Eavesdropping in Marivaux (review)

REVIEWS 149 History of the Wars of Charles XII (1715). I would agree that not much would be lost in having this work disappear from the canon, but I worry about the reasoning behind their decision. It boils down to their feeling that it is not well written. And this is the guiding principle behind many decisions. The chapter on Defoe's prose styles is probably the best piece yet written on that subject, but if the upshot is that because Defoe could write brilliantly at times, he therefore could never write poorly, they have a weak argument on their hands. Defoe was in deep trouble in 1715. Suppose he was asked to patch up a manuscript for some ready cash. Why should we think him incapable of such a task? I am in general agreement with their notion that Defoe was a masterly writer of prose narrative, but anyone reading through the Review, the journal that he wrote over a period of ten years, will have to confess that, despite a remarkably high level of intelligence from number to number, there were times when the ink seems to have flowed from his hand with only the slightest movement of ideas through the brain. The document Furbank and Owens are after is John Robert Moore's Checklist (1960; rev. 1971). I cannot say that I agree with their judgment on any of the works they want removed from the canon or that I find any of their arguments for so doing convincing. This may make my admiration for the work seem paradoxical, but what is important here is the methodology and the questions raised rather than the answers. It should lead to a more satisfactory bibliography of Defoe's works, and in moving us closer to that, they have performed a significant service. Meanwhile, no critic of fiction need worry too much. So far no one has challenged Defoe's authorship of any major work of fiction even though the judgment depends upon what I would call probability and Furbank and Owens a plausible judgment. Crusoe remained Crusoe to the end, maintaining his reality to the last page of Serious Reflections. Only Charles Gildon, in his famous attack on the work, managed to conjure up a Crusoe separate from the imagination of Defoe, and that was done to have Crusoe administer a drubbing to his creator. Maximillian E. Novak University of California Los Angeles William H. Trapnell. Eavesdropping in Marivaux. Genève: Librairie Droz S.A. (Histoire des Idées et Critique Littéraire, Vol. 254), 1987. 120pp. Dans ce volume agréablement présenté et imprimé, William Trapnell montre qu'il n'est pas seulement un spécialiste de Voltaire, mais aussi, et depuis longtemps, un excellent connaisseur de Marivaux. 150 EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION Son étude illustre remarquablement le fait que seule une dénomination appropri ée permet de saisir vraiment un concept. Un chercheur français n'aurait pas eu l'idée de traiter ce sujet parce que le français ne dispose pas de mot pour traduire eavesdropping. "Le fait d'écouter aux portes" est un à peu près trop pesant et par sa longueur et parce que le mot anglais peut s'appliquer au fait de saisir en passant une conversation ou quelques paroles. Quoi qu'il en soit, W. Trapnell part de quelques cas typiques de conversations surprises dans la littérature française classique: les scènes 4-6 de l'acte IV de Tartuffe, dans lesquelles Orgon, caché sous la table, assiste à la tentative de séduction de sa femme, les scènes 3-8 de l'acte II de Britannicus, où Néron épie Junie, et la scène de l'aveu de Mme de Clèves à son mari surprise par Nemours dans La Princesse de Clèves; il en trouve chez Marivaux un nombre surprenant, tant dans les journaux et essais que dans les romans et les pièces de théâtre. Le plan suivi par W. Trapnell combine deux perspectives, celle de la chronologie et celle du genre, à savoir: I. premiers romans; II. oeuvres de journalisme et théâtre; HI. les grands romans. Dans chaque cas, il replace l...