Jean-Jacques Schuhl: du dandysme en littérature par Guillaume Basquin (review)

is fiction both on the page and in the bedroom that enthralls him and keeps him there. He continuously interprets her behavior, reminding this reader of other men in her life (from Mascolo to the critic Vircondelet)—indeed, always aware of the danger of betrayal, he carefully tries to keep her central to the discussion, as previously arranged with Duras, who permits this interview (78–80). “J’ai l’impression que c’est elle qui crée tout,” he states (87). In short, some will appreciate the work for the lurid details of the battle between homosexual and heterosexual desire, obsession and control; others will rightfully find it intriguing for the relation between fiction and life, and the mirror this “present” reflects on her written and lived past. Augusta University (GA) and University of Wisconsin, Madison E. Nicole Meyer Basquin,Guillaume.Jean-Jacques Schuhl: du dandysme en littérature.Paris: Champion, 2016. ISBN 978-2-7453-3032-1. Pp. 200. Jean-Jacques Schuhl’s career arc is an interesting one: five books published from 1972 to 2014; a Goncourt in 2000 for Ingrid Caven; a yawning gap of twenty-four years between his second novel and his third. The question that inevitably arises is whether this body of work warrants a book-length critical study. In some sense, that question engages less the writer of the book than the readers. Because one can become impassioned about a writer for a great many reasons, some of them largely incommunicable. But if one wishes to convince readers of a given writer’s excellence, that latter quality cannot be taken for granted—most especially in the case of a writer who is not already broadly known and acknowledged. To the contrary, such a case must be argued vigorously, efficiently, and convincingly. Passion is not lacking in this study, and clearly Guillaume Basquin feels that Schuhl deserves a great deal of consideration. Yet when it comes to persuading his readers of that, Basquin shies away from direct argument and analysis in favor of a more subjectivist approach: “Et bien oui! je me moque de l’esprit de sérieux, mon très haut ennemi. Seuls m’importent l’équivoque—Laurence Sterne a été mon maître—et le son de ma phrase qui s’accorde à un sens [...] ou pas” (32). Fans of Sterne are unlikely to recognize his influence in this book; and for many readers the question of whether a sentence makes sense or not is an important one. The notion of Schuhl as a dandy is promising, despite the fact that he himself rejects it outright, finding it “bête” and “hors du temps” (18), a rejection that Basquin discovers (by his own admission, to his credit) only after he has put that notion forward as the linchpin of his study. Recognizing the belatedness of the term, he maintains that Schuhl is “le dernier dandy littéraire” (18). In a subsequent chapter, he suggests that “enfin nous tenons notre écrivain pour écrivains” (35), as if Schuhl were the first writers’ writer in the French tradition. Along the way, Basquin compares Schuhl to a variety of other figures, from Baudelaire to Mallarmé, Roussel, Proust, Joyce, Kafka, Breton, Aragon, Prévert, Bataille, Burroughs, and Debord. But comparisons to living 248 FRENCH REVIEW 91.4 Reviews 249 writers are rare, if one excepts Philippe Sollers (who has published Schuhl’s last three books in his “L’Infini” collection at Gallimard). Such contextualization would be welcome, because it would help us to understand how Schuhl situates himself on the literary horizon of his time, and ours. Basquin’s prose is highly stylized, wagering upon mobility, quickness, and surprising shifts of focus. In many instances, those effects are pleasing, serving to pique our interest and keep us on our toes. At other moments however, that clamant stylization deflects attention from Schuhl and his work, and one may wonder in those moments whether Basquin’s chief concern in this book is Schuhl’s writing, or his own. University of Colorado Warren Motte Bilis, Hélène E. Passing Judgment: The Politics and Poetics of Sovereignty in French Tragedy from Hardy to Racine. Toronto: UP of Toronto, 2016. ISBN...