Article contents
The Novel and the Guillotine; or, Fathers and Sons in Le Rouge et le noir
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 October 2020
Abstract
The end of Le Rouge et le noir constitutes a chronic critical scandal, raising a host of problems concerning the novel's plot and its legitimating authority that may be approached through the question of paternity in the career of Julien Sorel. Paternity becomes a key issue in a novel structured by a conflict between legitimacy and usurpation, a conflict that has political, historical, and narratological implications. Politics versus manners, the hypothesis of Julien's illegitimate noble birth versus his career of monstrous usurpation, the role of the narrator as a father figure who subverts paternalistic control–these and related questions may provide a context for reading the end of the novel, for determining the relation of what Julien calls his novel to Stendhal's, and for understanding the uses of the guillotine.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1982
References
Works Cited
- 3
- Cited by