Flaubert critique litteraire d'apres sa correspondance

par Michel Martinez

Thèse de doctorat en Littérature française

Sous la direction de Guy Sagnes.

Soutenue en 1987

à Toulouse 2 .

mots clés

• Litterature francaise
• Litterature du 19e siecle
• Critique litteraire
• Flaubert , gustave
• France
• 19e siecle

Résumé

Flaubert, bien souvent, a ete considere comme "dogmatique" et "contradictoire" a travers ses jugements litteraires. Et pourtant, dans sa correspondance, ses classements d'auteurs gardent a partir de 1851-1852 une stabilite remarquable. Au sommet, un groupe de "grands" ecrivains, possedant par nature les vertus essentielles de la force, de la verite et de l'impersonnalite ; au-dessous d'eux, les "seconds", moins doues que les premiers mais souvent aussi attachants, et appeles "hommes", "poetes" ou "artistes" selon leur aptitude particuliere a "bien penser", "bien sentir" et "bien dire". A l'inverse, les mauvais auteurs, depourvus des trois qualites deja mentionnees, se repartissent en trois familles, celle des "eunuques", des "canailles" et des "farceurs". Cette grille claire, assouplie par la notion de "temperament" personnel, conduit flaubert a definir ce qu'il appelle le "regime" quotidien et les "principes", sacres pour tous ceux qui veulent devenir ou rester de vrais createurs, loin des ecoles, des genres et des modes, cette methode prudente qui se moque des "systemes ne manque ni de profondeur, ni d'originalite. Flaubert, en realite, n'a pu devenir un grand romancier qu'au moment meme ou, apres des annees d'incertitudes et de recherches, il venait enfin de devenir

Titre traduit

Flaubert as a literary critic in his correspondence

Résumé

Flaubert has often been regarded as "dogmatic" and "contradictory" in his literary opinions. And yet, in his correspondence, from 1851-1852 onwards, he classifies authors with remarkable consistency. At the top, he places a group of "great" writers naturally endowed with three essential virtues : strength, truth and impersonality ; next appear the "second best", less gifted than the former but often as engaging as them and called "men", "poets" or "artists" according to their particular ability "to think well", "to feel well", or "to say it well". Conversely, the poorer writers, lacking the three qualities mentioned above, fall into three other categories : the "eunuchs", the "scoundrels" and the "clowns". Such a clear classification, mitigated by the notion of personal "character", leads flaubert to define what he calls the everyday "diet" and the "principles" which must be scrupulously respected if one is to become or remain a real creator. Being remote from literary schools of thought, genres and fashions, this prudent method does not care about "systems" and is far from lacking in depth and originality. As a matter of fact, flaubert was able to become a