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Structure and Meaning in La Chute

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Adele King
Adele King*
Affiliation:
University of Alberta, Calgary, Alberta, Canada
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Extract

La chute is a disturbing and ironic picture of modern man caught in a hell of his own making. Since the involved irony and ambiguity make it Camus's most difficult work, the book was initially misunderstood by a number of critics. To appreciate fully the meaning of the novel it is necessary to understand Camus's use of literary parallels and of allusions to his own experience and to the history of his time. Some of the basic literary and historical allusions have been noted in recent criticism. The following study will examine in detail these allusions and will attempt to clarify the meaning of La Chute by elucidating particularly the relationship between the echoes of Dante and the echoes of L'Homme révolté and the controversy following its publication.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 77 , Issue 5 , December 1962 , pp. 660 - 667
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1962

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References

Note 1 in page 660 The parallel to Dante's Inferno and the final identification of Clamence with Satan have been noted by Alfred Galpin, “Dante in Amsterdam,” Symposium, xii (1958), 65–72. An excellent reading of La Chute as a reply to Sartre has been made by Roger Quilliot, “Un monde ambigu,” Preuves, No. 110 (April 1960), pp. 28–38.

Note 2 in page 660 See Dominique Aury, “A Talk with Albert Camus,” New York Times Book Review, 17 February 1957, p. 33.

Note 3 in page 660 See, e.g., La Chute (Paris, 1956), p. 47, where Clamence feels that others are laughing at him; and p. 125, his delusion regarding the debris.

Note 4 in page 660 See, e.g., La Chute, p. 122: “Mais, là encore, je rencontrai un obstacle en moi-même. Ce fut mon foie”; and p. 82: “je sentais une faiblesse irrésistible envahir mon corps.” Future page references to La Chute in the text and notes are marked C.

Note 5 in page 660 L'Homme révolté (Paris, 1951), p. 323. Future references are marked HR.

Note 6 in page 661 André Breton, as quoted by Camus, HR, p. 126.

Note 7 in page 661 Camus, “Révolte et conformisme,” in Actuelles II (Paris, 1953), p. 40. Future references to Actuelles II are marked A II.

Note 8 in page 661 See Francis Jeanson, “Albert Camus ou l'âme révoltée,” Les Temps modernes, vii (May 1952), 2070–90; Jeanson, “Pour tout vous dire …,” TM, viii (August 1952), 354–383; Jean-Paul Sartre, “Réponse à Albert Camus,” TM, viii (August 1952), 334–354; and Camus's letter in the August issue, reprinted in A II, pp. 85–124. For a general discussion of the controversy see John Cruickshank, Albert Camus and the Literature of Revolt (Oxford, 1959), pp. 120–127.

Note 9 in page 661 Germaine Brée, Camus (New Brunswick, N. J., 1959), p. 130.

Note 10 in page 662 See C, p. 35, pp. 68–69; and Jean-Claude Brisville, Camus (Paris, 1959), pp. 9–16.

Note 11 in page 662 See C, pp. 102–103; and Aury, p. 33.

Note 12 in page 662 Cf., e.g., C, p. 26, pp. 70–71; and preface to L'Envers et l'endroit (Paris, 1958), p. 18, pp. 24–25 (attitudes towards Parisian society and towards material possessions); and cf. C, p. 36, and preface, pp. 14–15 (feeling of being capable of any task, and of being specially designated for one's work).

Note 13 in page 662 L'Eté (Paris, 1954), p. 168; cf. C, pp. 42–13. See also Brisville, p. 72.

Note 14 in page 662 Cf. La Peste (Paris, 1947), pp. 330–332. Cf. also Jeanson, “Albert Camus ou l'âme révoltée,” p. 2072: “La Peste, déjà, était une chronique transcendantale. A la différence de L'Etranger … La Peste racontait des événements vus d'en haut, par une subjectivité hors situation qui ne les vivait pas elle-même et se bornait à les contempler.”

Note 15 in page 662 See Jean Daniel, “Albert Camus,” L'Express, 7 January 1960, pp. 27–29, for an account, by a personal acquaintance, of Camus's malaise due to his early and continual public successes.

Note 16 in page 662 Quilliot, p. 34.

Note 17 in page 662 As Philip Thody has pointed out, in Albert Camus (London, 1957), p. 76, Les Temps modernes published a prostitute's life story. Note the suggestion, through the use of the phrase “journal confessionnel,” of a connection between Sartre and Clamence.

Note 18 in page 662 Cf. Henri's attachment to a young actress in Les Mandarins, an attachment which leads him to a sacrifice of principles. See also, C, p. 45, an anecdote which bears similarities to the relationship of Henri and Paule.

Note 19 in page 662 Jeanson, “Albert Camus ou l'âme révoltée,” p. 2072.

Note 20 in page 663 Jeanson, “Pour tout vous dire …,” p. 356. See also C, pp. 113–114, for Clamence's ironic attitude towards his love of Greece; and cf. Jeanson, pp. 375 ff.

Note 21 in page 663 Jeanson, “Pour tout vous dire …,” p. 372. Quilliot (p. 29) notes a parallel to Jeanson's phrase in the description of Jonas' platform in L'Exil et le royaume.

Note 22 in page 663 See also C, p. 37: “j'ai plané littéralement, pendant des années dont, à vrai dire, j'ai encore le regret au cœur.” Perhaps Clamence's reference to his “livres à moitié lus” (p. 140) is another reflection of the quarrel. Sartre had suggested that Camus had never read either Hegel or Sartre. (Sartre, “Réponse à Albert Camus,” p. 344.) Quilliot (pp. 30–31) notes two different echoes of phraseology in La Chute.

Note 23 in page 663 Camus spent considerable time at the Mexico-City bar and wrote part of his manuscript there. At the time of his visit, several paintings were part of the decoration of the bar. The proprietor was a large, muscular ex-sailor who understood no languages except Dutch, although the bar was frequented by sailors of many nationalities. I visited the Mexico-City in 1958. The description of the bar and its inhabitants in the opening chapter of La Chute was sufficiently true-to-life to draw the admiration of the original proprietor's brother-in-law, with whom I spoke. Camus had sent them a copy of the book.

Note 24 in page 663 See Aury, p. 33.

Note 25 in page 663 Sartre, Situations II (Paris, 1948), p. 276.

Note 26 in page 663 Sartre, Situations II, p. 74.

Note 27 in page 664 Cf., e.g., Huis Clos, and the ideas of heat and clamminess in La Nausée.

Note 28 in page 664 Actuelles (Paris, 1950), pp. 260–261.

Note 29 in page 664 See C, p. 20. Dante had compared the arrangement of dams and streams in Hell to the Flemish landscape. See Canto xv.1-12, p. 158, of the Inferno, ed. P. H. Wicksteed (London, 1954). Canto, line and page references to this edition in the text are marked I. Several critics have noted the Dantean atmosphere of La Chute (see, e.g., Brée, p. 106); the basic pattern of the descent into Hell has been noted by Galpin, pp. 68–70.

Note 30 in page 664 See C, p. 20; and I iii.123, p. 34.

Note 31 in page 665 Galpin, p. 68.

Note 32 in page 665 See C, p. 10, and I i.87, p. 6; and C, p. 52 and p. 87, and I xxxii. 1–5, p. 358.

Note 33 in page 665 See C, p. 169; and I i.64, p. 6.

Note 34 in page 665 See C, p. 98. Clamence refers to this state of the neutral angels, although he mistakenly calls it “Les Limbes.” Limbo is really the first Circle in Hell, reserved to those who were not baptized, whereas the neutral angels are in a vestibule. See Cantos iii and iv.

Note 35 in page 665 See C, p. 124; and I v.36, p. 50.

Note 36 in page 666 C, pp. 129–130. Cf. I xxiii.109 ff, p. 256, the sin of Caiaphas.

Note 37 in page 666 This crime, as Gaëtan Picon noted (review of La Chute, Mercure de France, cccxxvii [1956], 688–693), is a real one. The painting was stolen in 1934 and has not yet been recovered. Dante's criminals are also, of course, drawn from the history of his time, some quite as obscure as this Belgian thief.

Note 38 in page 666 See I xxx.37 ff., p. 336, for the sin of false assumption of identity. The pope story contains several other elements inspired by Dante. In Circle Eight, ring eight, is an evil counsellor who told the pope to wage war for his own selfish ends (xxvii.85 ff., pp. 302 ff.); and in Circle Eight, ring ten, is Master Adam, who falsified alloy, sealed with the image of John the Baptist, and is now crying for a drop of water (xxx.63 ff., p. 338).

Note 39 in page 666 See C, p. 14; and Matthew iii.7.

Note 40 in page 666 See C, p. 135, and p. 168: “Allons, avouez que vous resteriez pantois si un char descendait du ciel pour m'em-porter”; and Matthew xi.14.

Note 41 in page 666 See C, pp. 86–87. Like the Miltonic Satan, although this is not mentioned by Dante, Clamence changes his name after his fall.

Note 42 in page 666 Even Clamence's preference for the imperfect subjunctive (p. 10) indicates perhaps a subtle desire that the past had been different, and thus adds to the involution. See also Brée, p. 106, on the spiralling movement of the story.

Note 43 in page 666 See the interview with Camus in Brisville, p. 259, where Camus states that the most important aspect of his work neglected by commentators is humor.

Note 44 in page 666 As an extra-literary gesture, it sent numerous readers to the Mexico-City bar, to see for themselves this image of the modern world. At the time of my inquiries in 1958 many others interested in Camus had visited the bar.

Note 45 in page 667 Galpin, p. 71.