CRITICISM – The author questions the responsibility of great writers during the Occupation.
In the courtyard of the Parisian Henri-IV high school, in khâgne, he discovered the writer and resistance fighter Jean Prévost. The man and the work, in perfect harmony, command respect. A passion is born. Jérôme Garcin likes everything about Jean Prévost: rejection of extremes, taste for sport, reading Stendhal, courage of commitment. But what about Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Jacques Chardonne, Paul Morand? Admirable talents and unspeakable gestures. In “Words and Actions”, the writer and journalist Jérôme Garcin is interested in “belles-letters under the Occupation”. His line is clear: for responsibility and against censorship. Intellectuals have duties, readers are free. But, beyond the eternal debate between the separation of man and work, the author of “For Jean Prévost” (1994) delivers a fascinating story about the darkness and light of human characters.
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The ignominy and the spinelessness. A mixture of anti-Semitism, homophobia, racism. The “Correspondence” between Jacques Chardonne and Paul Morand, the journey of Bernard Grasset, the pamphlets of Louis-Ferdinand Céline. We know: reading and writing do not make life better. But Jérôme Garcin was disgusted by the complacency enjoyed by collaborationist figures during the Mitterrand years. We came to rehabilitate the pro-Nazi Robert Brasillach. The author questions the two forgotten things of our time: memory and forgiveness. If forgiveness is a personal matter, memory is a collective emergency. In “Words and Actions”, Jérôme Garcin does not place himself above the others. He relates his interview, in 1977, with the widow of Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Lucette Destouches, under the patronage of the lawyer François Gibault. He doesn't accuse anyone. He prefers to accuse himself of naivety.
Neither complexity nor complacency
Staffing and staffing review. From abjection (Bernard Grasset, Paul Morand, Louis-Ferdinand Céline) to admiration (Jacques Decour, Jean Prévost, Jacques Lusseyran). We retain the statues and statures of François Mauriac and Jean Paulhan. “Words and Actions” is also the portrait of an era: ours. Debate on the reissue of Célinian pamphlets; controversy surrounding the works of Roman Polanski; epidemic of lists of zealous and late informers. At a time when artists are coming together to make heads roll and denounce loudly, we must recall the case of the collaborationist Robert Brasillach. He was sentenced to death on January 19, 1945, after a twenty-minute deliberation, for intelligence with the enemy. The most famous French writers then petitioned, including Albert Camus, Jean Paulhan and François Mauriac, to ask General de Gaulle for a pardon for the condemned man. The author of “As Time Passes…” was shot on February 6, 1945. The resistance fighters Jean Paulhan and François Mauriac rejected, each in their own way, denunciation and purification.
He is a pure literary person. The author of “Intimate Theater” (2003) advances calmly and straight on the muddy path of writers under the Occupation. He does not indulge in any intellectual quibbles, without ever simplifying anything about the human soul. He does not confuse complexity with complacency. Jérôme Garcin recounts here, in detail, his own journey as an idealistic young man, confronted with the reality of things. He grew up with strong souls. From the memory of his father, who died at 45, to Stendhal's fiery characters. “Words and Actions” is a story about the models we give ourselves and in whose shadow we choose to grow. Life flows from it. The choice of path.
“Words and deeds. Belles-letters under the Occupation”, by Jérôme Garcin, ed. Gallimard, 176 pages, 18.50 euros.
© DR
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