German Vices: Sexual/Linguistic Inversions in Fin-de-Siècle France

Abstract

In 1896, the prolific French author and journalist Armand Dubarry published the novel Invertis (Le Vice allemand), one in a series entitled Les desequilibres de l'amour that Dubarry devoted to the varieties of sexual perversion. Inversion was, of course, the term commonly used in the late nineteenth century for what was also called homosexuality; it referred to the idea that the homosexual had an inverted gender identity, a woman's soul trapped in a man's body, or vice versa. Dubarry's curious volume, which the first part of this essay will discuss in some depth, marks a notable moment in the histories of both popular literature and sexuality, a monument to the widespread public interest in perversion at the fin de siecle and a record of some of the most deeply entrenched and resonant ideologies of sexuality in France. It can productively be read, furthermore, in relation not only to contemporary works of sexology but to other literary attempts to inscribe sexuality in fiction, and notably to Proust's A la Recherche du temps perdu, whose earliest sections--including those on sexuality--were conceived barely a decade after Dubarry's novel was published. While Dubarry's overwrought potboiler and Proust's masterpiece can hardly be considered literary peers, both reflect their authors' keen interest in contemporary French sexology. The musings of the Recherche on the subject of inversion are deeply indebted to medical, legal, historical and ethnographic writings on sexuality that, like Dubarry's, proliferated in France in the second half of the nineteenth century. (1) Proust's novel often elaborates--albeit in far more sophisticated form--tropes derived from such texts; the second part of this essay will be dedicated to exploring one that has particular resonance for both Dubarry and Proust, the notion of deviant sexuality as foreign and/or treasonous to the French nation, and indeed to Frenchness itself. Sexology was just one of Armand Dubarry's varied interests. In addition to working as a journalist, he also produced children's books; biographies; a history of brigands and smugglers in Italy (depuis les temps les plus recules jusqu'a nos jours [from ancient rimes to the present] (2)); several titles, both fictional and non-fictional, on ancient Rome; an anecdotal history of foods; and numerous thrilling adventure stories, frequently set in exotic locales of the New World, with titles like Aventuriers de l'Amazone; L'Alsace-Lorraine en Australie: histoire d'une famille d'emigrants sur le continent austral; and tueurs de serpents: aventures d'un officier francais au Lac Tchad. Dubarry combines several of these genres in Invertis. It begins as a mildly salacious bodice-ripper with a standard Gothic plot: Claire, the heroine, who loves an impoverished electrical engineer, Georges, is forced by the terres of a legacy to betroth herself to the loathsome and decadent aristocrat, Adolphe, the comte de Champlan. We soon learn that the real reason for the count's desire to marry Claire is that he has the most dishonorable intentions towards Georges and thinks that marrying Georges' beloved will bring him into closer proximity with the object of his unnatural desire. Meanwhile, the count's sister Florine, the baronne de Morangis--a woman with a suspiciously downy upper lip--harbors designs on Claire and is anxious for her brother's marriage to give her unfettered access to her new sister-in-law so that she can pursue her own nefarious purposes. The marriage between poor Claire and the evil, effeminate count takes place as scheduled but, not surprisingly, is never consummated. Instead, her new husband launches an all-out assault on the virtue of her beloved Georges, while Claire's sister-in-law assails her chastity with equal fervor. In the end the beleaguered young lovers are forced to flee to Switzerland to escape the clutches of their depraved admirers. Adolphe and Florine pursue them across the Alps, but come to a hideous end when they are, first, trapped by an avalanche and then torn to pieces by a pair of eagles pointedly described as heterosexual. …