
I do not know any stories more finished than these. They certainly prove that George Sand had the artistic sense, a quality which has frequently been denied her. The characters in these stories are living and active, and at the same time their psychology is not insisted upon, and they do not stand out in such relief as to turn our attention from things, which, as we know, are more important than people in the country. We are surrounded on all sides by the country, and bathed, as it were, in its atmosphere. And yet, in spite of all this, the country is not once described. There is not one of those descriptions so dear to the heart of those who are considered masters in the art of word-painting. We do riot describe those things with which we live. We are content to have them ever present in our mind and to be in constant communion with them. Style is, perhaps, the sovereign quality in these stories. Words peculiar to the district are introduced just sufficiently to give an accent. Somewhat old-fashioned expressions are employed, and these prove the survival of by-gone days, which, in the country, are respected more than elsewhere. Without any apparent effort, the narrative takes that epic form so natural to those
I am aware that George Sand has been accused of tracing portraits of her peasants which were not like them. This is so absurd that I do not consider it worth while to spend time in discussing it. It would be so easy to show that in her types of peasants there is more variety, and also more reality, than in Balzac's more realistic ones. Without being untruthful portraits, it may be that they are somewhat flattered, and that we have more honest, delicate and religious peasants in these stories than in reality. This may be so, and George Sand warns us of this herself. It was her intention to depict them thus.
It was not absolute reality and the everyday details of the peasants' habits and customs that she wanted to show us, but the poetry of the country, the reflection of the great sights of Nature in the soul of those who, thanks to their daily work, are the constant witnesses of them. The peasant certainly has no exact notion of the poetry of Nature, nor is he always conscious of it. He feels it, though, within his soul in a vague way. At certain moments he has glimpses of it, perhaps, when love causes
"And all this reminded him of a very old song with which his mother Zabelli used to sing him to sleep. It was a song with words such as people used to employ in olden times."
In George Sand's pastoral novels we have some of these old words. They come to us from afar, and are like a supreme blossoming of old traditions.
It is all this which characterizes these books, and assigns to them their place in our literature. We must not compare them with the rugged studies of
La Fontaine has done it in his fables and Perrault in his tales. George Sand has her place, in this race of writers, among the French Homers.
VIII: 1848. GEORGE SAND AND THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT—
HER PASTORAL NOVELS George Sand; Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings | ||