Alphonse Daudet (1840–1897)

A short and very amusing little novel (88p). Our hero, Tartarin, is a Quixote-like character, his imagination fired by adventure stories and his accumulation of weapons. But while he finds life in provincial southern France dull - at local hunting trips the men are reduced to throwing their caps in the air and shooting at them due to a paucity of wildlife - Tartarin also has a luxury-loving Sancho Panza side to his character, and consequently has never had a real adventure.
"Quixote-Tartarin show more firing up on the stories of Gustave Aimard and shouting "Up and at 'em!" and Sancho-Tartarin thinking only of the rheumatics ahead and murmuring "I mean to stay at home."
But after an encounter with a lion in a local menagerie, the rumour goes about that Tartarin is off to hunt lions in Algeria, and reluctantly he has to make the journey...
His adventures in Africa are highly entertaining and comical featuring a Moorish lady-of-the-night, a camel, a not-to-be-trusted Montenegrin prince ... and even a lion.
Great translation renders the original in convincing Victorian English. show less

Alphonse Daudet was arguably the most famous writer in the world for a brief period in the late 1870s. Today he is largely unread and hardly known. I've made an effort to read a lot of his work because I like his breezy charming style, wide variety and his happy go-lucky nature. However he also had a dark side, the last years of his life were a living hell in the late stages of syphilis which caused excruciating neurological pain that moved unpredictably throughout his body. Chronic pain, as show more Daudet knew, is not a great muse for writing, but he made an attempt to write about it. He never completed the book before his death, but did produce about 50 pages of notes, which were published by his wife in 1930 (in French), and translated by Julian Barnes into English in 2003.

As Barnes writes in the Introduction, Daudet discovers "the ironies and paradoxes of long-term illness: Surrounded by those you love, and unwilling to inflict pain on them, you deliberately talk down your suffering, and thus deprive yourself of the comfort you crave. Next, you discover that your pain, while always new to you, quickly becomes repetitive and banal to your intimates: you fear becoming a symptoms bore. Meanwhile, the anticipation of indignities to come - and the terror disgusting those you love - makes suicide not just tempting but logical; the catch is that those you love have already insisted that you live, if only for them." (Introduction, xi)

--Review by Stephen Balbach, via CoolReading (c) 2010 cc-by-nd show less

10/10

This undoubtedly reflects a nostalgia rating -- but for all of that it has stood the test of time rather well.

I was put back on this magical mystery tour by a chance remark of Fionnuala's in her 2019 year-in-review comments: that a tartarin is both a braggart, and a finely woven cloth. Both connected in my mind with the indefatigable Tartarin de Tarascon, who, braggart though he was, took us all on a (finely-woven) magic carpet ride, in the year when we were 10 or 11.

Other than the show more fact that 39 children (yes, class sizes were that big, back then, and more) probably didn't understand half of the nuances and jokes that were delivered, we were all completely mesmerized by the adventure, the journey and the delivery. You couldn't hear a pin drop, in that classroom, for a half hour every afternoon, as M. Dufault became Tartarin for us.

I would suggest that never had we heard, in our little hamlet, stories that were so rich, wherein the words and descriptions were swimming with such meaning and taste one could almost eat them with a spoon.

Enfin, devant le guéridon, un homme était assis, de quarante à quarante-cinq ans, petit, gros, trapu, rougeaud, en bras de chemise, avec des caleçons de flanelle, une forte barbe courte et des yeux flamboyants, d'une main il tenait un livre, de l'autre il brandissait une énorme pipe à couvercle de fer, et, tout en lisant je ne sais quel formidable récit de chasseurs de chevelures, il faisait, en avançant sa lèvre inférieure, une moue terrible, qui donnait à sa brave figure de petit rentier tarasconnais ce même caractère de férocité bonasse qui régnait dans toute la maison. Cet homme, c'était Tartarin, Tartarin de Tarascon, l'intrépide, le grand, l'incomparable Tartarin de Tarascon.

This was the first of many stories that M. Dufault would read to us, through the full of one scholastic year: alternating between French and English novels, we explored the furthest horizons of the imagination. More than most, Daudet remained in our hearts and engendered in us a desire to immerse ourselves in books -- to explore every corner of where these magical pages would take us.

More than half of that class of schoolmates became teachers: professors, instructors, lecturers, in various levels of schools, from elementary to university. They didn't all specialize in literature, of course, but they certainly brought their flare for the dramatic into their students' lives.

Daudet's rich imaginings, his deliberate exaggeration of the mundane and trivial; his colourful, exotic, incandescent descriptions of bird, beast and man, all gave us the breath to pursue our dreams.

Daudet was a much troubled soul; and no doubt, some of his literature would not gain an audience in today's more culturally sensitive world. (Thank goodness humankind does have the capacity to evolve in a positive way, from time to time.) But for all of that, I don't care, because I can distinguish between what was and what is; and I can distinguish between the spirit of adventure, and the cold heart facts of a cruel society.

He will always remain both Quichotte and Pansa for me -- the best of both worlds -- as I suspect he has remained for the other 38 that listened with me, in those old school days. Merci, M. Dufault, wherever you are. show less

Kicsit csodálkozom, hogy ezt a könyvet ilyen kevesen olvassák, holott Daudet ugye a XIX. század második felének fontos (és egykor itthon is népszerű) írója, tulajdonképpen a balzaci, dumas-i hagyomány szerves folytatója. Balzacnál talán kevésbé jól komponálja a drámai jeleneteket, viszont regényen belül egyenletesebb teljesítményt nyújt, Dumas-hoz mérten pedig vontatottabb, ugyanakkor jobban képes fókuszálni saját célkitűzéseire. Amely célkitűzés pedig show more nem más, mint a korszak párizsi valóságának, elsősorban a felső tízezernek a leképezése.

A Numa Roumestan politikusregény, címszereplője délvidéki lótifutiból emelkedik a miniszteri bársonyig – ilyen értelemben pedig ez a könyv simán beilleszthető a „magasra emelkedtél, de mekkorát zuhansz?”-típusú irodalomba, amiből akad egy-kettő rajta kívül a francia (és egyéb) prózában. A jó Numa szuperképességei, melyekkel a célt elérni szándékozik, a következőek: káprázatos beszélőke, simulékonyság, gondolatolvasás (mindig kitalálja, hallgatója mit is akar hallani), felszínesség (a túlságos elmélyültség csak megzavarná abban, hogy gombnyomásra lelkesedni tudjon azért, amiért pillanatnyilag lelkesedni praktikus), szelektív memória (bármit megígér, de azonnal el is felejti), és végül – de nem utolsósorban – beházasodás egy kellően párizsi, kellően magas rangú, de a kelleténél kicsit erkölcsösebb családba. Ezekkel felvértezve pedig hősünk egyszerűen legyőzhetetlen – legalábbis addig, amíg le nem győzi valaki.

Viszont ami a kötetet sajátossá teszi, az nem egy egyéni akarat küzdelme az őt körülvevő világgal, mert ilyet minden bokorban találni. Hanem hogy Daudet e küzdelem örvén déli és északi, latin és gall mentalitás konfliktusát írja meg. Numa ugyanis hangsúlyosan minden ízében délvidéki, habitusa olyan világosan különíti el a párizsiaktól, hogy az már szinte fertelem. Mert ami azt illeti, Daudet nem finomkodik az ábrázolással – az ő délvidékije típus, nem egyén, mégpedig olyan típus, ami leginkább valamiféle bantunak tűnik, aki beszél ugyan franciául (törve), de úgy alapvetően nem sok másban hasonlít a Daudet által elképzelt „normál” franciákhoz. Megjegyzem, az írót láthatóan lenyűgözi zenéjük, öltözködésük, sajátos kultúrájuk, de az is világos, hogy csak addig becsüli ezen elemeket, amíg élőhelyükön vizsgálhatja őket – amint beteszik a lábukat a fővárosba, máris minden, ami szép bennük, valahogy kínossá, komikussá, sőt: kártékonnyá válik.

Azonban ezzel a disszonanciával – vagy nevezzük becézőn egzotikumnak – együtt olvasásra érdemes, mi több, élvezeti értékkel bíró darab, érdemes leporolni, ha belefutunk mondjuk a padláson, az elfelejtett könyvek dobozában. Ha nem is éri el Maupassant vagy Zola szintjét, ott lohol a nyomukban. show less