Être by René Belletto

Abstract

Reviewed by: Être by René Belletto Philippe Brand Belletto, René. Être. P.O.L, 2018. ISBN 978-2-8180-4478-0. Pp. 286. From the first references to fast cars and flamenco, seasoned readers of Belletto's fiction may feel like they are in familiar territory as they navigate the initial chapters of his latest novel. As the twists of fate pile up, however, the formal and thematic complexity of the narrative that emerges belies the simplicity of the title. Although Belletto has written in an astonishingly wide variety of genres over the course of his career, he is particularly known for his detective fiction, and the reader struggling to gain ingress into the enigmatic first chapters might well feel as if he or she is confronted with an overabundance of signs to follow. The novel pushes and pulls at the boundaries of genre fiction and "serious" literature, oscillating between mysterious clues, grandiose tales of sexual exploits, and intimations of violent acts to come, on one hand, and the metaliterary spectacle of a text recounting the process of its own creation on the other. Densely packed with wordplay and citations from authors as varied as Charles Dickens, Maine de Biran, and Frigyes Karinthy, among many others—"Allons jusqu'au bout: la moindre syllabe pourrait m'entraîner à citer tous les livres du monde" (66)—the novel traces the steps of Miguel Padilla, a painter who no longer paints, as he threads his way through an intricate network of doubled characters, potential clues, and increasing narrative uncertainty. Searching for traces of a mysterious woman, Nathalie, who may or may not be dead, Padilla delves deeply into his past, ruminating on past loss and contemplating ways to recover his creative potential. Padilla strikes upon an elegant solution to his creative impasse, one which forces us to reinterpret everything that we have read thus far. Traces of the past run throughout this novel, and indeed the name "Miguel Padilla" conjures the memory of an identically named character from Belletto's 2002 novel Mourir, who appears in the book in a photo bearing a suspicious resemblance to Belletto himself. As with Mourir, which employs Velázquez's Las meninas as an emblematic image, Être incorporates a painting, Antoine-Jean Duclaux's La reine Hortense à Aix-les-Bains, in a frontispiece. Gide includes Velázquez's masterpiece as an exemplary illustration of the figure in his reflections on the mise-enabyme, a formal technique employed to great effect in Belletto's novel. Duclaux's painting in turn evokes the sense of loss and longing that pervades the pages of Padilla's adventures. In its creative exuberance and thoughtful treatment of desire, mourning, and art, Être has much to offer to a first-time reader, although it is perhaps even more rewarding for those readers who wish to hunt for clues, detective-like, to the rest of Belletto's oeuvre. [End Page 223] Philippe Brand Lewis & Clark College (OR) Copyright © 2019 American Association of Teachers of French