Fantastique
Encyclopedia
The Fantastique is a French term for a literary
and cinematic genre that overlaps with science fiction
, horror
and fantasy
.
The fantastique is a substantial genre within French literature
. Arguably dating back further than English language fantasy
, it remains an active and productive genre which has evolved in conjunction with anglophone
fantasy and horror and other French and international literature.
phenomena into an otherwise realist
narrative. It evokes phenomena which are not only left unexplained but which are inexplicable from the reader's point of view. In this respect, the fantastique is somewhere between fantasy
, where the supernatural is accepted and entirely reasonable in the imaginary world of a non-realist narrative, and magic realism
, where apparently supernatural phenomena are explained and accepted as normal. Instead, characters in a work of fantastique are, just like the readers, unwilling to accept the supernatural events that occur. This refusal may be mixed with doubt, disbelief, fear, or some combination of those reactions.
Fantastique literature is often considered close to science fiction. However, there is an important difference between the two: science fiction is situated in a different time and/or place from the reader, and seemingly irrational events are actually held to be rational in the framework of future or perhaps alien science and technology.
The Fantastique is often linked to a particular ambiance, a sort of tension in the face of the impossible. There is often a good deal of fear involved, either because the characters are afraid or because the author wants to provoke fright in the reader. However, fear is not an essential component of fantastique.
Some theorists of literature
, such as Tzvetan Todorov
, contend that the fantastique is defined by its hesitation between accepting the supernatural as such and trying to rationally explain the phenomena it describes. In that case, the fantastique is nothing more than a transitional area on a spectrum from magic realism to fantasy and does not qualify as a separate literary genre.
Fantastique is a term that has also been used to describe many television series and various films.
. The old Celtic
, Frankish
and Germanic
myths were translated from religion
(implying belief
and worship
) into popular folklore
(implying belief but not worship).
The root of modern thought about and artistic depiction of many things which are today often termed 'supernatural' (such as angels, demons, fairies, witches, et cetera) has its beginnings in this period, often called the Middle Ages. Concepts and characters such as Melusine
, Harlequin
, Oberon
, Morgan Le Fay
, et cetera, were first given their definitive shapes at this time.
Significant contributions of the times include:
were: the discoveries of new continents, new scientific and technical discoveries, and Johann Gutenberg's invention of the printing press which made the greater circulation of literary works possible.
The Renaissance bloomed in France during the reign of King Francis I
who created a favorable environment for the development of letters, arts and sciences. It was during the French Renaissance that proto-science fiction first split from the fantastique. The traditional fantastique derived from myths, legends and folklore also split into one form which continued the poetic tradition of the Middle Ages and eventually led to the Merveilleux [Marvelous] and the Contes de Fées or Fairy Tales, and the other, the darker side of the same literary coin, dealing with witchcraft
and devil worship.
Significant contributions of the times include:
. Starting with the accession to the throne in 1643 of Sun King Louis XIV, France entered a period of political, artistic and scientific grandeur, before settling into the decadent reigns of Louis XV and Louis XVI. Enlightenment could arguably be said to have started with René Descartes
in 1637 with his Le Discours de la Méthode ("Discourse on Methods") or in 1687 when Isaac Newton
published his Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica ("Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy").
Baroque
(whether in the form of novel
s, plays
or even opera
s) was the link between the Merveilleux of the Renaissance and the more formalized fairy tales of the Enlightenment period. The undeniable popularity of the genre was, in great part, attributable to the fact that Fairy Tales were safe; they did not imperil the soul
— a serious concern for a nation which had just come out of an era of great religious persecution
— and they appropriately reflected the grandeur of the Sun King's reign.
The precursor in the genre was Madame d'Aulnoy
who, in 1690, introduced in her rambling novel Histoire d'Hyppolite, Comte de Douglas ("Story Of Hippolyte, Count Of Douglas"), a fairy tale entitled L'Île de la Félicité ("The Island Of Happiness").
Significant contributions of the times include:
In this fashion, the literary evolution of the Fairy Tales paralleled that of French Royalty, with the decadence and corruption of Louis XV replacing the aristocratic grandeur of Louis XIV. Writers like Cazotte embodied the transition between the Fairy Tales and a darker and grimmer fantastique.
As the spiritual influence of the Church waned, thinkers dreamed of new faiths. Many of these based their thinking on occult knowledge allegedly handed down through the ages, from the Orient
to the Knights Templar
and, finally, to the Freemasons and the Rosicrucians who flourished during the Age of Enlightenment.
, France successively experienced Napoléon's First Empire, the Bourbon Restoration
, the Second Republic
, Napoleon III's Second Empire
and the Third Republic
. During the First and Second Empires, periods of proud, military glory alternated with crushing, humiliating defeats. It was in this ever-boiling cauldron of historical upheaval that French literature exploded into a bouquet of heretofore unknown and abundant colors—and so did the fantastique.
French fantastique writers of the 19th century were diversely influenced by the English Gothic novel writers, especially Ann Radcliffe
, Matthew Gregory Lewis
and Charles Maturin
, German author E. T. A. Hoffmann and composer Richard Wagner
, American writer Edgar Allan Poe
, British poets Lord Byron and Oscar Wilde
.
It was during this incredibly rich century that we started seeing a split between the more lurid and exploitative fantastique dubbed fantastique populaire, and the more literary forms adopted by mainstream writers, dubbed fantastique littéraire.
Imitation being the sincerest form of flattery, the English gothic writers helped launch a wave of what the French called romans noirs [black novels], or romans frénétiques [frantic novels], which became the first sub-genre of popular literature. Notable works in that category include:
, stories serialized in daily instalments in newspapers; the other was the popular novel, published in inexpensive formats, catering to large audiences. In the true tradition of popular fiction, these were often considered cheap thrills, good only for the barely educated masses.
.
The split between fantastique populaire and fantastique littéraire was definitively formed. The former was written by writers walking in the footsteps of Dumas, Sue and Féval, the latter by successors of Hoffmann, Poe and the symbolists
.
. A non-literary influence, especially on the surrealists, was that of Sigmund Freud
. Some of the major contributors of the period include:
introduced sharp new fears. Mainstream French culture increasingly frowned upon works of imagination and preferred instead to embrace the more naturalistic and political concerns of the existentialists such as Jean-Paul Sartre
and Albert Camus
. Yet, paradoxically, despite being marginalized by critics and the literary establishment, the fantastique thrived as never before, both in terms of quality and quantity.
Significant foreign influences on French modern fantastique include Franz Kafka
, Jorge Luis Borges
, H. P. Lovecraft
, Dino Buzzati
, Julio Cortázar
, Vladimir Nabokov
and Richard Matheson
. Other more recent influences included Stephen King
, J. R. R. Tolkien
and Robert E. Howard
, none of whom were well-known in France before the early 1980s. The growth in popularity of heroic fantasy
during the last decade is a tribute to the Americanization of world culture.
Some of the most interesting authors and works up to the 1980s are:
Other notable authors include:
The fantastic is a genre even wider to the movies than in literature. If it does in literature as the works evoking the intrusion of the supernatural in a familiar to the reader (as opposed to the wonderful , presenting worlds where almost everything is supernatural), the movies, it also includes films of entirely supernatural worlds. Thus, the novel Lord of the Rings of JRR Tolkien , will not be classified as fantasy, but in the wonderful (specifically in the fantasy ), but its film adaptation by Peter Jackson will be classified as fantasy. At present, the wonderful and heroic fantasy is not considered a full film genres, film featuring world where magic and the irrational are everyday characters ( Legend of Ridley Scott ) will be considered fantastic.
It therefore seems logical that the fantasy film is characterized by its diversity: it includes works inspired by wonderful and fantasy ( Legend ), the horror films involving the supernatural ( The Night of masks , which features a Killer Immortal), comedic movies where magic is part of the script engine ( The Visitors , including the heroes travel through time with an enchanting), film-inspired surrealism ( The Golden Age ) ...
Fantasy films should not be confused with the cinema of science fiction , which, of course, is often the scene of the facts considered impossible, but always presented as rational. Thus, the hero of Back to the Future time travel through a scientific process, namely a machine designed for this purpose; this work is therefore the science fiction film as opposed to the Visitors , who also directed a journey through time, but does not give a rational explanation (the heroes travel in time through the magic, thanks to the work of an enchanter) and therefore falls within the fantastic (more precisely, it is a fantastic comedy).
(Translation from the French Wikipedia: Cinéma fantastique)
Every year since 1994 the Fantastic'Arts
festival awards Fantastique films in the French town of Gerardmer
.
Literary genre
A literary genre is a category of literary composition. Genres may be determined by literary technique, tone, content, or even length. Genre should not be confused with age category, by which literature may be classified as either adult, young-adult, or children's. They also must not be confused...
and cinematic genre that overlaps with science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
, horror
Horror fiction
Horror fiction also Horror fantasy is a philosophy of literature, which is intended to, or has the capacity to frighten its readers, inducing feelings of horror and terror. It creates an eerie atmosphere. Horror can be either supernatural or non-supernatural...
and fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
.
The fantastique is a substantial genre within French literature
French literature
French literature is, generally speaking, literature written in the French language, particularly by citizens of France; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak traditional languages of France other than French. Literature written in French language, by citizens...
. Arguably dating back further than English language fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
, it remains an active and productive genre which has evolved in conjunction with anglophone
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
fantasy and horror and other French and international literature.
Definition
What is distinctive about the fantastique is the intrusion of supernaturalSupernatural
The supernatural or is that which is not subject to the laws of nature, or more figuratively, that which is said to exist above and beyond nature...
phenomena into an otherwise realist
Realism (arts)
Realism in the visual arts and literature refers to the general attempt to depict subjects "in accordance with secular, empirical rules", as they are considered to exist in third person objective reality, without embellishment or interpretation...
narrative. It evokes phenomena which are not only left unexplained but which are inexplicable from the reader's point of view. In this respect, the fantastique is somewhere between fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
, where the supernatural is accepted and entirely reasonable in the imaginary world of a non-realist narrative, and magic realism
Magic realism
Magic realism or magical realism is an aesthetic style or genre of fiction in which magical elements blend with the real world. The story explains these magical elements as real occurrences, presented in a straightforward manner that places the "real" and the "fantastic" in the same stream of...
, where apparently supernatural phenomena are explained and accepted as normal. Instead, characters in a work of fantastique are, just like the readers, unwilling to accept the supernatural events that occur. This refusal may be mixed with doubt, disbelief, fear, or some combination of those reactions.
Fantastique literature is often considered close to science fiction. However, there is an important difference between the two: science fiction is situated in a different time and/or place from the reader, and seemingly irrational events are actually held to be rational in the framework of future or perhaps alien science and technology.
The Fantastique is often linked to a particular ambiance, a sort of tension in the face of the impossible. There is often a good deal of fear involved, either because the characters are afraid or because the author wants to provoke fright in the reader. However, fear is not an essential component of fantastique.
Some theorists of literature
Literary theory
Literary theory in a strict sense is the systematic study of the nature of literature and of the methods for analyzing literature. However, literary scholarship since the 19th century often includes—in addition to, or even instead of literary theory in the strict sense—considerations of...
, such as Tzvetan Todorov
Tzvetan Todorov
Tzvetan Todorov is a Franco-Bulgarian philosopher. He has lived in France since 1963 with his wife Nancy Huston and their two children, writing books and essays about literary theory, thought history and culture theory....
, contend that the fantastique is defined by its hesitation between accepting the supernatural as such and trying to rationally explain the phenomena it describes. In that case, the fantastique is nothing more than a transitional area on a spectrum from magic realism to fantasy and does not qualify as a separate literary genre.
Fantastique is a term that has also been used to describe many television series and various films.
The Middle Ages
The fantastique began to become defined in the Middle AgesMiddle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
. The old Celtic
Celtic mythology
Celtic mythology is the mythology of Celtic polytheism, apparently the religion of the Iron Age Celts. Like other Iron Age Europeans, the early Celts maintained a polytheistic mythology and religious structure...
, Frankish
Franks
The Franks were a confederation of Germanic tribes first attested in the third century AD as living north and east of the Lower Rhine River. From the third to fifth centuries some Franks raided Roman territory while other Franks joined the Roman troops in Gaul. Only the Salian Franks formed a...
and Germanic
Germanic peoples
The Germanic peoples are an Indo-European ethno-linguistic group of Northern European origin, identified by their use of the Indo-European Germanic languages which diversified out of Proto-Germanic during the Pre-Roman Iron Age.Originating about 1800 BCE from the Corded Ware Culture on the North...
myths were translated from religion
Religion
Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to...
(implying belief
Belief
Belief is the psychological state in which an individual holds a proposition or premise to be true.-Belief, knowledge and epistemology:The terms belief and knowledge are used differently in philosophy....
and worship
Worship
Worship is an act of religious devotion usually directed towards a deity. The word is derived from the Old English worthscipe, meaning worthiness or worth-ship — to give, at its simplest, worth to something, for example, Christian worship.Evelyn Underhill defines worship thus: "The absolute...
) into popular folklore
Folklore
Folklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
(implying belief but not worship).
The root of modern thought about and artistic depiction of many things which are today often termed 'supernatural' (such as angels, demons, fairies, witches, et cetera) has its beginnings in this period, often called the Middle Ages. Concepts and characters such as Melusine
Melusine
Melusine is a figure of European legends and folklore, a feminine spirit of fresh waters in sacred springs and rivers.She is usually depicted as a woman who is a serpent or fish from the waist down...
, Harlequin
Harlequin
Harlequin or Arlecchino in Italian, Arlequin in French, and Arlequín in Spanish is the most popularly known of the zanni or comic servant characters from the Italian Commedia dell'arte and its descendant, the Harlequinade.-Origins:...
, Oberon
Oberon
Oberon is a legendary king of the fairies.Oberon may also refer to:-People:* Merle Oberon , British actress* Oberon Zell-Ravenheart , Neopagan activist-Media and entertainment:* Oberon...
, Morgan Le Fay
Morgan le Fay
Morgan le Fay , alternatively known as Morgane, Morgaine, Morgana and other variants, is a powerful sorceress in the Arthurian legend. Early works featuring Morgan do not elaborate her character beyond her role as a fay or magician...
, et cetera, were first given their definitive shapes at this time.
Significant contributions of the times include:
- The Chansons de gesteChanson de gesteThe chansons de geste, Old French for "songs of heroic deeds", are the epic poems that appear at the dawn of French literature. The earliest known examples date from the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries, nearly a hundred years before the emergence of the lyric poetry of the trouvères and...
[Songs of Deed] such as La Chanson de RolandThe Song of RolandThe Song of Roland is the oldest surviving major work of French literature. It exists in various manuscript versions which testify to its enormous and enduring popularity in the 12th to 14th centuries...
[The Song Of Roland] (c. 1100), Le Roman de Tristan et IseultTristan and IseultThe legend of Tristan and Iseult is an influential romance and tragedy, retold in numerous sources with as many variations. The tragic story is of the adulterous love between the Cornish knight Tristan and the Irish princess Iseult...
[The Novel Of Tristan & Ysolde] (c. 1170), Lancelot, ou Le Chevalier à la CharetteLancelotSir Lancelot du Lac is one of the Knights of the Round Table in the Arthurian legend. He is the most trusted of King Arthur's knights and plays a part in many of Arthur's victories...
[Lancelot, or The Knight With A Cart] (c. 1177) and Perceval, ou le Conte du GraalPercivalPercival or Perceval is one of King Arthur's legendary Knights of the Round Table. In Welsh literature his story is allotted to the historical Peredur...
[Perceval, or The Tale Of The Grail] (c. 1182), both by Chrétien de TroyesChrétien de TroyesChrétien de Troyes was a French poet and trouvère who flourished in the late 12th century. Perhaps he named himself Christian of Troyes in contrast to the illustrious Rashi, also of Troyes...
. - Between 1215 and 1235, Robert de BoronRobert de BoronRobert de Boron was a French poet of the late 12th and early 13th centuries who is most notable as the author of the poems Joseph d'Arimathe and Merlin.-Work:...
, a successor of Chrétien de Troyes, published Histoire du Saint-GraalHoly GrailThe Holy Grail is a sacred object figuring in literature and certain Christian traditions, most often identified with the dish, plate, or cup used by Jesus at the Last Supper and said to possess miraculous powers...
[The Story Of The Holy Grail], Histoire de Merlin [The Story Of Merlin], Le Livre de Lancelot du Lac [The Book Of Lancelot Of The Lake], La Quête du Saint-Graal [The Quest For The Holy Grail] and La Mort du Roi ArthuKing ArthurKing Arthur is a legendary British leader of the late 5th and early 6th centuries, who, according to Medieval histories and romances, led the defence of Britain against Saxon invaders in the early 6th century. The details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention, and...
[The Death Of King Arthur]. These books formed the basis for all subsequent Arthurian legendsRound Table (Camelot)The Round Table is King Arthur's famed table in the Arthurian legend, around which he and his Knights congregate. As its name suggests, it has no head, implying that everyone who sits there has equal status. The table was first described in 1155 by Wace, who relied on previous depictions of...
, and established the now well known origins of the Holy Grail as the vessel in which Joseph of ArimatheaJoseph of ArimatheaJoseph of Arimathea was, according to the Gospels, the man who donated his own prepared tomb for the burial of Jesus after Jesus' Crucifixion. He is mentioned in all four Gospels.-Gospel references:...
collected the blood of Jesus Christ. - The Fabliaux, satirical fables which relied on the tradition established by AesopAesopAesop was a Greek writer credited with a number of popular fables. Older spellings of his name have included Esop and Isope. Although his existence remains uncertain and no writings by him survive, numerous tales credited to him were gathered across the centuries and in many languages in a...
of using anthropomorphic animals such as Le Roman de RenartReynardReynard is the subject of a literary cycle of allegorical French, Dutch, English, and German fables largely concerned with Reynard, an anthropomorphic red fox and trickster figure.-Etymology of the name:Theories about the origin of the name Reynard are:...
, generally attributed to poet Pierre de Saint-Cloud (c. 1175). (By the 14th century, Le Roman de Renart included over 30 books.) - Medieval poetryPoetryPoetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
which often employed the supernatural as a mean of literary artifice, such as Le Roman de la RoseRoman de la RoseThe Roman de la rose, , is a medieval French poem styled as an allegorical dream vision. It is a notable instance of courtly literature. The work's stated purpose is to both entertain and to teach others about the Art of Love. At various times in the poem, the "Rose" of the title is seen as the...
[The Romance Of The Rose] by Guillaume de LorrisGuillaume de LorrisGuillaume de Lorris was a French scholar and poet from Lorris. He was the author of the first section of the Roman de la Rose. Little is known about him, other than that he wrote the earlier section of the poem around 1230, and that the work was completed forty years later by Jean de Meun.-...
(c. 1230), the ballads of Marie de FranceMarie de FranceMarie de France was a medieval poet who was probably born in France and lived in England during the late 12th century. She lived and wrote at an undisclosed court, but was almost certainly at least known about at the royal court of King Henry II of England...
(c. 1170), Le Jeu de la Feuillée [The Game Of The Leaves] (c. 1275) by Adam de la HalleAdam de la HalleAdam de la Halle, also known as Adam le Bossu was a French-born trouvère, poet and musician, whose literary and musical works include chansons and jeux-partis in the style of the trouveres, polyphonic rondel and motets in the style of early liturgical polyphony, and a musical play, "The Play of...
, and the anonymous Le Livre de la Fontaine Périlleuse [The Book Of The Perilous Fountain] (c. 1425). - The religious dramas called MysteriesMystery playMystery plays and miracle plays are among the earliest formally developed plays in medieval Europe. Medieval mystery plays focused on the representation of Bible stories in churches as tableaux with accompanying antiphonal song...
and Miracles which often took several days to perform, and included spectacular stage effects, such as Le Jeu d'AdamLe Jeu d'AdamLe Jeu d'Adam is a twelfth-century French dramatic representation of Biblical stories, including the temptation and fall of Adam and Eve, the story of Cain and Abel, and the prophets Isaiah and Daniel...
[Play Of Adam]; La Résurrection du Sauveur [Our Savior's Resurrection]; Le Jeu de Saint Nicolas [Play Of Saint Nicolas] by Jean Bodel d'Arras and the monumental Le Mystère de la Passion [Mystery Of The Passion, or Passion Play] by Arnoul Gréban, organist and choirmaster of Notre Dame de ParisNotre Dame de ParisNotre Dame de Paris , also known as Notre Dame Cathedral, is a Gothic, Roman Catholic cathedral on the eastern half of the Île de la Cité in the fourth arrondissement of Paris, France. It is the cathedral of the Catholic Archdiocese of Paris: that is, it is the church that contains the cathedra of...
.
The Renaissance
The 16th century was marked by the emergence of new ideas and literary trends, often as a reaction against what was perceived as the "obscurantism" of the Middle Ages. Among the factors which contributed to the RenaissanceRenaissance
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...
were: the discoveries of new continents, new scientific and technical discoveries, and Johann Gutenberg's invention of the printing press which made the greater circulation of literary works possible.
The Renaissance bloomed in France during the reign of King Francis I
Francis I of France
Francis I was King of France from 1515 until his death. During his reign, huge cultural changes took place in France and he has been called France's original Renaissance monarch...
who created a favorable environment for the development of letters, arts and sciences. It was during the French Renaissance that proto-science fiction first split from the fantastique. The traditional fantastique derived from myths, legends and folklore also split into one form which continued the poetic tradition of the Middle Ages and eventually led to the Merveilleux [Marvelous] and the Contes de Fées or Fairy Tales, and the other, the darker side of the same literary coin, dealing with witchcraft
Witchcraft
Witchcraft, in historical, anthropological, religious, and mythological contexts, is the alleged use of supernatural or magical powers. A witch is a practitioner of witchcraft...
and devil worship.
Significant contributions of the times include:
- In his Odes (1550), poet Pierre de RonsardPierre de RonsardPierre de Ronsard was a French poet and "prince of poets" .-Early life:...
(1524–1585), founder of the literary group La Pleïade, often drew heavily on the superstitions of his native Vendômois country, writing about witches. Then, at the peak of his literary fame, he devoted several of his more famous Hymnes (1552) to supernatural subjects such as "Daimons" and astrologyAstrologyAstrology consists of a number of belief systems which hold that there is a relationship between astronomical phenomena and events in the human world...
. - The classic novel L'Astrée [Astrea] (1607–27) by Honoré d'UrféHonoré d'UrféHonoré d'Urfé, marquis de Valromey, comte de Châteauneuf was a French novelist and miscellaneous writer.- Life :...
was obviously inspired by the prose romance of chivalry Amadis de GaulaAmadis de GaulaAmadis de Gaula is a landmark work among the knight-errantry tales which were in vogue in 16th century Iberian Peninsula, and formed the earliest reading of many Renaissance and Baroque writers, although it was written at the onset of the 14th century.The first known printed edition was published...
, which had been circulating since the late 13th century, but reached its pinnacle when reassembled by Spanish writer Garci Rodríguez de MontalvoGarci Rodríguez de MontalvoGarci Rodríguez de Montalvo was a Spanish author who arranged the modern version of the chivalric romance Amadis of Gaul, written in three books in the 14th century by an unknown author...
. - Famous playwright Pierre CorneillePierre CorneillePierre Corneille was a French tragedian who was one of the three great seventeenth-century French dramatists, along with Molière and Racine...
's lesser-known but classic tragedies, Médée (1635) and Circé (1675), popularized warlocks and witches as the deus ex machina of French theater. - The Malleus MaleficarumMalleus MaleficarumThe Malleus Maleficarum is an infamous treatise on witches, written in 1486 by Heinrich Kramer, an Inquisitor of the Catholic Church, and was first published in Germany in 1487...
spawned a number of French imitations, among which were Jean BodinJean BodinJean Bodin was a French jurist and political philosopher, member of the Parlement of Paris and professor of law in Toulouse. He is best known for his theory of sovereignty; he was also an influential writer on demonology....
's La Démonomanie des Sorciers [Demonology Of Sorcerers] (1580) and Le Fléau des Démons et ses Sorciers [Plague Of Demons And Sorcerers] (1616).
The Age of Enlightenment
The 18th century was known as the Siècle des Lumières ("Century of Lights"), or Age of EnlightenmentAge of Enlightenment
The Age of Enlightenment was an elite cultural movement of intellectuals in 18th century Europe that sought to mobilize the power of reason in order to reform society and advance knowledge. It promoted intellectual interchange and opposed intolerance and abuses in church and state...
. Starting with the accession to the throne in 1643 of Sun King Louis XIV, France entered a period of political, artistic and scientific grandeur, before settling into the decadent reigns of Louis XV and Louis XVI. Enlightenment could arguably be said to have started with René Descartes
René Descartes
René Descartes ; was a French philosopher and writer who spent most of his adult life in the Dutch Republic. He has been dubbed the 'Father of Modern Philosophy', and much subsequent Western philosophy is a response to his writings, which are studied closely to this day...
in 1637 with his Le Discours de la Méthode ("Discourse on Methods") or in 1687 when Isaac Newton
Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton PRS was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist, and theologian, who has been "considered by many to be the greatest and most influential scientist who ever lived."...
published his Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica ("Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy").
Baroque
Baroque
The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...
(whether in the form of novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
s, plays
Play (theatre)
A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...
or even opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
s) was the link between the Merveilleux of the Renaissance and the more formalized fairy tales of the Enlightenment period. The undeniable popularity of the genre was, in great part, attributable to the fact that Fairy Tales were safe; they did not imperil the soul
Soul
A soul in certain spiritual, philosophical, and psychological traditions is the incorporeal essence of a person or living thing or object. Many philosophical and spiritual systems teach that humans have souls, and others teach that all living things and even inanimate objects have souls. The...
— a serious concern for a nation which had just come out of an era of great religious persecution
Religious persecution
Religious persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or group of individuals as a response to their religious beliefs or affiliations or lack thereof....
— and they appropriately reflected the grandeur of the Sun King's reign.
The precursor in the genre was Madame d'Aulnoy
Madame d'Aulnoy
Marie-Catherine Le Jumel de Barneville, Baroness d'Aulnoy , also known as Countess d'Aulnoy, was a French writer known for her fairy tales...
who, in 1690, introduced in her rambling novel Histoire d'Hyppolite, Comte de Douglas ("Story Of Hippolyte, Count Of Douglas"), a fairy tale entitled L'Île de la Félicité ("The Island Of Happiness").
Significant contributions of the times include:
- In 1697, Charles PerraultCharles PerraultCharles Perrault was a French author who laid the foundations for a new literary genre, the fairy tale, with his works derived from pre-existing folk tales. The best known include Le Petit Chaperon rouge , Cendrillon , Le Chat Botté and La Barbe bleue...
, until then a renowned literary figure, a champion of sciences, released under his son's name Histoires ou Contes du Temps Passé ("Histories or Tales Of Past Times") a.k.a. Contes de ma Mère l'OieMother GooseThe familiar figure of Mother Goose is an imaginary author of a collection of fairy tales and nursery rhymes which are often published as Mother Goose Rhymes. As a character, she appears in one "nursery rhyme". A Christmas pantomime called Mother Goose is often performed in the United Kingdom...
("Tales Of Mother Goose"). In it, Perrault had carefully collected a number of popular folk tales and legends, such as Cendrillon aka CinderellaCinderella"Cinderella; or, The Little Glass Slipper" is a folk tale embodying a myth-element of unjust oppression/triumphant reward. Thousands of variants are known throughout the world. The title character is a young woman living in unfortunate circumstances that are suddenly changed to remarkable fortune...
, La Belle au Bois Dormant aka Sleeping BeautySleeping BeautySleeping Beauty by Charles Perrault or Little Briar Rose by the Brothers Grimm is a classic fairytale involving a beautiful princess, enchantment, and a handsome prince...
, Peau d'Âne aka Donkey Skin, Le Petit Chaperon Rouge ("Little Red Riding HoodLittle Red Riding HoodLittle Red Riding Hood, also known as Little Red Cap, is a French fairy tale about a young girl and a Big Bad Wolf. The story has been changed considerably in its history and subject to numerous modern adaptations and readings....
"), Barbe-Bleue ("BluebeardBluebeard"Bluebeard" is a French literary folktale written by Charles Perrault and is one of eight tales by the author first published by Barbin in Paris in January 1697 in Histoires ou Contes du temps passé. The tale tells the story of a violent nobleman in the habit of murdering his wives and the...
"), Le Chat Botté ("Puss in BootsPuss in Boots'Puss' is a character in the fairy tale "The Master Cat, or Puss in Boots" by Charles Perrault. The tale was published in 1697 in his Histoires ou Contes du temps passé...
"), etc. - Madame d'Aulnoy followed suit with a three-volume collection simply entitled Contes de Fées Fairy Tales, and then her Contes Nouveaux ou Les Fées à la Mode ("New Tales or Fairies In Fashion") (1698–1702). Her best-remembered stories are L'Oiseau BleuThe Blue Bird (fairy tale)"The Blue Bird" is a French literary fairy tale by Madame d'Aulnoy, published in 1697. An English translation was included in The Green Fairy Book, 1892, collected by Andrew Lang.The tale is Aarne-Thompson type 432, The Prince as Bird...
("The Blue Bird"), La Chatte Blanche ("PuddockyPuddocky"Puddocky" is a German fairy tale. A variant, "Cherry," was collected by the Brothers Grimm, and in French, Madame d'Aulnoy retold it in a literary fairy tale as "The White Cat", altering the tale's frog into a cat.-Synopsis:...
"), and Le Nain Jaune ("The Yellow DwarfThe Yellow DwarfThe Yellow Dwarf is a French literary fairy tale by Madame d'Aulnoy. Andrew Lang included it in The Blue Fairy Book.-Synopsis:A widowed queen spoiled her only daughter , who was so beautiful that kings vied for the honor of her hand, not believing they could attain it. Uneasy that her daughter...
"), which spawned a popular board gameBoard gameA board game is a game which involves counters or pieces being moved on a pre-marked surface or "board", according to a set of rules. Games may be based on pure strategy, chance or a mixture of the two, and usually have a goal which a player aims to achieve...
. - The Book of One Thousand and One NightsThe Book of One Thousand and One NightsOne Thousand and One Nights is a collection of Middle Eastern and South Asian stories and folk tales compiled in Arabic during the Islamic Golden Age...
was "translated" into French — and quite possibly made up from very thin or non-existent sources as no earlier Arabic manuscripts of AladdinAladdinAladdin is a Middle Eastern folk tale. It is one of the tales in The Book of One Thousand and One Nights , and one of the most famous, although it was actually added to the collection by Antoine Galland ....
and Ali BabaAli BabaAli Baba is a fictional character from medieval Arabic literature. He is described in the adventure tale of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves...
are known to exist — by Antoine GallandAntoine GallandAntoine Galland was a French orientalist and archaeologist, most famous as the first European translator of The Thousand and One Nights...
from 1704 to 1717. - In ZadigZadigZadig ou la Destinée, is a famous novel and work of philosophical fiction written by Enlightenment philosopher Voltaire. It tells the story of Zadig, a philosopher in ancient Babylonia...
(1747), VoltaireVoltaireFrançois-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...
mocked his contemporaries' predilection for the Fairy Tales, while making use of the same literary devices. - Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont, whose classic La Belle et la Bête ("Beauty and the BeastBeauty and the BeastBeauty and the Beast is a traditional fairy tale. The first published version of the fairy tale was a rendition by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, published in La jeune américaine, et les contes marins in 1740...
"; 1757) has transcended the ages, authored forty collections of tales (dubbed "Magasins" or "Stores", hence the English word magazineMagazineMagazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...
), published in London between 1750 and 1780. La Belle et la Bête was, itself, based on an earlier fairy tale by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Gallon de Villeneuve, included in her collection Les Contes Marins ou La Jeune Américaine ("Sea Stories or The Young American Girl"; 1740). - Jacques CazotteJacques CazotteJacques Cazotte was a French author.Born at Dijon, he was educated by the Jesuits. Cazotte then worked for the French Ministry ofthe Marine and at the age of 27 he obtained a public office at Martinique....
, who had started as a writer of Fairy Tales, such as La Patte du Chat ("Cat's PawCat's pawCat's paw is a phrase derived from La Fontaine's fable, "The Monkey and the Cat", referring to a person used unwittingly by another to accomplish his own purposes.Cat's paw or Catspaw may also refer to:* The paw of a cat*Cat's paw...
"; 1741) and Les Mille et Une Fadaises ("A Thousand and One Silly Stories"; 1742), soon tired of it and ended up writing darker tales. - Chevalier Charles-Joseph de Mayer gathered the best Fairy Tales of the times and released a forty-one volume anthologyAnthologyAn anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler. It may be a collection of poems, short stories, plays, songs, or excerpts...
entitled Le Cabinet des Fées ("The Fairies' Cabinet"), published in AmsterdamAmsterdamAmsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
and GenevaGenevaGeneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
between 1785 and 1789 — the first specialized fantasy imprintImprintIn the publishing industry, an imprint can mean several different things:* As a piece of bibliographic information about a book, it refers to the name and address of the book's publisher and its date of publication as given at the foot or on the verso of its title page.* It can mean a trade name...
ever published.
In this fashion, the literary evolution of the Fairy Tales paralleled that of French Royalty, with the decadence and corruption of Louis XV replacing the aristocratic grandeur of Louis XIV. Writers like Cazotte embodied the transition between the Fairy Tales and a darker and grimmer fantastique.
As the spiritual influence of the Church waned, thinkers dreamed of new faiths. Many of these based their thinking on occult knowledge allegedly handed down through the ages, from the Orient
Orient
The Orient means "the East." It is a traditional designation for anything that belongs to the Eastern world or the Far East, in relation to Europe. In English it is a metonym that means various parts of Asia.- Derivation :...
to the Knights Templar
Knights Templar
The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon , commonly known as the Knights Templar, the Order of the Temple or simply as Templars, were among the most famous of the Western Christian military orders...
and, finally, to the Freemasons and the Rosicrucians who flourished during the Age of Enlightenment.
- In 1670, the Abbé Nicolas-Pierre-Henri de Montfaucon de Villars published the thinly disguised occult fiction, Le Comte de Gabalis ("The Count Of Gabalis"), sub-titled Entretiens sur les Sciences Secrètes ("Conversations On Secret Sciences"). Having disclosed secret knowledge allegedly led to the Abbott's murder by Rosicrucians in 1675.
- In 1731, the Abbé Jean TerrassonJean TerrassonJean Terrasson , often referred to as the Abbe Terrasson, was a French priest, author, and most notably a member of the Académie française....
wrote Séthos, Histoire ou Vie Tirée des Monuments, Anecdotes de l'Ancienne Égypte ("Story or Life Drawn from Monuments & Anecdotes from Ancient Egypt"), whose pseudo-Egyptian and occult themes were later tapped by Wolfgang Amadeus MozartWolfgang Amadeus MozartWolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
for his opera The Magic FluteThe Magic FluteThe Magic Flute is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue....
. - Cazotte's Le Diable amoureux (The Devil in Love, 1772) was sub-titled un roman fantastique, the first time in literary history that a work was so labeled. The Devil in Love could be considered the first modern French horrorHorror fictionHorror fiction also Horror fantasy is a philosophy of literature, which is intended to, or has the capacity to frighten its readers, inducing feelings of horror and terror. It creates an eerie atmosphere. Horror can be either supernatural or non-supernatural...
novel. In it, a young nobleman conjures up a demon who assumes the shape of a beautiful woman. The supernatural was not treated as a fantasmagory, or for satirical or philosophical purposes. It was intended to be real and to induce fear in the reader. - Another work in the same vein was VathekVathekVathek is a Gothic novel written by William Beckford...
, a novel written directly into French in 1787 by English-born writer William Thomas BeckfordWilliam Thomas BeckfordWilliam Thomas Beckford , usually known as William Beckford, was an English novelist, a profligate and consummately knowledgeable art collector and patron of works of decorative art, a critic, travel writer and sometime politician, reputed to be the richest commoner in England...
. A Byronic figure steeped in occult knowledge and sexual perversions, Beckford allegedly wrote his novel non-stop in three days and two nights in a state of tranceAltered state of consciousnessAn altered state of consciousness , also named altered state of mind, is any condition which is significantly different from a normal waking beta wave state. The expression was used as early as 1966 by Arnold M. Ludwig and brought into common usage from 1969 by Charles Tart: it describes induced...
. - Finally, in 1813, the very strange Le Manuscrit Trouvé à Saragosse ("The Manuscript Found in SaragossaThe Manuscript Found in SaragossaThe Manuscript Found in Saragossa , is a frame-tale novel by the Polish Enlightenment author, Count Jan Potocki...
") was published. Like Vathek, it was written directly into French by a non-French writer, the PolishPolandPoland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
count and scientist Jan PotockiJan PotockiCount Jan Nepomucen Potocki was a Polish nobleman, Polish Army Captain of Engineers, ethnologist, Egyptologist, linguist, traveler, adventurer and popular author of the Enlightenment period, whose life and exploits made him a legendary figure in his homeland...
.
19th Century
The 19th century was a period of great turmoil in French history. After the French RevolutionFrench Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
, France successively experienced Napoléon's First Empire, the Bourbon Restoration
Bourbon Restoration
The Bourbon Restoration is the name given to the period following the successive events of the French Revolution , the end of the First Republic , and then the forcible end of the First French Empire under Napoleon – when a coalition of European powers restored by arms the monarchy to the...
, the Second Republic
French Second Republic
The French Second Republic was the republican government of France between the 1848 Revolution and the coup by Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte which initiated the Second Empire. It officially adopted the motto Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité...
, Napoleon III's Second Empire
Second French Empire
The Second French Empire or French Empire was the Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870, between the Second Republic and the Third Republic, in France.-Rule of Napoleon III:...
and the Third Republic
French Third Republic
The French Third Republic was the republican government of France from 1870, when the Second French Empire collapsed due to the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, to 1940, when France was overrun by Nazi Germany during World War II, resulting in the German and Italian occupations of France...
. During the First and Second Empires, periods of proud, military glory alternated with crushing, humiliating defeats. It was in this ever-boiling cauldron of historical upheaval that French literature exploded into a bouquet of heretofore unknown and abundant colors—and so did the fantastique.
French fantastique writers of the 19th century were diversely influenced by the English Gothic novel writers, especially Ann Radcliffe
Ann Radcliffe
Anne Radcliffe was an English author, and considered the pioneer of the gothic novel . Her style is romantic in its vivid descriptions of landscapes, and long travel scenes, yet the Gothic element is obvious through her use of the supernatural...
, Matthew Gregory Lewis
Matthew Gregory Lewis
Matthew Gregory Lewis was an English novelist and dramatist, often referred to as "Monk" Lewis, because of the success of his classic Gothic novel, The Monk.-Family:...
and Charles Maturin
Charles Maturin
Charles Robert Maturin, also known as C.R. Maturin was an Irish Protestant clergyman and a writer of gothic plays and novels.-Biography:...
, German author E. T. A. Hoffmann and composer Richard Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
, American writer Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
, British poets Lord Byron and Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...
.
It was during this incredibly rich century that we started seeing a split between the more lurid and exploitative fantastique dubbed fantastique populaire, and the more literary forms adopted by mainstream writers, dubbed fantastique littéraire.
Romans Noirs
As the 19th century was about to begin, the English gothic novels hit the French literary scene with a bang. Their extravagant and macabre nature tapped into the emotions released during the French Revolution, and eventually helped the genre to seamlessly evolve into the more modern forms of the fantastique.Imitation being the sincerest form of flattery, the English gothic writers helped launch a wave of what the French called romans noirs [black novels], or romans frénétiques [frantic novels], which became the first sub-genre of popular literature. Notable works in that category include:
- Coelina, ou l'Enfant du Mystère [Coelina, or The Child Of Mystery] (1799) by François-Guillaume Ducray-Duminil.
- Cyprien Bérard's Lord Rutwen ou les Vampires (1820), which was adapted into a stage play by Charles NodierCharles NodierJean Charles Emmanuel Nodier , was a French author who introduced a younger generation of Romanticists to the conte fantastique, gothic literature, vampire tales, and the importance of dreams as part of literary creation, and whose career as a librarian is often underestimated by literary...
the same year, and starred John William Polidori's vampireVampireVampires are mythological or folkloric beings who subsist by feeding on the life essence of living creatures, regardless of whether they are undead or a living person...
character Lord RuthvenLord Ruthven (vampire)Lord Ruthven is a fictional character. First appearing in print in 1816, he was one of the first vampires in English literature.-Origins:There is a genuine title of Lord Ruthven of Freeland which is a subsidiary title of the Earl of Carlisle in the United Kingdom...
. - Falthurne (1820) by Honoré de BalzacHonoré de BalzacHonoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright. His magnum opus was a sequence of short stories and novels collectively entitled La Comédie humaine, which presents a panorama of French life in the years after the 1815 fall of Napoleon....
, a novel about a virgin prophetess who knows occult secrets that date all the way back to Ancient MesopotamiaMesopotamiaMesopotamia is a toponym for the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, largely corresponding to modern-day Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey and southwestern Iran.Widely considered to be the cradle of civilization, Bronze Age Mesopotamia included Sumer and the...
. Also of note by Balzac: Le Centenaire [The Centenarian], inspired by Melmoth the WandererMelmoth the WandererMelmoth the Wanderer is a gothic novel published in 1820, written by Charles Robert Maturin .- Synopsis :...
(1822), L'Élixir de Longue Vie [The Elixir Of Long Life] (1830), Louis Lambert (1832), about a man seeking higher dimensions, the aptly named La Recherche de l'Absolu [The Search For The Absolute] (1834), whose hero is an alchemist, and Melmoth Réconcilié [Melmoth Reconciled] (1835). - Charles NodierCharles NodierJean Charles Emmanuel Nodier , was a French author who introduced a younger generation of Romanticists to the conte fantastique, gothic literature, vampire tales, and the importance of dreams as part of literary creation, and whose career as a librarian is often underestimated by literary...
with Smarra ou les Démons de la Nuit [Smarra, or The Demons Of The Night] (1821), a series of terrifying dream-based tales. Nodier's masterpiece was La Fée aux Miettes [The Crumb Fairy] (1832). In it, a young carpenter is devoted to the eponymous Fairy, who may be the legendary Queen of Sheba. In order to restore her to her true form, he searches for the magical Singing MandragoreMandrake (plant)Mandrake is the common name for members of the plant genus Mandragora, particularly the species Mandragora officinarum, belonging to the nightshades family...
. Nodier could rightfully lay claim to being one of the world's first "high fantasy" writers, sixty years before William MorrisWilliam MorrisWilliam Morris 24 March 18343 October 1896 was an English textile designer, artist, writer, and socialist associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and the English Arts and Crafts Movement...
. - The three-volume La Vampire (1825) by Étienne-Léon de Lamothe-Langon which tells the story of a young Napoleonic army officer who bring his HungarianHungaryHungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
fiancée home to later discover that she is a vampire, and Le Diable [The Devil] (1832) featuring the charismatic, evil Chevalier Draxel. - Victor HugoVictor HugoVictor-Marie Hugo was a Frenchpoet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist and exponent of the Romantic movement in France....
with Han d'Islande [Han Of Iceland] (1823), a bloody tale featuring a VikingVikingThe term Viking is customarily used to refer to the Norse explorers, warriors, merchants, and pirates who raided, traded, explored and settled in wide areas of Europe, Asia and the North Atlantic islands from the late 8th to the mid-11th century.These Norsemen used their famed longships to...
warrior and a mythical bear, Bug-Jargal (1826) and the morbid and romantic L'Homme qui Rit aka The Man Who LaughsThe Man Who LaughsThe Man Who Laughs is a novel by Victor Hugo, originally published in April 1869 under the French title L'Homme qui rit. Also published under the title By Order of the King...
(1869) about a horribly disfigured man who lived in 17th century England. (Its 1928 film version, starring Conrad VeidtConrad VeidtConrad Veidt was a German actor best remembered for his roles in films such as The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari , The Man Who Laughs , The Thief of Bagdad and Casablanca...
, was credited as the model for BatmanBatmanBatman is a fictional character created by the artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger. A comic book superhero, Batman first appeared in Detective Comics #27 , and since then has appeared primarily in publications by DC Comics...
's the JokerJoker (comics)The Joker is a fictional character, a comic book supervillain published by DC Comics. He is the archenemy of Batman, having been directly responsible for numerous tragedies in Batman's life, including the paralysis of Barbara Gordon and the death of Jason Todd, the second Robin...
.) - Frédéric Soulié with the classic Les Mémoires du Diable [The Devil's Memoirs] (1838) which combined the roman frénétique with the passions of the Marquis de SadeMarquis de SadeDonatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer famous for his libertine sexuality and lifestyle...
.
Fantastique Populaire
Eventually, the roman noir gave way to more modern forms of the fantastique. One was the feuilletonFeuilleton
Feuilleton was originally a kind of supplement attached to the political portion of French newspapers, consisting chiefly of non-political news and gossip, literature and art criticism, a chronicle of the latest fashions, and epigrams, charades and other literary trifles...
, stories serialized in daily instalments in newspapers; the other was the popular novel, published in inexpensive formats, catering to large audiences. In the true tradition of popular fiction, these were often considered cheap thrills, good only for the barely educated masses.
- Alexandre Dumas, pèreAlexandre Dumas, pèreAlexandre Dumas, , born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a French writer, best known for his historical novels of high adventure which have made him one of the most widely read French authors in the world...
was finely attuned to the literary marketplace. The success of Hoffmann's Tales and of the Thousand And One Nights influenced him to write Les Mille et Un Fantômes [A Thousand And One Ghosts] (1849), an anthology of macabre tales. Dumas wrote his own version of Lord Ruthwen in Le Vampire (1851). Finally, in 1857, he penned one of the first modern werewolfWerewolfA werewolf, also known as a lycanthrope , is a mythological or folkloric human with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf or an anthropomorphic wolf-like creature, either purposely or after being placed under a curse...
stories, Le Meneur de Loups [The Leader Of Wolves]. - Edgar QuinetEdgar QuinetEdgar Quinet was a French historian and intellectual.-Early years:Born at Bourg-en-Bresse, in the département of Ain. His father, Jérôme Quinet, had been a commissary in the army, but being a strong republican and disgusted with Napoleon's 18 Brumaire coup, he gave up his post and devoted himself...
wrote Ahasvérus (1833), a lengthy and sophisticated poetic narrative about the Wandering JewWandering JewThe Wandering Jew is a figure from medieval Christian folklore whose legend began to spread in Europe in the 13th century. The original legend concerns a Jew who taunted Jesus on the way to the Crucifixion and was then cursed to walk the earth until the Second Coming...
, and a remarkable book about Merlin, Merlin l'Enchanteur [Merlin The Enchanter] (1895). - Eugène SueEugène SueJoseph Marie Eugène Sue was a French novelist.He was born in Paris, the son of a distinguished surgeon in Napoleon's army, and is said to have had the Empress Joséphine for godmother. Sue himself acted as surgeon both in the Spanish campaign undertaken by France in 1823 and at the Battle of Navarino...
's own Wandering Jew narrative, Le Juif ErrantLe Juif Errant-Publication:Le Juif errant was a serially published novel, which attained great popularity in Paris, and beyond. According to historian John McGreevy, the novel was intensely and deliberately "anti-Catholic." Its publication, and that of its predecessor Les Mystères de Paris, greatly increased...
[The Wandering Jew], was serialized in 1844-45. Dumas' Isaac Laquedem appeared in 1853. - Paul Féval, pèrePaul Féval, pèrePaul Henri Corentin Féval, père was a French novelist and dramatist.He was the author of popular swashbuckler novels such as Le Loup Blanc and the perennial best-seller Le Bossu...
was a one of the most important fantastique writers of the period with Les Revenants [Revenants] (1853), La Fille du Juif Errant [The Daughter Of The Wandering Jew] (1864), the macabre La Vampire [The Vampire Countess] (1867), and La Ville Vampire [The Vampire City] (1874) which parodied Ann Radcliffe, making her the book's fictional heroine!
Fantastique Littéraire
On the more respectable side of the literary fence, the 19th century fantastique literature after 1830 was dominated by the influence of E. T. A. Hoffmann, and then by that of Edgar Allan PoeEdgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
.
- In 1839, Gérard de NervalGérard de NervalGérard de Nerval was the nom-de-plume of the French poet, essayist and translator Gérard Labrunie, one of the most essentially Romantic French poets.- Biography :...
collaborated with Alexandre Dumas on L'Alchimiste [The Alchemist]. Mentally unhinged after a lover's death, Nerval developed an interest in mystical beliefs, especially in his book Les Illuminés. Note that after being institutionalized, his work began taking on an increasing visionary quality, though non-fantastique with Aurélia (1853–54) and Les Filles du Feu [Daughters of Fire] (1854). - In La Morte AmoureuseLa Morte Amoureuse"La Morte Amoureuse" is a short story written by Théophile Gautier and was published in La Chronique de Paris in 1836. It tells the story of a priest named Romuald who falls in love with Clarimonde, a beautiful woman who turns out to be a vampire....
(1836), Théophile GautierThéophile GautierPierre Jules Théophile Gautier was a French poet, dramatist, novelist, journalist, art critic and literary critic....
told the story of a young priest who falls in love with a beautiful female vampire. In it, the vampire is not a soulless creature, but a loving and erotic woman. Gautier's AvatarAvatar (short story)Avatar, first published in 1856, is a Fantastique 19th century short story by French writer Théophile Gautier.-Plot Summary:Octave de Saville pines for Lithuanian Countess Prascovie Labinska. Alas, she rejects his advances, and remains faithful to her husband, Count Olaf. Octave slowly drifts...
(1856) and Spirite (1866) are roman spirites which deal with the theme of life after death. - Prosper MériméeProsper MériméeProsper Mérimée was a French dramatist, historian, archaeologist, and short story writer. He is perhaps best known for his novella Carmen, which became the basis of Bizet's opera Carmen.-Life:...
's La Vénus d'IlleLa Vénus d'IlleLa Vénus d'Ille is a short story by Prosper Mérimée. It was written in 1835 and published in 1837. It tells the story of a statue of Venus that comes to life and kills the son of its owner, whom it believes to be its husband.-Plot summary:...
(1837), features a pagan statue that comes to life and kills a young groom on his wedding night - Rustic legends of the AlsaceAlsaceAlsace is the fifth-smallest of the 27 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the seventh-most densely populated region in France and third most densely populated region in metropolitan France, with ca. 220 inhabitants per km²...
were also the main source of inspiration of Émile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian, a writing team who signed their works Erckmann-Chatrian. Their first collection, Les Contes Fantastiques [Fantastic Tales] (1847), includes the classic short story L'Araignée Crabe [The Crab-Spider], about a blood-sucking lake monster with the body of a spider and the head of a man. - Jules Amédée Barbey d'AurevillyJules Amédée Barbey d'AurevillyJules-Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly was a French novelist and short story writer. He specialised in mystery tales that explored hidden motivation and hinted at evil without being explicitly concerned with anything supernatural...
wrote tales of terror in which morbid passions are acted out in bizarre crimes, such as Les Diaboliques [The Diabolical Women] (written in 1858, published in 1874, no relation to the movie). Also of note is L'Ensorcelé. - In 1858, Gustave FlaubertGustave FlaubertGustave Flaubert was a French writer who is counted among the greatest Western novelists. He is known especially for his first published novel, Madame Bovary , and for his scrupulous devotion to his art and style.-Early life and education:Flaubert was born on December 12, 1821, in Rouen,...
produced what may very well be the first work of modern French heroic fantasy, SalammbôSalammbô (novel)Salammbô is a historical novel by Gustave Flaubert. It is set in Carthage during the third century BCE, immediately before and during the Mercenary Revolt which took place shortly after the First Punic War. Flaubert's main source was Book I of Polybius's Histories...
, a brash, colorful and exotic novel about ancient CarthageCarthageCarthage , implying it was a 'new Tyre') is a major urban centre that has existed for nearly 3,000 years on the Gulf of Tunis, developing from a Phoenician colony of the 1st millennium BC...
. - Joris-Karl HuysmansJoris-Karl HuysmansCharles-Marie-Georges Huysmans was a French novelist who published his works as Joris-Karl Huysmans . He is most famous for the novel À rebours...
created new dramatic templates for old concepts, such as the Devil, witchcraft, etc. in books such as À ReboursÀ reboursÀ rebours is a novel by the French writer Joris-Karl Huysmans...
[Against Nature] (1884) and Là-Bas [Down There] (1891). - Guy de MaupassantGuy de MaupassantHenri René Albert Guy de Maupassant was a popular 19th-century French writer, considered one of the fathers of the modern short story and one of the form's finest exponents....
followed in the footsteps of Poe, and anticipated H. P. LovecraftH. P. LovecraftHoward Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
, becoming obsessed with the notion of slow descent into madness caused by fearsome otherworldly forces. His masterpiece was Le Horla (1887), which was the basis for the 1963 film Diary of a MadmanDiary of a Madman (film)Diary of a Madman is a 1963 horror film directed by Reginald Le Borg and starring Vincent Price, Nancy Kovack, and Chris Warfield.The screenplay, written by producer Robert Kent, is an adaptation of Guy de Maupassant's short story "Le Horla" , written in 1887...
. In it, it is revealed that Man shared the Earth with invisible beings of great powers to whom we are only cattle. - The eclectic Villiers de l'Isle-Adam whose macabre Contes Cruels [Cruel Tales] (1883) and Tribulat Bonhomet (1887) were also inspired by Poe.
- Marcel SchwobMarcel SchwobMarcel Schwob was a Jewish French writer.-Biography:He was born in Chaville, Hauts-de-Seine on 23 August 1867...
with the classic Le Roi au Masque d'Or [The King In The Golden Mask] (1892). - Jean LorrainJean LorrainJean Lorrain , born Paul Duval, was a French poet and novelist of the Symbolist school....
, also obsessed with the nature of evil, with Buveurs d'Âmes [Soul Drinkers] (1893), "Les contes d'un buveur d'éther", the kabbalistic novel La Mandragore (1899) and Monsieur de Phocas (1901). - Octave MirbeauOctave MirbeauOctave Mirbeau was a French journalist, art critic, travel writer, pamphleteer, novelist, and playwright, who achieved celebrity in Europe and great success among the public, while still appealing to the literary and artistic avant-garde...
's sadistic and mean-spirited tales of murders, cannibalism and ghostly revenge collected in Le Jardin des SupplicesThe Torture Garden (novel)The Torture Garden is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau and was first published in 1899, during the Dreyfus Affair...
[Torture Garden] (1899). - BelgianBelgiumBelgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
poet Maurice MaeterlinckMaurice MaeterlinckMaurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck, also called Comte Maeterlinck from 1932, was a Belgian playwright, poet, and essayist who wrote in French. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911. The main themes in his work are death and the meaning of life...
won the Nobel PrizeNobel PrizeThe Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...
for Literature in 1911. The author of the classic Pelléas et Mélisande (1892) wrote the perennial classic L'Oiseau BleuL'Oiseau BleuThe Blue Bird is a 1908 play by Belgian author Maurice Maeterlinck. It premiered on 30 September 1908 at Constantin Stanislavski's Moscow Art Theatre and has been turned into several films and a TV series. The French composer Albert Wolff wrote an opera The Blue Bird is a 1908 play by Belgian...
[The Blue Bird] (1908), an allegorical fantasy conceived as a play for children. - Also from Belgium, Franz HellensFranz HellensFranz Hellens, born Frédéric van Ermengem was a prolific Belgian novelist, poet and critic...
, a precursor of the surrealists, displayed a lyrical, romantic approach to fantasy. Les Hors-le-Vent [The Out-Wind] (1909) and Nocturnal (1919) explored into the land of dreams, which he dubbed the "second life", while his novel Mélusine (1920) was generally considered a pre-surrealist novel.
20th century prior to World War II
The confidence displayed by French Society in the early 1900s was sapped by the slaughter of World War I in which, out of 8 million Frenchmen drafted, 1.3 million were killed and 1 million severely crippled. Large sections of France were devastated and industrial production fell by 60%. In French literature, the Dadaist and Surrealist movements exemplified that desire to break violently with the pastThe split between fantastique populaire and fantastique littéraire was definitively formed. The former was written by writers walking in the footsteps of Dumas, Sue and Féval, the latter by successors of Hoffmann, Poe and the symbolists
Symbolism (arts)
Symbolism was a late nineteenth-century art movement of French, Russian and Belgian origin in poetry and other arts. In literature, the style had its beginnings with the publication Les Fleurs du mal by Charles Baudelaire...
.
Fantastique populaire
Between the wars, the fantastique populaire continued to cater to the masses by providing cheap entertainment in the form of feuilletons, pulp magazines such as Le Journal des Voyages (1877–1947), Lectures Pour Tous (1898–1940) and L'Intrépide (1910–1937) and paperbacks from publishers such as Ollendorff, Méricant, Férenczi and Tallandier. Significant names of the times include:- Belgian Jean Ray was, whithout a doubt, the most famous and influential author of fantastique of the period and is generally regarded by genre scholars as the French-language equivalent of Poe and Lovecraft. Ray began his career as a pulp writer, using a variety of aliases, and had several stories published in Weird TalesWeird TalesWeird Tales is an American fantasy and horror fiction pulp magazine first published in March 1923. It ceased its original run in September 1954, after 279 issues, but has since been revived. The magazine was set up in Chicago by J. C. Henneberger, an ex-journalist with a taste for the macabre....
. His gigantic output can be divided into three parts. Short stories steeped in the rich, mist-shrouded atmosphere of his native Flanders; a few novels, including the classic Malpertuis (1943) and rewritten translations of an unauthorized Sherlock Holmes pastiche, Harry DicksonHarry DicksonHarry Dickson is a fictional pulp detective, born in America, educated in London, and was called The American Sherlock Holmes. He has appeared in almost 200 pulp magazines published in Germany, Holland, Belgium and France.- History :...
. His close friend and citizen-fellow Michel de GhelderodeMichel De GhelderodeMichel de Ghelderode was an avant-garde Belgian dramatist, writing in French.-Career:...
(Le Grand MacabreLe Grand MacabreLe Grand Macabre is György Ligeti's only opera. The opera has two acts and its libretto – loosely based on the 1934 play, La Balade du grand macabre, by Michel De Ghelderode – was written by Ligeti in collaboration with Michael Meschke...
) was another contemporary Belgian auteur fantastique. - Gaston LerouxGaston LerouxGaston Louis Alfred Leroux was a French journalist and author of detective fiction.In the English-speaking world, he is best known for writing the novel The Phantom of the Opera , which has been made into several film and stage productions of the same name, notably the 1925 film starring Lon...
with La Double Vie de Theophraste Longuet [The Double Life Of Theophraste Longuet] (1903), in which a retired merchant is possessed by the spirit of 18th century French highwayman Cartouche, the Hoffmannesque L'Homme qui a Vu le Diable [The Man Who Saw The Devil] (1908), the classic Le Fantôme de l'Opéra aka The Phantom of the OperaThe Phantom of the OperaLe Fantôme de l'Opéra is a novel by French writer Gaston Leroux. It was first published as a serialisation in "Le Gaulois" from September 23, 1909 to January 8, 1910...
(1910) and Le Coeur Cambriolé [The Burglared Heart] (1920). - Marcel AllainMarcel AllainMarcel Allain was a French writer mostly remembered today for his co-creation with Pierre Souvestre of the fictional arch-villain and master criminal Fantômas....
and Pierre SouvestrePierre SouvestrePierre Souvestre was a French lawyer, journalist, writer and organizer of motor races. He is mostly remembered today for his co-creation with Marcel Allain of the fictional arch-villain and master criminal Fantômas...
who unleashed their character FantômasFantômasFantômas is a fictional character created by French writers Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre .One of the most popular characters in the history of French crime fiction, Fantômas was created in 1911 and appeared in a total of 32 volumes written by the two collaborators, then a subsequent 11...
, the first modern sociopathicAntisocial personality disorderAntisocial personality disorder is described by the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, fourth edition , as an Axis II personality disorder characterized by "...a pervasive pattern of disregard for, and violation of, the rights of others that begins in childhood...
villain, in 1911. - André de LordeAndré de LordeAndré de Latour, comte de Lorde was a French playwright, the main author of the Grand Guignol plays from 1901-1926. His evening career was as a dramatist of terror; during daytimes he worked as a librarian in the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal. He wrote 150 plays, all of them devoted mainly to the...
, nicknamed the "Prince of Terror", a prolific playwright who wrote over one hundred and fifty plays for the Grand GuignolGrand GuignolLe Théâtre du Grand-Guignol — known as the Grand Guignol — was a theatre in the Pigalle area of Paris . From its opening in 1897 until its closing in 1962 it specialized in naturalistic horror shows...
theater, collected in various volumes, including Théâtre d'Épouvante [Theater Of Horror] (1909), Théâtre Rouge [Red Theater] (1922), Les Drames Célèbres du Grand-Guignol [Famous Tragedies Of The Grand-Guignol] (1924) and Théâtre de la Peur [Theater Of Fear] (1924). - Arthur BernèdeArthur BernèdeArthur Bernède was a French writer, poet, opera libretist, and playwright.He was born in Redon, Ille-et-Vilaine department, in Brittany....
, creator of Judex (1919) and BelphégorBelphégor (novel)Belphégor is a 1927 horror novel by French writer Arthur Bernède, about a "ghost" which haunts the Louvre Museum, in reality a masked villain trying to steal a hidden treasure...
(1928). - Claude FarrèreClaude FarrèreClaude Farrère, pseudonym of Frédéric-Charles Bargone , was a French author of novels set in such exotic locations as Istanbul, Saigon, and Nagasaki. One of his novels, Les civilisés won the Prix Goncourt for 1905. He was elected for a chair at the Académie Française on 26 March 1935...
, the first recipient of the French Prix GoncourtPrix GoncourtThe Prix Goncourt is a prize in French literature, given by the académie Goncourt to the author of "the best and most imaginative prose work of the year"...
literary award, wrote La Maison des Hommes Vivants [The House Of Living Men] (1911) in which a sect of immortals, founded by the Count of St GermainCount of St GermainThe Count of St. Germain has been variously described as a courtier, adventurer, charlatan, inventor, alchemist, pianist, violinist and an amateur composer. He achieved great prominence in European high society of the mid-1700s, and since then various scholars have linked him to mysticism,...
, steals others' life forceLife forceLife force is a concept of spiritual energy.Life force may also refer to:* Life Force , the American version of the arcade game Salamander* Lifeforce , a 1985 science fiction-horror film...
s in order to preserve their own immortalityImmortalityImmortality is the ability to live forever. It is unknown whether human physical immortality is an achievable condition. Biological forms have inherent limitations which may or may not be able to be overcome through medical interventions or engineering...
. - One of the most distinctive genre writers of the 1930s, who also blended genres with deceptive facility, was Pierre Véry, whose mysteryMystery fictionMystery fiction is a loosely-defined term.1.It is often used as a synonym for detective fiction or crime fiction— in other words a novel or short story in which a detective investigates and solves a crime mystery. Sometimes mystery books are nonfiction...
novels always incorporated surreal or supernatural elements. Some of his works squarely belonged in the fantasy genre, such as Le Pays sans Étoiles [The Starless Country] (1945) and Tout Doit Disparaître le 5 Mai [Everything Must Go On May 5] (1961), a collection of fantastic tales.
Fantastique Littéraire
In French literature, the Dadaist and Surrealist movements exemplified the desire to break violently with the past, but the more conventional forms of the novel remained otherwise less innovative. The only new foreign influence was that of Henry JamesHenry James
Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....
. A non-literary influence, especially on the surrealists, was that of Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud , born Sigismund Schlomo Freud , was an Austrian neurologist who founded the discipline of psychoanalysis...
. Some of the major contributors of the period include:
- Dadaism began as a nihilistic artistic movement that paralleled the political anarchist movements of the times. In France, it was heralded by Guillaume ApollinaireGuillaume ApollinaireWilhelm Albert Włodzimierz Apolinary Kostrowicki, known as Guillaume Apollinaire was a French poet, playwright, short story writer, novelist, and art critic born in Italy to a Polish mother....
with L'Enchanteur Pourrissant [The Rotting Enchanter] (1909), a poetic dialog between Merlin and Viviane, and L'Hérésiarque et Cie. (1910), a collection of short stories written between 1899 and 1910, dealing with a variety of fantasy themes such as magic, invisibilityInvisibilityInvisibility is the state of an object that cannot be seen. An object in this state is said to be invisible . The term is usually used as a fantasy/science fiction term, where objects are literally made unseeable by magical or technological means; however, its effects can also be seen in the real...
, etc. - In La Révolte des Anges [The Revolt Of The Angels] (1914), Anatole FranceAnatole FranceAnatole France , born François-Anatole Thibault, , was a French poet, journalist, and novelist. He was born in Paris, and died in Saint-Cyr-sur-Loire. He was a successful novelist, with several best-sellers. Ironic and skeptical, he was considered in his day the ideal French man of letters...
wrote a startling tale in which the Fallen angelFallen angelFallen angel is a concept developed in Jewish mythology from interpretation of the Book of Enoch. The actual term fallen angel is not found in either the Hebrew Bible or the New Testament. Christians adopted the concept of fallen angels mainly based on their interpretations of the Book of...
Arcade schemes to organize a new revolt among the fallen angels who are living on Earth, posing as artists. - Guillaume ApollinaireGuillaume ApollinaireWilhelm Albert Włodzimierz Apolinary Kostrowicki, known as Guillaume Apollinaire was a French poet, playwright, short story writer, novelist, and art critic born in Italy to a Polish mother....
was the first, true herald of surrealism. By the time of his death, in 1918, he had made it possible for the never-ending search for the bizarre in literature to be viewed not just as an amusing but pointless game, but as a true method, a metaphysical quest, reflecting more profound concerns and higher literary ambitions. - Blaise CendrarsBlaise CendrarsFrédéric Louis Sauser , better known as Blaise Cendrars, was a Swiss novelist and poet naturalized French in 1916. He was a writer of considerable influence in the modernist movement.-Early years:...
openly declared his admiration for Gustave Le RougeGustave Le RougeGustave Henri Joseph Le Rouge was a French writer who embodied the evolution of modern science fiction at the beginning of the 20th century, by moving it away from the juvenile adventures of Jules Verne and incorporating real people into his stories, thus bridging the gap between Vernian and...
. His La Fin du Monde Filmée par l'Ange [The End Of The World Filmed By An Angel] (1919) and Moravagine (1926) are surrealist novels, the latter named after, and telling the story of, an evil madman whose crimes rival those of FantômasFantômasFantômas is a fictional character created by French writers Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre .One of the most popular characters in the history of French crime fiction, Fantômas was created in 1911 and appeared in a total of 32 volumes written by the two collaborators, then a subsequent 11...
, a character much appreciated by the Surrealists. - Pierre BenoitPierre Benoit (novelist)Pierre Benoît was a French novelist and member of the Académie française.Pierre Benoit, born in Albi was the son of a French soldier. Benoit spent his early years and military service in Northern Africa, before becoming a civil servant...
's classic L'Atlantide (1919) was a superb variation on a theme introduced by H. Rider HaggardH. Rider HaggardSir Henry Rider Haggard, KBE was an English writer of adventure novels set in exotic locations, predominantly Africa, and a founder of the Lost World literary genre. He was also involved in agricultural reform around the British Empire...
in SheShe (novel)She, subtitled A History of Adventure, is a novel by Henry Rider Haggard, first serialized in The Graphic magazine from October 1886 to January 1887. She is one of the classics of imaginative literature, and with over 83 million copies sold in 44 different languages, one of the best-selling books...
, and told the story of two French Officers who find the last city of AtlantisAtlantisAtlantis is a legendary island first mentioned in Plato's dialogues Timaeus and Critias, written about 360 BC....
in the midst of the SaharaSaharaThe Sahara is the world's second largest desert, after Antarctica. At over , it covers most of Northern Africa, making it almost as large as Europe or the United States. The Sahara stretches from the Red Sea, including parts of the Mediterranean coasts, to the outskirts of the Atlantic Ocean...
, and fall in love with its beautiful queen, Antinea. It was filmed several times. http://www.coolfrenchcomics.com/atlantide.htm - The FaustFaustFaust is the protagonist of a classic German legend; a highly successful scholar, but also dissatisfied with his life, and so makes a deal with the devil, exchanging his soul for unlimited knowledge and worldly pleasures. Faust's tale is the basis for many literary, artistic, cinematic, and musical...
ian Marguerite de la Nuit [Marguerite Of The Night] (1922), by Pierre Mac OrlanPierre Mac OrlanPierre Mac Orlan, sometimes written MacOrlan, was a French novelist and songwriter.His novel Quai des Brumes was the source for Marcel Carné's 1938 film of the same name, starring Jean Gabin...
, was also made into a film. - Jean CocteauJean CocteauJean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau was a French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, playwright, artist and filmmaker. His circle of associates, friends and lovers included Kenneth Anger, Pablo Picasso, Jean Hugo, Jean Marais, Henri Bernstein, Marlene Dietrich, Coco Chanel, Erik Satie, María...
produced such acclaimed works as the poems of L'Ange Heurtebise [The Angel Heurtebise] (1925), the plays OrphéeOrphéeOrpheus is a 1950 French film directed by Jean Cocteau and starring Jean Marais. This film is the central part of Cocteau's Orphic Trilogy, which consists of The Blood of a Poet , Orpheus and Testament of Orpheus...
[Orpheus] (1926) and Les Chevaliers de la Table Ronde [The Knights Of The Round Table] (1937), and the hauntingly beautiful and surreal 1945 film version of La Belle et la Bête aka Beauty and the BeastBeauty and the Beast (1946 film)Beauty and the Beast is a 1946 French romantic fantasy film adaptation of the traditional fairy tale of the same name, written by Jeanne-Marie Le Prince de Beaumont and published in 1757 as part of a fairy tale anthology . Directed by French poet and filmmaker Jean Cocteau, the film stars Josette...
. - Jules SupervielleJules SupervielleJules Supervielle was a French poet and writer born in Uruguay.Jules Supervielle always kept away from Surrealism which was dominant in the first half of the twentieth century...
, a writer of BasqueBasque peopleThe Basques as an ethnic group, primarily inhabit an area traditionally known as the Basque Country , a region that is located around the western end of the Pyrenees on the coast of the Bay of Biscay and straddles parts of north-central Spain and south-western France.The Basques are known in the...
descent, incorporated Hispanic vistas and fantasy themes in his novel L'Enfant de la Haute Mer [The Child From The High Sea] (1931). - One of the greatest literary figures in Belgian history was eccentric playwright Michel de GhelderodeMichel De GhelderodeMichel de Ghelderode was an avant-garde Belgian dramatist, writing in French.-Career:...
, a true visionary whose folkish morality plays and stories resonated with Hieronymus Bosch-like humor and fantasy. Magie Rouge [Red Magic] (1934) and La Ballade du Grand Macabre [The Ballad Of The Great Macabre] (1935) brought to life the macabre tradition of Flemish culture. - Belgian author Henri MichauxHenri MichauxHenri Michaux was a highly idiosyncratic Belgian-born poet, writer, and painter who wrote in French. He later took French citizenship. Michaux is best known for his esoteric books written in a highly accessible style, and his body of work includes poetry, travelogues, and art criticism...
created a series of novels which read like voyages extraordinaires of the surreal with Voyage en Grande Garabagne [Voyage In Great Garabagne] (1936), Au Pays de la Magie [In The Land Of Magic] (1941) and Ici, Poddema [Here, Poddema] (1946), creating imaginary lands, peopled with colorful inhabitants who followed strange customs. - Playwright Jean GiraudouxJean GiraudouxHippolyte Jean Giraudoux was a French novelist, essayist, diplomat and playwright. He is considered among the most important French dramatists of the period between World War I and World War II. His work is noted for its stylistic elegance and poetic fantasy...
combined tragedy, humor and fantasy in IntermezzoThe Enchanted (play)The Enchanted is a 1950 English adaptation by Maurice Valency of the play Intermezzo written in 1933 by French dramatist Jean Giraudoux.-Original productions:...
(1937), where a timid ghost revolutionizes a small town, and OndineOndine (play)Ondine is a play written in 1938 by French dramatist Jean Giraudoux that tells the story of Hans and Ondine. Hans is a knight-errant who has been sent off on a quest by his betrothed. In the forest he meets and falls in love with Ondine, a water-sprite who is attracted to the world of mortal man....
(1939) about a water sprite who falls in love with a mortal. - Julien GracqJulien GracqJulien Gracq , born Louis Poirier in Saint-Florent-le-Vieil, in the French département of Maine-et-Loire, was a French writer. He wrote novels, critiques, a play, and poetry. His literary works were noted for their Surrealism.Gracq first studied in Paris at the Lycée Henri IV, where he earned his...
's first novel, Au Château d'Argol [At The Castle Of Argol] (1938) combined the effects of the roman noir with the poetry of Arthur RimbaudArthur RimbaudJean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud was a French poet. Born in Charleville, Ardennes, he produced his best known works while still in his late teens—Victor Hugo described him at the time as "an infant Shakespeare"—and he gave up creative writing altogether before the age of 21. As part of the decadent...
. The book takes place in a GormenghastGormenghast (castle)Gormenghast is a fictional castle of titanic proportions that features prominently in a series of fantasy works penned by Mervyn Peake. It is the setting for the first two books in the Gormenghast series, Titus Groan and Gormenghast...
-like castle where the young owner, his friend and the beautiful Heide spend their time playing morbid and decadent games. In 1951, Gracq published the brilliant Le Rivage des Syrtes [The Shores Of The Syrtes] (1951) which won the Prix GoncourtPrix GoncourtThe Prix Goncourt is a prize in French literature, given by the académie Goncourt to the author of "the best and most imaginative prose work of the year"...
and takes place in the fictional countryFictional countryA fictional country is a country that is made up for fictional stories, and does not exist in real life, or one that people believe in without proof....
of Orsenna. - Finally, Marcel AyméMarcel AyméMarcel Aymé was a French novelist, children's writer, humour writer and also a screenwriter and theatre playwright.- Biography :...
deserves a sprecial mention for his humorous and fantastic universe that combines wit and social satireSatireSatire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
with fantasy, in works such as Le Passe-Muraille [The Walker Through The Walls] (1943) about an obscure clerk who acquires the power to walk through solid objects and his animal fables, Les contes du chat perché [The Tales of the Crouching Cat] (1931).
20th century post World War II
World War II exacted both a huge physical and psychological toll on French culture. France's defeat in 1940, followed by four years of occupation, confronted writers with choices they never before had to face. The discovery of the atom bomb and the Cold WarCold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
introduced sharp new fears. Mainstream French culture increasingly frowned upon works of imagination and preferred instead to embrace the more naturalistic and political concerns of the existentialists such as Jean-Paul Sartre
Jean-Paul Sartre
Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic. He was one of the leading figures in 20th century French philosophy, particularly Marxism, and was one of the key figures in literary...
and Albert Camus
Albert Camus
Albert Camus was a French author, journalist, and key philosopher of the 20th century. In 1949, Camus founded the Group for International Liaisons within the Revolutionary Union Movement, which was opposed to some tendencies of the Surrealist movement of André Breton.Camus was awarded the 1957...
. Yet, paradoxically, despite being marginalized by critics and the literary establishment, the fantastique thrived as never before, both in terms of quality and quantity.
Significant foreign influences on French modern fantastique include Franz Kafka
Franz Kafka
Franz Kafka was a culturally influential German-language author of short stories and novels. Contemporary critics and academics, including Vladimir Nabokov, regard Kafka as one of the best writers of the 20th century...
, Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...
, H. P. Lovecraft
H. P. Lovecraft
Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
, Dino Buzzati
Dino Buzzati
Dino Buzzati-Traverso was an Italian novelist, short story writer, painter and poet, as well as a journalist for Corriere della Sera. His worldwide fame is mostly due to his novel Il deserto dei Tartari, translated into English as The Tartar Steppe.-Life:Buzzati was born at San Pellegrino,...
, Julio Cortázar
Julio Cortázar
Julio Cortázar, born Jules Florencio Cortázar, was an Argentine writer. Cortázar, known as one of the founders of the Latin American Boom, influenced an entire generation of Spanish speaking readers and writers in the Americas and Europe.-Early life:Cortázar's parents, Julio José Cortázar and...
, Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...
and Richard Matheson
Richard Matheson
Richard Burton Matheson is an American author and screenwriter, primarily in the fantasy, horror, and science fiction genres. He is perhaps best known as the author of What Dreams May Come, Bid Time Return, A Stir of Echoes, The Incredible Shrinking Man, and I Am Legend, all of which have been...
. Other more recent influences included Stephen King
Stephen King
Stephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...
, J. R. R. Tolkien
J. R. R. Tolkien
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...
and Robert E. Howard
Robert E. Howard
Robert Ervin Howard was an American author who wrote pulp fiction in a diverse range of genres. Best known for his character Conan the Barbarian, he is regarded as the father of the sword and sorcery subgenre....
, none of whom were well-known in France before the early 1980s. The growth in popularity of heroic fantasy
Heroic fantasy
Heroic fantasy is a sub-genre of fantasy which chronicles the tales of heroes in imaginary lands. Unlike stories of sword and sorcery, heroic fantasy narratives tend to be intricate in plot, often involving many peoples, nations and lands. Grand battles and the fate of the world are common themes,...
during the last decade is a tribute to the Americanization of world culture.
Some of the most interesting authors and works up to the 1980s are:
- Marcel BéaluMarcel BéaluMarcel Béalu was born in Selles-sur-Cher on October 30, 1908, and raised in impoverished circumstances in Saumur. He died on June 19, 1993.-Life:...
's fantasy followed the path of Hoffman, Poe and Gérard de Nerval. In his stories, hapless souls became slowly trapped in dream-like realities where inhuman forces held sway. L'Expérience de la Nuit [The Experience Of Night] (1945) deals with the power to see into other dimensions. L'Araignée d'Eau [The Water Spider] (1948) is about an impossible love between a man and a watery creature who slowly turns into a girl. - Marcel BrionMarcel BrionMarcel Brion was a French essayist, literary critic, novelist, and historian. -Biography:The son of a lawyer, Brion was classmates in Thiers with Marcel Pagnol and Albert Cohen. After completing his secondary education in Champittet, Switzerland, he studied law at the University of Aix-en-Provence...
's approach of the supernatural almost always referred to the romantic tradition and the search for a mystical absolute. His most famous collection of stories is Les Escales de la Haute Nuit [The Shore Leaves Of The Deepest Night] (1942). - André Pieyre de MandiarguesAndré Pieyre de MandiarguesAndré Pieyre de Mandiargues was a French writer born in Paris. He became an associate of the Surrealists and married the Italian painter Bona Tibertelli de Pisis...
' gift was to make the invisible visible with an implacable sense of logic and an almost maniacal precision. His stories are collected in Le Musée Noir [The Black Museum] (1946) and Soleil des Loups [The Sun Of The Wolves] (1951). - André Dhôtel used adolescents as protagonists to make us experience wondrous events, always presented in a disturbingly matter-of-fact way, in La Chronique Fabuleuse [The Fabulous Chronicle] (1955) and Le Pays où l'on n'arrive Jamais [The Unreachable Country] (1955).
- Noël Devaulx' own brand of fantastique relied of the intrusion of strange and unexplainable into everyday reality. His short stories were dubbed "parables without keys." His best collections are L'Auberge Parpillon [The Parpillon Inn] (1945) and Le Pressoir Mystique [The Mystic Press] (1948).
- In 1954, publisher Fleuve Noir launched a dedicated horror imprint, Angoisse, which continued monthly until 1974, publishing a total of 261 horror novels, including books by Marc Agapit, B.-R. Bruss, Maurice LimatMaurice LimatMaurice Limat was a French author of science fiction.His œuvre, particularly abundant, was published primarily by publisher Fleuve Noir...
, Kurt Steiner, André CaroffAndré CaroffAndré Caroff was a French author of science fiction and horror. His œuvre, particularly abundant, was published primarily by publisher Fleuve Noir....
's Madame AtomosMadame AtomosMadame Atomos is the name of a fictional villain who appears in a book series of novels written by French writer André Caroff, a prolific author of popular adventure series, many of which include science fiction and horror elements.-Plot:...
series and Jean-Claude CarrièreJean-Claude CarrièreJean-Claude Carrière is a screenwriter and actor. Alumnus of the École normale supérieure de Saint-Cloud, he was a frequent collaborator with Luis Buñuel...
's series of FrankensteinFrankenstein in popular cultureMary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, and the famous character of Frankenstein's monster have influenced popular culture for at least 100 years. The work has inspired numerous films, television programs, video games and derivative works...
novels. - The prolific Claude SeignolleClaude SeignolleClaude Seignolle was a French author. His main interests were folklore and archaeology before he turned to fiction. He also wrote under the pseudonyms 'Starcante', 'S. Claude' and 'Jean-Robert Dumoulin'.Claude Seignolle was born in Perigueux in 1917...
's brand of fantastique was influenced by his "sorcerous childhood" spent in the misty plains of his native SologneSologneSologne , a region of north-central France extending over portions of the départements of Loiret, Loir-et-Cher and Cher...
, and a terrifying encounter with the Devil incarnated in a local warlock which he claimed to have experienced at age 15 in 1932. This conferred a real sense of authenticity to Seignolle's books, which were almost devoid of any literary artifices. His major works include La Malvenue [The Illcome] (1952) and the collections Histoires Maléfiques [Maleficent Tales] (1965) and Contes Macabres [Macabre Stories] (1966). - One writer who defied any attempt at classification was Pierre GripariPierre GripariPierre Gripari was a French writer.-Life:Born to a Greek father and a French mother, he was orphaned in 1944 and had to interrupt his studies and support himself with various jobs....
who first wrote truculent, colorful genre novels, such as La Vie, la Mort et la Resurrection de Socrate-Marie Gripotard [Life, Death And Resurrection Of Socrate-Marie Gripotard] (1968), about a CandideCandideCandide, ou l'Optimisme is a French satire first published in 1759 by Voltaire, a philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment. The novella has been widely translated, with English versions titled Candide: or, All for the Best ; Candide: or, The Optimist ; and Candide: or, Optimism...
-like superman and L'Incroyable Equipée de Phosphore Noloc [The Incredible Voyage Of Phosphore Noloc] (1964), an homage to Jules Verne in which the hero discovers that our cosmos is really inside a woman's womb, before penning modern fairy tales such as Contes de la Rue Broca [Tales Of Broca Street] (1967), which became very popular in the 1980s. - Christia SylfChristia SylfChristia Sylf was the pseudonym of Christiane Léonie Adélaïde Richard, born 28 September 1924 in Paris, died on 28 November 1980 in Entrevaux . She was a French writer of the fantastique.-Overview:...
's Kobor Tigan't (1969) and its sequel, Le Règne de Ta [The Reign Of Ta] (1971), take place 30,000 years ago, during the reign of the Giants, a mythical pre-Atlantean race. The novels tell of the conflict between the sorcerous Queen-Mother, Abim, and her daughters Opak, who rules Kobor Tigan’t, the five-levelled City of the Giants, and her sister, Ta. The world of Kobor Tigan’t is inhabited by a race of reptilian bisexual humanoids, theT’los, who are used as sex slaves by the Giants. The novels also features the crystal-like Elohim, messengers of alien powers from beyond. The Kobor Tigan’t novels cannot be compared to anything published in England or America. They contain erotic scenes as well as esotericEsotericismEsotericism or Esoterism signifies the holding of esoteric opinions or beliefs, that is, ideas preserved or understood by a small group or those specially initiated, or of rare or unusual interest. The term derives from the Greek , a compound of : "within", thus "pertaining to the more inward",...
elements that one rarely finds in the literary worlds of Tolkien or Howard. - Charles DuitsCharles Duits-Overview:Charles Duits belongs to the same rich and colorful tradition of fantasy world-building as Gustave Flaubert and Christia Sylf. With Ptah Hotep and Nefer , Duits wrote a prodigious heroic fantasy saga that took place on an Earth with two moons—Athenade and Thana—during the time of...
belonged to the same rich and colorful tradition. With Ptah Hotep (1971) and Nefer (1978), he wrote a heroic-fantasy saga that takes place on a parallel Earth with two moons—Athenade and Thana—during the time of Ancient Egypt and the Roman Empire.
Other notable authors include:
- Pierre BarbetPierre BarbetPierre Barbet was the main pseudonym used by French science fiction writer and pharmacist Claude Avice. Claude Avice also used the pseudonyms of Olivier Sprigel and David Maine...
- Michel Bernanos
- Jean-Louis Bouquet
- Serge BrussoloSerge BrussoloSerge Brussolo is a French writer.-Biography:Born in Paris, Brussolo had a tormented childhood. He studied letters and psychology and wrote his first texts very early, finding inspiration in his misery and disturbed family environment...
- Christian Charrière
- Georges-Olivier Châteaureynaud
- Lise DeharmeLise DeharmeLise Deharme , was a French writer associated with the Surrealist movement.She was born in Paris in 1898, daughter of a famous doctor...
- Alain DorémieuxAlain DorémieuxAlain Dorémieux is a writer and translator of French science-fiction, born August 15 1933 at Paris and died on July 26 1998 in Paris .He is best known as editor of Fiction, the leading journal of science fiction and fantasy in France until 1990, which he edited for over twenty years.He has...
- Michel Grimaud
- Nathalie HennebergNathalie HennebergNathalie Henneberg was a French science fiction writer, a precursor of modern French heroic fantasy. She was married to, and collaborated with, Charles Henneberg zu Irmelshausen Wasungen .-Literary biography:...
- Thomas OwenThomas OwenThomas Owen was a Welsh Anglican priest and translator of works on agriculture.-Life:Owen was born in Anglesey, Wales in 1749. He studied at Jesus College, Oxford, matriculating on 20 March 1767. He obtained a B.A. degree in 1770. He then transferred to The Queen's College, Oxford, obtaining his...
- Alain Paris
- Gérard Prévot
- Yves Rémy and Ada Rémy
- Jacques SadoulJacques SadoulJacques Sadoul is a French author.He has produced a number of anthologies on the history of science fiction.His Histoire de la science fiction moderne was a major encouragement for the serious, academic study of SF, particularly among the East European peoples of that time, because the book was...
- Marcel Schneider
- Bernard Simonay
- Jacques SternbergJacques SternbergJacques Sternberg was a French-language writer of science fiction andfantastique.-Biography:...
- Roland ToporRoland ToporRoland Topor , was a French illustrator, painter, writer and filmmaker, known for the surreal nature of his work...
- Julia Verlanger
Cinéma Fantastique
The film fantasy is a genre of films together by appealing to the supernatural . The plot of a fantasy film is based on elements commonly regarded as physically impossible and irrational (existence of mythical creatures such as vampires or werewolves , apparitions of ghosts , trip to the afterlife, etc.).The fantastic is a genre even wider to the movies than in literature. If it does in literature as the works evoking the intrusion of the supernatural in a familiar to the reader (as opposed to the wonderful , presenting worlds where almost everything is supernatural), the movies, it also includes films of entirely supernatural worlds. Thus, the novel Lord of the Rings of JRR Tolkien , will not be classified as fantasy, but in the wonderful (specifically in the fantasy ), but its film adaptation by Peter Jackson will be classified as fantasy. At present, the wonderful and heroic fantasy is not considered a full film genres, film featuring world where magic and the irrational are everyday characters ( Legend of Ridley Scott ) will be considered fantastic.
It therefore seems logical that the fantasy film is characterized by its diversity: it includes works inspired by wonderful and fantasy ( Legend ), the horror films involving the supernatural ( The Night of masks , which features a Killer Immortal), comedic movies where magic is part of the script engine ( The Visitors , including the heroes travel through time with an enchanting), film-inspired surrealism ( The Golden Age ) ...
Fantasy films should not be confused with the cinema of science fiction , which, of course, is often the scene of the facts considered impossible, but always presented as rational. Thus, the hero of Back to the Future time travel through a scientific process, namely a machine designed for this purpose; this work is therefore the science fiction film as opposed to the Visitors , who also directed a journey through time, but does not give a rational explanation (the heroes travel in time through the magic, thanks to the work of an enchanter) and therefore falls within the fantastic (more precisely, it is a fantastic comedy).
(Translation from the French Wikipedia: Cinéma fantastique)
Awards
Some Awards for French-language fantastique include or have includes the Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire (1974- ), the Prix Julia Verlanger (1986- ), the Prix Ozone (1977–2000) and the Prix Tour Eiffel (1997–2002).Every year since 1994 the Fantastic'Arts
Fantastic'Arts
The Festival international du film fantastique de Gérardmer is an international festival of horror and science fiction films which has been held each year since 1994 in Gérardmer in the Vosges, France towards the end of January...
festival awards Fantastique films in the French town of Gerardmer
Gérardmer
Gérardmer is a commune in the Vosges department in Lorraine in northeastern France.-Culture:The Fantastic'Arts festival of horror and fantastic film has been held in Gérardmer each year since 1994.-External links:...
.
See also
- FantasyFantasyFantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
- FantasticFantasticThe Fantastic is a literary term that describes a quality of other literary genres, and, in some cases, is used as a genre in and of itself, although in this case it is often conflated with the Supernatural. The term was originated in the structuralist theory of critic Tzvetan Todorov in his work...
- Science fictionScience fictionScience fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
- French literatureFrench literatureFrench literature is, generally speaking, literature written in the French language, particularly by citizens of France; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak traditional languages of France other than French. Literature written in French language, by citizens...
- French science fictionFrench science fictionFrench science fiction is a substantial genre of French literature. It remains an active and productive genre which has evolved in conjunction with anglophone science fiction and other French and international literature....
- :Category:French fantasy writers