Oh dear. I bought it.
That was fast. Well, to be exact, I batted some eyelashes and pouted a little and made my man buy it.
This sounds like Eco.
It's completely Eco-like. It's a little similar to "Foucault" in a way (just not as much as I would have liked, or perhaps not in the ways I expected the books would be alike). There he sought to expose the mechanisms of "esoterism" and did so by brilliantly trapping the readers using its methods, catching them in a non existing conspiracy that fed on itself. It made for an amazing intellectual puzzle that was pure fun to get immersed into (no to mention how many other books Foucault's Pendulum made me read. It must be close to a hundred, and no other novel ever came close to that). In this novel, he sought to deconstruct the mechanisms of hatred (with massive foreshadowing of the XXth century events - there's a lot of "one day, someone will have the guts to apply the final solution of that (insert some racial slur against germans) monk Luther" and to the XXIth.
Still, it sounds very promising.
It's very clever again, but it's not as fun as the "Foucault", perhaps because the subject matter is so unpleasant and the sheer absurdity of the protagonists' hatred is depressing. Eco has a strong point, though, when he points out in the days of political correctness when these aspects of the difficult and very chaotic birth of democracies, the excesses of nationalism etc. are less and less well-known, it's good from time to time to go take a look at the cultural sewers and be exposed to the raw material again, if only to realize the west, especially but far from exclusively the US, are developping much the same cultural reflexes against the muslims this time.
Yes.
I'm still analyzing my own thoughts and reactions to the book, that's why I haven't finished the review.
I look forward to it. No rush. I do not want to get tricked into buying it in something other than English. That would be bad.
I am talking about sheer weight in my hand.
Too much for nothing in French, they used a very large font for some unknown reason.
So is the Spanish. It looks like it was made for people who really need new glasses.
Aramis, while brilliant is never quite as loveable as Athos.
That's for sure. It's Aramis's ambiguity that I find attractive, I think (I love brilliant and a bit shaddy characters). Athos is touching and loveable. Porthos is hilarious, in a tradition that survives even today, for eg in some characters from Kaamelott. I like d'Artagnan, but at times he's like the prototype of the French man and has quite a few of the aspects of the French that makes me want to slap them.
I never really warmed to Porthos.
d'Artagnan was my first introduction to those stereotypes. He was also, I think, my first meeting with a not wholly sympathetic main character. I remember being confused about that.
Le Fils des Mousquetaires (I think that was the title) where Aramis is EVIL. Well, to an extent, anyway. I read it when I was very young and impressionable.
Have you seen La fille de d'Artagnan with Sophie Marceau? It's a pretty funny movie (better, in fact, than all adaptations of the novels so far. It's a bit of a mystery how the books have never been captured well on film even though they're perfect for that... It puzzles a lot some Dumas scholars (one wrote an essay on that).
I have not. I had wrong thoughts when I saw that title. I assume it is about an actual daughter?
I have been puzzled by the adaptations as well. You almost get the impression they don't want to follow the books too closely. Perhaps they fear the charge of unoriginality? It is also strangely coupled with some good casting. How can they do good casting and then force the perfect casting into the wrong mould? I don't know. Do you remember the title of the essay?
I wouldn't put Scott so much as Dickens or Thackeray as his contemporary, but yes.
It discusses Scott's influence on the young Dumas, and how this influence increased during his career as a novelist, but it doesn't discuss Dumas' foreign contemporaries like Dickens (he's never even mentionned), Bertoli etc.
I was a bit more surprised that Eco did the same (but I had some expectations about how roman-feuilleton would play a larger role in Prague's Cemetary. It's mostly limited to Dumas's Balsamo and its masonic plot, and Eugène Sue's Les Mystères de Paris - and in a whole other way to Monte Cristo (the first two are discussed a lot, there are many nods in the plot and literary devices to the third - but to Balsamo again as well).
I am looking forward to the Sue links. And Dumas, of course. I have been meaning to read Sue. As it is, I have mainly read about it, the fear of poor quality holding me back.
Did I tell you about the open letter I found from Thackeray to Dumas, asking the latter to finish Ivanhoe. It makes sense in the context of Bertiere's observations on the "unreal" attitude to history. It does recall Scott's treatment of it.
You did. IRRC, it's a bit in this context she brings up Scott.
Oooh.
Thank heavens for Maquet. I have always enjoyed the history bits. The Norwegian translation of Bragelonne cut out almost all of it. I am still shocked and appalled.
It's not the only one, far from it. At one point I amused myself by looking at some English editions of Dumas. It's appalling how unfaithful they are, at least the old ones (but has Dumas been re translated of late, at least his classics? Some of the books that had not seen an English edition yes, but the better known ones?). It's not altogether surprising, though. First, the translators had to work really fast as the public was anxious to get the books - so everything they had to research to be able to translate they seemed to have cut (a truculent description of a multi course meal turns into "an abundant meal", and so a lot of other typically French stuff), and then they seemed to have cut everything they felt interested only the French (like many historical details) or would necessitate explanations/notes). Of course Dumas's jokes about the appalling English cuisine got the cut, at least in early editions.
I haven't read the English editions. I had the impression they were more complete than the Norwegians because they publish Vicomte in three volumes (in Norwegian it is about the same length as the first two books). This is very disappointing. They kept the jokes about English cooking and fog in the Norwegian one. I remember. Again, my first introduction to the ubiquitous mentions of English weather.
In the 19th century editions (at least, again), they also seemed to have cared not one bit for the prose as such. They did nothing to reflect the fact it was French, "adapting" it to English tastes rather than translating it, so where Dumas would use three or four adjective to be very precise, they'd use one and no matter it was more vague or ambiguous when the original text was not. That was hardly an English prerogative, the French were even worse and tended to embellish English by inventing missing words and stylistic effects (Jane Austen's early translations were a case in point. I've heard Dickens' as well, but never read anything by him in French).
Don't ever go near Flaubert in Norwegian. Apparently the translator inserted his own paragraphs.
I have very strong feelings about he Raoul-Louise thing. I have actually never been able to forgive the real Louise. Whenever her name shows up in books I find myself getting angry. I cannot imagine the books without that. It is like when people call The Two Towers "filling". I don't get it. The Norwegian translation, while it kept the skin and bones of Raoul and Louise and ... oh dear, I cannot remember his name: Raoul's friend -- all the court intrigues have been cut. While it worked well for me when I was a kid, I am growing steadily angrier about it as I grow older and read the original. That is another of my projects: a proper Norwegian translation of the whole book.
Well, you could have less interesting projects than that!
Indeed. Perhaps I should seek out unemployment.
My opinion of the Raoul-Louise parts (and IRRC it's a bit the one Bertière defends, but I forget) it's that it's very much a matter of tastes. In a way, it's undeniable that if you see the story as the third act of the Musketeers, the story of Raoul is really a massive disgression if it's main purpose is to set up one last tragedy for Athos. One might also argue Raoul as a kind of surrogate son to the musketeers is a bit disappointing.
I cannot help feeling that you need to get to know Raoul if Athos' reaction is going to make sense. If you did not, it would be entirely random. De Guiche? Wasn't that his friend's name? I still remember the day I found out he was a real person.
OTOH, the readers of Dumas who also love his more complex, more historical novels like Balsamo, the Queen's necklace etc. find much to enjoy in Bragelonne.
As I read it much later (mid 30s) than the other two (at around 14 y.o.) I guess I can see why Bertière wasn't as interested in the Raoul-Louise parts. She knows the source material really well, and as she points out, some of it was virtually lifted from Mémoires by Maquet. I can see why it would feel a little bland to someone like her. It's nowhere as fictionalized as the material was in the first two books and it doesn't keep the historical figures to the background (like Anne and Buckingham), or transform them fully into literary characters (like Richelieu, for instance) - but historically speaking this vision of the early years of Louis XIV's rule is terribly outdated.
How did you manage to hold off? I read through the whole series start to finish as soon as I could get my hands on them (I was borrowing them from a friend who was simultaneously lending them out to two other slower readers (imagine my pain) and cried for an hour when it was done (well, not only because it was done ... you understand, I am sure).
I recently taught English Restoration literature, and I cannot tell you the fun I had reading up on the period and getting flashbacks to the novel. Monk, especially. Do you remember if Pepys shows up? I really need to reread it.
Pepys... hmmm... I vaguely remember he does make an appearance (something about shopping for a chicken?) but I might be mixing up novels!
That could very well be the man.
That does sound good. I haven't read anything by him. Perhaps it is time I did.
The Louis XIV would be my favourite. It offers a very great deal of context and perspective. The Louis XVI is nearly as good, though (and again, a lot of context - it is also an history of the early years, and the roots, of the Revolution).
There is no way I do not start with the book on d'Artagnan. Sorry.
*MySmiley*
structured procrastinator
structured procrastinator
Simone Bertière - Dumas et les Mousquetaires
- 09/05/2011 09:49:15 PM
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I need this book.
- 10/05/2011 04:51:17 PM
1533 Views
Re: I need this book.
- 11/05/2011 12:44:23 AM
1637 Views
Re: I need this book.
- 11/05/2011 09:58:27 AM
2157 Views
Re: I need this book.
- 11/05/2011 02:23:35 PM
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Re: I need this book.
- 11/05/2011 08:18:14 PM
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Which of the three books do you like more, Three Musketeers, Twenty Years After, or Le Vicomte? NM
- 11/05/2011 07:54:44 AM
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Aaand I started it. Damn.
- 20/05/2011 08:39:42 PM
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