Gide's
Rhetoric of Acceptance in Les Faux-monnayeurs
Etudier
d'abord le point d'ou
doit affluer la lumiere; toutes les ombres en dependent. Chaque figure repose et s'appuie sur
son ombre.
--Le Journal des Faux-Monnayeurs, 1921 (479)
La culture doit comprendre qu'en cherchant
a absorber le christianisme elle absorbe quelque chose de mortel pour
elle-meme. Elle cherche a admettre
quelque chose qui ne peut pas l'admettre, elle; quelque chose qui la nie.
--Journal, 1926 (817)
Andre Gide
is a writer of contrariness and ambiguity: of light and shadow. The two epigraphs I've chosen here express
in a nutshell part of the contrariness of Les Faux-monnayeurs. Critics have read Gide's contrariness
from a number of different positions.
Just over two decades ago many saw a Gide poised between two
"ages": between that poorly defined age that reigned before--and existentialism. Currently, because of his
self-contradictions and relativism, combined with his use of religious
language, some see a Gide looking forward to postmodernism. Others read him theologically, as
embodying a transitional notion of God in a century when God is being
constantly redefined (one book I've been reading is entitled Andre Gide: The
Theism of an Atheist). And finally there are those who see his
contradictions as a weakness, as symptomatic of a simple lack of
commitment. Though I am certain
there is much work of interest on Gide, that which I have been able to find in
our limited stacks hasn't been all that noteworthy, nor has it significantly
altered (or even addressed) my own, initial understanding of Les
Faux-monnayeurs. This is surprising to me, because it
seems that many parts of the novel function in obvious ways, ways that,
nonetheless, never get mentioned.
Perhaps it is the
case that my understanding of Gide is too obvious for publication. Perhaps I'm off the mark presenting an
analysis of Gide from this angle.
In any event, I was about to give up on my Gide essay until I was
emboldened by this entry in the journal:
"Les choses les plus importantes a dire sont celles que souvent je
n'ai pas cru devoir dire--parce qu'elles me paraissaient trop evidentes."
(824) Thus I will begin by
insisting that the following assertions are trop evident.
Gide's Les
Faux-monnayeurs employs
rhetorical and other narrative devices to establish the acceptability of
homosexual love. One of the more
important devices used to this end concerns the reader projected by the novel. What I will call the "projected reader"
offers a telling example of the contrariness mentioned above. This projected reader is meant to hold
simultaneously the moral convictions of a literate French bourgeois Catholic
and those of someone who doesn't see anything too objectionable in male
homosexual love. In other words,
this reader is a being that, in the 1920s, didn't quite yet exist. Such a projected reader is of
particular interest to us insofar as it does and does not overlap with the
actual readers Gide could expect in his contemporary French public. The distance between the reader
projected by Les Faux-monnayeurs
and the readers actually anticipated by Gide is the distance that Gide must
negotiate with his painstaking rhetoric.
This projected reader is perhaps the most crucial and interesting aspect
of Gide's rhetorical efforts, and it is one we will spend some time analyzing.
Another important
series of devices can be found intertwined with the theme of
counterfeiting. The
all-pervasiveness and, in some cases, acceptability of counterfeiting in the
narrative allows for an easily manipulated circulation of moral judgment from
one character to the next. Gide
establishes a Dark Side in the form of the character Passavant and his circle
of fiends, a Dark Side to which all the dirt is sent and against which
Edouard's noble and accepted version of pedophilia is established. The constant movement of counterfeit
goods in the forms of art, theatricality, hypocrical speech, and texts (novels,
journals, letters, even a magic talisman) makes a constant shifting of readerly
judgments quite simple, if only because such shifting seems so natural in such
an environment. In addition, Gide
also manipulates age barriers, the differences between Protestantism and
Catholicism, and religious feeling in general towards his end of establishing
acceptance. Thus, in the case of Les
Faux-monnayeurs, Gide's
apparent self-contradictions are not to be seen as a flaw, but rather as part
of a subtly deployed rhetorical strategy.
I ought to make
something clear from the outset. I
do not see this project as a means of trying to pin down Gide so that he may be
condemned for dishonesty, or, as some might do, for his sexual preference. These considerations are not at all to
the point as far as I am concerned, and I respect both the novel and its
writer. Considering the historical
and biographical determinants of Gide's work, one is led in writing on Gide to
analyze his struggle to establish the legitimacy of homosexual love. Of course there have already been many
studies of just this theme, studies that focus in the main on his work Corydon. But to imagine that Gide's struggle can
be seen mainly in Corydon--which
Gide considered his most important work--and that this struggle is somehow
absent or only slightly relevant to a reading of Les Faux-monnayeurs--this seems to me ridiculous. Klaus Mann, in his biographical and
journalistic sketch, provides a quick overview of the virulent hatred Gide had
to face in the public realm. (note 1)
When Gide's work was not being attacked for its irrelevance, it was
being portrayed as powerful and wicked enough to corrupt all of France. "His work is the most revolting
moral and intellectual scandal of this century," screamed the Revue
Francaise in the
mid-twenties. (19) Mann recounts a
conversation with a young French writer--a recent convert and Catholic priest
in the making--with whom he was looking at a portrait of Gide.
As usual,
I was taken with the noble shape of [Gide's] physiognomy, and expressed my
delight.
"Mais oui," admited the devout young man,
"il est beau." And he added, with a transient shudder,
"Que voulez-vous? C'est la
beaute du diable."
(22)
It is
against this background of public condemnation that Gide had to choose his
strategies as a writer. Rather
than stand up in the manner of a late 20th century gay pride activist and shout
his defiance, he chose to employ his considerable literary skill to establish
the possibilities of acceptance, to establish a basis on which homosexuality
might not immediately seem so disagreeable to those so predisposed to be
horrified. Gide thus had a
difficult task ahead of him, and it is in relation to this difficulty that his
chosen methods in Les Faux-monnayeurs must be judged.
I've raised the
notion of a historical distance between ourselves and the early twentieth
century as regards acceptance of homosexuality. That this distance is real is evident. And yet one difficulty for late
twentieth century readers in accepting Gide's presentation of homosexuality in Les
Faux-monnayeurs will be
the fact that the homosexuality he presents is in the main pedophilia. Everywhere in this novel it is a
question of the potential relations of men and boys. We have rightly become sensitized to the dangers of such
relations; and whereas most of us accept homosexuality as part of the normal
human spectrum, we would also insist that pedophilia is too often a matter of
the abuse and sexual manipulation of those who cannot adequately defend
themselves. Though I raise Gide's
"rhetoric of acceptance" sympathetically, I am aware of this issue as
problematic. Here too there is an
element of distance between us and the early part of the century. Just as we have learned to accept
homosexual love, we have certainly also learned to be more careful about the
differences between adult and child: more careful about protecting those who
are potentially victims.
To begin
I would like to consider in detail the first appearances of the homosexual
theme in Les Faux-monnayeurs. Because my reading seeks to take into
account Gide's contemporary public, when I refer to "the reader" I am
thinking particularly of the reading public of the 1920s in France. When, on the other hand, I refer to the
"projected reader," I am thinking of the artificial and more tolerant
reader projected in Gide's text.
The first appearance
of the homosexual theme occurs at the beginning of Part I, chapter VI. I will quote the whole passage:
We are all bastards;
And
that most venerable man which I
Did
call my father, was I know not where
When I
was stamped.
Shakespeare.
Bernard a fait un reve
absurde. Il ne se souvient pas de
ce qu'il a reve. I ne cherche pas
a se souvenir de son reve, mais a en sortir. Il rentre dans le monde reel pour sentir le corps d'Olivier
peser lourdement contre lui. Son
ami, pendant leur sommeil, ou du moins pendant le sommeil de Bernard, s'etait
rapproche, et du reste l'etroitesse du lit ne permet pas beaucoup de distance;
il s'etait retourne; a present, il dort sur le flance et Bernard sent son
souffle chaud chatouiller son cou.
Bernard n'a qu'une courte chemise de jour; en travers de son corps, un
bras d'Olivier opprime indiscretement sa chair. Bernard doute un instant si son ami dort vraiment. Doucement il se degage. Sans eveiller Olivier, il se leve, se
rhabille et revient s'etendre sur le lit.
(58)
Some of
the ambiguities here are more obvious than others. The epigraph is read most obviously as a reference to
Bernard's false relation to Profitendieu.
In light of the homosexual theme, however, the passage can be read in an
entirely different way. If we are
to understand that "[the] man which I did call my father" can refer
to a male role model (either the real father or not) and "stamped"
can refer to the development of sexual orientation (as the term has such heavy
overtones of fate), the passage may refer to the theory of the origin of male
homosexuality being the lack of a male role model. "We are all bastards" can be understood as
establishing a sort of legitimacy in the face of illegitimacy through the
assertion of averageness, or normality.
The ambiguity is not only grounded in the epigraph, however. We are immediately told of Bernard's
absurd dream, which he is both trying to forget and has forgotten. As one usually tries to remember
dreams, the reader is placed in an ambiguous relation to this strange dream:
the reader would like to remember it, read its content. "What sort of absurd dream?"
one is asking oneself just as one reads of the possible cause of the dream:
Olivier's body is pressing heavily against Bernard's. The reader may thus understand why Bernard is trying to
repress his dream, but the reader also knows that dreams hold the truth.
"You shouldn't repress your dream, Bernard, but face up to it," the
reader thinks. The next sentence
hints that Olivier's touching of Bernard may be intentional (Olivier may have
been awake), but also gives an objective reason for this contact (the
narrowness of the bed) just in case the reader himself is too uncomfortable to
face the (possible) truth. Gide is
using narrated monologue here both to establish Bernard's reactions ("ou
du moins pendant le sommeil de Bernard";
"et du reste . . .")
and to cause the reader to have similar reactions while simultaneously
condemning Bernard for his shy refusal of the truth in the form of the
dream. Next we have a description
of the boys' position and of Bernard's scant clothing, and implicit in this is
the fact that Bernard does not move away all that quickly. The word indiscretement is of interest here: it is difficult to
attribute it wholly to Bernard, to the reader, or to the narrator. It can be seen as a single, floating
chaperone on the scene: it keeps things respectable while at the same time describing
the most graphic aspect of the boys' contact. The next sentence--"Bernard doute un instant si son ami
dort vraiment"--can also be felt as a light query to the reader: Je
doute un instant si mon lecteur dort vraiment--or, in other words, one may wonder if the reader's moral
reactions are sufficiently numbed by all this ambiguity. And then, a request to the reader for
acceptance and gentle patience: "Doucement il se degage." Thus if the reader is unwilling for
such contact, he is given a discreet escape. But the discretion of this escape actually forces the reader to be gentle: it doesn't give
him the option of harshly pulling away.
The reader's consciousness is by this point too close to Bernard's and
too benumbed to disagree harshly with any of his actions. In any case, one must not wake the
(awake? asleep? dreaming?) Olivier.
Finally, after dressing himself (establishing a bit of distance) the
reader is not averse to lying down next to Olivier, perhaps to consider things
a bit more comfortably.
Gide thus brings us
into the theme of homosexuality by means of a strategic manipulation of doubt
and of our identification with Bernard.
Though it is true that the epigraph is only read ironically upon a
second reading, the ambiguity of the first sentences seizes the reader
immediately. The ambiguity and
truth of dreaming, along with the ambiguity of narrated monologue, prepares the
way for an encounter whose apparent innocence and obvious implications are
finally put temporarily to rest as Bernard gently disengages himself and gets
dressed, only to lie down once again in Olivier's narrow bed. A few sentences later, still in bed, we
read his nascent and heroic plans in a quoted monologue. His use of the term destin echoes the ambiguous fatalism of the
epigraph. "Dans un instant,
se dit-il, j'irai vers mon destin.
Quel beau mot: l'aventure!" (58-9)
The second instance
of the homosexual theme occurs in Part I, chapter IX. The whole chapter is worthy of attention. It opens:
Nous n'aurions a deplorer rien de
ce qui arrive par la suite, si seulement la joie qu'Edouard et Olivier eurent a
se retrouver eut ete plus demonstrative; mais une singuliere incapacite de
jauger son credit dans le coeur et l'esprit d'autrui leur etait commune et les
paralysait tous deux; de sorte que chacun se croyant seul emu, tout occupe par
sa joie propre et comme confus de la sentir si vive, n'avait souci que de ne
point trop en laisser paraitre l'exces. (78)
In the
last instance, homosexual intentions were defused through their being hidden or
ambiguous: Bernard was dreaming, but we know not what; Olivier was probably
asleep, and the bed was so small, after all. Here the intentions are not at all hidden, and the mutual
attraction of Olivier and Edouard is obvious. How is this, then, an instance of Gide's rhetoric of
acceptance?
In the first sentence
we are led to value the two characters more highly than they value themselves:
each has "une singuliere incapacite de jauger son credit dans le coeur et
l'esprit d'autrui." In
particular, we are set on the track of sensing their goodness behind their
self-presentation, if only because we learn that their incapacity has paralyzed
both of them, a dilemma with which we can sympathize. Olivier and Edouard become pitifully concerned with hiding
their own joy (and thus their own intentions) from the other. Further, each is comme confus to find this joy so great. In this way the reader is led through
his or her sympathy to put value on the characters' hidden selves; to feel
shame along with them--not for their feelings, however, but for their inability
to express them (after all, what reader hasn't been in a similar painful
situation?). The reader is led to
share in the excessiveness of their joy as a dulling confusion (similar to the
ambiguous and foggy confusion suffered by Bernard and the reader in the passage
analyzed above), and finally is thus prepared for the narration of an
unsatisfying and stifled encounter.
The surface being of Edouard and Olivier is thus devalued at the same
time as it is presented, and their intentions are all the more valued because
hidden--and this regardless of the fact that these intentions are not presented
or even in the smallest way fulfilled.
Through the reader's disappointment with and sympathy for their
befuddlement, he is led to support their still unspoken desires.
One can see how this
passage works rhetorically simply by imagining the opposite: What if their
meeting was written as a success?
Gide obviously sensed that writing of such a success would mean failure
to attain the reader's sympathy.
The reader's sympathy, he feared, would be dashed on the rocks of such a
straightforward narration. Gide's efforts are everywhere in the direction of a
subtle establishment of sympathy rather than in any clear declaration of gay
pride. In fact there is no
homosexual encounter in the whole novel narrated step by step as a success;
there is no instance when a homosexual declaration of love is spoken by any of
the characters. This rhetoric may
be too low-keyed to be even noticed by many readers of the late 20th century,
who are used to the more direct methods of the gay pride movement. But to attain the sympathy of anything
near a majority of educated readers in 1920, Gide could not have resorted to
such tactics.
Through the
embarrassment of Edouard and Olivier, what does this chapter finally
become? It becomes an entirely
conventional encounter between a somewhat formal older man and a shy young
boy. Its homosexual content is
almost entirely defused; the topics of their conversation are only the most
banal. Edouard asks when Olivier's
examination is and wishes him luck, then interrogates him as any uncle would. Olivier goes so far as to ask for a
little advice, but Edouard stodgily throws a gulf between them by saying:
"Oh! les conseils, il faut savoir se les donner a soi-meme ou les chercher
aupres de camarades; ceux des aines na valent rien." (80) The reader may be led to think
something like: "So this is what happens when those fellows get
together. Quite typical,
actually. One doesn't see anything
wrong in that."
There is yet another
element in the chapter that defuses the reader's judgment. As Edouard and Olivier are walking away
from the station, Bernard stalks secretly behind. The reader's eye for vice is thus placed on Bernard: he
becomes a scapegoat for the reader's suspicions. Poor Edouard is about to lose his luggage because of his
confusion in the presence of Olivier.
Not only is his confusion the culprit, but the adventure-hungry
Bernard. The reader is led to feel
sorry for Edouard as the victim of a crime precisely in the course of Edouard's
own would-be criminal come-on to the young Olivier.
Concerning this
chapter as a whole, we can again quote its first sentence: Gide himself
"n'avait souci que de ne point trop en laisser paraitre l'exces."
The two passages I
have analyzed thus far give many good examples of Gide's techniques for
establishing the acceptability of his homosexual characters. I would say, as they are early in the
novel, that they go a long way toward projecting a reader that can do little
other than sympathize and accept.
To do justice to Gide's wide range of devices in service to this end, it
is necessary to consider several of them in more general terms rather than
glean them from longer quoted passages. First I would like to consider Gide's
small pantheon of characters and the religious images he generates from their
interaction.
Gide sets
up a whole cosmological battle between good and evil in the narrated space
between Edouard and Passavant.
Their respective fields of influence chart the parameters of a miniature
epic of the salvation or damnation of French youth. (note 2) Passavant, and his circle of fiends,
constitute the shadow against which Edouard shines and against which Edouard's
quiet goodness triumphs. Gide is
not so unambiguous in his opposition of Edouard and Passavant that he portrays
Edouard as perfect. But the fact
that Passavant is everywhere so demonstrably evil and corrupting supports the
contention that Edouard is in some senses a Christ figure (fallible in his
humanity, but divine nonetheless) and that Passavant is a Devil figure (wily,
polished in a Mephistophelean manner, and purely evil). Gide has not set up this moral
micro-universe only as a means of
justifying Edouard's pedophilia.
It is obvious, however, that one of the crucial uses of this
micro-universe is as a backdrop for what I am calling Gide's rhetoric of
acceptance.
The boys in the novel
are stretched between the two poles of Edouard and Passavant, and the Molinier
boys in particular are possessed by both of them at one time or another. Little George Molinier is the most
innocent of the lot, and the one whom it would be easiest to save. Olivier is older and so is corrupted
more thoroughly by Passavant for a time, but is finally saved also. Vincent functions as an example of one
who has completely fallen under the influence of evil. The resemblance between Edouard and
Passavant--they are both male novelists of presumably the same age, of similar
class backgrounds, with similar sexual preferences--allows Gide a certain
amount of light irony in his presentation of Eduoard as noble and Passavant as
wicked, but at the same time allows him more easily to stage his drama of
salvation and damnation. How is a
young boy to tell the difference between these two men, after all? Edouard and Passavant are, in a
perverse and functional way, counterfeits of each other, but Passavant is more
deeply counterfeit. Edouard is,
moreover, almost the sole voice of judgment here (there is some narrative
judgment of Edouard now and then, but it is meager in comparison with Edouard's
constant judgments), and the Christian language of good and evil is obviously
presented as the language of Edouard's camp. The following passage shows how Gide's moral universe
functions. After receiving
Bernard's letter from Saas-Fee, Olivier is precipitated, through false
jealously, into the clutches of the evil Passavant.
Bernard etait beaucoup trop
spontane, trop naturel, trop pur, il connaissait trop mal Olivier, pour se
douter du flot de sentiments hideux que cette lettre allait soulever chez
celui-ci; une sorte de raz-de-maree ou se melait du depit, du desespoir et de
la rage. . . . Une phrase surtout de la lettre de Bernard le torturait, que
Bernard n'aurait jamais ecrite s'il avait pressenti tout ce qu'Olivier pourrait
y voir: "Dans la meme chambre", se repetait-il--et l'abominable
serpent de la jalousie se deroulait et se tordait en son coeur. "Ils couchent dans la meme
chambre! . . ." Que
n'imaginait-il pas aussitot? Son
cerveau s'emplissait de visions impures qu'il n'essayait meme pas de chasser. . . .Il les
imaginait tour a tour l'un et l'autre ou simultanement, et les enviait a la
fois. Il avait recue la lettre a
midi. "Ah! c'est ainsi. . .", se redisait-il
tout le restant du jour. Cette
nuit, les demons de l'enfer l'habiterent.
Le lendemain matin il se precipita chez Robert. Le comte de Passavant l'attendait.
(171)
This
passage begins by stressing Bernard's innocence in Olivier's jealousy, an
innocence in which we are not necessarily inclined to believe. Bernard should at least have suspected
Olivier's real feelings for Edouard, and should thus have avoided the
temptation to show off his newfound employer. His innocence is asserted, even so, and the fact of his
showing off can only increase Edouard's value to the reader. Bernard is still far from perfect: he is
currently a protege of the almost
perfect Edouard. What is of interest here is how
Bernard's sentiments hideux,
originally attributable to this arrogant letter, are slowly converted into a
demonic possession by the forces of Passavant. This is certainly the standard Christian understanding of
the dangers of jealousy, spite, despair and rage. Allowing such feelings to get the better of one eventually
leads one into the Devil's clutches.
Here, indeed, Olivier is given a little time for the transaction or
transformation to take place. His
visions repeat themselves in a shamanic excess of jealousy. "Il avait recu la lettre a midi. 'Ah! c'est ainsi. . .', se redisait-il tout le restant du
jour." That night, the demons
of hell possess him. The next morning,
naturally, he runs to Passavant.
The last sentence finally establishes Passavant's collaboration with, or
even identity as, the Devil: that Passavant was waiting for him proves that he
knew he was coming; that he knew he was coming proves that he sent the demons
of the previous night.
Gide is not averse to
calling forth the reader's resistance to homosexuality in this passage. "Que n'imaginait-il pas aussitot? Son cerveau s'emplissait de visions
impures qu'il n'essayait meme pas de chasser." What is the origin and status of the term impure here? It can be read ironically, of course, but it also functions
as a precursor of the condemnation of jealous rage immediately following. It is not a term from Gide's projected
reader, nor is it narrated monologue.
It simultaneously calls forth the graphic nature of Olivier's visions
and blankets them under a false piety.
That these visions are objectively incorrect (Bernard and Edouard are
not lovers) provides a sort of objective prop on which the term rests, on
which, in other words, the moral indignation of the language can be
dissipated. The reader is not sure
whether he is horrified that Olivier has homosexual visions or whether he is
marking the unfoundedness of Olivier's jealousy. This ambiguity--"Que n'imaginait-il pas
aussitot?"--between two distinct moral issues--Olivier's jealousy and
Olivier's homosexuality--confuses the reader and brings his condemnation off of
Olivier's homosexuality and onto his jealousy. The upshot: it is not at all the homoeroticism of Olivier's
visions that leads him to the Devil, but the rage of his jealousy.
Other characters are
similarly shifted between Edouard and Passavant. Boris and George are both under the aegis of the two of
them. Bernard (who is on Edouard's
side) saves Sarah from Passavant at the party, as well as saving her from the
inauthenticity of her family's puritanism. Edouard and Passavant both have their flunkies. Bernard's moral imperfection reflects
that of Edouard, but Bernard's goodness, like Edouard's, truimphs in the
end. (More on this below.) Edouard and Bernard constitute a team
against the more organized and sinister hierarchy of Passavant, Strouvilhou and
Gheridanisol. The latter three are
in descending order of importance.
The Angel that meets Bernard can be understood as a divine endorsement
of Edouard's side.
I stated in my
introduction that Gide manipulates the reader's understanding of different age
groups in order to establish the acceptability of pedophilia. This is worth considering at this
point, because it also functions within the opposition of Edouard and
Passavant. The most important
point, which need only be stated briefly because of its obviousness, rests on
the fact that the children in this novel (with the exception of Boris and
Bronja) have the feel of adults.
There are a number of ways Gide establishes their adult-like
characters. We find out that the
children are involved in crime and go to prostitutes. Olivier runs off on his own as Passavant's secretary, and
several of the boys are offered adult jobs (editor or secretary, for
example). Bernard has much of the
precocious verve of a Stendhal hero: he is always trying to fit into adult
clothes. These modifications of
the characteristics of childhood serve Gide's rhetoric of acceptance because
they lessen the moral revulsion that might otherwise meet his presentation of
pedophilia. Boys that are men are
not the victims of child abuse. At
the same time Gide has turned the adults, particularly the fathers and
grandfathers, into ineffectual clowns.
Profitendieu is first presented limping along with a pain in his side:
"la fatigue, chez lui, portait sur le foie, qu'il avait un peu
delicat." He can think of
nothing in this first scene but the warm bath he is looking forward to, before
which he will be certain not to take any tea. "[Il estime] qu'il n'est prudent d'entrer dans l'eau,
fut-elle tiede, qu'avec un estomac non charge. Apres tout, ce n'etait peut-etre la qu'un prejuge; mais les
prejuges sont les pilotis de la civilization." (17) This is precisely the point: the
fathers in Gide's novels are nothing but the "[lazy, cramped] props of
civilization." When he hears
the news of Bernard's departure--presented to him by a servant whose job it is
to maintain the hypocritical normality of the household at all costs--he can do
little but wheeze and fall back into an armchair. (20-24) Molinier is not much better. Because he leaves his mistress' love
letters lying around, his wife needs to help him out by putting them back in
his coat. (273) Both of these
clowns, particularly the more experienced Molinier, subscribe to a legal
philosophy that defines justice as that which balances the reputations of
wealthy families against the preservation of their own jobs. (18-19) This particular characteristic makes
them no match for the organized evil of Passavant, and so the middle class and
its public guardians are exposed as insufficient to fight the damnation
threatening the boys. The pathetic
weakness and bureaucratic stiffness of these men also makes their value systems
almost completely irrelevant to anyone who is concerned with authentic
life. Thus, once again, Edouard is
the answer. The other father
figure of any importance is Pastor Vedel.
Armand describes him as stuck in his role, going through the motions of
faith, too terrified of the consequences that might ensue from inquiring into
the basis of this faith. (358)
Along with the hypocrisy and corruption of those upholding the laws,
there is a parallel corruption in those upholding a false faith. Neither of them is in touch with the
authentic source represented by Edouard.
One can briefly lay
to rest the old men as well.
Azais's childlike oppressiveness and blindness to reality is powerful
only in that it forces hypocrisy on those around him. (106) The pervasive paranoia and quirkiness
of the La Perouses is presented as the alternative vision of old age. La Perouse cannot even control the boys
within the confines of the classroom: that he might contribute to their
salvation is thus out of the question.
Women are treated
with more sympathy, but they are not presented as being particularly
powerful. With the exception of
Sophroniska, the important women in this novel depend on men. Their virtue rests on the fact that
they are at least wise enough to perceive who the good men are. Pauline and
Laura both come to Edouard as a last rock of hope. Sarah is liberated by Bernard.
If we
have not already been dealing in counterfeit goods, it is worth looking into
the all-pervasiveness of the counterfeiting theme and how it functions within
Gide's rhetoric of acceptance. As
I suggested in my introduction, counterfeiting here is not to be understood
simply as the production and passing of counterfeit coins, and counterfeiters
are not simply those who engage in this production and passing. Counterfeiting takes many forms: art,
hypocritical speech, hypocritical religious sentiments and images,
theatricality, and texts of all sorts (journals, novels, letters, Boris's magic
mandala). The all-pervasiveness of
counterfeiting gives Gide many opportunities to shift readerly judgments toward
his own ends. Some of Gide's devices
have been considered above (his use of the counterfeit nature of narrated
monologue, of the counterfeit nature of dreams, of embarrassed behavior, of his
"boys" and "men," of the illusory unity of the actual
reader and his projected reader, etc.).
Such an environment allows Gide to play the role of the quick-change
artist if only because his machinations seem natural within it. Gide allows Edouard to present his
unfinished novel as an unplanned production in which the necessity of
characters' changing needs, rather than some artificially imposed plot
structure, will presumably determine the progress of the narrative. Chapter VII of Part II, where
"L'auteur juge ses personnages," implies that Gide's Les
Faux-monnayeurs is
itself such a novel. Thus Gide's
characters are meant to have their own internal necessity, one that will lead
them where they are meant to go.
The reiteration of the unplanned nature of Les Faux-monnayeurs makes the reader less likely to suspect
the careful subterfuge that is everywhere present, just as it justifies the
abruptness of much of the action and the shiftiness of many of the characters'
decisions. (note 3) The constant movement of most of the characters, along with
their tendency to soliloquize, gives the novel its theatrical feel, and the
many trap doors and escape routes Gide provides allows him the quick changes
necessary for demonstrating human mutability in the face of the opposing forces
of Good (Edouard) and Evil (Passavant).
In numerous instances Gide uses the trap doors in his micro-universe to
carefully orchestrate a shifting of readerly condemnation onto objects other
than homoeroticism or Edouard. As
the text borrows heavily from the Christian tradition, it is worth looking into
the opportunities for counterfeiting this tradition offers.
In the literal
counterfeit racket little George Molinier is involved in, the counterfeit coins
must be produced and passed. For
the unnamed counterfeiters that produced the coins, the goal is to create money
that will be accepted by n'importe qui. For Gide, the
goal is likewise to create a counterfeit object that will be accepted. Gide's most obvious counterfeit object
is the novel itself, which, like other novels, makes pretentions to the
real. I have shown that Gide also
counterfeits a whole structure of acceptance and condemnation, one mediated
across a projected reader. Gide
"passes" this structure by building it in the traditional language of
piety, and, perhaps more importantly, by counterfeiting scapegoats onto which
the reader can dissipate the evil the reader potentially perceives. Thus for Gide's more rhetorical
counterfeiting the buck must also be printed and passed. Gide passes the buck.
The Christian
tradition is particularly suited to Gide's enterprise. It is not simply that scapegoating was
a historical Hebrew practice designed to cleanse a community of sin. Christ himself is a scapegoat--the
final scapegoat,
according to the Book of Hebrews, who has taken on the sins of the world. Christian theology thus depends on a
transfer of negative value--sin--onto a counterfeit human--Christ--stamped in
the womb of his mother by a father who is in fact the artificer of the universe
itself. Though the Devil continues
to work his wiles in the world, we are still saved through our patient faith in
the value of this transaction, by our faith in Christ and God's grace. Perhaps this kind of analogy seems to
be stretching things a bit. Gide's
novel has a Christ figure in it, however.
Though Edouard is Christlike in ways, the real Lamb here is Boris.
It is of interest
that Little Boris and Bronja are the only real children in Gide's novel, and
that both of them are dead by the end.
They are presented in the following lines from Edouard's journal:
La petite
Bronja est exquise; elle doit avoir quinze ans. Elle porte en nattes d'epais cheveux blonds qui descendent
jusqu'a sa taille; son regard et le son de sa voix semblent plutot angeliques
qu'humains. Je transcris les
propos de ces deux enfants:
"Boris, maman prefere que
nous ne touchions pas a la lorgnette.
Tu ne veux pas venir te promener?"
"Oui, je veux bien. Non, je ne veux pas."
. . . .
"Pourquoi?"
"Il fait trop chaud, il fait
trop froid." . . . .
"Voyons. Boris, soi gentil. Tu sais que cela ferait plaisir a maman
que nous sortions ensemble. Ou as-tu
mis ton chapeau?"
"Vibroskomenopatof. Blaf blaf."
"Qu'est-ce que ca veut
dire?"
"Rien."
"Alors pourquoi le
dis-tu?"
"Pour que tu ne comprennes
pas." (172-73)
Boris's
companion is the angelic Bronja.
The rhythm of this conversation, the curtness and decisiveness of his
tone, suggest that he is an intelligent child in control of what he says. The contradictory nature of what he
says, combined with his intelligence, give him the air of speaking in riddles
or parables. Gide may be playing
with the obscurantism of religious language by having Boris say something
simply in order that Bronja not understand. Boris's self-mystification, when considered along with his
lamblike qualities, is Christlike in a way. Later in the conversation, Boris suggests his own fated
sinfulness as if it were a burden laid on him: "Bronja, toi, tu ne's pas
mechante, c'est pour ca que tu peux voir les anges. Moi je serai toujours un mechant." (173) Several sentences later he establishes
himself as a sacred/profane being, in the manner of Noli me tangere.
Bronja asks him if he wants to go off and pray to the Virgin so that she
can help him not to be so mechant. Boris suggests that he close his eyes
and Bronja lead him there on the end of a stick, each of them holding one
end. Bronja is about to grasp the
stick, but Boris stops her:
"Oui, non, pas ce
bout-la. Attends que je
l'essuie."
"Pourquoi?"
"J'y ai touche." (174)
All of this may be
seen simply as the quirks of a neurotic child, but Gide would not have
introduced this neurotic child without some intention. Boris's paradoxical guilt/innocence are
further established in Edouard's conversations with Sophroniska. (174-78) Sophroniska is convinced that Boris is
hiding some fundamental guilt, and she is using all her insidiously oppressive
techniques to force him to confess.
Edouard sees no reason for weighing so heavily on the child, and is not
so sure that Sophroniska is not projecting the guilt onto him. Later we find out that Boris's guilt is
linked to magic. Sophroniska
discovers the meaning of a "parchemin" that Boris always wore around
his neck, on which was written a text all the more cryptic for its banality:
"GAZ. TELEPHONE. CENT MILLE ROUBLES." (202) Boris's mysterious guilt (it turns out
to be the sin of all mankind: masturbation) is thus linked to a Logos, as was
Christ's in the sense that Christ was the prophesied Word made flesh,
preordained to his role as ultimate sacrifice. The meaning of this word is further established by the fact
that Strouvilhou mysteriously shows up at the hotel and acquires it from the
prying Sophroniska. The word is
later used to weaken Boris for his final sacrifice.
Boris's sacrifice and
in particular its aftermath should establish him as a Christ figure. To begin with, he is aware that he is
being betrayed by the other members of La Confrerie des Hommes Forts, as Christ
was aware that he would be betrayed by Judas.
Boris eut
le soupcon que l'on trichait; mais se tut. A quoi bon protester?
Il savait qu'il etait perdu.
Pour se defendre, il n'eut pas fait le moindre geste; et meme, si le
sort avait designe l'un des autres, il se serait offert pour le remplacer, tant
son desespoir etait grand. (370)
Boris's
suicide saves a number of sinners, and manages to put the families somewhat
back in order. The hypocritical
and oppressive Vedel-Azais school is discredited, and many of the boys go
home. Gheridanisol and his realm
are also discredited and lose their hold: "George n'etait pas si corrumpu que
son admiration pour Gheridanisol ne cedat enfin a l'horreur. Lorsqu'il revint ce soir chez ses
parents, il se jeta dans les bras de sa mere; et Pauline eut un elan de
reconnaissance vers Dieu, qui, par ce drame affreux, ramenait a elle son
fils." (375) Armand, we are
told, has decided to help his family by working in the school, which should
distance him a bit from Passavant.
Perhaps his cynicism will inject a little authenticity into the Vedel
faith. (376) Bernard has also
returned to his father out of sympathy, which, according to the good Edouard,
is the best thing he could have done.
The last conversation with La Perouse (it is the last conversation in
the novel) is also instructive.
Earlier La Perouse had told Edouard of a noise coming from the wall near
his bed: the noise kept him awake at night, but he could never manage to
identify it. After Boris's
suicide, the noise is gone. La
Perouse's joy at this newfound peace and quiet leads him to a more mystical
interpretation of noise: "Avez-vous remarque que, dans ce monde, Dieu se
tait toujours? Il n'y a que le
diable qui parle. Ou du moins, ou
du moins. . ., reprit it, quelle que soit notre attention, ce n'est jamais que
le diable que nous parvenons a entendre." What is the message of all this if not that Boris, in his
self-sacrifice, has conquered Satan?
La Perouse continues, perhaps reminding the reader of the magic
talisman: "Vous vous souvenez du debut de l'Evangile: 'Au commencement etait
la Parole.' J'ai souvent pense que
la parole de Dieu, c'etait la creation tout entiere. Mais le diable s'en est empare." (377) And finally, referring to God:
"Et savez-vous ce qu'il a fait de plus horrible?. . . C'est de sacrifier
son propre fils pour nous sauver.
Son fils! son fils! . .
. La cruaute, voila le premier des
attributs de Dieu." Edouard
comments on this: "Il ne m'avait pas dit un mot de Boris; mais je pensai
qu'il fallait voir dans ce desespoir mystique une indirecte expression de sa
douleur, trop etonnante pour pouvoir etre contemplee fixement." (378) Edouard unwittingly identifies Little
Boris with the Savior.
The final image of
the novel is one of order restored.
Edouard is invited to dine at Profitendieu's with Bernard, Molinier,
Pauline and the two boys. Gide's sacrifice of the Lamb has brought his wayward
characters into harmony.
Boris's suicide
paradoxically allows Gide to end his novel on a positive note, with the forces
of Edouard in the transcendent.
Gide makes several characters partially responsible for the suicide:
Edouard advised sending him to the school, though he knew such an oppressive
atmosphere would only be bad for him; Sophroniska, in attempting to dissect his
psyche, only threw him off balance; La Perouse's clinging obsession with the
boy could only make him uneasy (one can read his suicide in La Perouse's
presence as a rebellion against his feeble old authority); George's and
Phiphi's desire to shine before the demon Gheridanisol, and their competition
with each other, led them to betray Boris against their own hearts. The fact that the sins of all are
responsible for Boris's death further emphasizes the narrative reason for his
death: to wash away the sins of Gide's miniature world. This illusory transference of the
accumulated sin of the novel onto Boris--a counterfeit Christ--manages to
obliterate the image of the sin that would otherwise most stand out in the
minds of Gide's contemporary readers: namely, the sin of pederasty. This transference is illusory precisely
because this latter sin is not really purged by the sacrifice; neither is it
laid on the Lamb's shoulders (as the sins leading to Boris's death are laid on
his shoulders), nor do any of the characters renounce it or "reform,"
as the young George is led to do.
The last sentence of the novel--"Je suis bien curieux de connaitre
Caloub"--in fact narrates Edouard's interest in another man. The reader is given the feeling of sin purged, and so is led to the
subconscious conviction that any tension caused by sin earlier in the novel has
been alleviated. Gide's rhetoric
of acceptance thus makes use of the potentialities for counterfeiting inherent
in the Christian tradition: he counterfeits a salvation of the micro-universe
of Les Faux-monnayeurs. Without ever having explicitly labeled
homosexuality a sin, Gide, by means of the numerous devices demonstrated above,
frequently goes along rhetorically with the anticipated reader's conviction
that it is a sin. This hardly
mentioned sin is eventually purged with the other sins, and is not purged. The redemption of sin by Christ would
necessarily become ambiguous if sin itself were ambiguous. But Gide provokes a strategic moral
ambiguity in Les Faux-monnayeurs by
establishing Edouard as the prime source of goodness, by occasionally
projecting a reader that accepts homosexuality as normal, and by occasionally
and very strategically adopting the language of those readers who think
homosexuality is a sin. In such an
ambiguous milieu, the rhetorical sleights of hand appear merely as the
necessary march forward of the plot.
I mentioned in my
introduction Gide's use of the tension between Protestantism and
Catholicism. In the form of the
Vedel-Azais family, Protestantism is more fully represented in the novel than
Catholicism, and is clearly held up to scorn as a religion full of
possibilities for inhuman stiffness and hypocrisy. What's more, it is represented mainly through Edouard's
eyes, and it is represented as Other (see especially Part I, chapter XII). That Edouard positions himself as an observer
viewing Protestantism from the outside, and that he lightly mocks its puritan
tendencies, allies him further with the French Catholic reader. Edouard needn't express his own
Catholicism to establish this alliance: his French nationality, his relation to
the Protestants, and the narrator's use of the language of good and evil in
relation to Edouard all go a long way to establish his voice as the voice of
the true faith. This alliance is
most remarkable because of Gide's lifelong adherence to Protestant beliefs
(though it is clear he never advocated a strict orthodoxy). It is as if Gide downplayed his own
religious beliefs in order to put his homosexuality on better terms with the
French Catholic reader. It is
true, however, that Catholicism does not go unscathed in Les Faux-monnayeurs, particularly in its nationalist strains
(see especially Part III, chapter XIII, "Bernard et l'ange").
Because I
have so frequently reiterated the devices Gide employs in Les
Faux-monnayeurs to
establish the acceptability of homosexuality, I will only very briefly
summarize them here. Gide often
makes use of narrated monologue to project an ambiguous haze around the
reader's attitude to homoeroticism.
He uses the ambiguity of different states of consciousness--sleep,
dreaming, embarrassment, jealous rage, protectiveness--to obscure the
intentionality of homosexual passion.
An elaborate microcosmic battle of good and evil is staged between
Edouard and Passavant so that Edouard (and thus Edouard's homosexual love of the
boys) is made to appear the embodiment of virtue in relation to his demonic
counterpart. The major theme of Les
Faux-monnayeurs--counterfeiting
as manifested in art, writing, religion and behavior--creates an environment in
which quick shifts in behavior of the characters and in the moral values placed
on these behaviors are made to appear natural. Gide can thus deploy his rhetoric with less attention from
the reader and this, of course, is part of his rhetoric. Finally, Christian thinking itself is
founded on a transfer and redemption of the negative power of sin, and Gide
does not miss the opportunity of reenacting the Passion of Christ in the
character of Little Boris, thus somehow redeeming, and thus obliterating, any
impression of sinfulness that the reader may have picked up over the course of
the novel. This serves Gide's
rhetoric of acceptance, for, although many of the other characters reform their
behavior, Edouard, in the last sentence of the novel, is looking forward to
getting to know Caloub.
In conclusion, I
would like to stress once more that my analysis here has not been in service to
any intention of somehow morally condemning Gide, but has rather been an effort
to show how his novel established the authenticity of its erotic milieu in a
historical period when the author's very notions of passion were seen as
unnatural, as in fact gravely sinful.
The novel represents a stage in the debate of modern western culture
over the status of homosexual love.
Aside from being a carefully constructed novel, it is a subtle and
nuanced plea for acceptance addressed to a literate public that, if addressed
more directly, would surely have scowled with disapproval.
(This
paper was written in the fall of 1989 for Professor David Hayman's
undergraduate course on Flaubert and modernism at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison.)
1) See
Klaus Mann: Andre Gide and the Crisis of Modern Thought, Creative Age Press, Inc., 1943, pp.
18-22.
2) D. J.
Fletcher, in "The Epic Strain in Les Faux-monnayeurs" (Modern Language Review 72, 1977,
pp. 53-61), discusses the epic desire in Edouard's theory of the novel and
considers Fielding's influence on Gide (Fielding as "the founder of the
English prose epic").
Fletcher seems to miss some very crucial points, however. Gide's erosion of normal novelistic
contours and the "high seriousness" of his concern with
"exploring the nature and conditions of authenticity in human
relationships" are stressed as the bases of his epic quality, while his
obvious construction of a miniature and closed
cosmos of good and evil is ignored. (54) Epic depends not so much on "exploration" as on
assertion and recording of religious or national history, as well as on
assertion of moral precepts.
Bakhtin and others have taught us that one of the defining
characteristics of epic is its attempt to seal off a field of action as having
occurred in mythic time: this rather than any tendency to Romantic
indeterminacy is crucial. Fletcher
seems to depend too much on Gide's stated desires and intentions and not enough
on the text of Les Faux-monnayeurs.
3)
Catherine Brosman, in her article "The Relativization of Character in Les
Faux-monnayeurs"
(Modern Language Review 69, 1974, pp. 770-78), considers and applauds Gide's
characters in terms of different twentieth century assertions of the illusory
nature of the unified subject. The
questions I raise here are not addressed.
NB: All quotes from Les Faux-monnayeurs were taken from the Folio edition. The quote in the epigraph from Le
Journal des Faux-monnayeurs
was taken from the second Gallimard edition cited.
Brosman,
Catherine S. "The
Relativization of Character in Les Faux-monnayeurs." Modern Language Review 69 (1974): 770-78.
Fletcher,
D. J. "The Epic Strain in Les
Faux-monnayeurs." Modern Language Review 72 (1977): 53-61.
Gide,
Andre. Les Faux-monnayeurs .
Paris: Gallimard (Collection Folio), 1925.
---. Les Faux-monnayeurs; suivi du
Journal des Faux-monnayeurs . Paris: Gallimard, 1925.
---. Journal: 1889-1939.
Paris: Gallimard (Bibliotheque de la Pleiade), 1951.
Mann,
Klaus. Andre Gide and the
Crisis of Modern Thought. New York: Creative Age Press, Inc.,
1943.
Nersoyan,
H. J. Andre Gide: The Theism of
an Atheist. Syracuse: Syracuse UP, 1969.
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