''Fantastique'' is a French term for a
literary
Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...
and
cinematic genre that overlaps with
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...
,
horror, and
fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy literature and d ...
.
The ''fantastique'' is a substantial genre within
French literature
French literature () generally speaking, is literature written in the French language, particularly by citizens of France; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak traditional languages of France other than F ...
. Arguably dating back further than English language
fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy literature and d ...
, it remains an active and productive genre which has evolved in conjunction with
anglophone
Speakers of English are also known as Anglophones, and the countries where English is natively spoken by the majority of the population are termed the ''Anglosphere''. Over two billion people speak English , making English the largest language ...
fantasy and horror and other French and international literature.
Definition
What is distinctive about the ''fantastique'' is the intrusion of
supernatural phenomena into an otherwise
realist narrative. It evokes phenomena which are not only left unexplained but which are inexplicable from the reader's point of view. In this respect, the ''fantastique'' is somewhere between
fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy literature and d ...
, where the supernatural is accepted and entirely reasonable in the imaginary world of a non-realist narrative, and
magic realism, where apparently supernatural phenomena are explained and accepted as normal. Instead, characters in a work of ''fantastique'' are, just like the readers, unwilling to accept the supernatural events that occur. This refusal may be mixed with doubt, disbelief, fear, or some combination of those reactions.
The ''Fantastique'' is often linked to a particular ambiance, a sort of tension in the face of the impossible. A good deal of fear is often involved, either because the characters are afraid or because the author wants to provoke fright in the reader. However, fear is not an essential component of ''fantastique''.
Some
theorists of literature, such as
Tzvetan Todorov
Tzvetan Todorov (; ; bg, Цветан Тодоров; 1 March 1939 – 7 February 2017) was a Bulgarian-French historian, philosopher, structuralist literary critic, sociologist and essayist. He was the author of many books and essays, whi ...
, contend that the ''fantastique'' is defined by its hesitation between accepting the supernatural as such and trying to rationally explain the phenomena it describes. In that case, the ''fantastique'' is nothing more than a transitional area on a spectrum from magic realism to fantasy and does not qualify as a separate literary genre.
History
The Middle Ages
The ''fantastique'' began to become defined in the
Middle Ages
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...
. The old
Celtic
Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to:
Language and ethnicity
*pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia
**Celts (modern)
*Celtic languages
**Proto-Celtic language
* Celtic music
*Celtic nations
Sports Fo ...
and
Germanic myths
Myth is a folklore genre consisting of Narrative, narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or Origin myth, origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not Objectivity (philosophy), ...
were translated from
religion
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatural, ...
(implying
belief
A belief is an attitude that something is the case, or that some proposition is true. In epistemology, philosophers use the term "belief" to refer to attitudes about the world which can be either true or false. To believe something is to take ...
and
worship
Worship is an act of religious devotion usually directed towards a deity. It may involve one or more of activities such as veneration, adoration, praise, and praying. For many, worship is not about an emotion, it is more about a recogniti ...
) into popular
folklore
Folklore is shared by a particular group of people; it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. This includes oral traditions such as tales, legends, proverbs and jokes. They include material culture, ranging ...
(implying belief but not worship).
The root of modern thought about, and artistic depiction of, many things which are today often termed 'supernatural' (such as
angels
In various theistic religious traditions an angel is a supernatural spiritual being who serves God.
Abrahamic religions often depict angels as benevolent celestial intermediaries between God (or Heaven) and humanity. Other roles incl ...
,
demons,
fairies,
witches, etc.) has its beginnings in this period, often called the Middle Ages. Concepts and characters such as
Melusine
Mélusine () or Melusina is a figure of European folklore, a female spirit of fresh water in a holy well or river. She is usually depicted as a woman who is a serpent or fish from the waist down (much like a lamia or a mermaid). She is als ...
,
Harlequin
Harlequin (; it, Arlecchino ; lmo, Arlechin, Bergamasque pronunciation ) is the best-known of the '' zanni'' or comic servant characters from the Italian '' commedia dell'arte'', associated with the city of Bergamo. The role is traditional ...
,
Oberon
Oberon () is a king of the fairies in medieval and Renaissance literature. He is best known as a character in William Shakespeare's play ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'', in which he is King of the Fairies and spouse of Titania, Queen of the Fairi ...
,
Morgan Le Fay
Morgan le Fay (, meaning 'Morgan the Fairy'), alternatively known as Morgan ''n''a, Morgain ''a/e Morg ''a''ne, Morgant ''e Morge ''i''n, and Morgue ''inamong other names and spellings ( cy, Morgên y Dylwythen Deg, kw, Morgen an Spyrys), is a ...
etc., were first given their definitive shapes at this time.
Significant contributions of the times include:
* The ''
chansons de geste''
ongs of deedssuch as ''
La Chanson de Roland
''The Song of Roland'' (french: La Chanson de Roland) is an 11th-century ''chanson de geste'' based on the Frankish military leader Roland at the Battle of Roncevaux Pass in 778 AD, during the reign of the Carolingian king Charlemagne. It is ...
''
he Song of Roland(c. 1100), ''
Le Roman de Tristan et Iseult''
he Romance of Tristan and Ysolde(c. 1170), ''
Lancelot, ou Le Chevalier à la Charette''
ancelot, or The Knight of the Cart(c. 1177) and ''
Perceval, ou le Conte du Graal''
erceval, or The Tale of the Grail(c. 1182), both by
Chrétien de Troyes.
* Between 1215 and 1235,
Robert de Boron, a successor of Chrétien de Troyes, published ''
Histoire du Saint-Graal''
he Story of the Holy Grail ''
Histoire de Merlin''
he Story of Merlin ''Le Livre de Lancelot du Lac''
he Book of Lancelot of the Lake ''La Quête du Saint-Graal''
he Quest for the Holy Grailand ''
La Mort du Roi Arthu''
he Death of King Arthur These books formed the basis for all subsequent
Arthurian legends
The Matter of Britain is the body of medieval literature and legendary material associated with Great Britain and Brittany and the legendary kings and heroes associated with it, particularly King Arthur. It was one of the three great Wes ...
, and established the now well-known origins of the Holy Grail as the vessel in which
Joseph of Arimathea
Joseph of Arimathea was, according to all four canonical gospels, the man who assumed responsibility for the burial of Jesus after his crucifixion. The historical location of Arimathea is uncertain, although it has been identified with several ...
collected the blood of
Jesus Christ
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
.
* The ''
fabliau
A ''fabliau'' (; plural ''fabliaux'') is a comic, often anonymous tale written by jongleurs in northeast France between c. 1150 and 1400. They are generally characterized by sexual and scatological obscenity, and by a set of contrary attitudes ...
x'', satirical fables which relied on the tradition established by
Aesop
Aesop ( or ; , ; c. 620–564 BCE) was a Greek fabulist and storyteller credited with a number of fables now collectively known as ''Aesop's Fables''. Although his existence remains unclear and no writings by him survive, numerous tales c ...
of using anthropomorphic animals such as ''
Le Roman de Renart'', generally attributed to the poet
Pierre de Saint-Cloud
Pierre is a masculine given name. It is a French language, French form of the name Peter (given name), Peter. Pierre originally meant "rock" or "stone" in French (derived from the Greek word πέτρος (''petros'') meaning "stone, rock", via ...
(c. 1175). (By the 14th century, ''Le Roman de Renart'' included over 30 books.)
* Medieval
poetry
Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings i ...
which often employed the supernatural as a mean of literary artifice, such as ''Le
Roman de la Rose
''Le Roman de la Rose'' (''The Romance of the Rose'') is a medieval poem written in Old French and presented as an allegorical dream vision. As poetry, ''The Romance of the Rose'' is a notable instance of courtly literature, purporting to prov ...
''
he Romance of the Roseby
Guillaume de Lorris
Guillaume de Lorris (c. 1200c. 1240) was a French scholar and poet from Lorris. He was the author of the first section of the ''Roman de la Rose''. Little is known about him, other than that he wrote the earlier section of the poem around 1230, ...
(c. 1230), the ballads of
Marie de France
Marie de France ( fl. 1160 to 1215) was a poet, possibly born in what is now France, who lived in England during the late 12th century. She lived and wrote at an unknown court, but she and her work were almost certainly known at the royal court ...
(c. 1170), ''Le Jeu de la Feuillée''
he Game of the Leaves(c. 1275) by
Adam de la Halle
Adam de la Halle (1245–50 – 1285–8/after 1306) was a French poet-composer '' trouvère''. Among the few medieval composers to write both monophonic and polyphonic music, in this respect he has been considered both a conservative and progr ...
, and the anonymous ''Le Livre de la Fontaine Périlleuse''
he Book of the Perilous Fountain(c. 1425).
* The religious dramas called ''
mysteries'' and ''miracle plays'' which often took several days to perform, and included spectacular stage effects, such as ''
Le Jeu d'Adam
''Le Jeu d'Adam'' (Latin: ''Ordo representacionis Adae'', English: ''The Play of Adam'') is a twelfth-century liturgical drama written in the Anglo Norman dialect of Medieval French. While choral texts and stage directions are in Latin, the spoken ...
''
lay of Adam ''La Résurrection du Sauveur''
ur Savior's Resurrection ''Le Jeu de Saint Nicolas''
lay of Saint Nicolasby
Jean Bodel
Jean Bodel (c. 1165 – c. 1210), was an Old French poet who wrote a number of ''chanson de geste, chansons de geste'' as well as many fabliaux. He lived in Arras.
Writings
Bodel wrote ("Song of the Saxons") about the war of King Charlemagne wi ...
of Arras and the monumental ''Le Mystère de la Passion ''
ystery of the Passion, or Passion Playby
Arnoul Gréban, organist and choirmaster of
Notre Dame de Paris
Notre-Dame de Paris (; meaning "Our Lady of Paris"), referred to simply as Notre-Dame, is a medieval Catholic cathedral on the Île de la Cité (an island in the Seine River), in the 4th arrondissement of Paris. The cathedral, dedicated to the ...
.
The Renaissance
The 16th century was marked by the emergence of new ideas and literary trends, often as a reaction against what was perceived as the "obscurantism" of the Middle Ages. Among the factors which contributed to the
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...
were: the discoveries of new continents, new scientific and technical discoveries, and
Johann Gutenberg
Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg (; – 3 February 1468) was a German inventor and craftsman who introduced letterpress printing to Europe with his movable-type printing press. Though not the first of its kind, earlier designs ...
's invention of the printing press which made the greater circulation of literary works possible.
The Renaissance bloomed in France during the reign of King
Francis I Francis I or Francis the First may refer to:
* Francesco I Gonzaga (1366–1407)
* Francis I, Duke of Brittany (1414–1450), reigned 1442–1450
* Francis I of France (1494–1547), King of France, reigned 1515–1547
* Francis I, Duke of Saxe-Lau ...
who created a favorable environment for the development of letters, arts and sciences. It was during the French Renaissance that proto-science fiction first split from the ''fantastique''. The traditional ''fantastique'' derived from myths, legends and folklore also split into one form which continued the poetic tradition of the Middle Ages and eventually led to the ''Merveilleux''
arvelousand the ''Contes de Fées'' or
Fairy Tales, and the other, the darker side of the same literary coin, dealing with
witchcraft
Witchcraft traditionally means the use of magic or supernatural powers to harm others. A practitioner is a witch. In medieval and early modern Europe, where the term originated, accused witches were usually women who were believed to have ...
and
devil worship
Theistic Satanism, otherwise referred to as religious Satanism, spiritual Satanism, or traditional Satanism, is an umbrella term for religious groups that consider Satan, the Devil, or Lucifer to objectively exist as a deity, supernatural en ...
.
Significant contributions of the times include:
* In his ''Odes'' (1550), poet
Pierre de Ronsard
Pierre de Ronsard (; 11 September 1524 – 27 December 1585) was a French poet or, as his own generation in France called him, a " prince of poets".
Early life
Pierre de Ronsard was born at the Manoir de la Possonnière, in the village of ...
(1524–1585), founder of the literary group ''La Pleïade'', often drew heavily on the superstitions of his native Vendômois country, writing about witches. Then, at the peak of his literary fame, he devoted several of his more famous ''Hymnes'' (1552) to supernatural subjects such as "
Daimons
Daimon or Daemon (Ancient Greek: , "god", "godlike", "power", "fate") originally referred to a lesser deity or guiding spirit such as the daimons of ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology and of later Hellenistic religion and Hell ...
" and
astrology
Astrology is a range of divinatory practices, recognized as pseudoscientific since the 18th century, that claim to discern information about human affairs and terrestrial events by studying the apparent positions of celestial objects. Di ...
.
* The classic novel ''
L'Astrée
''L'Astrée'' is a pastoral novel by Honoré d'Urfé, published between 1607 and 1627.
Possibly the single most influential work of 17th-century French literature, ''L'Astrée'' has been called the "novel of novels", partly for its immense leng ...
''
strea(1607–27) by
Honoré d'Urfé
Honoré d'Urfé, marquis de Valromey, comte de Châteauneuf (11 February 15681 June 1625) was a French novelist and miscellaneous writer.
Life
He was born at Marseille, the grandson of Claude d'Urfé, and was educated at the Collège de T ...
was obviously inspired by the prose romance of chivalry ''
Amadis de Gaula'', which had been circulating since the late 13th century, but reached its pinnacle when reassembled by Spanish writer
Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo
Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo (; c. 1450 – 1505) was a Castilian author who arranged the modern version of the chivalric romance '' Amadis of Gaul'', originally written in three books in the 14th century by an unknown author. Montalvo incorpora ...
.
* Famous playwright
Pierre Corneille's lesser-known but classic tragedies, ''
Médée
''Médée'' is a dramatic tragedy in five acts written in alexandrine verse by Pierre Corneille in 1635.
Summary
The heroine of the play is the sorceress Médée. After Médée gives Jason twin boys, Jason leaves her for Creusa. Médée ...
'' (1635) and ''Circé'' (1675), popularized warlocks and witches as the ''deus ex machina'' of French theater.
* The ''
Malleus Maleficarum
The ''Malleus Maleficarum'', usually translated as the ''Hammer of Witches'', is the best known treatise on witchcraft. It was written by the German Catholic clergyman Heinrich Kramer (under his Latinized name ''Henricus Institor'') and first ...
'' spawned a number of French imitations, among which were
Jean Bodin
Jean Bodin (; c. 1530 – 1596) was a French jurist and political philosopher, member of the Parlement of Paris and professor of law in Toulouse. He is known for his theory of sovereignty. He was also an influential writer on demonology.
Bodi ...
's ''La Démonomanie des Sorciers''
emonology Of Sorcerers(1580) and ''Le Fléau des Démons et ses Sorciers''
lague Of Demons And Sorcerers(1616).
The Age of Enlightenment
The 18th century was known as the ''Siècle des Lumières'' ("Century of Lights"), or
Age of Enlightenment
The Age of Enlightenment or the Enlightenment; german: Aufklärung, "Enlightenment"; it, L'Illuminismo, "Enlightenment"; pl, Oświecenie, "Enlightenment"; pt, Iluminismo, "Enlightenment"; es, La Ilustración, "Enlightenment" was an intel ...
. Starting with the accession to the throne in 1643 of Sun King
Louis XIV
, house = Bourbon
, father = Louis XIII
, mother = Anne of Austria
, birth_date =
, birth_place = Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France
, death_date =
, death_place = Palace of Ver ...
, France entered a period of political, artistic and scientific grandeur, before settling into the decadent reigns of
Louis XV
Louis XV (15 February 1710 – 10 May 1774), known as Louis the Beloved (french: le Bien-Aimé), was King of France from 1 September 1715 until his death in 1774. He succeeded his great-grandfather Louis XIV at the age of five. Until he reache ...
and
Louis XVI
Louis XVI (''Louis-Auguste''; ; 23 August 175421 January 1793) was the last King of France before the fall of the monarchy during the French Revolution. He was referred to as ''Citizen Louis Capet'' during the four months just before he was ...
. Enlightenment could arguably be said to have started with
René Descartes
René Descartes ( or ; ; Latinized: Renatus Cartesius; 31 March 1596 – 11 February 1650) was a French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician, widely considered a seminal figure in the emergence of modern philosophy and science. Mathem ...
in 1637 with his ''
Le Discours de la Méthode'' ("Discourse on Methods") or in 1687 when
Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton (25 December 1642 – 20 March 1726/27) was an English mathematician, physicist, astronomer, alchemist, theologian, and author (described in his time as a "natural philosopher"), widely recognised as one of the grea ...
published his ''Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica'' ("
Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy
Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...
").
Baroque
The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...
(whether in the form of
novel
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...
s,
plays
Play most commonly refers to:
* Play (activity), an activity done for enjoyment
* Play (theatre), a work of drama
Play may refer also to:
Computers and technology
* Google Play, a digital content service
* Play Framework, a Java framework
* P ...
or even
opera
Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a librett ...
s) was the link between the ''Merveilleux'' of the Renaissance and the more formalized fairy tales of the Enlightenment period. The undeniable popularity of the genre was, in great part, attributable to the fact that Fairy Tales were safe; they did not imperil the
soul
In many religious and philosophical traditions, there is a belief that a soul is "the immaterial aspect or essence of a human being".
Etymology
The Modern English noun ''soul'' is derived from Old English ''sāwol, sāwel''. The earliest attes ...
— a serious concern for a nation which had just come out of an era of great
religious persecution — and they appropriately reflected the grandeur of the Sun King's reign.
The precursor in the genre was
Madame d'Aulnoy
Marie-Catherine Le Jumel de Barneville, Baroness d'Aulnoy (1650/1651 – 14 January 1705), also known as Countess d'Aulnoy, was a French author known for her literary fairy tales. When she termed her works ''contes de fées'' (fairy tales), sh ...
who, in 1690, introduced in her rambling novel ''Histoire d'Hyppolite, Comte de Douglas'' ("Story Of Hippolyte, Count Of Douglas"), a fairy tale entitled ''L'Île de la Félicité'' ("The Island Of Happiness").
Significant contributions of the times include:
* In 1697,
Charles Perrault, until then a renowned literary figure, a champion of sciences, released under his son's name ''Histoires ou Contes du Temps Passé'' ("Histories or Tales Of Past Times") a.k.a. ''
Contes de ma Mère l'Oie'' ("Tales Of Mother Goose"). In it, Perrault had carefully collected a number of popular folk tales and legends, such as ''Cendrillon'' a.k.a.
Cinderella
"Cinderella",; french: link=no, Cendrillon; german: link=no, Aschenputtel) or "The Little Glass Slipper", is a folk tale with thousands of variants throughout the world.Dundes, Alan. Cinderella, a Casebook. Madison, Wis: University of Wisconsi ...
, ''La Belle au Bois Dormant'' a.k.a.
Sleeping Beauty
''Sleeping Beauty'' (french: La belle au bois dormant, or ''The Beauty in the Sleeping Forest''; german: Dornröschen, or ''Little Briar Rose''), also titled in English as ''The Sleeping Beauty in the Woods'', is a fairy tale about a princess cu ...
, ''Peau d'Âne'' a.k.a.
Donkey Skin
''Donkeyskin'' (french: Peau d'Âne) is a French fairytale fantasy, literary fairytale written in verse by Charles Perrault. It was first published in 1695 in a small volume and republished in 1697 in Perrault's ''Histoires ou contes du temps pa ...
, ''Le Petit Chaperon Rouge'' ("
Little Red Riding Hood
"Little Red Riding Hood" is a European fairy tale about a young girl and a sly wolf. Its origins can be traced back to several pre-17th century European folk tales. The two best known versions were written by Charles Perrault and the Brot ...
"), ''Barbe-Bleue'' ("
Bluebeard
"Bluebeard" (french: Barbe bleue, ) is a French folktale, the most famous surviving version of which was written by Charles Perrault and first published by Barbin in Paris in 1697 in '' Histoires ou contes du temps passé''. The tale tells the s ...
"), ''Le Chat Botté'' ("
Puss in Boots
"Puss in Boots" ( it, Il gatto con gli stivali) is an Italian fairy tale, later spread throughout the rest of Europe, about an anthropomorphic cat who uses trickery and deceit to gain power, wealth, and the hand of a princess in marriage for ...
"), etc.
* Madame d'Aulnoy followed suit with a three-volume collection simply entitled ''Contes de Fées''
Fairy Tales, and then her ''Contes Nouveaux ou Les Fées à la Mode'' ("New Tales or Fairies In Fashion") (1698–1702). Her best-remembered stories are ''
L'Oiseau Bleu'' ("The Blue Bird"), ''La Chatte Blanche '' ("
Puddocky
"Das Mahrchen von der Padde" ("The Tale of the Toad") is a German folktale collected by Johann Gustav Gottlieb Büsching in ''Volks-Sagen, Märchen und Legenden''. It has been translated into English under the titles of "Puddocky" or "Cherry the ...
"), and ''Le Nain Jaune'' ("
The Yellow Dwarf"), which spawned a popular
board game
Board games are tabletop games that typically use . These pieces are moved or placed on a pre-marked board (playing surface) and often include elements of table, card, role-playing, and miniatures games as well.
Many board games feature a co ...
.
* ''
The Book of One Thousand and One Nights
''One Thousand and One Nights'' ( ar, أَلْفُ لَيْلَةٍ وَلَيْلَةٌ, italic=yes, ) is a collection of Middle Eastern folk tales compiled in Arabic during the Islamic Golden Age. It is often known in English as the ''Arabian ...
'' was "translated" into French — and quite possibly made up from very thin or non-existent sources as no earlier
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic languages, Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C ...
manuscripts of ''
Aladdin'' and ''
Ali Baba
"Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves" ( ar, علي بابا والأربعون لصا) is a folk tale from the '' One Thousand and One Nights''. It was added to the collection in the 18th century by its French translator Antoine Galland, who heard ...
'' are known to exist — by
Antoine Galland from 1704 to 1717.
* In ''
Zadig
''Zadig; or, The Book of Fate'' (french: Zadig ou la Destinée; 1747) is a novella and work of philosophical fiction by the Enlightenment writer Voltaire. It tells the story of Zadig, a Zoroastrian philosopher in ancient Babylonia. The story ...
'' (1747),
Voltaire
François-Marie Arouet (; 21 November 169430 May 1778) was a French Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher. Known by his ''Pen name, nom de plume'' M. de Voltaire (; also ; ), he was famous for his wit, and his ...
mocked his contemporaries' predilection for the Fairy Tales, while making use of the same literary devices.
*
Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont
Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont (; 26 April 17118 September 1780) was a French novelist who wrote the best known version of ''Beauty and the Beast''. Her third husband was the French spy Thomas Pichon (1757–1760).
Life and work
Christened Ma ...
, whose classic ''La Belle et la Bête'' ("
Beauty and the Beast
''Beauty and the Beast'' (french: La Belle et la Bête) is a fairy tale written by French novelist Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve and published in 1740 in ''La Jeune Américaine et les contes marins'' (''The Young American and Marine ...
"; 1757) has transcended the ages, authored forty collections of tales (dubbed "Magasins" or "Stores", hence the English word
magazine
A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combinatio ...
), published in London between 1750 and 1780. ''La Belle et la Bête'' was, itself, based on an earlier fairy tale by
Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve
Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve (28 November 1685 – 29 December 1755) was a French novelist influenced by Madame d'Aulnoy, Charles Perrault, and various précieuse writers. Villeneuve is particularly noted for her original story of ...
, included in her collection ''La jeune américaine et les contes marins'' ("The Young American Girl and Sea Stories"; 1740).
*
Jacques Cazotte
Jacques Cazotte (; 17 October 1719 – 25 September 1792) was a French author.
Life
Born in Dijon, he was educated by the Jesuits. Cazotte then worked for the French Ministry of
the Marine and at the age of 27 he obtained a public office at Mar ...
, who had started as a writer of Fairy Tales, such as ''La Patte du Chat'' ("Cat's Paw"; 1741) and ''Les Mille et Une Fadaises'' ("A Thousand and One Silly Stories"; 1742), soon tired of it and ended up writing darker tales.
* Chevalier gathered the best Fairy Tales of the times and released a forty-one volume
anthology entitled ''Le Cabinet des Fées'' ("The Fairies' Cabinet"), published in
Amsterdam
Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...
and
Geneva
Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevra ; rm, Genevra is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaki ...
between 1785 and 1789 — the first specialized fantasy
imprint
Imprint or imprinting may refer to:
Entertainment
* ''Imprint'' (TV series), Canadian television series
* "Imprint" (''Masters of Horror''), episode of TV show ''Masters of Horror''
* ''Imprint'' (film), a 2007 independent drama/thriller film
...
ever published.
In this fashion, the literary evolution of the Fairy Tales paralleled that of French Royalty, with the decadence and corruption of Louis XV replacing the aristocratic grandeur of Louis XIV. Writers like Cazotte embodied the transition between the Fairy Tales and a darker and grimmer ''fantastique''.
As the spiritual influence of the Church waned, thinkers dreamed of new faiths. Many of these based their thinking on occult knowledge allegedly handed down through the ages, from the
Orient to the
Knights Templar
, colors = White mantle with a red cross
, colors_label = Attire
, march =
, mascot = Two knights riding a single horse
, equipment ...
and, finally, to the
Freemasons and the
Rosicrucians who flourished during the Age of Enlightenment.
* In 1670, the Abbé
Nicolas-Pierre-Henri de Montfaucon de Villars published the thinly disguised occult fiction, ''Le Comte de Gabalis'' ("The Count Of Gabalis"), sub-titled ''Entretiens sur les Sciences Secrètes'' ("Conversations On Secret Sciences"). Having disclosed secret knowledge allegedly led to the Abbot's murder by Rosicrucians in 1675.
* In 1731, the Abbé
Jean Terrasson Jean Terrasson (31 January 1670 – 15 September 1750), often referred to as the Abbé Terrasson, was a French priest, author and member of the Académie française. The erudite Antoine Terrasson was his nephew.
Life
Jean Terrasson, born in Lyo ...
wrote ''Séthos, Histoire ou Vie Tirée des Monuments, Anecdotes de l'Ancienne Égypte'' ("Story or Life Drawn from Monuments & Anecdotes from Ancient Egypt"), whose pseudo-Egyptian and occult themes were later tapped by
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 17565 December 1791), baptised as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition r ...
for his opera ''
The Magic Flute
''The Magic Flute'' (German: , ), K. 620, is an opera in two acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a '' Singspiel'', a popular form during the time it was written that in ...
''.
* Cazotte's ''Le Diable amoureux (
The Devil in Love'', 1772) was sub-titled ''un roman fantastique'', the first time in literary history that a work was so labeled. ''The Devil in Love'' could be considered the first modern French
horror novel. In it, a young nobleman conjures up a demon who assumes the shape of a beautiful woman. The supernatural was not treated as a fantasmagory, or for satirical or philosophical purposes. It was intended to be real and to induce fear in the reader.
* Another work in the same vein was ''
Vathek
''Vathek'' (alternatively titled ''Vathek, an Arabian Tale'' or ''The History of the Caliph Vathek'') is a Gothic novel written by William Beckford. It was composed in French beginning in 1782, and then translated into English by Reverend S ...
'', a novel written directly into French in 1787 by English-born writer
William Thomas Beckford
William Thomas Beckford (29 September 1760 – 2 May 1844) was an English novelist, art collector, patron of decorative art, critic, travel writer, plantation owner and for some time politician. He was reputed at one stage to be England's riches ...
. A
Byronic
The Byronic hero is a variant of the Romantic hero as a type of character, named after the English Romantic poet Lord Byron. Both Byron's own persona as well as characters from his writings are considered to provide defining features to the cha ...
figure steeped in occult knowledge and
sexual perversion
Paraphilia (previously known as sexual perversion and sexual deviation) is the experience of intense sexual arousal to atypical objects, situations, fantasies, behaviors, or individuals. It has also been defined as sexual interest in anything o ...
s, Beckford allegedly wrote his novel non-stop in three days and two nights in a state of
trance
Trance is a state of semi-consciousness in which a person is not self-aware and is either altogether unresponsive to external stimuli (but nevertheless capable of pursuing and realizing an aim) or is selectively responsive in following the dir ...
.
* Finally, in 1813, the very strange ''Le Manuscrit Trouvé à Saragosse'' ("
The Manuscript Found in Saragossa
''The Manuscript Found in Saragossa'' (; also known in English as ''The Saragossa Manuscript'') is a frame-tale novel written in French at the turn of 18th and 19th centuries by the Polish author Count Jan Potocki (1761–1815). It is narrated ...
") was published. Like Vathek, it was written directly into French by a non-French writer, the
Polish
Polish may refer to:
* Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe
* Polish language
* Poles
Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, w ...
count and scientist
Jan Potocki
Count Jan Potocki (; 8 March 1761 – 23 December 1815) was a Polish nobleman, ethnologist, linguist, traveller and author of the Enlightenment period, whose life and exploits made him a celebrated figure in Poland. He is known chiefly for his pi ...
.
19th century
The 19th century was a period of great turmoil in French history. After the
French Revolution
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are considere ...
, France successively experienced
Napoléon
Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...
's First Empire, the
Bourbon Restoration, the
Second Republic,
Napoleon III
Napoleon III (Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte; 20 April 18089 January 1873) was the first President of France (as Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte) from 1848 to 1852 and the last monarch of France as Emperor of the French from 1852 to 1870. A nephew ...
's
Second Empire Second Empire may refer to:
* Second British Empire, used by some historians to describe the British Empire after 1783
* Second Bulgarian Empire (1185–1396)
* Second French Empire (1852–1870)
** Second Empire architecture, an architectural styl ...
and the
Third Republic. During the First and Second Empires, periods of proud, military glory alternated with crushing, humiliating defeats. It was in this ever-boiling cauldron of historical upheaval that French literature exploded into a bouquet of heretofore unknown and abundant colors—and so did the ''fantastique''.
French ''fantastique'' writers of the 19th century were diversely influenced by the English
Gothic novel writers, especially
Ann Radcliffe
Ann Radcliffe (née Ward; 9 July 1764 – 7 February 1823) was an English novelist and a pioneer of Gothic fiction. Her technique of explaining apparently supernatural elements in her novels has been credited with gaining respectability for G ...
,
Matthew Gregory Lewis
Matthew Gregory Lewis (9 July 1775 – 14 or 16 May 1818) was an English novelist and dramatist, whose writings are often classified as "Gothic horror". He was frequently referred to as "Monk" Lewis, because of the success of his 1796 Gothic no ...
,
Sheridan Le Fanu, and
Charles Maturin
Charles Robert Maturin, also known as C. R. Maturin (25 September 1780 – 30 October 1824), was an Irish Protestant clergyman (ordained in the Church of Ireland) and a writer of Gothic plays and novels.Chris Morgan, "Maturin, Charles R(obert) ...
, German author
E. T. A. Hoffmann and composer
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most op ...
, American writer
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe (; Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. He is wid ...
, British poets
Lord Byron
George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and Peerage of the United Kingdom, peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and h ...
and
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 185430 November 1900) was an Irish poet and playwright. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular playwrights in London in the early 1890s. He is ...
.
It was during this incredibly rich century that we started seeing a split between the more lurid and exploitative ''fantastique'' dubbed ''fantastique populaire'', and the more literary forms adopted by mainstream writers, dubbed ''fantastique littéraire''.
Romans noirs
As the 19th century was about to begin, the English gothic novels became a major influence on the development of the fantastique. Their extravagant and macabre nature tapped into the emotions released during the French Revolution, and eventually helped the genre to seamlessly evolve into the more modern forms of the ''fantastique''.
The English gothic writers helped launch a wave of what the French called ''romans noirs'' (black novels), or ''romans frénétiques'' (frantic novels), which became the first subgenre of popular literature. Notable works in that category include:
* ''Coelina, ou l'Enfant du Mystère''
oelina, or The Child Of Mystery(1799) by
François Guillaume Ducray-Duminil
François Guillaume Ducray-Duminil (1761, Paris - 29 October 1819, Ville-d'Avray) was a French novelist, poet and songwriter.
Career
Born in Paris, from 1790 onward, Ducray-Duminil was the literary editor of ''Les Petites Affiches'' where he wa ...
.
* Cyprien Bérard's ''Lord Rutwen ou les Vampires'' (1820), which was adapted into a stage play by
Charles Nodier
Jean Charles Emmanuel Nodier (29 April 1780 – 27 January 1844) was a French author and librarian who introduced a younger generation of Romanticists to the ''conte fantastique'', gothic literature, and vampire tales. His dream related writings ...
the same year, and starred
John William Polidori's
vampire
A vampire is a mythical creature that subsists by feeding on the vital essence (generally in the form of blood) of the living. In European folklore, vampires are undead creatures that often visited loved ones and caused mischief or deat ...
character
Lord Ruthven.
* ''Falthurne'' (1820) by
Honoré de Balzac
Honoré de Balzac ( , more commonly , ; born Honoré Balzac;Jean-Louis Dega, La vie prodigieuse de Bernard-François Balssa, père d'Honoré de Balzac : Aux sources historiques de La Comédie humaine, Rodez, Subervie, 1998, 665 p. 20 May 179 ...
, a novel about a virgin prophetess who knows occult secrets that date all the way back to Ancient
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the ...
. Also of note by Balzac: ''Le Centenaire''
he Centenarian inspired by ''
Melmoth the Wanderer
''Melmoth the Wanderer'' is an 1820 Gothic novel by Irish playwright, novelist and clergyman Charles Maturin. The novel's titular character is a scholar who sold his soul to the devil in exchange for 150 extra years of life, and searches the wo ...
'' (1822), ''L'Élixir de Longue Vie''
he Elixir Of Long Life(1830), ''Louis Lambert'' (1832), about a man seeking higher dimensions, the aptly named ''La Recherche de l'Absolu''
he Search For The Absolute(1834), whose hero is an alchemist, and ''Melmoth Réconcilié''
elmoth Reconciled(1835).
*
Charles Nodier
Jean Charles Emmanuel Nodier (29 April 1780 – 27 January 1844) was a French author and librarian who introduced a younger generation of Romanticists to the ''conte fantastique'', gothic literature, and vampire tales. His dream related writings ...
with ''Smarra ou les Démons de la Nuit''
marra, or The Demons Of The Night(1821), a series of terrifying dream-based tales. Nodier's masterpiece was ''La Fée aux Miettes''
he Crumb Fairy(1832). In it, a young carpenter is devoted to the eponymous Fairy, who may be the legendary
Queen of Sheba
The Queen of Sheba ( he, מַלְכַּת שְׁבָא, Malkaṯ Šəḇāʾ; ar, ملكة سبأ, Malikat Sabaʾ; gez, ንግሥተ ሳባ, Nəgśətä Saba) is a figure first mentioned in the Hebrew Bible. In the original story, she bring ...
. In order to restore her to her true form, he searches for the magical Singing
Mandragore
''Mandragora officinarum'' is the type species of the plant genus '' Mandragora'' in the nightshade family Solanaceae. It is often known as mandrake, although this name is also used for other plants. , sources differed significantly in the speci ...
. Nodier could rightfully lay claim to being one of the world's first "high fantasy" writers, sixty years before
William Morris
William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was a British textile designer, poet, artist, novelist, architectural conservationist, printer, translator and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He ...
.
* The three-volume ''La Vampire'' (1825) by
Étienne-Léon de Lamothe-Langon
Étienne-Léon de Lamothe-Langon (1786-1864) was a prolific French author of many novels, apocryphal memoirs, and a controversial historical work.
Biography
Étienne-Léon de Lamothe-Langon, a descendant of an old family of Languedoc, was b ...
which tells the story of a young Napoleonic army officer who bring his
Hungarian fiancée home to later discover that she is a vampire, and ''Le Diable''
he Devil
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
(1832) featuring the charismatic, evil Chevalier Draxel.
*
Victor Hugo
Victor-Marie Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romantic writer and politician. During a literary career that spanned more than sixty years, he wrote in a variety of genres and forms. He is considered to be one of the great ...
with ''Han d'Islande''
an Of Iceland(1823), a bloody tale featuring a
Viking
Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden),
who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...
warrior and a mythical bear, ''Bug-Jargal'' (1826) and the morbid and romantic ''L'Homme qui Rit'' a.k.a. ''
The Man Who Laughs
''The Man Who Laughs'' (also published under the title ''By Order of the King'' from its subtitle in French) is a novel by Victor Hugo, originally published in April 1869 under the French title ''L'Homme qui rit''. It takes place in England beg ...
'' (1869) about a horribly disfigured man who lived in 17th century England. (Its 1928 film version, starring
Conrad Veidt
Hans Walter Conrad Veidt (; 22 January 1893 – 3 April 1943) was a German film actor who attracted early attention for his roles in the films ''Different from the Others'' (1919), '' The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari'' (1920), and '' The Man Who Laug ...
, was credited as the model for
Batman's the
Joker.)
*
Frédéric Soulié with the classic ''Les Mémoires du Diable
he Devil's Memoirs' (1838) which combined the ''roman frénétique'' with the passions of the
Marquis de Sade.
Fantastique populaire
Eventually, the ''roman noir'' gave way to more modern forms of the ''fantastique''. One was the ''
feuilleton
A ''feuilleton'' (; a diminutive of french: feuillet, the leaf of a book) was originally a kind of supplement attached to the political portion of French newspapers, consisting chiefly of non-political news and gossip, literature and art critici ...
'', stories serialized in daily instalments in
newspapers
A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background.
Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as politics, business, sports ...
; the other was the popular novel, published in inexpensive formats, catering to large audiences. In the true tradition of popular fiction, these were often considered cheap thrills, good only for the barely educated masses.
*
Alexandre Dumas, père was finely attuned to the literary marketplace. The success of Hoffmann's ''Tales'' and of the ''Thousand And One Nights'' influenced him to write ''Les Mille et Un Fantômes''
Thousand And One Ghosts(1849), an anthology of macabre tales. Dumas wrote his own version of Lord Ruthwen in ''Le Vampire'' (1851). Finally, in 1857, he penned one of the first modern
werewolf
In folklore, a werewolf (), or occasionally lycanthrope (; ; uk, Вовкулака, Vovkulaka), is an individual that can shapeshift into a wolf (or, especially in modern film, a therianthropic hybrid wolf-like creature), either purposely ...
stories, ''Le Meneur de Loups''
he Leader Of Wolves
*
Edgar Quinet
Edgar Quinet (; 17 February 180327 March 1875) was a French historian and intellectual.
Biography
Early years
Quinet was born at Bourg-en-Bresse, in the ''département'' of Ain. His father, Jérôme Quinet, had been a commissary in the army, ...
wrote ''Ahasvérus'' (1833), a lengthy and sophisticated poetic narrative about the
Wandering Jew
The Wandering Jew is a mythical immortal man whose legend began to spread in Europe in the 13th century. In the original legend, a Jew who taunted Jesus on the way to the Crucifixion was then cursed to walk the Earth until the Second Coming. Th ...
, and a remarkable book about Merlin, ''Merlin l'Enchanteur''
erlin The Enchanter(1895).
*
Eugène Sue
Marie-Joseph "Eugène" Sue (; 26 January 18043 August 1857) was a French novelist. He was one of several authors who popularized the genre of the serial novel in France with his very popular and widely imitated ''The Mysteries of Paris'', whic ...
's own Wandering Jew narrative, ''
Le Juif Errant
''The Wandering Jew'' (french: link=no, Le Juif errant) is an 1844 novel by the French writer Eugène Sue.
Plot
The story is entitled ''The Wandering Jew'', but the figure of the Wandering Jew himself plays a minimal role. The prologue of the ...
''
he Wandering Jew was serialized in 1844–45. Dumas' ''Isaac Laquedem'' appeared in 1853.
*
Paul Féval, père
Paul Henri Corentin Féval, ''père'' (29 September 1816 - 8 March 1887) was a French novelist and dramatist.
He was the author of popular swashbuckler novels such as '' Le Loup blanc'' (1843) and the perennial best-seller '' Le Bossu'' (1857). ...
was one of the most important ''fantastique'' writers of the period with ''Les Revenants''
evenants(1853), ''La Fille du Juif Errant''
he Daughter Of The Wandering Jew(1864), the macabre ''La Vampire''
he Vampire Countess(1867), and ''La Ville Vampire''
he Vampire City(1874) which parodied Ann Radcliffe, making her the book's fictional heroine!
Fantastique littéraire
On the more respectable side of the literary fence, the 19th century fantastique literature after 1830 was dominated by the influence of
E. T. A. Hoffmann, and then by that of
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe (; Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. He is wid ...
.
* In 1839,
Gérard de Nerval
Gérard de Nerval (; 22 May 1808 – 26 January 1855) was the pen name of the French writer, poet, and translator Gérard Labrunie, a major figure of French romanticism, best known for his novellas and poems, especially the collection '' Les ...
collaborated with Alexandre Dumas on ''L'Alchimiste''
he Alchemist Mentally unhinged after a lover's death, Nerval developed an interest in mystical beliefs, especially in his book ''Les Illuminés''. Note that after being institutionalized, his work began taking on an increasing visionary quality, though non-fantastique with ''Aurélia'' (1853–54) and ''Les Filles du Feu''
aughters of Fire(1854).
* In ''
La Morte Amoureuse
"La Morte amoureuse" (in en, "The Dead Woman in Love") is a short story written by Théophile Gautier and published in ''La Chronique de Paris'' in 1836. It tells the story of a priest named Romuald who falls in love with Clarimonde, a beautiful w ...
'' (1836),
Théophile Gautier
Pierre Jules Théophile Gautier ( , ; 30 August 1811 – 23 October 1872) was a French poet, dramatist, novelist, journalist, and art and literary critic.
While an ardent defender of Romanticism, Gautier's work is difficult to classify and rema ...
told the story of a young priest who falls in love with a beautiful female vampire. In it, the vampire is not a soulless creature, but a loving and erotic woman. Gautier's ''
Avatar
Avatar (, ; ), is a concept within Hinduism that in Sanskrit literally means "descent". It signifies the material appearance or incarnation of a powerful deity, goddess or spirit on Earth. The relative verb to "alight, to make one's appeara ...
'' (1856) and ''Spirite'' (1866) are ''roman spirites'' which deal with the theme of life after death.
*
Prosper Mérimée
Prosper Mérimée (; 28 September 1803 – 23 September 1870) was a French writer in the movement of Romanticism, and one of the pioneers of the novella, a short novel or long short story. He was also a noted archaeologist and historian, and a ...
's ''
La Vénus d'Ille'' (1837), features a pagan statue that comes to life and kills a young groom on his wedding night
* Rustic legends of the
Alsace
Alsace (, ; ; Low Alemannic German/ gsw-FR, Elsàss ; german: Elsass ; la, Alsatia) is a cultural region and a territorial collectivity in eastern France, on the west bank of the upper Rhine next to Germany and Switzerland. In 2020, it had ...
were also the main source of inspiration of Émile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian, a writing team who signed their works
Erckmann-Chatrian
Erckmann-Chatrian was the name used by French authors Émile Erckmann (1822–1899) and Alexandre Chatrian (1826–1890), nearly all of whose works were jointly written.Mary Ellen Snodgrass, ''Encyclopedia of Gothic Literature''. New York, Facts ...
. Their first collection, ''Les Contes Fantastiques''
antastic Tales(1847), includes the classic short story ''L'Araignée Crabe''
he Crab-Spider about a blood-sucking lake monster with the body of a spider and the head of a man.
*
Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly
Jules-Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly (2 November 1808 – 23 April 1889) was a French novelist and short story writer. He specialised in mystery tales that explored hidden motivation and hinted at evil without being explicitly concerned with anythin ...
wrote tales of terror in which morbid passions are acted out in bizarre crimes, such as ''Les Diaboliques''
he Diabolical Women(written in 1858, published in 1874, no relation to the movie). Also of note is ''L'Ensorcelé''.
* In 1858,
Gustave Flaubert
Gustave Flaubert ( , , ; 12 December 1821 – 8 May 1880) was a French novelist. Highly influential, he has been considered the leading exponent of literary realism in his country. According to the literary theorist Kornelije Kvas, "in Flauber ...
produced what may very well be the first work of modern French heroic fantasy, ''
Salammbô
''Salammbô'' (1862) is a historical novel by Gustave Flaubert. It is set in Carthage immediately before and during the Mercenary Revolt (241–237 BCE). Flaubert's principal source was Book I of the ''Histories'', written by the Greek hist ...
'', a brash, colorful and exotic novel about ancient
Carthage
Carthage was the capital city of Ancient Carthage, on the eastern side of the Lake of Tunis in what is now Tunisia. Carthage was one of the most important trading hubs of the Ancient Mediterranean and one of the most affluent cities of the classi ...
.
*
Joris-Karl Huysmans
Charles-Marie-Georges Huysmans (, ; 5 February 1848 – 12 May 1907) was a French novelist and art critic who published his works as Joris-Karl Huysmans (, variably abbreviated as J. K. or J.-K.). He is most famous for the novel '' À rebour ...
created new dramatic templates for old concepts, such as the Devil, witchcraft, etc. in books such as ''
À Rebours
''À rebours'' (; translated ''Against Nature'' or ''Against the Grain'') is an 1884 novel by the French writer Joris-Karl Huysmans. The narrative centers on a single character: Jean des Esseintes, an eccentric, reclusive, ailing aesthete. The ...
''
gainst Nature(1884) and ''Là-Bas''
own There(1891).
*
Guy de Maupassant
Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant (, ; ; 5 August 1850 – 6 July 1893) was a 19th-century French author, remembered as a master of the short story form, as well as a representative of the Naturalist school, who depicted human lives, destin ...
followed in the footsteps of Poe, and anticipated
H. P. Lovecraft, becoming obsessed with the notion of slow descent into madness caused by fearsome otherworldly forces. His masterpiece was ''
Le Horla
"The Horla" (French: ''Le Horla'') is an 1887 short horror fiction, horror story written in the style of a journal by the French writer Guy de Maupassant, after an initial, much shorter version published in the newspaper ''Gil Blas (periodical ...
'' (1887), which was the basis for the 1963 film ''
Diary of a Madman''. In it, it is revealed that Man shared the Earth with invisible beings of great powers to whom we are only cattle.
* The eclectic
Villiers de l'Isle-Adam
Jean-Marie-Mathias-Philippe-Auguste, comte de Villiers de l'Isle-Adam (7 November 1838 – 19 August 1889) was a French symbolist writer. His family called him Mathias while his friends called him Villiers; he would also use the name Auguste w ...
whose macabre ''Contes Cruels''
ruel Tales(1883) and ''Tribulat Bonhomet'' (1887) were also inspired by Poe.
*
Marcel Schwob
Mayer André Marcel Schwob, known as Marcel Schwob (23 August 1867 – 26 February 1905), was a French symbolist writer best known for his short stories and his literary influence on authors such as Jorge Luis Borges, Alfonso Reyes, Roberto Bol ...
with the classic ''Le Roi au Masque d'Or''
he King In The Golden Mask(1892).
*
Jean Lorrain
Jean Lorrain (9 August 1855 in Fécamp, Seine-Maritime – 30 June 1906), born Paul Alexandre Martin Duval, was a French poet and novelist of the Symbolist school.
Lorrain was a dedicated disciple of dandyism and spent much of his time amongs ...
, also obsessed with the nature of evil, with ''Buveurs d'Âmes''
oul Drinkers(1893), "Les contes d'un buveur d'éther", the kabbalistic novel ''La Mandragore'' (1899) and ''Monsieur de Phocas'' (1901).
*
Octave Mirbeau
Octave Mirbeau (16 February 1848 – 16 February 1917) was a French novelist, art critic, travel writer, pamphleteer, journalist and playwright, who achieved celebrity in Europe and great success among the public, whilst still appealing to the ...
's sadistic and mean-spirited tales of murders, cannibalism and ghostly revenge collected in ''
Le Jardin des Supplices''
orture Garden(1899).
*
Belgian
Belgian may refer to:
* Something of, or related to, Belgium
* Belgians, people from Belgium or of Belgian descent
* Languages of Belgium, languages spoken in Belgium, such as Dutch, French, and German
*Ancient Belgian language, an extinct languag ...
poet
Maurice Maeterlinck
Maurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck (29 August 1862 – 6 May 1949), also known as Count (or Comte) Maeterlinck from 1932, was a Belgian playwright, poet, and essayist who was Flemish but wrote in French. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in ...
won the
Nobel Prize
The Nobel Prizes ( ; sv, Nobelpriset ; no, Nobelprisen ) are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind." Alfr ...
for Literature in 1911. The author of the classic ''
Pelléas et Mélisande'' (1892) wrote the perennial classic ''
L'Oiseau Bleu''
he Blue Bird
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
(1908), an allegorical fantasy conceived as a play for children.
* Also from Belgium,
Franz Hellens
Franz Hellens, born Frédéric van Ermengem (8 September 1881, in Brussels – 20 January 1972, in Brussels) was a prolific Belgian novelist, poet and critic. Although of Flemish descent, he wrote entirely in French, and lived in Paris from 1947 t ...
, a precursor of the surrealists, displayed a lyrical, romantic approach to fantasy. ''Les Hors-le-Vent''
he Out-Wind(1909) and ''Nocturnal'' (1919) explored into the land of dreams, which he dubbed the "second life", while his novel ''Mélusine'' (1920) was generally considered a pre-surrealist novel.
20th century prior to World War II
The confidence displayed by French Society in the early 1900s was sapped by the slaughter of World War I in which, out of 8 million Frenchmen drafted, 1.3 million were killed and 1 million severely crippled. Large sections of France were devastated and industrial production fell by 60%. In French literature, the Dadaist and Surrealist movements exemplified that desire to break violently with the past
The split between ''fantastique populaire'' and ''fantastique littéraire'' was definitively formed. The former was written by writers walking in the footsteps of Dumas, Sue and Féval, the latter by successors of Hoffmann, Poe and the
symbolists.
Fantastique populaire
Between the wars, the ''fantastique populaire'' continued to cater to the masses by providing cheap entertainment in the form of ''feuilletons'':
pulp magazines
Pulp magazines (also referred to as "the pulps") were inexpensive fiction magazines that were published from 1896 to the late 1950s. The term "pulp" derives from the cheap wood pulp paper on which the magazines were printed. In contrast, magazine ...
such as ''Le Journal des Voyages'' (1877–1947), ''Lectures Pour Tous'' (1898–1940) and ''L'Intrépide'' (1910–1937) and paperbacks from publishers such as Ollendorff, Méricant, Férenczi and Tallandier. Significant names of the times include:
* Belgian
Jean Ray is considered the most famous and influential author of ''fantastique'' of the period and is generally regarded by genre scholars as the French-language equivalent of Poe and Lovecraft. Ray began his career as a pulp writer, using a variety of aliases, and had several stories published in ''
Weird Tales
''Weird Tales'' is an American fantasy and horror fiction pulp magazine founded by J. C. Henneberger and J. M. Lansinger in late 1922. The first issue, dated March 1923, appeared on newsstands February 18. The first editor, Edwin Baird, pri ...
''. His output can be divided into three parts. Short stories steeped in the rich, mist-shrouded atmosphere of his native Flanders; a few novels, including the classic ''Malpertuis'' (1943) and rewritten translations of an unauthorized Sherlock Holmes pastiche,
Harry Dickson
Harry Dickson is a fictional pulp detective, born in America, educated in London, and was called ''The American Sherlock Holmes''. He has appeared in almost 200 pulp magazines published in Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and France.
History
T ...
. His close friend and citizen-fellow
Michel de Ghelderode
Michel de Ghelderode (born Adémar Adolphe Louis Martens, 3 April 1898 – 1 April 1962) was an avant-garde Belgian dramatist, from Flanders, who spoke and wrote in French. His works often deal with the extremes of human experience, from death an ...
(Le Grand Macabre) was another contemporary Belgian ''auteur fantastique''.
* Gaston Leroux with ''La Double Vie de Theophraste Longuet'' [The Double Life Of Theophraste Longuet] (1903), in which a retired merchant is possessed by the spirit of 18th century French highwayman Cartouche; the Hoffmannesque ''L'Homme qui a Vu le Diable'' [The Man Who Saw The Devil] (1908); the classic ''Le Fantôme de l'Opéra'' a.k.a. ''The Phantom of the Opera'' (1910) and ''Le Coeur Cambriolé'' [The Burglared Heart] (1920).
* Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre who unleashed their character Fantômas, the first modern Antisocial personality disorder, sociopathic villain, in 1911.
* André de Lorde, nicknamed the "Prince of Terror", a prolific playwright who wrote over one hundred and fifty plays for the Grand Guignol theater, collected in various volumes, including ''Théâtre d'Épouvante'' [Theater Of Horror] (1909), ''Théâtre Rouge'' [Red Theater] (1922), ''Les Drames Célèbres du Grand-Guignol'' [Famous Tragedies Of The Grand-Guignol] (1924) and ''Théâtre de la Peur'' [Theater Of Fear] (1924).
* Arthur Bernède, creator of Judex (1919) and Belphégor (novel), Belphégor (1928).
* Claude Farrère, the first recipient of the French Prix Goncourt literary award, wrote ''La Maison des Hommes Vivants'' [The House Of Living Men] (1911) in which a sect of immortals, founded by the Count of St Germain, steals others' Energy (esotericism), life forces in order to preserve their own immortality.
* One of the most distinctive genre writers of the 1930s, who also blended genres with deceptive facility, was Pierre Véry, whose Mystery fiction, mystery novels always incorporated surreal or supernatural elements. Some of his works squarely belonged in the fantasy genre, such as ''Le Pays sans Étoiles'' [The Starless Country] (1945) and ''Tout Doit Disparaître le 5 Mai'' [Everything Must Go On May 5] (1961), a collection of fantastic tales.
Fantastique littéraire
In French literature, the Dadaist and Surrealist movements exemplified the desire to break violently with the past, but the more conventional forms of the novel remained otherwise less innovative. The only new foreign influence was that of Henry James. A non-literary influence, especially on the surrealists, was that of Sigmund Freud. Some of the major contributors of the period include:
* Dadaism began as a nihilistic artistic movement that paralleled the political anarchist movements of the times. In France, it was heralded by Guillaume Apollinaire with ''L'Enchanteur Pourrissant'' [The Rotting Enchanter] (1909), a poetic dialog between Merlin and Viviane, and ''L'Hérésiarque et Cie.'' (1910), a collection of short stories written between 1899 and 1910, dealing with a variety of fantasy themes such as magic, invisibility, etc.
* In ''La Révolte des anges'' [The Revolt Of The Angels] (1914), Anatole France wrote a startling tale in which the Fallen angel Arcade schemes to organize a new revolt among the fallen angels who are living on Earth, posing as artists.
* Guillaume Apollinaire was the first, true herald of surrealism. By the time of his death, in 1918, he had made it possible for the never-ending search for the bizarre in literature to be viewed not just as an amusing but pointless game, but as a true method, a metaphysical quest, reflecting more profound concerns and higher literary ambitions.
* Blaise Cendrars openly declared his admiration for Gustave Le Rouge. His ''La Fin du Monde Filmée par l'Ange'' [The End Of The World Filmed By An Angel] (1919) and ''Moravagine'' (1926) are surrealist novels, the latter named after, and telling the story of, an evil madman whose crimes rival those of Fantômas, a character much appreciated by the Surrealists.
* Pierre Benoit (novelist), Pierre Benoit's classic ''Atlantida (novel), L'Atlantide'' (1919) was a superb variation on a theme introduced by H. Rider Haggard in ''She (novel), She'', and told the story of two French Officers who find the lost city of Atlantis in the midst of the Sahara, and fall in love with its beautiful queen, Antinea. It was filmed several times.
* The Faustian ''Marguerite de la Nuit'' [Marguerite Of The Night] (1922), by Pierre Mac Orlan, was also made into a film.
* Jean Cocteau produced such acclaimed works as the poems of ''L'Ange Heurtebise'' [The Angel Heurtebise] (1925), the plays ''Orpheus (play), Orphée'' [Orpheus] (1926) and ''Les Chevaliers de la Table ronde (Cocteau), Les Chevaliers de la Table Ronde'' [The Knights Of The Round Table] (1937), and the hauntingly beautiful and surreal 1945 film version of ''La Belle et la Bête'' a.k.a. Beauty and the Beast (1946 film), Beauty and the Beast.
* Jules Supervielle, a writer of Basque people, Basque descent, incorporated Hispanic vistas and fantasy themes in his novel ''L'Enfant de la Haute Mer'' [The Child From The High Sea] (1931).
* One of the greatest literary figures in Belgian history was eccentric playwright
Michel de Ghelderode
Michel de Ghelderode (born Adémar Adolphe Louis Martens, 3 April 1898 – 1 April 1962) was an avant-garde Belgian dramatist, from Flanders, who spoke and wrote in French. His works often deal with the extremes of human experience, from death an ...
, a true visionary whose folkish morality plays and stories resonated with Hieronymus Bosch-like humor and fantasy. ''Magie Rouge'' [Red Magic] (1934) and ''La Ballade du Grand Macabre'' [The Ballad Of The Great Macabre] (1935) brought to life the macabre tradition of Flemish culture.
* Belgian author Henri Michaux created a series of novels which read like ''voyages extraordinaires'' of the surreal with ''Voyage en Grande Garabagne'' [Voyage In Great Garabagne] (1936), ''Au Pays de la Magie'' [In The Land Of Magic] (1941) and ''Ici, Poddema'' [Here, Poddema] (1946), creating imaginary lands, peopled with colorful inhabitants who followed strange customs.
* Playwright Jean Giraudoux combined tragedy, humor and fantasy in ''The Enchanted (play), Intermezzo'' (1937), where a timid ghost revolutionizes a small town, and ''Ondine (play), Ondine'' (1939) about a water sprite who falls in love with a mortal.
* Julien Gracq's first novel, ''The Castle of Argol'' (1938) combined the effects of the roman noir with the poetry of Arthur Rimbaud. The book takes place in a Gormenghast-like castle where the young owner, his friend and the beautiful Heide spend their time playing morbid and decadent games. In 1951, Gracq published the brilliant ''The Opposing Shore'' (1951) which won the Prix Goncourt and takes place in the fictional country of Orsenna.
* Finally, Marcel Aymé deserves a special mention for his humorous and fantastic universe that combines wit and social satire with fantasy, in works such as ''Le Passe-Muraille'' [The Walker Through The Walls] (1943) about an obscure clerk who acquires the power to walk through solid objects and his animal fables, ' [''The Tales of the Crouching Cat''] (1931).
20th century post World War II
World War II exacted both a huge physical and psychological toll on French culture. France's defeat in 1940, followed by four years of occupation, confronted writers with choices they never before had to face. The discovery of the atom bomb and the Cold War introduced sharp new fears. Mainstream French culture increasingly frowned upon works of imagination and preferred instead to embrace the more naturalistic and political concerns of the existentialists such as Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. Yet, paradoxically, despite being marginalized by critics and the literary establishment, the ''fantastique'' thrived as never before, both in terms of quality and quantity.
Significant foreign influences on French modern ''fantastique'' include Franz Kafka, Jorge Luis Borges,
H. P. Lovecraft, Dino Buzzati, Julio Cortázar, Vladimir Nabokov and Richard Matheson. Other more recent influences included Stephen King, J. R. R. Tolkien and Robert E. Howard, none of whom were well known in France before the early 1980s. The growth in popularity of heroic fantasy during the last decade is a tribute to the Americanization of world culture. In Latin America of the 21st century,
authors such as César Aira, Roberto Bolaño, José Baroja, Andrés Neuman, Juan Gabriel Vásquez, Jorge Volpi, among others, stand out.
Some of the most interesting authors and works up to the 1980s are:
* Marcel Béalu's fantasy followed the path of Hoffman, Poe and Gérard de Nerval. In his stories, hapless souls became slowly trapped in dream-like realities where inhuman forces held sway. ''L'Expérience de la Nuit'' [The Experience Of Night] (1945) deals with the power to see into other dimensions. ''L'Araignée d'Eau'' [The Water Spider] (1948) is about an impossible love between a man and a watery creature who slowly turns into a girl.
* Marcel Brion's approach of the supernatural almost always referred to the romantic tradition and the search for a mystical absolute. His most famous collection of stories is ''Les Escales de la Haute Nuit'' [The Shore Leaves Of The Deepest Night] (1942).
* André Pieyre de Mandiargues' gift was to make the invisible visible with an implacable sense of logic and an almost maniacal precision. His stories are collected in ''Le Musée Noir'' [The Black Museum] (1946) and ''Soleil des Loups'' [The Sun Of The Wolves] (1951).
* André Dhôtel used adolescents as protagonists to make us experience wondrous events, always presented in a disturbingly matter-of-fact way, in ''La Chronique Fabuleuse'' [The Fabulous Chronicle] (1955) and ''Le Pays où l'on n'arrive Jamais'' [The Unreachable Country] (1955).
* Noël Devaulx' own brand of fantastique relied of the intrusion of strange and unexplainable into everyday reality. His short stories were dubbed "parables without keys." His best collections are ''L'Auberge Parpillon'' [The Parpillon Inn] (1945) and ''Le Pressoir Mystique'' [The Mystic Press] (1948).
* In 1954, publisher Fleuve Noir launched a dedicated horror imprint, ''Angoisse'', which continued monthly until 1974, publishing a total of 261 horror novels, including books by , B. R. Bruss, Maurice Limat, André Ruellan, Kurt Steiner, André Caroff's ''Madame Atomos'' series and Jean-Claude Carrière's series of ''Frankenstein in popular culture, Frankenstein'' novels.
* The prolific Claude Seignolle's brand of ''fantastique'' was influenced by his "sorcerous childhood" spent in the misty plains of his native Sologne, and a terrifying encounter with the Devil incarnated in a local warlock which he claimed to have experienced at age 15 in 1932. This conferred a real sense of authenticity to Seignolle's books, which were almost devoid of any literary artifices. His major works include ''La Malvenue'' [The Illcome] (1952) and the collections ''Histoires Maléfiques'' [Maleficent Tales] (1965) and ''Contes Macabres'' [Macabre Stories] (1966).
* One writer who defied any attempt at classification was Pierre Gripari who first wrote truculent, colorful genre novels, such as ''La Vie, la Mort et la Resurrection de Socrate-Marie Gripotard'' [Life, Death And Resurrection Of Socrate-Marie Gripotard] (1968), about a ''Candide''-like superman and ''L'Incroyable Equipée de Phosphore Noloc'' [The Incredible Voyage Of Phosphore Noloc] (1964), an homage to Jules Verne in which the hero discovers that our cosmos is really inside a woman's womb, before penning modern fairy tales such as ''Contes de la Rue Broca'' [Tales Of Broca Street] (1967), which became very popular in the 1980s.
* Christia Sylf's ''Kobor Tigan't'' (1969) and its sequel, ''Le Règne de Ta'' [The Reign Of Ta] (1971), take place 30,000 years ago, during the reign of the Giants, a mythical pre-Atlantean race. The novels tell of the conflict between the sorcerous Queen-Mother, Abim, and her daughters Opak, who rules Kobor Tigan’t, the five-levelled City of the Giants, and her sister, Ta. The world of Kobor Tigan’t is inhabited by a race of reptilian bisexual humanoids, theT’los, who are used as sex slaves by the Giants. The novels also features the crystal-like Elohim, messengers of alien powers from beyond. The ''Kobor Tigan’t'' novels cannot be compared to anything published in England or America. They contain erotic scenes as well as Esotericism, esoteric elements that one rarely finds in the literary worlds of Tolkien or Howard.
* Charles Duits belonged to the same rich and colorful tradition. With ''Ptah Hotep'' (1971) and ''Nefer'' (1978), he wrote a heroic-fantasy saga that takes place on a parallel Earth with two moons—Athenade and Thana—during the time of Ancient Egypt and the Roman Empire.
Other notable authors include:
* Pierre Barbet (writer), Pierre Barbet
* Michel Bernanos
* Jean-Louis Bouquet
* Serge Brussolo
*
* Georges-Olivier Châteaureynaud
* Lise Deharme
* Alain Dorémieux
*
* Nathalie Henneberg
* Rockne S. O'Bannon
*
*
*
* Jacques Sadoul
* Marcel Schneider (writer), Marcel Schneider
*
* Jacques Sternberg
* Roland Topor
* Julia Verlanger
Awards
Some Awards for French-language ''fantastique'' include or have includes the Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire (1974– ), the Prix Julia Verlanger (1986– ), the Prix Ozone (1977–2000) and the Prix Tour Eiffel (1997–2002).
Every year since 1994 the Fantastic'Arts festival awards ''Fantastique'' films in the French town of Gerardmer. It was preceded by the Avoriaz International Fantastic Film Festival, a similar event.
See also
*Fantastic
*French science fiction
References
French Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror and Pulp Fictionby Jean-Marc Lofficier & Randy Lofficier .
{{Film genres
Fantasy genres
French literature
Horror genres