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  • Method in Madness: Control Mechanisms in the French Fantastic
  • Kenneth Widgren
Fortin, Jutta Emma . Method in Madness: Control Mechanisms in the French Fantastic. New York: Rodopi, 2005. Pp. 148. ISBN 90-420-1656-6

Fantastic literature is a troublesome genre to say the least. Anthologies and studies devoted to it never seem to come to any kind of consensus on just how to define it, categorize it, or explicate it, leading to wildly divergent approaches and opinions. One of the more common means of attack is to examine fantastic literature from a psychological point of view, invoking Freud and the myriad terms that come along with him in order to make sense of what, at first glance, seems to make no sense at all. In her book, Method in Madness: Control Mechanisms in the French Fantastic, this is precisely the work of Jutta Emma Fortin. The subtitle may lead the reader to believe that he is faced with yet another attempt to formalize a genre which, as Fortin states, "is complicated by its vague delimitation" (16). However, this is not the case. Fortin presents the reader with a selection of nineteenth-century French short stories which she analyzes from a Freudian standpoint, specifically, in terms of Freudian defense mechanisms. Rather than attempting to redefine the whole genre, she shows how these mechanisms are at work in these specific texts. Interestingly, however, Fortin does not show how these mechanisms function successfully, but rather how they are attempts on the part of the characters to deal in a rational way with what is inherently irrational: in short, how these defense mechanisms fail.

Fortin's introduction, as is common, serves as a review of the various theories on the fantastic, citing Rosemary Jackson, Pierre-Georges, Castex, and Tzvetan Todorov, among others, as well as introducing Freud's well-known essay on "The Uncanny." She then explains the path she will follow in analyzing these stories, detailing Freud's concept of psychic defense and neurosis, which allows this book to become more accessible to the non-specialist who may not be well versed in Freudian theory.

Chapter One deals with the concept of fetishization as it applies to Balzac's "Le Chef-d'œuvre inconnu," Maupassant's "La Chevelure," and Gautier's "Le Pied de momie." One might object to the inclusion of Balzac's story here, as it is not typically [End Page 284] considered a fantastic story (an objection to which Fortin concedes in her introduction); nevertheless, Fortin defends her choice to include this story (as well as Sand's "La Fée aux gros yeux" and Merimée's "Carmen") by admitting that she has chosen texts which "best serve [her] purpose" (17). Fortin's analysis of Balzac is sound and is not so much in question as its place in the book in general. That which is admirable in this chapter is that Fortin, though couching her arguments in Freudian terms, goes beyond a simple regurgitation of technical language and draws from a wide variety of other disciplines, such as anthropology and Marxism, to lend more weight to her analysis of these three stories.

Chapter Two examines the concept of projection and applies it to Sand's "La Fée aux gros yeux" and Merimée's "Carmen" (this later reappears in chapter three). She begins the chapter with an discussion of Freud's essay on "The Uncanny," which she then links to Sand's short story, drawing certain parallels between it and Hoffmann's "Der Sandmann." After discussing "La Fée aux gros yeux," Fortin, drawing primarily from Naomi Schor, discusses George Sand and idealist æsthetics in her novels, then linking them to Sand's fantastic works. This allows her to consider the traditional male-centered viewpoint of fantastic literature and how Sand's story, with its female protagonist, differs from the "norm" (however one chooses to define that term for the fantastic).

Chapter Three focuses on intellectualization, using Mérimée's "La Vénus d'Ille" and "Carmen" as exemplar texts. Her analysis of "La Vénus d'Ille" is one of the stronger arguments in the book (along with her discussion of Gautier's...

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