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RED_ON_BLACK
October 11, 2005
Stendhal's "The Black and the Red" (1830):
TAKEN_LIGHTLY
A tale of a low born young man,
Julien Sorrel, slowly rising in
status among the high born, by
dint of intelligence and luck ("dint"?) This book made
and determined schemes and JFK's short
overweening pride. list of favorite
novels...
BONDED_TIGHTLY
He secretly worships the memoirs
of Napoleon, and laments the collapse
of an age when a young man might
advance through heroic action.
He resolves to compete in
the only worthy field of endeavor There are a few
left open to him: hypocrisy. references to
Moliere's "Tartuffe"...
He can recite the bible from which I tired of
memory in Latin, and believes not knowing about:
not a word of it.
TARTUFFE
Perhaps one day he might even
become a Bishop.
A royal restoration has occurred
in France, but they still feel FRENCHREVS
tremendously rocky.
Julien sneers at the upper class,
fearing a Jacobin under every bed.
Truly, the modern world began
in France, in the early 1800s.
Ideology and the fear
of ideology, plot and
counterplot.
Dreams of utopia,
and terror of
The Terror.
Narrative voice:
ominiscient, ducking into
either character's head. Since this is
completely impossible
it's a cheat... But Stendhal does
seem quite a cheat:
ALL_WRONG fabricated chapter
But Stenndahl head quotations.
himself comments in
places, remarking on
how his opinion of
the a character is The texture of
effected by his the novel: the
actions (or more action is
usually: reactions). primarily (though
not entirely) There's this
An opinionated god. mental, with two sense of being
characters an objective
continually observer, working
misunderstanding out a science
each other in of humanity.
ways that we
understand Stendhal was
perfectly. supposedly
a fan of
Goethe's
"Elective
Affinities"
(Which I
found
nearly
unreadable,
myself.)
Stendhal's grasp of human character
seems very peculiar to my eye.
Take the provincial married woman
that Julien becomes involved with --
early on she's astoundingly naive
(she isn't allowed to read novels --
and never sneaks one? -- she never
gossips with other women?).
Then when there's a hint of possible
discovery she clicks over into
the mode of an accomplished schemer,
a conspirator.
Later on Julien has an initial
repulsion to the Marquis
daughter, Mathilde, but this
seems completely unbelieveable.
Landing this pretty young woman
is an obvious course for his
social advance.
Wouldn't it be more in keeping with
his character to at least reproach
himself for not going after her? Why The interesting stuff is
isn't he riding high on the ego boost the continual attempts at
of his earlier "conquest"? embracing moral inversion
that don't go quite far
enough.
General themes:
Julien screws himself up
by trying to be too clever.
His deep reasoning edges
over into paranoia...
They love each other
when they think the
other does not.
One thing they have in common:
Not a "knot" so much as
a violent oscillation. They're both bored by
the same people.
KNOTS
The desperation for
an achievement with
out any standards for
evaluating it.
Sophisticated
expectations, the
enemy of joy?
The book is slow going
in it's early stages... Adultery
should be spelled
with two "l"s.
It picks up steam
when the main
character is isolated
in a seminary school (!).
And then really gets
rolling when he becomes
employed as a
secretary in Paris,
living and working in the
home of an upper class
family.
SPOILERS
A perfectly insane romance
develops between him, and The plot veers into
his employer's daughter -- romantic comedy --
a haughty, changeable feigning indifference
young woman. to win a woman --
and then melodrama --
They're both wired to love each attempting to kill
other only when the other one his former mistress
doesn't, so they immediately for sending a poisonous
fall into a violent oscillation. letter...
The meaning of the title is
not abundantly clear, and I Julien's intended career in
would guess has provided the clergy requires that he
fodder for many a literature wear a suit of black.
class composition.
There's no such obvious
correlate for the red:
passion? blood?
The color of some
military uniform that (Yes, I guess
was on Stendhal's mind that's a
but not on ours? commonly
accepted
parallel.)
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