Céline et son interaction avec le lecteur : une poétique moderne

ABSTRACT

Long before literary critics discovered reception theory, Louis-Ferdinand Céline placed the reader at the center of his poetics and put forward surprisingly modern ideas about his role in the literary process. In the many interviews he gave, in his pamphlet Bagatelles pour un massacre, in his letters to the American scholar Milton Hindus, and in his work Entretiens avec le professeur Y where most of his literary ideas and theories can be found, Céline not only showed that he was very interested in the reading process, but also that he was very aware of the intricacies that characterize that process and constitute the object of study of reception theorists such as Wolfgang Iser. In addition, Céline's stylistic innovations, such as his usage of the ellipsis and of suspension points, which attempt to communicate to his reader what he called “pure emotion,” allow the latter to complete the text he is reading by introducing in it his own ideas, reactions, or prejudices and thus to become the author's active collaborator.

KEYWORDS:

• Céline
• poetics
• interaction
• reader
• reception
• theory

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Pascal Ifri

Pascal Ifri is a Professor of French at Washington University. He is the author of five books, on Proust, Céline, and Lucien Rebatet. He has written approximately fifty articles and essays on Proust, Céline, Rebatet, Gide, Musset, Stendhal, Zola, and Nabokov. Since 1995 he has been Editor or co-Editor-in-Chief of the Bulletin Marcel Proust. He is currently editing an unpublished novel by Rebatet: La Lutte finale.