A sharp, satirical essay by Octave Mirbeau (1894) on literary criticism, journalism’s moral failings, and the ephemeral nature of the press. Translated from French, capturing Mirbeau’s biting wit and ironic observations on critics who condemn without reading.
People can think what they like about M. Brunetière. Plenty think ill of him; that’s their business. I think well of him; that’s my right. Not that it changes anything about who M. Brunetière is. Whatever the rest of us think, M. Brunetière remains M. Brunetière. We can’t do a thing about it. I admire his moral courage, the fierce conviction of his literary opinions, his unshakeable sincerity in views that aren’t always mine—views I often disapprove of, in fact. I can see why people don’t like them. I would never force anyone to admire M. Brunetière. But equally, I would like to be left alone in my appreciation of him. If I fancy attending this professor’s eloquent lectures, I would like to do so in peace, without having desks, benches, and dead rats—those new tools of modern debate—hurled at my head. I would also appreciate it if, before demolishing M. Brunetière from top to bottom, people would take the trouble to read him. Most of those tearing him down with such zealous enthusiasm have never read a word. And they are proud of it. Some imagine—God knows why—that M. Brunetière is someone in the vein of M. Patinot, and what’s more, they prove it. So much more convenient. It saves the bother of understanding, sidesteps the difficulty of forming one’s own opinion about a writer or a work, and lets you fancy yourself a free thinker to boot. These strange habits are more widespread than you would think. Through their devoted practice, M. Hector Pessard has achieved considerable standing in the world of professional detractors. The day he confessed to his priestly habit of completely ignoring the dramatic works submitted for his judgement, he was anointed as an eminent critic. He has been climbing the ranks ever since. Let’s dream on.
I once did what so many others have done. On the word of a few immensely distinguished columnists, I too went to war against M. Brunetière. And having reduced him to dust, I took it into my head to read his books. Perhaps I should have started there. But one doesn’t think of everything in life. No doubt “copy” was urgent; no doubt my editor was behind me, spurring me on to glorious boldness: “Above all, be passionate… Give it some fire, and make it fit in nine columns.” Oh, youth! Oh, the generous and divine passions of youth! How sincerely I vibrated. Later, I was rather taken aback when, reading M. Brunetière’s works—those works I had made such mincemeat of—I found alongside some admittedly off-putting bits, admirable pages that rank among the strongest of our time. I was ashamed of my enthusiasm and thought that, when discussing a work, even a vilified one, nothing beats actually knowing it.
M. Brunetière has unleashed the fury of the press upon himself because he spoke freely about it. What he said seemed as monstrous as sacrilege. A priest defiling the holy chalice couldn’t have been more reviled by the devout. And the anger persists. Really, there’s no need. What one might reproach M. Brunetière for is lacking courage on this occasion and not following his idea through to the end. What he said has been said twenty times over, here and there. The anathema is commonplace. It could have been far more terrible and true. For there really is a “new spirit” blowing through the press. Denunciation spreads with all its cowardice; informing triumphs with all its shamelessness. It’s enough to turn your stomach. M. Brunetière could have shown the press abandoning its mission, renouncing its social character—which had been, until now, to maintain the balance between abuses of authority and the rights of human freedom—suddenly transforming itself, out of fear, into a police force that hunts, a tribunal that condemns, an executioner that kills. The daily spectacle of this degradation could have inspired the forceful words of a man of courage like M. Brunetière. But the Academy, cautious in its contempt, might not have tolerated it.
It’s not for me to cast this anathema. If I have nothing of the sort to reproach myself for, I have other reproaches to make. And my voice is too weak to be heard. Besides, nobody hears anything anymore. These are bad times for reason and pity. Ideas are powerless to pierce the clamour for death. Let’s dream on.
When you have spent some years in journalism, and you find yourself, like the heroes of novels, reliving your life in moments of sadness and discouragement, you are truly horrified by the harm you may have done, and the little good you haven’t. This examination doesn’t come without bitter remorse. It ought to lead to great humility. Those disparate and hasty opinions, born yesterday, disowned tomorrow, all those frivolous pages thrown to the wind that carries everything away, those conscious or unconscious injustices that may have echoed painfully in the hearts of strangers or half-strangers—ah, how one would like to erase all that from one’s life. And when you have been, like me, just a minor sower passing by, you can console yourself thinking that nothing grew from the bad seeds scattered at random. But those whose voices may have resounded among the crowds, those who perhaps influenced ignorant and naive souls—with what bitter melancholy they must examine their conscience.
Actually, no. The seed sown doesn’t germinate; the voice passes on the wind, leaving no trace. It’s still vanity to believe one could have done harm.
Look, yesterday I reread Rochefort’s La Lanterne, that terrible pamphlet that toppled the Empire, according to boulevard historians. I expected to find something of that formidable French wit that shook the old world, the continuation of Voltaire’s work, of Beaumarchais, Courier, Veuillot; I expected at least to breathe an acrid perfume of literature, to see laughter baring its teeth in torchlight. Wit, certainly, there was—Parisian wit, too exclusively Parisian, playing with words more than ideas, tickling the belly of the rebellious bourgeois while leaving the artist cold. What, was that all? An undeniable verve, but rather coarse, rather forced, an incessant joke, but mechanical, a joke that rings hollow beneath the thin surface of its empty gaiety. So I imagine La Lanterne had nothing to do with the Empire’s fall. The Empire didn’t fall under M. Henri Rochefort’s blows: it fell under the weight of the social fatalities it had accumulated; it fell because it had reached the historical date of its collapse.
These things last but a day, but an hour, the hour of their birth; when they lack the support of a philosophy or the flame of an artist’s thought to keep them alive, they die quickly. They were the summary of curiosities, the form of wit of an era: that’s already something. But eras are all the same. Yesterday no longer resembles today, and tomorrow is already devouring today. Nothing remains of these fragile constructions; nothing grows from these too-light seeds.
The chronicle—as its name indicates—is but the flower of a day, and tomorrow it’s withered. And it’s a great pity to think that so many talented men, who might perhaps have given literature beautiful and noble works, will leave behind them only chronicles, that is to say smoke that dissipates, a perfume that evaporates, a noise that immediately returns to the great silence of dead things. Let’s dream on.
Octave Mirbeau, Le Journal, 11 March 1894
This is one of 50+ rare French literary texts translated into English for the first time on this site.
Léon Hennique Novel 