Le Chant de l'arabesque: poétique de la répétition dans l'oeuvre de Claude Simon (review)

Le Chant de l'arabesque is the first full-length study of repetition in the work of Claude Simon. Approaching the topic from a number of different angles (linguistic, rhetorical, structural, thematic), Stéphanie Orace argues that, in many instances, repetition is the common factor linking such apparently diverse features as unorthodox punctuation, parenthesis, intertextuality, omission of the name, delayed identification of the referent, mise en abyme, the serial motif and reflexive irony. The study is most assured and most revealing when it focuses on the detailed analysis of the linguistic mechanisms of Simon's writing. Orace's exposition and handling of her sources in linguistics is confident and proficient, and her application of ideas and observations from these sources to the microstructure of Simon's novels is pertinent. The analysis of punctuation and mise en page (Chapter 1), of the omission or postponement of pronominal antecedents or referents (Chapter 2) and of the omission of the name (Chapter 3) highlights the tension between centrifugal and centripetal pulses in the Simonian text and shows how certain syntactical and typographical devices are used to defer meaning and impede closure, and thereby to energise the relationship between text and reader. The more or less mandatory chapter on spiral construction, combinatoire and variation tackles rather more familiar territory and, although sound, is the least illuminating section of the study. The remaining three chapters focus on the recurrence of certain types of motif in Simon, on the reflexive functions of these motifs and on the ways in which they contribute to the creation of a coherent Simonian œuvre. In Chapter 6, the theory of Jean-Louis Dufays is used profitably to demonstrate the process by which a given motif is transformed into an corpus-specific stereotype (the much-discussed 'sabre brandi' motif serves as illustrative example), while Chapter 7 offers a useful comparative survey of the relationship between the Simonian cycle and the roman-fleuve. Le Chant de l'arabesque is a lucidly written study of an important issue in Simon studies. Specialists will appreciate its attention to detail; students will welcome the accessibility of its arguments. My main reservation relates to its failure to acknowledge the very substantial body of significant work on Simon written in English over the last three decades. Although Orace engages very productively with francophone criticism, anglophone criticism is largely ignored. This fault is, of course, not exclusive to Le Chant de l'arabesque; however, given that a significant proportion of the most substantial monographs and articles on Simon (and, indeed, on the nouveau roman) have been published in English, the francophone critic cannot simply disregard them.