An eccentric hanger-on holds court in Denis Diderot's Rameau's Nephew (Le Neveu de Rameau ou La Satire seconde). This enlightenment-era novella by the French philosopher and critic narrates a lively conversation between two unnamed characters: a narrator, identified as "I", and the nephew of the French composer Rameau, identified as "He".
The nephew, who dominates the discussion, turns out to be frustratingly paradoxical; until now he has been a great high society flatterer and parasite because he acts foolish for them, but his foolishness is by design, and he's debased on principal and shallow only by having achieved a wide breadth of appreciation. Although often inconsistent, the perspectives he shares with us all have a cynical lining. He voices his most vital thesis halfway through the testimony:
And since I can achieve happiness through failings natural to me which I have acquired without toil and retain without effort ... it would be strange indeed for me to torture myself like a soul in hell so as to mutilate myself into something quite different from what I am. I should give myself a character quite foreign to me and qualities most praiseworthy (I grant you that, so as to have no argument), but which would cost a lot to acquire and land me nowhere, because I should be continually satirizing the rich from whom poor devils like me have to make a living.You can hear the bitter results of the author's internal conflict--the desire to do right versus what's expedient, whether to pursue ideals or approach life pragmatically. That he can see no middle ground is almost tragic, as he's forged a nihilistic reality atop his internal anguish, leaving a despicable hypocrite to face in the mirror.
I enjoyed it.
This type of book needs a good translator. The version I read, an old Penguin Classic, has a great one: Leonard Tancock, whose brief front matter bio includes this line: "Since preparing his first Penguin Classic (1949), he has been intensely interested in problems of translation, about which he has written, lectured, and broadcast, and which he believes is an art rather than a science." He's a craftsman! And then in the foreword he quickly notes the difficulties presented him in this very situated, socially contextual dialog, then adds that "Complete notes would be as long or longer than the text."
Note:
- The Wikipedia page is pretty good.
