''Les Deux Étendards'' ("The two banners") is a 1952 novel by the French writer

Lucien Rebatet Lucien Rebatet (15 November 1903 – 24 August 1972) was a French fascist, writer, journalist, and intellectual. He is known as an exponent of fascism and also as the author of '' Les Deux étendards''. Biography Early life Rebatet was born and ...

Background and publication

Rebatet began to write the novel in 1942 and continued to write it in the

Sigmaringen enclave The Sigmaringen enclave was a temporary government-in-exile formed by remnants of France's Nazi-collaborating Vichy regime during the final stages of World War II. Established in the requisitioned Sigmaringen Castle in southwestern Ger ...

, where he fled together with the

Vichy government Vichy France (; 10 July 1940 – 9 August 1944), officially the French State ('), was a French rump state headed by Marshal Philippe Pétain during World War II, established as a result of the French capitulation after the defeat against ...

in 1944. In 1946 he was sentenced to death for his sympathy for

National Socialism Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During Hitler's rise to power, it was frequ ...

and

collaboration Collaboration (from Latin ''com-'' "with" + ''laborare'' "to labor", "to work") is the process of two or more people, entities or organizations working together to complete a task or achieve a goal. Collaboration is similar to cooperation. The ...

during the war, but the penalty was commuted to forced labour the next year. He finished the novel in prison before he was released in 1952. The novel was published in two volumes, with 496 and 519 pages respectively.

Plot

The narrative is partly autobiographical and set in

Lyon Lyon (Franco-Provençal: ''Liyon'') is a city in France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of the French Alps, southeast of Paris, north of Marseille, southwest of Geneva, Switzerland, north ...

in the 1920s. It follows two young men who are in love with the same woman; one of them is to become a

Jesuit The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...

priest, while the other—the author's alter ego—is a fierce agnostic.

Reception

The novel has been praised by a large number of French-language writers, critics and intellectuals, such as

Roger Nimier Roger Nimier (31 October 1925 – 28 September 1962) was a French novelist. Life Nimier was born in Paris, and served in the French Army, specifically in the 2nd Hussard Regiment in the Second World War (until 1945). He began to write quite early ...

Antoine Blondin Antoine Blondin (; 11 April 1922 – 7 June 1991) was a French writer. He belonged to the literary group called the '' Hussards''. He was also a sports columnist in ''L'Équipe''. Blondin also wrote under the name Tenorio. Biography Blondin w ...

Jean Paulhan Jean Paulhan (2 December 1884 – 9 October 1968) was a French writer, literary critic and publisher, director of the literary magazine '' Nouvelle Revue Française'' (NRF) from 1925 to 1940 and from 1946 to 1968. He was a member (Seat 6, 1963– ...

, Étiemble, Pol Vandromme,

José Cabanis José Cabanis (2 March 1922 – 6 October 2000) was a French novelist, essayist, historian and magistrate. He was elected mainteneur of the Académie des Jeux floraux in 1965 and a member of the Académie Française in 1990. Works *''La Pit ...

Jean Dutourd Jean Gwenaël Dutourd (; 14 January 192017 January 2011) was a French novelist. Biography Dutourd was born in Paris. His mother died when he was seven years old. At the age of twenty, he was taken prisoner fifteen days after Germany's invasion ...

George Steiner Francis George Steiner, Fellow of the British Academy#Fellowship, FBA (April 23, 1929 – February 3, 2020) was a Franco-American literary critic, essayist, philosopher, novelist and educator. He wrote extensively about the relationship between ...

Anne Desclos Anne Cécile Desclos (23 September 1907 – 27 April 1998) was a French literary critic, journalist, and novelist who wrote under the pen names Dominique Aury and Pauline Réage. She is best known for her erotic novel '' Story of O'' (1954). ...

Jean Duvignaud Jean Duvignaud (22 February 1921 – 17 February 2007) was a French novelist, sociologist and anthropologist. He was born in La Rochelle, Charente-Maritime, on February 22, 1921. Duvignaud was a secondary school teacher first at Abbeville, then at ...

Marc-Édouard Nabe Marc-Édouard Nabe (born Alain Marc Édouard Zannini; 27 December 1958) is a French writer, painter and jazz guitarist. After drawing cartoons for several publications including Hara-Kiri (magazine), Hara-Kiri, Nabe published his first book ''A ...

, and

Simon Leys Pierre Ryckmans (28 September 1935 – 11 August 2014), better known by his pen name Simon Leys, was a Belgian-Australian writer, essayist and literary critic, translator, art historian, sinologist, and university professor, who lived in Austral ...

. Several of them have named it as one of the greatest novels of the post-war era, but it is also controversial due to the writer's background. Pascal Alain Ifri, professor of French at the

Washington University in St. Louis Washington University in St. Louis (WashU) is a private research university in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Founded in 1853 by a group of civic leaders and named for George Washington, the university spans 355 acres across its Danforth ...

, wrote in his monograph about the novel: "Because of Rebatet's pro-fascist, pro-German and antisemitic positions before and during World War II, notably seen in his virulent pamphlet ''Les Décombres'', there is, indeed, in the literary and journalist environment, a consensus, which was set at the publication of the book and which continues to this day, to keep quiet about Rebatet's novel, and this despite the fact that love, religion and art, and not politics, constitute its principal themes."

References

;Notes ;Bibliography *

External links

Publicity page
at

Éditions Gallimard Éditions Gallimard (), formerly Éditions de la Nouvelle Revue Française (1911–1919) and Librairie Gallimard (1919–1961), is one of the leading French book publishers. In 2003, it and its subsidiaries published 1,418 titles. Founded by G ...

's website {{DEFAULTSORT:Deux etendards 1952 French novels Novels set in Lyon French autobiographical novels French-language novels Novels set in France Novels set in the 1920s Éditions Gallimard books