MAXIME ET "JE" DANS LE ROMAN DE FORME AUTOBIOGRAPHIQUE: ESSAIS SUR CONSTANT, PROUST ET MARIVAUX. (FRENCH TEXT).
Item
-
Title
-
MAXIME ET "JE" DANS LE ROMAN DE FORME AUTOBIOGRAPHIQUE: ESSAIS SUR CONSTANT, PROUST ET MARIVAUX. (FRENCH TEXT).
-
Identifier
-
AAI8103920
-
identifier
-
8103920
-
Creator
-
COMAN, COLETTE.
-
Contributor
-
Henri Peyre
-
Date
-
1980
-
Language
-
English
-
Publisher
-
City University of New York.
-
Subject
-
Literature, Romance
-
Abstract
-
The object of this dissertation based on the well-known novels of Constant, Proust and Marivaux (Adolphe, A la Recherche du temps perdu and La Vie de Marianne) is the investigation of that which at first might appear as a narrative incongruity: the recurrence of impersonal, universal statements or maxims in a personal account of one's life, or more precisely in a novel written in the autobiographical style.;On closer scrutiny this seeming incongruity is in fact a logical device inherent to the first-person narrator. Indeed, while telling the story of his life, the latter is driven to state general truths in order to rationalize his behavior as a fictional I (Adolphe), to draw "laws" out of his past as a hero of a novel (Marcel), or to do both at the same time (Marianne).;However, this constant use of maxims by a first-person narrator has dangerous effects upon the narrative: it not only interrupts the story-line, but threatens also to ruin the illusion of the I as a "true-to-life" character, as the hero is about to become a mere illustration of a "law" or a pretext for general reflections.;On the other hand, the narrative does not remain passive in the face of this subversive action of the maxim which endangers the "autonomy" of the I and thus the illusion of reality sought for by the novel. It therefore develops a series of strategic devices that we have analyzed throughout this study: the occultation of the maxim in Adolphe, its integration in a theme (in la Recherche) or in a character (in La Vie de Marianne).;The first-person retrospective novel becomes thus the site of a "struggle for power" between the I as a narrator and author of general statements or maxims who strives to infuse a universal meaning into his personal experience, and the I represented by the narrative as an "autonomous", "ebullient" character, irreducible to a schematic illustration of a "law". As a result of this tension produced in the text, the non-referential discourse or the maxim not only enriches the image of the I as a hero who wants to rationalize his behavior (Adolphe) or to transcend his experience (Marcel), but also, as in Marivaux's novel, creates quite paradoxically the very "reality" of this I.
-
Type
-
dissertation
-
Source
-
PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
-
degree
-
Ph.D.
-
Program
-
French
