CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE The Pre-War Generation.-It was about the year 1890 that new tendencies were manifested simultaneously in poetry, in philo sophy, in criticism and in the novel. While keeping as a funda mental principle the recognition of the fact, that is to say the method of observation, the newcomers insisted upon their ob servation being complete, upon its taking into account the whole of reality, not merely facts, but also all the stuff of feeling, the impulses of the soul, and spiritual energy. As a result of all this, thought became re-invigorated, took a new lease of life. Such was the accomplishment of men very different in their inspiration and their convictions. Paul Bourget and Barnes among the nov elists, Henri de Regnier among the poets, Remy de Gourmont, Charles Maurras and Andre Gide among the critics, played a great part in this change. Groups like those of the Mercure de France, the Nouvelle Revue Francaise, the Cahiers de la Quin zaine, under the leadership of Charles Peguy, did their capable share.
It may be said that the distinction had been clearly made be tween science, which establishes laws and fundamental causes and sets them forth in abstract terms, and art, which manifests these causes sympathetically by appealing at one and the same time to the reason, the heart and the senses. The works of a mathema tician of genius, Jules Henri Poincare, had made for the develop ment of a more exact conception of science and the scientific method. The books of Henri Bergson, especially the one which appeared in 1907 (L'givolution crgiatrice), had created a new spiri tual awakening. The teaching of Hamelin (Essai, 1907) estab lished a new deism based on the most technical disquisitions of intellectualistic philosophy. Everything thus contributed towards liberating the spirit from the narrow boundaries of naturalism. A literary outburst was the result, the main characteristic of which is that each work reflects the temperament and the tastes of the author, without dependence on any school. Certain writers re main faithful to their conception of the novel (Gustave Geffroy, Cecile Pommier, 1922), and the Academie Goncourt continue the tradition of objectivity and naturalism. But the brilliant group of psychological writers that followed Paul Bourget and Maurice Barnes goes back to Benjamin Constant and Stendhal, indeed even invokes Balzac, and attempts to make of the novel a complete representation of life, of the spiritual life as well as the social and material.
Paul Bourget (1852-1935) wrote Le Demon de Midi (1914), Nemesis (1918) . Maurice Barnes (1862-1923) wrote Greco, ou Le secret de Tolede (1912), La colline inspiree (1913), and just before his death published that Enquete aux pays du Levant (1923), which unites in itself all his peculiar qualities of thought and expression and remains one of his finest books. Rene Bazin (Les nouveaux Oberle, 1919) ; Henri Bordeaux (La maison, 1913, and La resurrection de la chair, 1920) ; Rene Boylesve (Tu n'es plus Tien, 1914, Elise, 1921) ; Louis Bertrand (Jean Serbal, 1924) ; Edouard Estaunie (Les choses voient, 1913, L'ascension de M. Baslevre, 1920), attest the vitality of a genre which was tried with success also by Emile Clermont (1878-1915), author of Laure (1913) ; Louis Codet (1877-1918), author of La petite Ciziquette 0910, Cesar Caperan (19I8), La fortune de Becot (1919) ; and Roger Martin du Gard, of a more philosophical turn (Jean Barois, 1914, and Les Thibault, 1922-1928).
The analytic and descriptive novel of manners continued with Henri Lavedan (Irene Olette, Le chemin du salut, 1920-23) ; Abel Hermant (Les Renards, 1912, L'aube ardente, 1919, 1La journgie breve, 1920) ; Gaston Cherau (La prison de verre, 1912, Le monstre, 1913) ; Jerome and Jean Tharaud (L'ombre de la Croix, 1917, and Un royaume de Dieu, 1920) ; Gilbert de Voisins (L'enfant qui grit peur, 1912) ; the tales of Henri Duvernois (Le veau gras, 1912, Edgar, 1912) ; Andre Gide (L'immoraliste, La porte etroite, Les faux monnaycurs, 1926) ; Edmond Jaloux, Mar cel Boulenger, Eugene Montfort (Cesar Casteldor, 1927), Claude Anet, Charles Geniaux. An offshoot of the symbolist movement, the poetic novel of fantasy had its most illustrious exponents in the poet Henri de Regnier (La pecheresse, 1920, Le divertisse ment provincial, 1923) ; in the poet Francis Jammes (M. le Cure d'Ozeron, 1918, Le poete rustique, 1920) ; and in the young Alain Fournier (1886-1914), snatched away too soon from let ters by the War, whose book Le grand Meaulnes (1914) remains a charming and impressive work. Finally, exotic literature, domi nated by the great name of Pierre Loti, finds brilliant expression in Claude Farrere (La Bataille, 1909, Dix-sept tiistoires de Marins, 1914) ; Jerome and Jean Tharaud (La fete Arabe, 1912) ; Pierre Mille, Marius-Ary Leblond, and in the posthumous book of Louis Herron on Canada, Maria C/iapdelaine (1916), which had a pro digious success. Romain Rolland produced in Jean C/iristophe (lo vols., 1904-12) an epic of French life inspired by ardent en thusiasm for spiritual values, and yet full of the sharpest criti cism of the epoch.
Women have always excelled in the literature of imagination. Three writers occupy the first rank in this respect-Colette, whose works include La vagabonde (1910), L'entrave (1914), Cheri (1920), La maison de Claudine (1922) and La fin de Cheri (1926) ; Gerard d'Houville (1875- ), daughter of the poet J. M. de Heredia, wife of Henri de Regnier, who has a poetic gift and tells in the most fluid style prose stories of charming and often profound imagination (Le seducteur, 1914, Jeune fille, 191b, Tant pis pour toi, 1920), and who has written in L'enfant (1926) a little masterpiece; and Comtesse de Noailles (1876-1933), a poet of passionate and inspired quality, who in 1923 under the title of Les innocentes published a series of novelettes and meditations in which lyricism is made the vehicle of a daring frankness. Mme. Marcelle Tinayre published in 192o Persephone and in 1922 Pris cille Severac. Mme. Lucie Delarue-Mardrus, a very gifted story teller, observant and poetic, wrote L'dme aux trois visages in 1919 and Graine au vent in 1925.
Edmond Rostand became a popular celebrity of the stage at the beginning of the century. Cyrano de Bergerac (1897), l'Aiglon (1900), Chanticler (1910) are romantic dramas of poor quality as dramas, but which may yet survive because of some passages that rise into really great rhetoric. Francois de Curel, produced Terre inhumaine. (1923), La viveuse and Le moribond (1925). G. de Porto-Riche made vigorous studies of passion in Le vieil homme (1911) and Le marchand d'Estampes (1918). Maurice Donnay, so charming, and, at the same time, so melan choly and whimsical, has written social studies in Les eclaireuses (1913) and La c/iasse a l'homme (192o). Alfred Capus, a lucid realist, ironical and with a gift for natural dialogue, produced Helene Ardouin in 1913 and L'institut de beaute in 1914. Henri Bataille (1872-1922), hypersensitive, slightly involved and exotic, brought out Le Phalene in 1914 and L'/iomme a la rose in 1922. Henry Bernstein, after a series of dramatic and violent plays, brought out Le secret (1917) , in which his effects are drawn from psychology and character. Comedy has owed its greatest suc cesses to Robert de Flers (L'habit vert, 1913, M. Brotanneau, 1914, Les nouveaux messieurs, 192 5) ; to Tristan Bernard (Les petites curieuses, 1920) ; to Francis de Croisset (Le Coeur dispose, 1912) ; and to Sacha Guitry, whose vivacity and wit find trium phant expression in Le veilleur de nuit (I 91 I), L'illusionniste (1921) and L'amour masque (1924). The most interesting at tempts in the way of original work have been made by Francois Porche, who in Les butors et la Finette (1918) and Le Chevalier de Colomb (192 2) combines in a curious way the relics of ancient traditions with an entirely modern feeling for symbolism ; and by P. Claudel, author of L'otage (1911), L'annonce faite a Marie (1912), Le pere humilie (1920) and Le pain dur (1918), works sometimes obscure, but freighted with purpose of an incontestable quality, and with austere emotion.
In the domain of poetry all the squabbles of the schools had already been silenced by 1910. Symbolism had done its work. Its most illustrious representative, Henri de Regnier, had re turned to traditional forms. Master of rhythm and of rhyme, con noisseur of language, sumptuous and self-contained, he has am plitude and richness. The outcome of this is magnificent and lordly poetry (Poesies, 1907, Vestigia Flammae, 1921). Much nearer symbolism, Francis Viele-Griffin (1863-1937) studied the ancient myths and attempted to interpret their eternal significance (Voix d'lonie, 1914). Francis Jammes (1868-1938) is the poet of nature and divinity. He knew the country well, and he speaks of it with simplicity and freshness (Les Georgiques chretiennes, 191I–I2). He shows the same ingenuousness, the same healthy realism, the same humility in his poetry of religious inspirations; he had in him something at once bucolic and Christian (La Vierge et les sonnets, 1919). Comtesse de Noailles was on the contrary pantheistic and pagan. Impetuous and consciously unrestrained, heavy with doom like a priestess of old time, she sang in elo quent and remarkably rhythmical verse of youth, love, the beauty of the universe, and also of human unhappiness, implacable destiny and death (Les vivants et les morts, 1913, Les forces eternelles, 1920). In her later verses (Poeme de l'amour, 1924) she adopted a deliberately simple and bare style, in which is trace able a growing melancholy, a strange lassitude in her ardent work, and, by way of substitute for resignation, a courage full of serenity. Paul Claudel, a vigorous personality, penetrated by a faith which, unlike the tenderness of Francis Jammes, is austere and sometimes sombre, has written poems (La cantate a trois voix, 1914, Trois poemes de guerre, 1915, La messe la-bas, 1919) which present a mixture of rather obscure metaphysics, rather self-conscious simplicity, and vivid and powerful imagery.
Charles Peguy, Socialist and patriot, shows in his poems Le mystere de la Charite de Jeanne d'Arc (1910), Le mystere des Saints Innocents (1912), Eve (1914) a fluency which is slightly wearing because of his repetition of the same themes, but at the same time a real power due to sincerity, tenderness and the human need for faith and piety. Finally, Paul Valery, who had made his appearance between 1889 and 1898 in reviews of poetry and letters, La Conque and Le Centaure, published in 1917 Le jeune Parque, and in 1922 Charmes. These two ex tremely slender collections contained much substance under an unpretentious form, and established his reputation. Mathemati cian and philosopher, a subtle and experienced artist, a disciple of Mallarme, to whom he owes much, he gives expression to an abstract and intellectual life which though slightly arid is still passionate, and his work has a deep full note. He has taken his place with Monsieur Teste (1896-1927) and Eupalinos (1923) among the great writers of prose and the great moralistes of the best French tradition. The tendency to return to simple, pure and classical sources is found also with Paul Fort, whose Ballades f rancaises are full of colour and imagination; with J. P. Toulet, Fernand Gregh, Abel Bonnard, Fanc-Nohain, whose Fables (1921) are delightfully humorous ; with Alfred Droin and Pierre Camo; while symbolistic description is the more natural vehicle for Jean Royere.
If one were obliged, in spite of this diversity of temperaments, to characterize the period between 1911 and 1914, one might make two observations. One is that in matters of form pre-War writers went back almost without exception to classical traditions, to proportion, simplicity, clearness. The other is, that as far as guid ing principles went they were for the most part occupied with furnishing a moral discipline to their contemporaries, and that in the wake of dilettantism and naturalistic pessimism they la boured to restore notions of order, of decorum, of hierarchy, which to them seemed useful to the national life. Whatever may have been the glory of Anatole France, it was not he who was then a leader, and who exercised an influence over men's souls ; it was Paul Bourget and Maurice Barres. There appeared at the ap proach of that danger constituted by the War a phenomenon worthy of remark by historians of the future. The grandson of Renan, Ernest Psichari, wrote in 1913 L'appel des armes, and shortly afterwards Le voyage du centurion (1916). Political crises and intellectual visionings had brought about a state of uncer tainty that might prove a cause of weakness. Under the pressure of national exigencies that were apparent to all thoughtful minds, French literature in 1911 was mainly inspired by the attempt, which has been justified by the facts, to assure the future of the threatened country, to make readers acquainted with the strenu ous life and the fundamental principles of the social and moral worlds.
This interesting and noble outburst necessarily faded as the events moved further away. More or less indifferent to the heri tage of their elders, the young writers appeared to be under the impression of existing in a new world where they had to recreate everything. But nevertheless they remained under the influence of the past, sometimes without suspecting it themselves. They discovered, by the very fact that they lived in a predetermined epoch, the result of the labours of their elders. Tendencies, varieties of talent and aspirations are very diverse. There is little unity in the literature of the younger generation. Everyone fol lows the inclinations of his own temperament.
The dominating form in modern literature is still the novel, and it will serve as a type. It is not distinctively, in spite of the definition, a narrative representing life, but often consists of recollections like a book of memoirs or of reflections like a book of essays. The strongest influence to appear has been that of Marcel Proust (1871-1922). According to the date of his birth he belongs to the pre-War generation ; his work has appeared almost entirely during or since the War. Only the first volume of his great novel A la recherche du temps perdu, namely Du cote de Chez Swann, had appeared by the end of the year 1913. All the others appeared in sequence down to 1925. Marcel Proust is remarkable for the depth and daring of his analysis. Gifted with an acute, morbid sensitivity, he probed deeply into the motives of the heart and soul. With an extraordinary delicacy and detail, he succeeded in expressing new and original nuances of thought in sinuous and often interminable sentences. The bold analysis of the emotions in French literature was 'begun some years before Marcel Proust by Anatole France, but with discretion, and later with more freedom by the female writers ; but Marcel Proust has gone much further. He has carried the taste and feeling for intro spection to the extreme limits. By this one can say he has enlarged the scope of the novel, and that is the reason for his great pres tige and influence among post-War writers.
This preoccupation with analysis is found in a series of works the most characteristic of which are: Jacques Riviere's Aimee (1921), Jacques de Lacretelle's Silbermann (192 2) and La Boni fas (1925). In reality a gift as personal and exceptional as that of Marcel Proust encourages tendencies more than it provokes imitation. Psychological introspection is part of our period. It appeared in the course of the War more acutely and frequently than ever. Carried to the extreme, it has resulted in an attempt at the formation of a super-realist (sur-realiste) school.
The writers who have been most successful in these last years escape any attempt at classification. Each follows his own tern perament and inclination. Recourse to the past is necessary to distinguish influences, forerunners, schools. In contemporary liter ature the only thing that can be distinguished is the individual. The choir of young poets protest their personal freedom (Tristan Dereme, Charles Derennes, Geraldy, Roger Allard, Chabaneix). The novelists do the same; M. Pierre Benoit is a master of the novel of adventure ; he knows how to construct ; he knows how to tell a story; and addressing himself to a public which, as after every period of upheaval, is in need of distraction, he has been able to captivate the attention, in a series of well-made novels (Koenigsmark, 1918; L'Atlantide, 1919; Mlle. de la Ferte, 1923; Le puits de Jacob, 1924), in which he shows a remarkable fa cility in employing imaginary or historical events and in keeping the reader breathless with suspense over the turns of his stories.
It is only necessary to recall Le kilometre 83, by Henry Da guerches (1913) , to show that since before the War the taste for the novel of adventure had been revived. The influence of Anglo Saxon literature, and particularly that of Kipling, had been a powerful stimulant in this development. The War naturally only accentuated this tendency. A proof of this is found in the books of Pierre MacOrlan (La cavaliere Elsa, 1921), of Louis Cha dourne (Terre de Chanaan, 1921) of Jean d'Esme (Les Barberes, 1925), of Roland Dorgeles (Le reveil des morts, 1923), of Rene Bizet (La sirene hurle, 1921) and of J. Kessel (La Steppe rouge, 1922, L'Equipage, 1924). All of these appeared between 1918 and 1925. Actually, however, it does not seem that this form of literature is capable of much further development, except in the case of the exotic, historical or colonial novel. French literature is traditionally psychological. It is characteristic that the best book of Pierre Benoit, the most popular writer of novels of adventure, is a novel of manners, Mlle. de la Ferte (1923).
Francis Carco (1886— ) is a painter of the lower depths of society, of the world of the apaches and of the outer boulevards. He deals, as did Villon in his day, with the world of thieves. He has handled this subject with much tact (Les innocents, 1916, L'homme traque, 1922, Perversites). Jean Giraudoux (1882 ) is also a subtle analyst. He has a capricious imagination and a very individual, if somewhat complicated, poetic manner, which makes him difficult reading; but he is provocative. There is in him much humour, often of an unexpected kind, difficult to understand. The world of images has no secrets from him. Un usual comparisons and strange associations of ideas abound in his books. The most successful are Suzanne et le Pacifique (1921), the story of a shipwrecked young girl alone on a desert island, and Bella (1926), a story of contemporary French political life.
Henry de Montherlant (1893— ) is one of the most gifted of the young writers. He has a sense of style, and is capable of vig orous mental- activity. After Le Songe (1922) he wrote Les onze devant la porte doree (1924) and Les Bestiaires (1926) which dis close his national and moral preoccupations. He is interested in the disciplines which make a human being master of himself, per mit him to live under the best conditions, and give the greatest possible value to his acts. He is very modern, and at the same time deeply attached to tradition ; his works are filled with youth ful ardour, strength of will, and an impetuosity which express themselves in vivid and poetic language.
Francois Mauriac (1885— ) is a powerful novelist. His books (Le baiser au le preux, 1922, Genitrix, 1923, Le desert de l'amour, 1925, Therese Desqueyroux, 1927) have placed him among the most notable writers of his generation. Brought up in the Catholic tradition and attached to his faith, Francois Mauriac is aware both of the demands imposed by a Christian life and of the weaknesses of most human beings. All his work, which inci dentally is open-minded, seems dominated by the idea of sin, by the necessary artifices in which egotism and passion entangle hu man beings and by the nothingness of their desires.
Andre Maurois (1885— ), who in the War was interpreter with the British, made his debut with an impressionistic book, en titled Les silences du Colonel Bramble (1918), which had a great success. This was followed by Ariel, ou la vie de Shelley (1923), which had great charm, Des dialogues sur le Commandement (1924) and Disraeli (1927). He is less a novelist than an essayist. He has a penetrating, highly cultivated mind and loves the play of ideas; he excels in delicate analyses, in the nuances of the emotions and in psychological insight.
Valery Larbaud (1881— ) is interested in the manifestations of the international mind, and has written novels. Firmina Mar quez is an original study of the life of young people in South American schools. Le journal d' A. 0. Barnabooth, which fol lowed, is a novel in which satire is mingled with poetic fancy.
Paul Morand (1889— ) represents the impressionist school at its best. His short stories Ouvert la nuit (1922), and his novel Lewis et Irene (1924) are certainly among the most entertaining studies of the present time. Paul Morand has a keen feeling for the feverishness and instability of contemporary life. He is also keenly aware of the international aspect of post-War cities.
Pierre Hamp (1876— ) (Le Lin, 1924) elaborated a new kind of novel with no hero and'no tale. He aims at giving a pic ture of human effort in all its aspects and uses his personal ex perience and technical knowledge to make up a most vivid presen tation chiefly of the life of the working classes.
Jean Richard Bloch (1884— ) (Et Compagnie, 1925) has written perhaps the most successful Balzacian novel of his genera tion. He has since attempted the novel of adventure on the po etical plane in La Nuit Kurde (1925), and produced in Le Dernier Empereur (1926) a much more vigorous type of play than the French stage has seen for many years.
Jules Romains (1885— ), known as the founder of the poetical school l'Unanimisme, achieved success in the novel Lu cienne (1922) and on the stage with Dr. Knocke (19 24) and le Dictateur (1926). Andre Chamson (1900— ) is one of the most promising of the newest writers; his essay L'Homme contre l'Histoire (1926) attracted attention after Roux le Bandit (1024) ; and Les Hommes de la Route (1a27) is the most important of the recent novels.
The essay seems to be winning back some of its former popu larity. The most celebrated of contemporary essayists is "Alain" (Emile Chartier, 1868— ) who won notoriety with a series of essays on the War (Mars ou la guerre jugee, 192o). His essays are very short and pregnant, and rise to passionate moral intensity (Les I dees et les Ages, 1927). Alain is one of the three or four best writers of modern French prose. Henri Bremond (1865 ' 933) should also be noticed.
All the schools, after their trials and struggles, have achieved their work and have transmitted the best that was in them. The quarrels between romanticism and naturalism, between the Par nassians and the Symbolists have come to an end. The opposition between scientific rationalism and the world of the spirit has be come less acute. It was a long struggle, bearing witness to the vitality of literature ; of all the doctrines nothing is left but the trace of whatever in them was useful and true. Present-day French literature seems to be going in the direction of a classic revival in which certain other elements are mingled. We can con clude on a hopeful note. At 'few periods of French literature has there been so much young talent. Genius can be attributed to several of our contemporaries, and the effervescence of the present day in French literature contains much more than mere promises for the literary historian and critic.