Sylvie Germain: Œuvre romanesque. Un monde de cryptes et de fantômes (review)

Although there have been a number of collections of articles on the work of Sylvie Germain, this is the first monograph to be devoted solely to her œuvre. Alain Goulet discusses fifteen of Germain's books in detail, including all of her major fiction from Le Livre des nuits (1985) to Magnus (2005) and a number of her essays. He also considers the significance of her unpublished doctoral thesis, 'Perspectives sur le visage', deeply influenced by the thought of Lévinas. One of the problems facing the author of an initial monograph is combining general, introductory material with analysis that opens up more probing perspectives for other researchers. Goulet manages to meet this dual challenge. On the one hand, he provides useful contextual information for each of the novels and shows how they contribute to an exploration of Germain's major themes, notably the question of evil, the silence of God, and the significance of encounters. In addition to this discussion of overt themes, Goulet pursues the underlying presence of 'crypts' and 'phantoms' in the Germainian universe. The terms in Goulet's subtitle are drawn from the ideas developed by psychoanalysts Nicolas Abraham and Maria Torok in Le Verbier de L'Homme aux loups and L'Ecorce et le noyau. Although not discussed in any great detail, this theoretical framework provides Goulet with a number of concepts that lend a greater degree of coherence to what otherwise could have become a somewhat fragmented study. The framework proves particularly useful in the analysis of Le Livre des nuits and Nuit-d'Ambre since this fictional diptych includes a number of 'cryptophoric' characters presented as part of a transgenerational saga. Although Germain's novelistic world is greatly influenced by her Catholic background, God is generally perceived as a deus absconditus in her work; as Jacob wrestles with the angel in Genesis, so her characters struggle with the perplexing absence of God. Yet, Goulet argues, especially in her work after La Pleurante des rues de Prague (1992), a luminous horizon becomes more visible in her world and her characters embark on journeys of discovery that ultimately allow them to come to terms with the ghosts that haunt them. Goulet's asides and footnotes frequently provide useful onomastic information with respect to Germain's characters as well as drawing a number of significant intertextual parallels. It would have been helpful if Goulet had complemented the latter with a chapter situating Germain more firmly within the contemporary literary landscape. Throughout his study, Goulet makes good use of personal interviews and correspondence with Germain to illuminate her practice as a writer and to shed light on some of the connections between her biography and her fictional world. Germain's work is sufficiently rich and diverse to merit future monographs —indeed, L'Harmattan published Mariska Koopman-Thurlings's Sylvie Germain: La hantise du mal in 2007. These books will no doubt allow deeper analysis of many of the important issues raised in Goulet's work, but his study will remain a useful resource for students and a valuable springboard for other specialists.