Œuvres complètes, x bis: Les Nuits d’octobre — Contes et facéties by Gérard de Nerval (review)

This volume brings together two of Gérard de Nerval’s less well known prose writings: Les Nuits d’octobre, first published as a series of fictional pieces or fragments in L’Illustration in October–November 1852; and Contes et facéties (1852), a set of three stories, the longest and most substantial of which is ‘La Main enchantée’ (originally entitled ‘La Main de gloire’), first published in Le Cabinet de lecture in 1832. The Introduction provides details of the publication history, literary context, and significance of each work, the first of which has been edited here by Gabrielle Chamarat, the second by Jean-Nicolas Illouz. Les Nuits d’octobre consists of twenty-six short texts describing walks through Paris and giving Nerval’s reflections and musings on several different quartiers of the city and its environs, including Pantin and Meaux. Nerval was known to his friends and literary acquaintances as a highly talented storyteller who had a deep knowledge of Paris, of its geography and history, and of the immense wealth of literature the city had inspired — and his interests and knowledge in those areas are evident in these texts, as is his ironic and unassuming authorial stance. ‘La Main enchantée’ also has a precise Parisian setting, in and around the Place Dauphine and the Pont Neuf. The other two stories, ‘Le Monstre vert’ and ‘La Reine des poissons’, are much shorter texts set in Paris and in the nearby Valois region, which Nerval knew well. In all three stories, Nerval reveals his fondness for fantastic and macabre tales, for humour and irony (qualities not often associated with this author’s works), and for the imaginative and linguistically exuberant writing styles of Rabelais, Cyrano de Bergerac, Jacques Cazotte, and Prosper Mérimée. He takes obvious delight in reviving and utilizing words and expressions that had been commonly used in the six-teenth century but which had become archaic by the 1830s and 1840s. All these texts have been edited in an exemplary manner by Chamarat and Illouz. Linguistic obscurities and literary references are explained in extensive footnotes. Engravings by Paul Gavarni and others, which accompanied the original publications, are reproduced here, as is a ‘Scénario’ of a dramatized version of ‘La Main de gloire’, which was drafted by Nerval but never fully written or produced. The volume closes with an extensive primary and secondary bibliography and an index of persons and characters.