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Flaubert's Itinerary in Greece
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
In the various studies of French Hellenism, attention has rarely been directed thus far to determining with exact precision where French travellers went in Greece.1 And yet their itineraries are often very revealing. This is particularly true of Gustave Flaubert. From his itinerary, not only may we know what he saw and what he chose to omit, but also we may divine the reasons for his choices. Their implications will allow us to establish one more facet of his place in nineteenth-century French Hellenism. Further, but within this broad framework, a closer study of the specific problems of his trip through the Pass of Thermopylæ and of his difficulties with its topography will permit us to begin evaluating his approach to the problems of Greek archæology, upon whose resolution so much of modern Hellenism has depended. In his life and works, Hellenism occupied an important place. From the first version of the Education sentimentale begun in 1843 to the final version of the Tentation de saint Antoine published in 1874, passages in his works frequently center about it; and his esthetics are profoundly imbued with the implications and conclusions which he drew, over the years, from his intimate study of ancient Greece. As one part of the total definition of his place in the movement, I am presenting here his itinerary, based upon the confusing data which he has left us,2 and, as a sample of his archaeological efforts, I am offering an elucidation of his complex notes on the Pass of Thermopylæ.
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1950
References
1 Eug. Lovinesco, Les Voyageurs français en Grèce au XIXe siècle (Paris: Jouve, 1909), gives summary accounts of numerous travellers. But the absence of precise maps and of detailed itineraries and indices lessens the usefulness of this book, even as a repertory.
2 The data are to be found in his Notes de voyages (Paris : Conard, 1910), II, 65-179, and in his letters from Greece. This edition of the Notes (hereafter abbreviated Ndv) leaves a great deal to be desired but, in so far as the Notes in Greece are concerned, it has not been improved upon. Some idea of the problem can be gleaned from comparing the Conard text with the fragments published in the Annales romantiques, vIII (1911), 358-371, “Paysages de Grèce. Extraits inédits des notes de voyage de Gustave Flaubert (Hiver 1850-51).” Fortunately for the present purposes, no serious differences occur. The recent edition of the Notes by M. Dumesnil (Paris: Belles Lettres, 1948) reproduces the earlier ones—in so far as the material on Greece is concerned—with only the addition of a few explanatory notes. Since I refer to Flaubert's letters by date and recipient, any of the several editions of Flaubert's Correspondance may be consulted.
3 Jean Seznec, Les Sources de l'épisode des Dieux dans la Tentation de Saint Antoine (Première version, 1849), Publications de la Faculté des Lettres de l'Université de Lille, v (Paris : Vrin, 1940).
4 Published in 1841, presumably at Athens, at the Imprimerie de l'Ami du Peuple and sold at Athens, Chez Adolphe Nast, Libraire, Rodolphe Bund, Libraire, et chez l'Auteur.
6 Paris: Gosselin, 1843. How Flaubert and DuCamp came into possession of this volume I do not know.
6 Maxime DuCamp, Souvenirs littéraires, 2 vols. (Paris: Hachette, 1883). Cf. I, 139–140.374
7 Par les champs et par les grèves (Paris: Conard, 1910), p. 326. On the following page Flaubert refers inaccurately to Chateaubriand's visit to Thermopylæ ! But the accompanying remarks suggest that this is perhaps no more than an easy slip of his memory. While Chateaubriand's itinerary in Greece seems to have had little or no direct effect on Flaubert, the earlier man's concepts and his descriptions do have an important bearing which I hope to examine in a further study.
8 I have also made use of a further map put out by Aldenhoven, Carle du royaume de la Grèce, de l'Epire et de la Thessalie dressée au 800,000e (Athens, 1839). Despite Flaubert's notoriously weak spelling, most of the places can be identified from the modern Guides bleus. Grèce (Paris: Hachette, 1932). I have found its index more useful than an atlas. One must keep in mind the modern use of k for c and the interchange of i, y and j, and of o and ou. The following place names, arranged alphabetically, cause trouble; I give Flaubert's form first: Agia-Marina = Haghia Marina; Andvitzena=Andritsœna; Apasso Samati = Stamata; Budanitza= (modern) Mendenitsa, (ancient) Pharygœ; Cemino=Ziméno; Chalus, pic de= (misreading for?) Chalcis; Crissa=Chrysso; Dravoï=Dragoï; Erimoclisi=Khelmos (?); Gastun=Gastouni; Hacamili=Hexamilia; Iogitzanika=Longaniko (?); Julinari= Soulinari; Mourozoumena=Mavrozouménos; Panapanagia=Palœo-Panaghia (?); Rapurna = Copréna; Ralyvia = Kalyvia.
The last two require special mention. Kalyvia is thus defined in Aldenhoven's guidebook (p. 428) : “… mot à mol, Cabanes. Les villages de la plaine qui portent ce nom dépendent le plus souvent d'un autre village considérable situé dans la montagne et ne sont habités que pendant l'hiver.” Further, we should note that on a number of occasions, the printed text of Flaubert's MS works gives an initial R where the word—always a foreign one— actually has a K. Thus Kapréna and Kalyvia were the forms used in his guidebooks. It is hard to know whether this is a consistent misreading of the MSS or a consistent failure on the part of Flaubert to distinguish the sounds. Additional data may be found in the letter to Ernest Chevalier of April 9, 1851, where the text gives Ramsin for Khamsin. In the absence of an opportunity to examine the MSS, I can only hazard a guess. A confusion of a voiced with an unvoiced sound is most unusual: on the other hand, a rapidly written K— and all three examples are from MSS which would have not been written carefully—could easily look like an R. A misreading is perhaps more likely than a misspelling. But, particu-375
9 It is astounding to the modern student to realize how completely recent archæology has altered the character of the great sites in Greece. Ed. About's comment on Sparta is typical of contemporary travellers and wittily revealing: “L'ancienne Sparte a péri tout entière. Tandis que les débris d'Athènes brillent encore de jeunesse et de beauté, et attirent de loin les regards du voyageur, il faut chercher sous les champs d'orge un théâtre enseveli, un tombeau, et quelques pans de muraille qui marquent la place où fut sa rivale.” La Grèce contemporaine, 4th ed. (Paris: Hachette, 1860), pp. 27-28.
10 Lettres et souvenirs d'enseignement d'Eugène Gandar publiés par sa famille, 2 vols. (Paris: Didier, 1869). Cf. I, 365.
11 Flaubert was aware of many other features: Attic realism and richness, an Anacreontic element, an Alexandrian one and still further ones. But to analyze these would take us be- yond a study of the itinerary.
12 Again, Gandar (I, 219-221) draws out for us the meaning of Flaubert's passage by refer- ence to a doctrine to which Flaubert gave ready assent: “Il existe entre les lieux célèbres
15 The same letter phrases the bitterness even more strongly. He notes that his trip in Italy will have the same defects and then says: “C'est comme pour la Grèce; je hausse les épaules de pitié, en songeant que j'y vais rester quelques semaines et non quelques mois.” And a few lines earlier, with a crisp image: “Mon voyage d'Orient a rudement entamé mon mince capital. Le soleil l'a fait maigrir.”
14 Cf. Ndv, II, 87, among others.
16 Op. cit., p. 483.
16 “D'Athènes à Corinthe”, Nouvelles Annales des voyages, Sixième Série, Deuxième Année (1856), tome premier, p. 306.379
17 Flaubert's letters from Greece do contain many picturesque details. No traveller could completely miss them. And like any traveller writing letters to his friends, Flaubert picked out those aspects of his trip having the most obviously picturesque value. Naturally, mod- ern Greece and his experiences in it bulk large in the Correspondance. But with the exception of Canaris, they are relatively absent from the Notes. His apparent lack of interest in mod- ern Greece is in striking contrast to his thoughtful considerations of contemporary problems in Egypt (cf. letters to his brother of Dec. 15, 1849, and to Cloquet of Jan. 15, 1850). Similarly, when we compare his observations on Greece with those of his contemporaries, it is obvious that he had relatively little interest in modern Greece and that he shows no sign of understanding either her problems or her potentialities. Convenient lists of other travel- lers may be found in Eug. Lovinesco, op. cit., and in Henri Peyre, Bibliographie critique de l'Hellénisme en France de 1843 à 1870, Yale Romanic Studies, vi (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1932).
18 I am convinced that in the initial planning Greece was never fully intended as a part of this long voyage en Orient. In a letter to Ernest Chevalier on May 6, 1849, Flaubert mentions Greece among the places to be visited, “s'il nous reste le temps.” Maxime Du- Camp (I, Appendice) gives a copy of the itinerary he and Flaubert established before leaving Paris. It does not include Greece. Flaubert's letters during the trip (vide letters to Emman- uel Vasse, Jan. 17, 1850; to Bouilhet, Mar. 13 and Nov. 4,1850) show a gradual crystal- lizing of the decision to include Greece on the return trip. DuCamp (I, 510-512) tells an unlikely tale of Flaubert's overwhelming homesickness and a decision to turn back toward France—via Greece—rather than to make a journey into Persia. This, he says, took place in September. This reason for the final inclusion of Greece we may dismiss as a falsehood. On April 19 Flaubert had written to Chevalier explaining that there were disquieting re- ports of revolts in Persia; on May 17 he wrote to Vasse outlining a new itinerary definitely dropping Persia. But if the journey through Greece was not merely the result of Flaubert's homesickness, at any rate it was not carefully prepared in advance by a long program of reading and study. Flaubert and DuCamp had to depend largely on their previous knowl- edge and on their guidebooks. Flaubert's classical readings have been noted by Seznec, “Les Lectures antiques de Flaubert entre 1840 et 1850”, Revue d'Histoire de la Philosophie et d'Histoire générale de la Civilisation (Dec., 1939).380
19 The wording in the Notes is often identical with that in Aldenhoven and he is referred to in several places. A comparison of II, 69-73, with Aldenhoven, pp. 61-70, will indicate how closely Flaubert followed him.381
20 Op. cit., I, 541-543. DuCamp is often an untrustworthy source.
21 P. H. Larcher, Histoire d'Hérodote, traduite du grec. Avec des Remarques Historiques et Critiques, un Essai sur la Chronologie d'Hérodote, et une Table Géographique (Paris : Crapelet, 1802).
22 Pausanias, whom Flaubert had read upon landing in Greece (II, 124–125), gave him a clue to this when he explained that, even in his day, the Gulf of Lamia was already very muddy. Cf. I, iv. But Flaubert may well not have recalled the passage; in any case, it was not conclusive. The change in the shoreline was, however, known in Flaubert's day: the other visitors to Thermopylæ at this time seem all to have been aware of it, with the pos- sible exception of Buchon. Connop Thirlwall, whose work Ad. Joanne had translated under the title Histoire de la Grèce ancienne (Paris: Paulin, 1847), was a further possible source for this information. He published a map in his English edition (London, 1846), II, 312. The map is lacking in the French edition; but a paragraph (I, 491) explains the matter. Flaubert wrote to Bouilhet on Dec. 19,1850, that he was reading Thirlwall. But he apparently felt that he was carrying enough texts when he had included Buchon, Larcher's Hérodote, and perhaps Pausanias (he is quoted on II, 88). The four volumes of Thirlwall were probably too much. Larcher's notes do not clarify the problem.
23 Again I am indebted to Professor Demorest for drawing my attention to similar diffi- culties which Flaubert encountered in his trip to Carthage for the preparation of Salammbô, particularly in regard to the exact location of the Défilé de la Hâche.
24 Op. cit. pp. 319-321.384
26 Buchon also notes this “croûte blanche qui retentit sous les pieds comme une voûte” and comments: “Rien n'est plus triste et plus disgracieux.” But he adds that the hot springs could doubtless be put to use and that this would help to alleviate the poverty of the region. His keen eye for economic and social possibilities has foreseen the future: the hot springs are now used in precisely the fashion which he recommends ! Flaubert seems to have taken no account of this. At any rate, the Notes are silent. Flaubert's Lamiaque should be Malia-que, the form used in his day.
26 His query “restes de mur?” may refer to Buchon.
27 The answer is probably that the Persians were anxious not to let Leonidas get away, not to have him still commanding a real force in their rear. Actually, Flaubert's question is a good one. In 279, the Gaul Brennus did exactly what Flaubert suggests, taking his whole army along the Anopea, as the path is called. But this gave the Greeks under Callippos time to flee (cf. Pausanias, I, x, and x, xx ff.). Fearing this attack over the pass, Antiochus III, king of Syria, tried to defend the path by erecting walls along it. These were taken by the attacking force. Therefore, Flaubert's question is not to be dismissed as irrelevant.
88 Herodotus discusses the battle at Thermopylæ in Bk. vII, pp. 198 ff. of the Larcher translation.
29 A very similar story appears in the Journal des Goncourt, vI, 86. Further corroboration is to be found in the letters to Madame Roger des Genettes of April 2 and Nov. 10, 1877, and in the letter to his niece Caroline of June 15, 1879. This interest of Flaubert's, albeit only nascent at the time of his visit, perhaps explains the minute description of the view from the pass which he gives in the Notes. It is a purely factual account of what there is to be seen and is in no sense a literary exercise.
30 Preface to Lettres de Gustave Flaubert à George Sand (Paris : Charpentier, 1884).