“Manon Lescaut, c’est lui”: A study of point of view in Prévost’s Manon Lescaut

Abstract

Intertexts, Vol. 5, No. 2, 2001 C C Manon Lescaut, c’est lui”: Astudy of point of view in Prevost’s Manon Lescaut Valentini Papadopoulou Brady U n i v e r s i t y o f H o u s t o n In her book-length study of Manon Lescaut entitled The Unintended Reader, Naomi Segal states unequivocally that “the profound masculinity of the text proves that it is profoundly directed at amale readership” (xiii), and suggests that, when woman is totally excluded from language as Manon is, the aim is to make her marginal.And yet it is clear that this attempt to marginalize Manon has not succeeded. Literary history tells us that what was originally a story within anovel (Prevost’s Memoires d’un homme de qualite) and entitled “Histoire du Chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut” detached itself and started appearing separately as early as 1733, retaining as its only title the name of the heroine. It also seems that Manon has attracted the attention of the critics more than Des Grieux, though often in anegative way: SainteBeuve , Michelet, Barbey d’Aurevilly, Paul Hazard, Georges Poulet, Henri Roddier, Raymond Picard, Frederic Deloffre, Leon Cellier, Jean Sgard, to mention but afew earlier ones, all devote much thought and space in their studiestothecharacterofManon.MorerecentcriticslikePatrickBrady,Her¬ bert Josephs, Richard Frautschi, Clifton Cherpack, William Mead, Lionel Gossman, J.-L. Jaccard, Grahame Jones, Sylvere Lotringer, again to mention butafew,havealsogivenManonagoodmeasureoftheirattention.Finally,in 1980, in her book entitled The Heroine’s Text, Nancy Miller included the novel in her study of what she calls the “feminocentric novel.” However, I may not be able to say with her that “the heroine’s text, despite its formally subordinated status, has displaced the hero’s” (Miller, Heroine’sVO), because Iuse the word text in its more traditional sense. The text is strictly speaking Des Grieux’s, because he creates it and utters it. Manon is not the creator of her own text, but she is ever-present as the object of narration. Without her therewouldbenothingtonarrate,becausetherewouldbenoobjectofdesire for Des Grieux, and it is this desire, its causes, and especially its effects that de¬ fine and dominate the novel. If we retrace our steps in time, we can ask what kind of interest has the character of Manon generated in eighteenth-, nineteenth-, and early twentiethcentury criticism. Is it centered on the character of Manon for her own sake, on her point of view, her feelings, her predicament, or is it centered mostly on the effect that Manon has on Des Grieux? The author’s own preface informs us that the reader “will see in the behavior of M. des Grieux, aterrible example of the force of passions” [“II verra dans la conduite de M. des Grieux exemple terrible de la force des passions”] (Prevost 29). There is no mention o f M a n o n . , u n 1 5 6 1 5 7 Brady—“Manon Lescaut, c’est lui” After reading Naomi Segal’s book, which seems to be the most recent book-length study on Manon Lescaut, and reflecting again on the numerous comments made on Manon by critics, especially earlier ones (but even as late as 1965 by Leon Cellier*), Iagree with her that often what comes through, under the guise of admiration or marvel at the feelings that Manon arouses in Des Grieux, is amoral judgment of the heroine with agood measure of con¬ tempt. Naomi Segal reviews eighteenth-, nineteenth-, and twentieth-century critics’ opinions and concludes correcdy that there is aperceptible change in the reading of the figure of Manon throughout these centuries. We can sum up this change briefly as follows: eighteenth-century criticism seems to be mostly concerned with morality, and blames Manon for the downfall of Des Grieux and for the misfortunes that the young couple experiences; the words “fripon” (rogue) or “escroc” (swindler) may occasionally be used for Des Grieux, but Manon is “une catin,” aharlot, which is definitely worse. Nineteenth-century critics tend to see Manon as the object for man of fantasy and obsession known as the femme fatale. Some have afew good words for the heroine (e.g. Musset and Baudelaire) but...