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Journey to the End of Art: The Evolution of the Novels of Louis-Ferdinand Céline

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 December 2020

Colin W. Nettelbeck
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Abstract

Contrary to its negative reputation, Céline's literary opus, with the exception of Voyage au bout de la nuit, evolves toward a spirit of regeneration. Although inVoyage Céline shows the image of death as a paralyzing force to derive from man's egoism, his own artistic vision remains too self-centered to allow him to follow his intuition of the beauty of life. Mort à crédit, Casse-pipe, and Guignol's Band, as novels of initiation, are an attempt to eradicate this egoism, and the presence of death is now counterbalanced both by a structure that permits of catharsis and by the creation of archetypal figures representing the superior value of life. The pamphlets, despite their treatment of the Jews, emphasize and elucidate this shift towards affirmation. The novels of maturity, Féerie pour une autre fois, D'un château l'autre, and Nord, through their structure and symbolism, make explicit that Céline's basic artistic intention has become not only to transcend the disintegration of Western civilization but to provide the mechanism for a similar transcendence in his reader. In Rigodon, he reaches a level of contemplation from which even the collapse of a civilization can be seen as promising new life.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 87 , Issue 1 , January 1972 , pp. 80 - 89
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1972

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References

1 The references from Voyage au bout de la nuit and Mort à crédit are to the Pléïade ed. (Paris: Gallimard, 1962). There is further documentation from Bagatelles pour un massacre (Paris: Denoël, 1937), L'Ecole des cadavres (Paris: Denoël, 1938), and Les Beaux Draps (Paris: Nouvelles Editions Françaises, 1941). For the other works, I have used the Gallimard eds. (Paris), as follows: Casse-pipe (1952), Guignol's Band i (1952), Féerie pour une autre fois i (1952), Normance (Féerie pour une autre fois ii, 1954), Entretiens avec le Professeur Y (1955), D'un château l'autre (1957), Le Pont de Londres (Guignol's Band ii, 1964), Nord (“édition définitive,” 1964), Rigodon (1969).

2 In the preface to Voyage in the Pléiade ed.

3 Céline, La Bibliothèque idéale (Paris: Gallimard, 1961), p. 138.

4 See Robert Poulet, Entretiens familiers avec L-F. Céline (Paris: Pion, 1958), pp. 40–42.

5 “Hommage à Zola,” L'Herne, No. 3 (1963), p. 171.

6 In œuvres de L-F, Céline, ed. J. Ducourneau (Paris: A. Balland, 1967), ii, 723, n.

7 See Milton Hindus, The Crippled Giant (New York: Boar's Head Books, 1950), p. 49.

8 In this context, the inscription following the dedication—“Dieu est en réparation”—is very telling.

9 “Pour mon petit personnel je dois beaucoup à Barbusse, à Daudet du ‘Rêve éveillé‘ ” (Bagatelles, p. 216).

10 A letter to Hindus makes it clear that, in recognizing Barbusse's influence, Céline is referring to Le Feu. See L'Herne, No. 5 (1965), p. 78.

11 See L'Herne, No. 3, pp. 169–70.

12 “ La Quête du délire,” L'Herne, No. 3, pp. 279–88.

13 L'Herne, No. 5, p. 103.

14 L'Herne, No. 5, p. 75; Entretiens, pp. 91–118.

15 Céline and His Vision (New York: New York Univ. Press, 1967), p. 202.

16 Ostrovsky stresses this viewpoint (pp. 157–80), and in her last chapter sees Celine's art as being designed principally to force the reader to confront a negative vision (pp. 201–02).