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Abstract

MLRy 100.3, 2005 821 L'Annee balzacienne 2003: 'Le Medecin de campagne'. By the Groupe d'Etudes Balzaciennes. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. 2004. 421 pp. ?43. ISBN 2-13-053343-4. The first,and most substantial, part of L'Annee balzacienne 2003 is devoted to new perspectives on Le Medecin de campagne, a novel that Balzac hoped would secure him a place 'a la tete des intelligences de l'Europe' (letter of 20 July 1832, in Honore de Balzac, Correspondance, ed. by Roger Pierrot, 5 vols (Paris: Garnier, 1960-69), 11(1962), 62). Published in 1833, the firstof Balzac's Scenes de la vie de campagne sees the eponymous Doctor Benassis retreat to the mountains of Dauphine, where he breathes new social and economic life into an impoverished village. Together with Le Cure de village (1841), Le Medecin de campagne has long been accepted as a utopian vision of rural reform. While not neglecting this interpretation, the authors of the eight essays in this section revisit the text using a welcome variety of approaches. With refreshing clarity, Michael Tilby analyses the self-reflexive nature of a novel he terms 'une veritable machine a fabriquer des contes' (p. 14), in which the popular tales recounted by the Napoleonic veteran, Goguelat, are but one type of embedded narrative. Other contributors focus on the theme of violence. Owen Heathcote demonstrates that, through the intervention of metonymy and metaphor, suffering is shown to blight the lives of the novel's characters, from the brokenhearted Benassis to the battle-weary Genestas, in the process acquiring '[une] valeur benigne et meme positive' (p. 26). Alex Lascar takes further critical pleasure in the pain of the fictional protagonists with a discussion of mourning rituals, and the role of these public expressions of grief within Benassis's programme. Of the remaining essays in this opening section, arguably the most engaging is by Mireille Labouret, who examines the reasons why Balzac lauded Le Medecin de campagne as 'LTmitation de Jesus-Christ poetisee' (letter at the end of January 1833, in Honore de Balzac, Lettres a Madame Hanska, 2 vols (Paris: Laffont, Bouquins, 1990), 1, 22), yet failed to mention this religious manual in the novel itself. The second half of the volume moves into other corners of the Balzacian universe through a series of genetic and thematic studies. In a provocative essay, Roland Chollet journeys across the 'Touraine inventee' (p. 165) of Stenie, beginning with the question of why the house in which Balzac was born is described nowhere in his vast literary output. In an important work of synthesis, Frederic Pollaud-Dulian outlines Balzac's attempts to defend his intellectual property against piracy, a struggle more enduring than the novelist's short-lived presidency of the Societe des Gens de Lettres, from August 1839 to January 1840, might otherwise lead us to believe. The remaining essays include Arlette Michel on the public debate between Balzac and Hippolyte Castille in 1846, on the (im)morality of La Comedie humaine, and Joost Mertens on Adrien Thilorier (1790-1844), a scientist who pioneered techniques in the pressurization of gas, and who stands as a possible model for Balthazar Claes, the tormented alchemist of La Recherche de I'absolu. In the back ofthe volume is a text-by-text bibliography, covering work carried out in the field of Balzac studies in 2001, as well as a comprehensive guide to Balzac scholarship, both recently completed and still in progress, outside France. The high standard of both content and presentation makes this volume an indispensable resource for specialists, and a worthy addition to university libraries. University of Bristol Andrew Watts ...