DRIEU LA ROCHELLE (Pierre). - Lot 96

DRIEU LA ROCHELLE (Pierre). Born in Paris. 1893–1945. French writer. Autograph letter signed “Drieu” to Gérard Bauër. No place, January 16, [19]40. 6 numbered pages, in-4. Enclosed: Autograph letter “Drieu” to the same. No place, no date—2 pages, in-4. Drieu responds to the controversial remarks made by journalist Gérard Bauër regarding Barrès and GILLES [a book by Drieu published in 1939 that sparked controversy]. He adds a more personal letter as a preface to the first one. …My article did indeed stem from our conversation at the Relais, but through a chain of musings. I didn’t recall that you had lamented the absence of a Barrès (…). Otherwise, I would have shied away from the indecency of slyly attacking a *Figaro* contributor in the *Figaro* itself. My “Monsieur” was legendary… I believe that what you say in defense of Barrès was implied in the very cautious terms with which I couched my judgment. “Exquisitely inadequate.” He did everything he could to avoid offending anyone while helping as many people as possible, but despite all his care, he could not grasp a certain reality of experience. So much so that suddenly all his effort seemed useless—and more than useless. I had seen men wounded on the front lines who were, nevertheless, his most devoted literary admirers and even our political supporters... As for Napoleon, won’t you grant me two points? First, the military legend has been diminished by a new military reality. After 1914, one cannot view certain Hugo-esque depictions of cavalry charges in the same light. Second, a certain frenzied ambition à la Sorel [Julien Sorel, Stendhal’s hero] or à la Rastignac [Balzac’s character from *The Human Comedy*, embodying ambition] no longer resonates with young people. I did not find it in any of the “ambitious” people I came into contact with: Raymond Lefèvre (a young Communist Party leader who died in 1920 in the Blanche Sea), Aragon, Bergery, Malraux, a certain Arnaud Petitjean… According to Bauër, *Gilles* is merely a novel about… failed ambition… Drieu protests vigorously before explaining: …Oh no, I have emphatically stated throughout that Gilles is not ambitious. He is a contemplative man who is haunted by the ambition of others for only a moment and who then maintains a perfectly defined relationship of “respectful distance” from the ambition of certain individuals, one of “mutual service.” This is the very opposite of nineteenth-century ambition, which confuses action with dreams. Gilles embodies the constant distinction between these two forces. I am extremely disappointed and surprised by such an interpretation, coming from an attentive reader. What is the point of writing, then? I began my literary career in 1917 with a collection of poems titled *Interrogation*, which was banned by the censors. In that collection was a poem titled “To You Germans,” which was a eulogy to the enemy—on a historical and philosophical level, incidentally, that had very little in common with the intellectual debates of the time. I have no desire to revisit that poem, as I noted in an article against Bernard Shaw. But I remain just as unwilling to join the massive personal diatribe against Hitler, which seems to me to mislead public opinion, just as the diatribes against William or Bismarck did. There is the German, and that is all there is to it. And that is how he is, and he must be fought as such, without any vain hope of changing him through his leaders. I have always upheld this thesis in all my political essays and in my articles in *L’Émanipation*, to which you make a misinformed or malicious allusion […] I have absolutely no intention, under any circumstances, of renouncing a certain appreciation of the German genius through all its manifestations—an appreciation that still truly set me at odds with Maurras in private correspondence and that may just as well set me at odds with any passionate denial of that genius coming from any other quarter. As for enthusiasm, ask Montherlant, Malraux, Green, and Bernanos—as well as me—to account for it! They remain far more tight-lipped than I do… He concludes with a handshake… not without a frown…Enclosed: Letter (preamble) …There has never been any friendship between us, but during our rare encounters (…) I enjoyed that free, intangible interplay of feelings, which is like an infinitely prolonged prelude to friendship (…). I don’t much care for personal quarrels; I have more than enough of them on my aging shoulders. I am sending you this letter, which I had first written and then tossed aside. It is more expressive than the other one. I assure you that people who knew nothing about the matter found your articles very unpleasant for me. He adds a P.S.: ...(I never seem to finish!)...