Paul Alexis Trublot : du vrai et du faux dans le Naturalisme

Abstract

Paul Alexis — considered the most loyal friend and disciple of Zola - contributed largely to the diffusion of naturalism thanks to his numerous chronicles scatterd in the journals of the time. The most famous ones are in «Cri du Peuple» (1883-1888), for which Alexis used the zolaesque pseudonym «Trublot, » borrowed from Pot-Bouille. In these pages he staunchly advocates for the principles of naturalism in poetry but, in a curious contrast, he does so by unorthodox means, which sometimes border on hoax and blur the line between real and fictional, between serious and comical, between raw documentation and artifice. The idea of mimesis and transparency in naturalist writing, extolled in Alexis' discourse, is therefore broached through a formal fabrication, which owes a lot to romantic practices and to the techniques of the «industrial» novel. The ques- tion then is: Would the journal - less legitimate and at the margins of literature - authorize a freer outlook on the constraining principles of theory? Would it also authorize a more playful form of dispute, which would bring Alexis closer to his friends from Médan and also to those transgressive innovators who used the journal to start a poetic revolution (the group «Chat Noir, » the Hydropates) ?