Mémoire et manipulation dans The House in Paris d’Elizabeth Bowen

Mémoire et manipulation dans The House in Paris d’Elizabeth Bowen

In an article dealing with the problem of nostalgia in post-World War II Britain, Elizabeth Bowen made a comment that seems particularly apt for her writing as a whole: « […] the past is veiled from us by illusion – our own illusion. It is that which we seek. It is not the past, but the idea of the...

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Главный автор: Wells-Lassagne, Shannon
Формат: Article ou chapitre numérique
Язык:Français
Опубликовано: Études britanniques contemporaines 2019
Online-ссылка:Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM
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spelling openedition-oai:revues.org:ebc_7201 https://doi.org/10.4000/ebc.7201 urn:doi:10.4000/ebc.7201 fr https://journals.openedition.org/ebc/7201 2019-06-17T02:00:00Z info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess article info:eu-repo/semantics/article urn:handle:20.500.13089/fe9i https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ Mémoire et manipulation dans The House in Paris d’Elizabeth Bowen Études britanniques contemporaines Presses universitaires de la Méditerranée info:eu-repo/semantics/reference/issn/2271-5444 info:eu-repo/semantics/reference/issn/1168-4917 URI:https://journals.openedition.org/ebc Wells-Lassagne, Shannon In an article dealing with the problem of nostalgia in post-World War II Britain, Elizabeth Bowen made a comment that seems particularly apt for her writing as a whole: « […] the past is veiled from us by illusion – our own illusion. It is that which we seek. It is not the past, but the idea of the past which draws us » (« The Bend Back », Bowen 1986, 58). The relation between memory and illusion, and the underlying desire not for an impossible reality, but for what is inevitably representation, are clearly reflected in the author’s novel The House in Paris. Indeed, the attraction of memory, present in the very structure of the text (the book is divided into three sections, the Present, the Past, and the Present, the last of which takes up where the first left off), contrasts with the story itself, where the characters show a marked suspicion of memory and its subversive influence. Through this contradiction among others, Bowen posits the essentially ambiguous nature of memory: the recall of the past is necessary both within the diegesis and as a narrative strategy, but it is a siren call, invariably heeded and necessarily dangerous, which shapes the perception of the present, while insidiously changing the vision of the past. In The House in Paris, as in many of Bowen’s novels, memory and manipulation are inextricable, both for the characters, and for the reader. Une remarque d’Elizabeth Bowen dans un article traitant du problème de la nostalgie en Grande-Bretagne après la deuxième guerre mondiale s’applique particulièrement bien à son œuvre : « […] the past is veiled from us by illusion — our own illusion. It is that which we seek. It is not the past, but the idea of the past which draws us » (« The Bend Back », The Mulberry Tree 58). Le lien entre mémoire et illusion et le désir sous-jacent non pas d’une réalité insaisissable mais d’une représentation de celle-ci trouvent leur écho dans la fiction de Bowen, tout particulièrement dans The House in Paris. En effet, l’attrait pour la mémoire dont témoigne la structure même du roman (le texte est divisé en trois sections, « The Present, « The Past », et « The Present », la dernière de ces sections reprenant l’intrigue là où la première s’achève) présente un fort contraste avec la trame de l’histoire, où les personnages se montrent au contraire méfiants vis-à-vis de la mémoire et de son influence nocive. Par cette contradiction, Bowen montre à un niveau intra-et extra-diégétique la nature fondamentalement ambiguë de la mémoire : semblable au chant des sirènes, à la fois attirant et dangereux, qui déforme la perception du présent, tout en changeant la vision du passé. Dans The House in Paris, comme dans beaucoup de romans de Bowen, la mémoire et la manipulation sont ainsi inextricables, tant pour les personnages que pour le lecteur.
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description In an article dealing with the problem of nostalgia in post-World War II Britain, Elizabeth Bowen made a comment that seems particularly apt for her writing as a whole: « […] the past is veiled from us by illusion – our own illusion. It is that which we seek. It is not the past, but the idea of the past which draws us » (« The Bend Back », Bowen 1986, 58). The relation between memory and illusion, and the underlying desire not for an impossible reality, but for what is inevitably representation, are clearly reflected in the author’s novel The House in Paris. Indeed, the attraction of memory, present in the very structure of the text (the book is divided into three sections, the Present, the Past, and the Present, the last of which takes up where the first left off), contrasts with the story itself, where the characters show a marked suspicion of memory and its subversive influence. Through this contradiction among others, Bowen posits the essentially ambiguous nature of memory: the recall of the past is necessary both within the diegesis and as a narrative strategy, but it is a siren call, invariably heeded and necessarily dangerous, which shapes the perception of the present, while insidiously changing the vision of the past. In The House in Paris, as in many of Bowen’s novels, memory and manipulation are inextricable, both for the characters, and for the reader.
author Wells-Lassagne, Shannon
spellingShingle Wells-Lassagne, Shannon
Mémoire et manipulation dans The House in Paris d’Elizabeth Bowen
author_facet Wells-Lassagne, Shannon
author_sort Wells-Lassagne, Shannon
title Mémoire et manipulation dans The House in Paris d’Elizabeth Bowen
title_short Mémoire et manipulation dans The House in Paris d’Elizabeth Bowen
title_full Mémoire et manipulation dans The House in Paris d’Elizabeth Bowen
title_fullStr Mémoire et manipulation dans The House in Paris d’Elizabeth Bowen
title_full_unstemmed Mémoire et manipulation dans The House in Paris d’Elizabeth Bowen
title_sort mémoire et manipulation dans the house in paris d’elizabeth bowen
publisher Études britanniques contemporaines
publishDate 2019
container_title URI:https://journals.openedition.org/ebc
url https://ezproxy.univ-orleans.fr/login?url=https://doi.org/10.4000/ebc.7201
https://ezproxy.univ-orleans.fr/login?url=https://journals.openedition.org/ebc/7201
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