Cline and His Vision by Erika Ostrovsky Review by: Glenn S. Burne Comparative Literature Studies, Vol. 7, No.

2 (Jun., 1970), pp. 248-251 Published by: Penn State University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40467902 . Accessed: 17/11/2013 22:30
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248

COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES

Saint whereas theless reduced to hisanthology marin," piece"Le Cimetire an encomium JohnPerseis awarded applicableto anyof his longpoems. or individual Dr. Balakian impliesthat almostevery recentmovement the has gathered writer a sparkfrom Proust, Ionesco,Beckett, symbolism: on the lackvalidity; NewNovel,and evenFellini.None ofherstatements a lengthy woulddeserve of herpassing chapter. insights contrary, many
Rene Riese Hubert

University Irvine of California,

Cline and His Vision

Press, 1967. By ERIKA OSTROVSKY. New York: New York University 225 pp. Erika Ostrovsky has writtena livelyand challengingbook, a full-length of France's controversial study "crippled giant" of modern letters.In this undertakesto establishCline researchedwork,Miss Ostrovsky thoroughly than just a savage nihilistand more as more than just an influential stylist, artistof a positive of depraved humanity:he is also a misunderstood flayer and creativevision.She attempts to show thatit is wrongto see Cline only in the guise of "a thundering oracle of ugliness and death." He is also a Above all, we must writer even of "lighthearted of high comedy, spoofing." not be blind to the "compassion" which underlies his diatribes,for his "virulenceand insolence hide an authenticfeelingof pity." In her efforts relies heavily on on solid evidence,Miss Ostrovsky to base her arguments she affords material. often Cline so for himself, By letting primary speak readers not overly familiar with the author somethingapproaching the This experienceusually actual experienceof reading the novels themselves. view of Cline; sometimesit works works to support Miss Ostrovsky's against her. - that of showinghis considerableinfluShe takes on the easier task first ence on contemporary "black comedy."She rankshim among the existensuch as of styleespecially,on writers tialists;assertshis impact,in matters Sartre,Burroughs,Kerouac, Ginzberg,Aym, and Henry Miller; and describeshis work as "a juncture of existentialist thoughtand contemporary style,that is, the eruption of the spoken work into literature."(Compare Henri Peyre,in French Novelists of Today: "It seems likely that Celine's language will be judged the most artificialelement in his novels, which themselves rank among the most deliberatelycontrivedand the most selfconsciousof thepresentage in France.") - to Miss Ostrovsky then addressesherselfwith vigor to her major task that Cline is not the he is nihilist proving savage generallythoughtto be. But she grantsmuch to the opposition when she describes,and lets - not just on human Cline describe,his ferociousassault on human life but on "life itself,"on the very fact of character, actions,or institutions, human existence.This assault has elicited, as might be expected, a considerable variety of reactions and interpretations, some of which Miss sketches Cline has been viewed,withconsiderablejustice, Ostrovsky briefly.

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as a paranoiac, a ravingmadman,a derangedpervert withan obsessionfor the "cloaca of life" and an almost pathological penchant for themes of and cruelty. But whereas some consider Cline a stupidity,suffering, a superfanatical hater of humanity,others see him as a Christ-figure, to take all thishatred and evil upon himself.Still others scapegoat,trying To Miss or Ezekiel. What is Cline in truth? see him as a modernJeremiah obvious one . . . thoughonly a veryfew the answer "is a fairly Ostrovsky, criticsseem to have arrived at it. Celine's constant involvementwith a dark and wrathfuluniversearises froma literarychoice. Simple as it is, of the author's work." this insightformsthe basis for an understanding Celine's method is "to choose out of realitythe evil, ugliness,and despair he "chooses himself"and his own and to make themhis themes."Further, tragiclife as literaryraw material,thus making both "an existentialand choice." aesthetic with evidence she giveselsewhere, consistent This account is not entirely for she later describesCeline's voice as a "cry" that is "not so much the as the expressionof resultof a reasoningattitude,or a rational comment, deeply feltanger and disgust. . . aii authenticoutburstof emotion."Is this an "existentialand aestheticchoice," or is it merely the succumbingto The forceof her evidence tendsto supportthe latter,and her compulsion? The apparent confusioncrops somewhatcontradictory. becomes argument up later when, afterfullydocumentingCeline's relentless"noircissement" she explains that he mustalso "se noircir."He mustheap of all humanity, abuse upon himselfand so become one with his created world. His work "with a snarl." To which can be seen as a long and agonizingconfession, adds that "of course this snarl or 'cry' is Celine's literary Miss Ostrovsky is "a voice." She assertsthat one of the reasons for his self-blackening authentic,sincere,and to probe the dark desire to be completely truthful, cornersof one's own inner world." But again, what is the relationship betweenCeline's literary voice, based on "existentialand aestheticchoice," It is doubtful that one and "sincerity"? and his desire for "authenticity" "chooses"to be sincere. Miss Ostrovsky beginsher studywiththe mostnegativeaspectsof Celine's workand graduallymoves,in her later chapters,towardwhat she feelsare positiveelementsin his dark vision of the world. She argues that Cline is the value he is also a "creator,"affirming not merelythe "greatdestroyer"; of man's life.For it should be understoodthathe is basicallya seekerafter is one of man's deepest and most ultimateknowledge,and since suffering authentic feelings,it is one of the keys to the understandingof human experience.Lucidity,even when painful,has a "tutelaryfunction"and is the antidote to the hypocrisy, pretense,and deception of life. In a rather Cline implies that man can face and accept the backhanded compliment, believes that this denotes a belief and Miss Ostrovsky truthabout himself, in the in the existence of some recessesof dignity,worth,and integrity withoutselfhuman being. "For the abilityto stand naked beforea mirror pity or shame is no small virtue." When we think of the image man is indeed. thisis a compliment expectedto see there,

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COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES

In her discussionof the comic elementin Celine's work,Miss Ostrovsky traces the developmentof his portraitsof death from the intenselyindividual death of the earlynovels to the mass death scenesof the later works, and she shows how he frequently tries to deprive death of its traditional force.She quotes him as saying,"My danse macabre amuses awe-inspiring me as much as an enormousfarce. . . the world is comical,death is comic/' to grant and she acknowledgeshis "black humor." But despite her efforts him thisquality,it is evident that she is not amused. She feels that as the death increases,the terroralso mounts,especially buffoonery surrounding "reaches such in the last workswhere the comedyof death and suffering and dimensionsthatit breaksthe bounds of its initial form."It overwhelms inundates the reader,the necessary detachmentis lost, the grotesqueplayratherthan comedy. It becomes tragedy acting becomes terrifying. at comedy. Other criticshave been more appreciativeof Celine's efforts David Heyman, in his Louis-FerdinandCline (1965), findsthat the comic Celine's works.He enjoys,forexample, the spiritis maintainedthroughout "hilarious antics" of Jules, a legless cripple, even while recognizingthat the maimed Julesremainsa they"suggesttrueevil." But to Miss Ostrovsky horrifying Heyman sees Cline as "unmatched as a comic monstrosity. genius, the father of verbal slapstick." Miss Ostrovskysees him as the which is a necesmasterof "truncatedtragedy," who can "evoke the terror vision which the but of the without ennobling tragicexperience," sarypart follows,withoutthe redeemingsense of human dignity. traditionally Miss Ostrovsky on one of the more notoriousand touchesratherbriefly - that of "der Sndenbock,"the scapeunpleasant aspectsof Celine's work thatplaysa prominent fromDr. Semmelweiss role in his writing goat figure to Ferdine of Nord. The sense of guilt is deeply ingrained in Celine's characters(and in himself), showshow he moves from and Miss Ostrovsky for the underdog,in the early works,to joining speaking sympathetically - in some of - the Jews,especially the oppressorsin persecuting scapegoats his wilder diatribes (Ecole des cadavres,Bagatelles pour un massacre,Les Beaux Draps). She points out that, oddly enough, Cline saw the Jews, whom he attackedso viciously, not as weak, nor as victims, but as strong, as a "power group." This attitude is further complicatedby the fact that Cline, the great "destroyer"and here the great persecutor,always considered himselfa victim,a scapegoat, one of the persecuted. Miss Ostrovsky, in the course of giving us a fascinating studyof a comremainsundismayedby, or tends to explain writer, plex and contradictory away, the gross unpleasantnessof the man and of most of his ideascharacteristics which have provoked Henri Peyre into an untempered denunciationof both the authorand his work,and Dennis Donoghue into a flat dismissalof Cline as a "man without art" (New York Review of case is presentedwith intelliBooks, 15 June 1967). Yet Miss Ostrovsky's amount of evidence gence and erudition.She bringsto bear an impressive in support of her views; and although it must be said that some of that evidence may serve to supportjudgmentscontrary to her own, the reader is indebted to her for a richnessof material,an interesting and readable style,and the occasion to reconsiderthe achievementof a highlydisturb-

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She also providesher readera good index and a fullbibliography ing artist. of worksin Frenchand English. Glenn S. Burne Kent State University Machado: A Revaluation Press, Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity

Manuel

By GORDON BROTHERSTON. 1968. 162 pp.

The revaluation of Manuel The subtitle of this book is significant. Machado's poetrywas timely,perhaps overdue. Northrop Frye has compared literaryfame to the ups and downs of the stock market.Manuel Machado's prestige,once as great or perhaps greater than his brother an eclipse since his death in 1947. The author of Antonio's,had suffered two or threeof the greatestpoems in the Spanish language (consider,for example,his sonnet to Philip IV and his evocationof El Cid in "Castilla") was being "sold short" by criticsand readers. It was time for a careful reexamination. There is indeed nothing hasty or opportunisticabout Brotherston's several monograph. His painstakingresearchhelps to establish correctly dates in Manuel Machado's life and in the historyof his works which, of the authorhimselfand of Spanish editorsand because of the carelessness about the New details and insights had been accepted erroneously. critics, Machados and theirancestors give us a clearerpictureof thisgiftedfamily. with more than just a few drops of the They were essentiallymavericks, "Jacobine blood" mentioned by Antonio Machado in a famous poem. Manuel Machado's enthusiastic support of Franco's regimefrom 1936 on or to a climateof fearand was perhapsan aberrationdue eitherto senility conversion.In any a of result the or religious again, perhaps hysteria case, this support was one of the causes of Manuel Machado's lowered prestige among Liberal critics and the general reading public outside are Spain, and most probably inside Spain too. Politics and literature countries. in Spanish-speaking Siamese brothers There are yetotherreasonswhyManuel Machado was so long neglected. himas Brotherston His "folkpoetry"in theAndalusian vein is second-rate, self recognizes.Some of his best poems are Parnassian in spirit. Heredia not Baudelaire or Mallarm.This is a and Leconte de Lisle are his masters, over Parof symbolism second strikeagainst him: by now the superiority nassianismis acknowledgedby everycritic,in France and elsewhere.Yet, thereare perhaps two Manuel Machados, the folkpoet and the modernist he may have paved one seldom reaches greatness, poet. Although the first the way for Lorca and Alberti: "At its best his Andalusian poetry was original and prepared the way for the poets who came afterhim. But he whenhe posed as a spontaneous,'popular*poet, and a tendency exaggerated on occasion gave himselfaway with his exotic refrains.... If Manuel as a superficial Andalusian, in the view of thosewho Machado has suffered best poetry,it is his own fault. He his to wish read or never have ignore

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