Jean Giono by Colette Trout and Derk Visser (review)

Book Reviews133 of view: "like racism, sexism is so well implanted in ruling class ideology that only a radical seizing of power can destroy it . . . we want above all to fight against the ideology that produces male chauvinism and the system that benefits from it." Pushing further Simone de Beauvoir's concept of woman as a cultural construct, Wittig spurred radical feminism by identifying women as a political class. In two essays, Wittig reflects back on her most famous texts: Les Guérillères, an experimental novel honoring female warriors, and The Lesbian Body, one hundred and ten prose poems that have been referred to as the Lesbian Song of Songs. Wittig's commentaries highlight the genealogy of her writing, tracing its roots to the New Novel and to Proust's mapping of love. In terms of technique, Wittig describes her method as a "pitiless collage" that uses what the filmmaker Jean-Marie Straub refers to as "lacunary art," a form of agglomeration that leaves intervals among its constituent parts. Wittig applied this process to her writing by creating strategic intervals, placing holes in sentences at the grammatical level, and destabilizing the conventional order of discourse. Of particular interest is the author's account of her ground-breaking use—as a constituent element of her writing—of the feminine pronoun "elles" [they]: a collective character, used as a singular, and meant to topple the masculine universality of "ils" [they]. Wittig's hope was that her use of the "elles" "could situate the reader in a space beyond the categories of sex for the duration of the book" (41). Among the other essays, organized into three sections: "critical approaches," "theoretical applications," and "a new generation of readers," Dominique Bourque demonstrates the author's Bakhtinian use of dialogical counter-textual practices, Catherine Rognon Ecamot productively explores travesty and pastiche in Wittig's literary and sexed representations, and Diane Griffin Crowder considers Wittig's writing from a lesbian materialist perspective. These are just a few examples ofthe remarkable scholarship at play here. From tribute to irreverent parody, subtle close readings to theoretical developments, the collection offers readers multiple rewards. As a whole, the book situates Wittig's writing in its inception and reception, and suggests stimulating, rich, and provocative explorations into the concept of challenging heterosexuality as a social contract. Salah KhanUniversity of North Dakota Trout, Colette et Derk Visser. Jean Giono. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2006. Pp 155. ISBN-10: 90-420-2029-6. $42.00 (Paper). Dans leur ouvrage intitulé Jean Giono, Colette Trout et Derk Visser explorent la diversité thématique et stylistique des œuvres de Giono tout en insistant sur l'unité qui les lie. Les auteurs analysent, entre autres, les motifs de l'homme/nature, de l'amitié/fraternité et du féminin, fils conducteurs de ses romans. 134Women in French Studies Dès le premier chapitre « Giono et ses vies », Trout et Visser réfutent la thèse des « deux Giono », rejetant ainsi l'idée d'une rupture entre les romans rustiques d'avant 1939 et ceux des « Chroniques » et du « cycle d'Angelo » publiés après la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Ils nous présentent un Giono ambigu et complexe qui n'a cessé de renouveler son écriture à la fois par un style détaché de toute influence et par une palette de thèmes diversifiés, qui, loin de diviser l'œuvre entière, renforcent son unité : les motifs récurrents de la pauvreté, de la liberté, de l'homme/nature et de l'errance imprègnent ses œuvres. S'appuyant sur le passé familial de l'écrivain, sur sa vision du père glorieux et sur ses relations avec ses jeunes acolytes, les Contadouriens, Trout et Visser nous permettent de comprendre les origines de l'écriture gionienne : spontanéité et mythe autobiographique. Un second chapitre « Homme et terre : la recherche de l'être complet » révèle chez Giono une unité de pensée qui prend racine dans l'ensemble de ses aspirations anti-politiques et anti-capitalistes. Auteur pacifiste, poète des artisans et des paysans, Giono affirme son rejet de la modernisation, considérant la révolution industrielle comme une déshumanisation progressive...