A Selection from the Comedies of Marivaux | Page 7

end of his imagination, and so on. The purpose of the story was to turn to ridicule romantic love, but, following the expression of Fournier, it advanced only "cahin-caha, comme le pauvre coche dont il contait les accidents, et il finit par s'embourber avec lui."[32] He somewhat redeemed himself in 1715 with _le Triomphe de Bilboquet, ou la D��faite de l'Esprit, de l'Amour et de la Raison_, a fancy inspired by the game of cup and ball, so much in vogue at that period that it threatened to usurp the time and rights of conversation, and had even made its way upon the stage, in which simple matter Marivaux found occasion for moral observation.
In 1717 he allied himself with _le Nouveau Mercure_, a paper devoted to the interests of the Modernes as against those of the Anciens. This quarrel over the comparative merits of the ancient and modern writers, begun in the first half of the seventeenth century with the abb�� de Bois- Robert, Desmarets de Saint-Sorlin, and later Perrault, Fontenelle, La Motte, and others ranged on the side of the latter, while Boileau, Corneille, Racine, Rollin, Mme. Dacier, and followers strenuously upheld the honor of antiquity, had dragged on through the seventeenth and into the eighteenth century, until apparently the last word had been said by Mme. Dacier in her _Pr��face �� la traduction de l'Odyss��e_ (1716). Marivaux, however, by turn of mind and training a modern, and ever the champion of his friend La Motte, and, perhaps more to avenge him for the "grosses paroles de Mme. Dacier"[33] than to depreciate _le divin Hom��re_ (whom he made a point of always mentioning in that way), would not let the matter rest, and, in 1717, composed a burlesque poem entitled _l'Iliade ravestie_. Had he been familiar with the Greek language, he might never have committed this piece of literary impudence, but he knew Homer only through La Motte's reduction of the Iliad, which in turn was based upon Mme. Dacier's translation. If his object was to overthrow the great Greek poet, it must have been a bitter disappointment to Marivaux to see that his burlesque passed almost unnoticed by his contemporaries and was soon forgotten. The same year he wrote a _T��l��maque travesti_, a parody on the masterpiece of F��nelon. This work was not published until 1736, when it was received with such disapprobation that he hastened to disavow its authorship.[34]
Marivaux was now some twenty-nine years of age, and had had but little success as a writer. He must have felt that parody was not his forte, and, with his connection with _le Mercure_, an opportunity was presented to deal with actualities, where his powers of observation might come into play. He was, as he says of himself, born an observer. "Je suis n�� de mani��re que tout me devient une mati��re de r��flexion; c'est comme une philosophie de temp��rament que j'ai re?ue, et que le moindre objet met en exercice."[35] With his keen eyes constantly on the watch and his subtle mind ever ready to ferret out the eccentricities, defects, or hidden motives which some glance or gesture in his neighbor has revealed to him, and which a less delicate mind would have failed to grasp, going so far sometimes as to impute finesse where he has seen but the reflection of his own nature, he, nevertheless, presents to us, as no other author of the time, a vivid picture of the brilliant and refined society in which he moved, and sometimes, also, bold and clever sketches of the world at large. "C'est une f��te d��licieuse," he tells us, "pour un misanthrope, que le spectacle d'un si grand nombre d'hommes assembl��s; c'est le temps de sa r��colte d'id��es. Cette innombrable quantit�� d'esp��ces de mouvements forme �� ses yeux un caract��re g��n��rique. A la fin, tant de sujets se r��duisent en un; ce ne sont plus des hommes diff��rents qu'il contemple, c'est l'homme repr��sent�� dans plusieurs milliers d'hommes."[36] Wherever he might be, on the street, at the homes of his friends, at church, or at the theatre, he was ever a prey to this demon of observation. Behold him coming from the theatre; forced by the throng to stop a moment, he employs the time to examine the passers-by: "J'examinais donc tous ces _porteurs de visages_, hommes et femmes; je tachais de d��m��ler ce que chacun pensait de son lot; comment il s'en trouvait; par exemple, s'il y en avait quelqu'un qui pr?t le sien en patience, faute de pouvoir faire mieux; mais je n'en d��couvris pas un, dont la contenance ne me d?t: Je m'y tiens."[37]
Whatever he saw became food for meditation, and, if not used at once, was treasured up for future need. Marivaux came at last to surmise that here lay the secret of his inspiration,