XXVI. Maurice Barrès as a Romanticist

Abstract

During the last two and a half years France has lost three great writers, Pierre Loti, Anatole France, and Maurice Barrès. Loti, because of his impressionistic novels of the most artistic kind which record his tireless quest of sensations in all countries of the world, France, because of his epicurean philosophy and Voltairean wit expressed in two-score works of the most finished style, and Barrès, because of his triple rôle of author, politician, and leader of traditionalism in France,—all three have left a profound influence on the contemporary literature of their country. Of these three, Barrès, in spite of the conceit of his early egotism, the narrowness of his nationalism, and the occasional arrogance of his confidence in the superiority of French culture, is by far the most highly endowed and representative; and on this account his work will receive more and more attention from serious students of the political, social, and literary movements of the last thirty years in France. He was one of the first to make his voice heard against the extreme naturalism of Zola and his school; he founded a group of enthusiastic young writers striving toward a new order of things; and, after a period of hesitation, he stood forth as the champion of the best traditions of his country. The purpose of this paper is not, however, to make a comparative study of the relative greatness of these three writers, but rather to trace the struggle between the classical and romantic elements in Barrès' composition, and to show that the latter were not only predominant in his first writings but continued to the end of his life as a strong undercurrent in his novels and books of travel.