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Portraits de femmes
L'un des phénomènes culturels importants de notre époque est le retour de la biographie. Un autre est la place conquise par les femmes, ou qui leur est rendue. Or Sainte-Beuve était passionné des deux, et de sensibilité très féminine. Le moment est venu, par-delà l'anathème proustien, de lui rendre justice. D'autant que le portrait n'est pas la biographie : c'est la synthèse d'une vie, d'une personnalité, en quelques dizaines de pages libérées de l'anecdote, et qui vont droit à l'essentiel.
On passe ainsi de Mme de Sévigné à Mme de La Fayette, de Mme de Staël à Mme Roland, et même à La Rochefoucauld, «homme couvert de femmes» ; le lecteur (la lectrice) est passionné par ces figures complexes, aventureuses et charmantes, peintes par celui qui définissait son objectif avec une fausse modestie de grand écrivain : «introduire le plus possible et fixer pour la première fois dans la littérature ce qui n'en était pas tout à fait auparavant.»
On passe ainsi de Mme de Sévigné à Mme de La Fayette, de Mme de Staël à Mme Roland, et même à La Rochefoucauld, «homme couvert de femmes» ; le lecteur (la lectrice) est passionné par ces figures complexes, aventureuses et charmantes, peintes par celui qui définissait son objectif avec une fausse modestie de grand écrivain : «introduire le plus possible et fixer pour la première fois dans la littérature ce qui n'en était pas tout à fait auparavant.»
- GenresFranceFrench Literature
704 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1844
About the author
Charles-Augustin Sainte-Beuve
1,482 books40 followersCharles Augustin Sainte-Beuve was a literary critic and one of the major figures of French literary history.
He was born in Boulogne, educated there, and studied medicine at the Collège Charlemagne in Paris (1824-27). In 1828, he served in the St. Louis Hospital. Beginning in 1824, he contributed literary articles, the Premier lundis of his collected Works, to the Globe newspaper, and, in 1827, he came, through a review of Victor Hugo's Odes et ballads, into close association with Hugo and the Cénacle, the literary circle that strove to define the ideas of the rising Romanticism and struggle against classical formalism. Sainte-Beuve became friendly with Hugo after publishing a favourable review of the author's work but later had an affair with Hugo's wife, which, naturally enough, led to their estrangement. Curiously, when Sainte-Beuve was made a member of the French Academy in 1845, the ceremonial duty of giving the reception speech fell upon Hugo.
Sainte-Beuve published collections of poems and the partly autobiographical novel Volupté in 1834. His articles and essays were collected the volumes Port-Royal and Portraits littéraires.
During the turmoil of 1848 in Europe, he lectured at Liège on Chateaubriand et son groupe littéraire. He returned to Paris in 1849 and began his series of topical columns, Causeries du lundi ('Monday Chats') in the newspaper, Le Constitutionnel. When Louis Napoleon became Emperor, he made Sainte-Beuve professor of Latin poetry at the Collège de France, but anti-Imperialist students hissed him, and he resigned.
After several books of poetry and a couple of failed novels, Sainte-Beuve began to undertake literary research, of which the most important is Port-Royal. He continued to contribute to La Revue contemporaine.
Port-Royal (1837-1859), probably Sainte-Beuve's masterpiece, is an exhaustive history of the Jansenist abbey of Port-Royal-des-Champs. It not only influenced the history of religious belief, i.e., the methodology of such research, but also the philosophy of history and the history of esthetics.
He was made Senator in 1865, in which capacity he distinguished himself by his pleas for freedom of speech and of the press. According to Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly, "Sainte-Beuve was a clever man with the temper of a turkey!" In his last years, he was an acute sufferer and lived much in retirement.
One of Sainte-Beuve's critical contentions was that, in order to understand an artist and his work, it was necessary to understand that artist's biography. Marcel Proust took issue with this notion and refuted it in a set of essays, Contre Sainte-Beuve ("Against Sainte-Beuve"). Proust developed the ideas first voiced in those essays in À la recherche du temps perdu.
He was born in Boulogne, educated there, and studied medicine at the Collège Charlemagne in Paris (1824-27). In 1828, he served in the St. Louis Hospital. Beginning in 1824, he contributed literary articles, the Premier lundis of his collected Works, to the Globe newspaper, and, in 1827, he came, through a review of Victor Hugo's Odes et ballads, into close association with Hugo and the Cénacle, the literary circle that strove to define the ideas of the rising Romanticism and struggle against classical formalism. Sainte-Beuve became friendly with Hugo after publishing a favourable review of the author's work but later had an affair with Hugo's wife, which, naturally enough, led to their estrangement. Curiously, when Sainte-Beuve was made a member of the French Academy in 1845, the ceremonial duty of giving the reception speech fell upon Hugo.
Sainte-Beuve published collections of poems and the partly autobiographical novel Volupté in 1834. His articles and essays were collected the volumes Port-Royal and Portraits littéraires.
During the turmoil of 1848 in Europe, he lectured at Liège on Chateaubriand et son groupe littéraire. He returned to Paris in 1849 and began his series of topical columns, Causeries du lundi ('Monday Chats') in the newspaper, Le Constitutionnel. When Louis Napoleon became Emperor, he made Sainte-Beuve professor of Latin poetry at the Collège de France, but anti-Imperialist students hissed him, and he resigned.
After several books of poetry and a couple of failed novels, Sainte-Beuve began to undertake literary research, of which the most important is Port-Royal. He continued to contribute to La Revue contemporaine.
Port-Royal (1837-1859), probably Sainte-Beuve's masterpiece, is an exhaustive history of the Jansenist abbey of Port-Royal-des-Champs. It not only influenced the history of religious belief, i.e., the methodology of such research, but also the philosophy of history and the history of esthetics.
He was made Senator in 1865, in which capacity he distinguished himself by his pleas for freedom of speech and of the press. According to Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly, "Sainte-Beuve was a clever man with the temper of a turkey!" In his last years, he was an acute sufferer and lived much in retirement.
One of Sainte-Beuve's critical contentions was that, in order to understand an artist and his work, it was necessary to understand that artist's biography. Marcel Proust took issue with this notion and refuted it in a set of essays, Contre Sainte-Beuve ("Against Sainte-Beuve"). Proust developed the ideas first voiced in those essays in À la recherche du temps perdu.
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Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review
July 24, 2011
Ce sont bien des portraits et non des biographies que Sainte-Beuve consacre à Mme de Sévigné, Mme de Souza, Mme de Duras, Mme de Staël, Mme Roland, Mme Guizot, Mme de La Fayette, M de la Rochefoucauld - pour avoir été au centre de l'attention de tant de dames - , dont Mme de Longueville, et bien d'autres.
Ces portraits sentent l'érudition, et sans connaissances préalables, le lecteur est livré à la perplexité devant les allusions, les enthousiasmes de l'auteur. Ce que je n'ai pas beaucoup aimé ces textes, c'est un style un peu trop affecté pour mon goût. On sent la satisfaction qu'inspire le style plus que l'attention portée sur le fond. Mais au moins, il a le mérite de piquer la curiosité, et donne l'envie de lire la correspondance et les vies de ces femmes qui furent au centre de la vie mondaine.
Lettres choisies par Madame de Sévigné
De la littérature par Anne-Louise-Germaine de Staël
La Princesse de Clèves, La princesse de montpensier, Histoire de madame Henriette d'Angleterre; Mémoires de la cour de France pour les années 1688 et 1689 par Madame de La Fayette
Maximes et Réflexions diverses par François de La Rochefoucauld
Mémoires de Marie d'Orléans, duchesse de Nemours / Lettres inédites de Marguerite de Lorraine, duchesse d'Orléans par
Marie d'Orléans-Longueville
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review