Taine lecteur de Flaubert. Quand l'histoire rencontre la littérature

Abstract

Taine's critical gaze on literature necessarily involves multiple points of view - the philosopher's, the sociologist's, the historian's. The peculiarity of such an approach, which doesn't always result in a univocal critical evaluation, accounts for Taine's judgement on Flaubert: his enthusiasm is often qualified by implicit reservations, particularly about those novels which more directly represent contemporary society. While acknowledging the great historical worth of such works as Madame Bovary or L'Éducation sentimentale, on the grounds of their "objectivity" and "truthfulness", Taine nevertheless underscores of the author's moral responsibility to his audience and towards the risk inherent in the reader's potential identification with the novel's main protagonist. Such reservations do not apply to the works inspired by ancient times (Salammbo, La Tentation de saint Antoine and Hérodias), since time distance allows Taine to disengage his critical evaluation from moral implications. In his view, a great visual power and a strong, passionate, lucid and uncompromising style of writing are the conditions for an effective reconstruction of the past. Qualities which are undoubtedly Flaubert's and which find their finest expression in Hérodias.