Le Mythe de la passante (review)

L'Esprit Créateur one of die best in its exploration of die literary principles bought to bear on a building project. Femey became not only a home but a reflection of a way of thinking, of a particular taste, and of an acute sense of dispositio: in sum, a work of art. Luc Fraisse ("Viollet-le-Duc et le livre de pierre") offers a detailed demonstration of die lessons of Viollet-le-Duc's ten-volume Dictionnaire raisonné de Varchitecture française du XIe au XVIe siècle (1854-75), namely, a catiiedral is a book—and vice-versa; architectural principles of construction can be applied to literature. (Neither here nor elsewhere among the papers does one find the expected reference to Heidegger on "Building" and "Dwelling".) In the second section ("Discours 'De l'architecture'") one finds a fascinating study of "Blaise de Vigenère et l'architecture" by Richard Crescenzo. Vigenère, whom most of us know for his mythological manuel, Tableaux de platte-peinture, attempted to "nationalize" into French the many architectural terms borrowed from Italian, to raise to a level of respectability the "métier" of architect, and to celebrate the major builders and buildings of die past. In "Diderot et l'architecture" Laurent Versini demonstrates how, by giving the builder's art the same thought that he accorded to painting and music, Diderot succeeds in turning his reflections on architecture into literature. In pursuing the architectural images scattered—of course—throughout the work of Georges Bataille, Gilles Ernst ("Bataille ou les cabanes dans le désert'") discovers certain key conceptual icons, such as "le temple et l'abattoir" and "les maisons de Bataille" that reveal Bataille's view of space and language. Section III ("Architectures rêvées") features a study by Gilbert Schrenk of "Le Temple de Salomon dans La Magnificence de Du Bailas. Through a vast network of "correspondances" worthy of Baudelaire, the poet signs the unity of the human and die divine, just as it is found in the structure of die temple of Jerusalem. In a graceful piece ("L'architecture dans quelques grands romans du premier XVIIe siècle"), Noémi Hepp discusses die way in which L'Astrée, Polexandre, and Clélie avoid an architectural discourse. Through recourse to descriptions of the decor or to establishing a correspondence between the perfection of a construction and diat of a main character , the novelists remain resolutely focussed on die only place that counts: die interior landscape. The fourth division ("Ut pictura poesis") is highlighted, first, by Marie-Odile Sweetser's reflections on "Les pierres et les mots: Du Bellay, Malherbe, Saint-Amant." All three poets use architectural imagery to translate their conviction that France would soon realize its mission of becoming a new Rome, thanks to the cultural and military "constructions" of monarchs and "grands seigneurs." Jean-Pierre Collinet ("La Fontaine et les châteaux") studies die real and fictional châteaux described by La Fontaine to show how they inspired him to create "une poétique de l'architecture" (377). (It is rather disappointing that CoUinet's is the only study of architecture in the age of Louis XIV as Patron of Architecture, as Robert W. Berger would say [Cambridge UP, 1994].) The last paper in this rich volume ("Claudel et l'architecture") is a major contribution to Claudel Studies by Michel Lioure, who traces Claudel's deep interest in architecture from his first published piece. Whedier the object be sacred or profane, practical or ornamental, it reveals Claudel's vision of die universe as a "vaste édifice" created by the divine Architect. Ronald W. Tobin University of California, Santa Barbara Claude Leroy. Le Mythe de la passante. Paris: P.U.F., 1999. Pp. 275. 258FF. En prenant pour point de départ le fameux sonnet écrit par Baudelaire en 1860, "A une passante ", Claude Leroy montre comment s'est constitué un véritable mythe de la passante dans la littérature française, mythe dont on retrouve la trace dans une centaine de poèmes, de romans, de nouvelles et de textes autobiographiques échelonnés jusqu'à nos jours. Leroy étudie en premier lieu le fantasme de la "rencontre" chez...