Andre Gide and the Voices of Rebellion

Abstract

The Dostoevsky centenary celebration in Paris in 1921 featured, among other events, an allocution at Jacques Copeau's VieuxColombier theater by Andr6 Gide, the novelist and founder in 1908 of the now-famous Nouvelle Revue FranCaise. The novel in the Western World, said Gide, a part de tres rares exceptions, ne s'occupe que des relations des hommes entre eux, rapports passionnels ou intellectuels, rapports de famille, de soci6t6, de classes sociales-mais jamais, presque jamais, des rapports de l'individu avec lui-meme ou avec Dieu.I Although referring to Dostoevsky, Gide was apparently also thinking of his own endeavors. What attracted him to the Russian writer, in spite of Nietzsche's announcement concerning God's death, was the protagonists' insistent dialogues with themselves, with God, and with Mammon. Gide's books, like Dostoevsky's, describe the battles his heroes and heroines wage with their divided selves. These struggles for identity reflect Gide's own search for