Under my previous blog post about Dangerous Liaisons (or Les Liaisons dangereuses), Michael wrote:
“I feel odd commenting because I’ve never read the book. But I think I still need some convincing that this is a book I would enjoy.
It sounds extraordinarily well written, but didn’t you find the ugliness and corruption of the characters off-putting? I recall, in reading Madame Bovary, feeling like the novel was extremely well-written and a deeply insightful picture of people whom I didn’t like and didn’t want to know (and maybe I’m wrong, but I felt Flaubert felt the same way.) Corrupt or ugly people can be fun to read about of course, but I find I don’t love books where they are the prime focus. There’s a novel by Trollope called The Eustace Diamonds that suffers from this problem; the main character is more or less a sociopath, and I find Thai [sic] tire of her company. Vanity Fair is a counter example, I suppose, but then Becky Sharp is just one character, and there are some other redeeming central characters in that novel that balance her out. Perhaps I’m just an unsophisticated and puritanical American, I don’t know. But Does [sic] Laclos have any redeeming central characters? I guess I just need some convincing that I’d enjoy it.”
Interesting question, so I thought I’d answer in a blog post.
To put it simply: is Dangerous Liaisons a cynical book that just focuses on people’s ugliness and corruption?
I’d say no.
Firstly, Dangerous Liaisons is not a celebration of cynicism and corruption. The sex games, the manipulation, the way Merteuil and Valmont play with others’ feelings bring misery to everyone involved, including themselves.
Secondly, Choderlos de Laclos dissects the cruelty and depravity of these two characters, but doesn’t depict these traits as universal or common traits of humanity—Merteuil is seen as exceptionally evil; she is, in the end, condemned and shunned by society.
Contrast that with Balzac’s vision of life in Eugénie Grandet: “She has the noblest qualities of sorrow, the saintliness of one who has never soiled her soul by contact with the world…” (translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley). In Eugénie Grandet, the world is corrupt; everyone is materialistic, selfish, scheming, dishonest; the father has no humanity; the only good people are Eugénie Grandet, her mother, and Nana, who do not understand society and its lies and deceit, who are not soiled “by contact with the world.”
That is not the vision of life in Dangerous Liaisons: Cécile de Volanges, her mother Madame de Volanges, Madame de Tourvel, Madame de Rosemonde (Valmont’s aunt) are good people; Danceny is also arguably good-natured, though his infidelity to Cécile is disappointing.
Thirdly, evil doesn’t triumph. It corrupts, it destroys, but it doesn’t win in the end. Think about King Lear: evil destroys many things in its wake and kills Cordelia (and arguably Lear), but the evil characters of the play—Cornwall, Oswald, Goneril, Regan, Edmund—are all defeated. It is similar with Dangerous Liaisons.
Choderlos de Laclos depicts two characters who like pulling the strings and manipulating other people and having power over them, but they gradually realise that many things are beyond their control. Despite their cleverness, despite their manipulation, despite their understanding of psychology, Merteuil cannot control Valmont, Valmont cannot control his own feelings for Tourvel, Merteuil cannot triumph over Cécile. Their little games are all futile.
Contrast Laclos’s vision of life in Dangerous Liaisons and the vision of life in Naomi: Tanizaki’s book is a picture of perversity, control, and baseness; the manipulative character triumphs in the end; Naomi left a bad taste in my mouth. That is not the case for Dangerous Liaisons.
Most importantly, Dangerous Liaisons is a masterpiece. Choderlos de Laclos’s psychological insight and talent for characterisation are astonishing. Even if it doesn’t end up as one of your favourite novels (which after all is personal), it is very much worth reading.
Very well argued! You’ve convinced me to try it. King Lear is an interesting example, except that we don’t focus wholly on the evil characters, even if we can temporarily feel intrigued by the clever deceptions of, say, Edmund. There is a miraculous symmetry and balance that allows one to absorb the horror and evil, but feel ultimately uplifted despite it all. But, it’s Shakespeare. Finding perfect symmetry and balance in his works is about as surprising as finding it in Mozart.
ReplyDeleteI do wonder if my view of the novel is too much influenced by the 1988 film, which I quite like — but which always leaves me feeling slightly sullied. In the film I felt that we were being invited, a bit too much, to revel in the cynicism and immorality of the characters. Sounds like perhaps Laclos judges his characters more harshly than one gets a sense of in the film?
Anyway, you’ve made me interested in trying it, so thank you.
As you know, I think that Madame Merteuil's getting smallpox and losing her looks is a contrived ending put there to pacify censors. It does not follow from the rest of the plot in any way. It is wholly arbitrary.
ReplyDeleteI think that Laclos is saying that love is a form of war, and that the book is not so much cynical as nihilistic.
Coleman,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment, though I didn't say a single word about the smallpox. That may or may not be "a contrived ending put there to pacify censors", depending on how you see it, but the more important point is that she is defeated and proven wrong, as I have argued above.
I strongly disagree with the idea that "Laclos is saying that love is a form of war." That is the thinking of Merteuil and Valmont, and it's precisely because they think of love that way and act accordingly that they are defeated. Look at Tourvel. Look at Cécile. Look at Danceny, who in the end, when he has to choose, chooses Cécile. Love is not a form of war.
The book is not at all nihilistic.
Michael,
There is no doubt that Merteuil and Valmont are charming and fascinating, but I don't think the book invites us to revel in their cynicism and immorality as such. I'm both fascinated and repulsed by them.
Thanks. Again, you have my interest.
DeleteAm I correct in my hypothesis that the film has a very different, and perhaps more cynical, tone than the book? Yes, the evil characters are punished, but we as viewers are invited to enjoy their deception and corruption a bit too much for my taste. Again, it may be just a subtle question of tone or valence.
Maybe? It was years ago when I saw the film though.
DeleteDeeply cynical is my vote. But I disagree about Lear as well. Endings are often ironic.
ReplyDeleteI recommend a return, in search of irony, to the Publisher's Note and the Editor's Preface, apparently written by John Ray, Jr., Ph.D. (Lolita reference for those who don't know). I think you are giving way (way way, way way way) too much credit to "society." There is a reason readers soon saw the novel as prophetic.
Balzac, despite his deep interest in furniture, is actually the Swedenborgian mystic in this comparison, while Laclos is the Enlightenment materialist.
I have to disagree with Amateur Reader. Laclos is not really a materialist, and the irony of the novel is (as is often the case, cf. Flaubert) an inverted idealism. I think the contending prefaces suggest this, as does the novel's very negative view of Cécile's mother, with her plans for pushing into an arranged marriage a daughter she is culpable for having kept in ignorance. Laclos is being didactic here about what a mother-daughter relationship should be, not gleefully subversive of parental authority. From what we know of Laclos' life, he seems to have been a model bourgeois husband, even if his marriage did begin (so it's said) with an unauthorized courtship like Danceny's. But setting that aside, we shouldn't downplay the role of Mme de Rosemonde, whose compassionate perspective in my opinion is not subjected to destructive irony and indeed is probably close to the author's own.
ReplyDelete"Inverted idealism" is a good phrase. It seems to me it is often a complement to direct cynicism.
ReplyDeleteNow that I have returned to London, after a few days away, and looked again at the book, I will say that I didn't read the Publisher's Note and Editor's Preface as straight at all - I know they're like the one in Nabokov's book and that Laclos isn't moralistic.
ReplyDeleteBut I do think the book is not cynical, as explained in the blog post. Laclos is ambiguous enough and presents enough of different sides for readers to interpret it in different ways. I have explained my perspectice and contrasted it with other novels.