Fin-De-Siècle Tales of Crime in the Mass Press and Pulp Fiction
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Dominique Kalifa. L'Encre et le sang: recits de crimes et sociÖ©tÖ© Ö la Belle Epoque. Paris: Fayard, 1995. 351 pp. ISBN 978-2-213-59513-9. Reviewed by Robin Walz Published on H-France (July, 1996) During the "reign of the apaches", those noto‐ In the introduction to L'Encre et le sang, Kali‐ riously violent thugs who captured the Parisian fa rejects the notions that press sensationalism popular imagination in the opening decade of the and pot-boiler crime novels can be dismissed as twentieth century, the daily newspaper Le having no social or literary value, a charge that Gaulois lamented: "it seems impossible to deter‐ can emerge from the Marxist Left as readily as the mine if the recent emergence of the Apache has conservative Right. The author also disagrees with inspired a genre of writing, or if it is the genre the tendency in structural anthropology and semi‐ that has created the Apache." At the heart of histo‐ otics to reduce popular tales of crime and bandit‐ rian Dominique Kalifa's L'Encre et le sang ("Ink ry to a fxed set of themes. Instead Kalifa insists and Blood") lies this critical and historical prob‐ upon the historically specific nature of crime sto‐ lem of determining whether depictions of crimi‐ ries in various forms of mass culture in turn-of- nality in mass culture fundamentally express an the-century France. Although having cultural ori‐ underlying social reality or instead fashion a so‐ gins in traditions of criminal complaintes, which cial imagination. This book traces the production recounted the crimes and confessions of murder‐ of stories of crime in mass circulation daily news‐ ers on broadsheets, and Bibliotheque bleue chap‐ papers, popular novels, and early cinema; ana‐ book tales of banditry, the criminal milieux de‐ lyzes cultural systems established by these forms picted in the sensationalist press and popular of mass culture; and charts the influence and re‐ novels were thoroughly modern and urban. Yet ception of social and political discourses on crime social preoccupations with the criminal under‐ in turn of the century France. I highly recommend world of Paris, and the "naive" narrative strate‐ it to social and cultural historians working on the gies and "primitive" technological techniques em‐ Belle Epoque, and to cultural studies critics inter‐ ployed by publishers and movie studios during ested in debates over the social effects of the de‐ the Belle Epoque, also clearly demarcate this piction of violence in the mass media. brand of criminality from the realms of interna‐ tional mafias and espionage, mystery and hard- H-Net Reviews boiled detective novels, and flm noir, which de‐ or alcoholism, and usually committed by hand, veloped from the interwar period forward. such as strangulation, or by extension with knives Throughout the book, Kalifa is attentive to what is or revolvers. The violent "armee du crime" was particular to this era and what is peculiarly characterized by the press, and mythologized in French about this culture of criminality. such popular serial novels as Zigomar and Fan‐ The frst of the book's three sections deals tomas, as emerging from la pegre, a parallel social with the production of crime stories during the underworld on the margins of normative society, Belle Epoque. According to Kalifa, the develop‐ whose most notorious members were the dreaded ment of a mass fait-divers (sensationalist) press apaches. However, the image of the corrupt bour‐ and weekly illustrated supplements, the promo‐ geois as the perpetrator of thefts and crimes tion of crime and police serials by such publishers against property was a theme more frequently as Eichler, Fayard, and Ferenczi, and the advent found in detective fiction than press reportage. of the cinema, were fundamental in cultivating an In the fnal part of the book, Kalifa considers ever expanding popular market for crime stories. the ramifications felt throughout French society Over the course of the late nineteenth and early as a result of this culture of criminality. One was twentieth centuries, Kalifa argues, there was a the sense of social insecurity generated through shift in narrative emphasis in crime stories from association of violent crime with anarchist poli‐ recounting horrific events to a preoccupation tics, a connection periodically fueled during the with investigative details surrounding a case. This era of outrages at the end of the nineteenth centu‐ new emphasis upon criminal investigation not ry and by the exploits of the Bonnot anarchist only drew greater attention to the fgure of the de‐ gang in the early twentieth century. Anarchist tective, both real and fctional; it also carved out radicals in a certain sense encouraged this affilia‐ an important role for the investigative reporter. tion, notably in Gustave Herve's championing of Mass circulation newspapers such as Le Petit apache assassin Liabeuf in La Guerre Sociale, and Parisien, Le Journal, and Le Matin all had their in Felix Feneon's articles in La Revue Blanche. But "envoyes speciaux," their special correspondents, Kalifa emphasizes that the connection between who uncovered additional sordid criminal details anarchism and criminal violence was overwhelm‐ when the police were slow in producing evidence. ingly one of political rhetoric and press sensation‐ Investigative reporters predominated in French alism, lacking a substantial basis in social reality detective fction as well, such as Gaston Leroux's (anarchist activities accounted for a minuscule Joseph Rouletabille, in contrast to amateur sleuths percentage of criminal violence). Kalifa also elab‐ such as Sherlock Holmes in England, or private orates upon the conservative social critique of detectives such as Nick Carter and Nat Pinkerton criminal anthropologists, doctors, and jurists in American serials. against press sensationalism, popular crime nov‐ The second part of the book describes the els, and flm serials. These experts believed that contours of the social imagination generated by such mass culture provoked what Kalifa calls a these mass crime stories. This mass culture of criminogene, or "criminal gene," whereby latent criminality was French, urban, predominantly hereditary traits of vice among the "less well ft‐ Parisian, and public (although private crimes and ted" members of society were supposedly activat‐ locales were often the themes of detective fction). ed by reading stories or viewing images of violent There was an over-emphasis in the press upon vi‐ sensationalism. Such fantastic political and bio‐ olent physical crimes of assault, murder, and logical characterizations did not remain in the rape, often attributed to uncontrollable passions cultural realms of the social imagination, Kalifa insists, but contributed to anti-crime legislation 2 H-Net Reviews and changes in judicial investigative and court derstands the cultural relationship between crime practices. In their fait-divers "slice of life realism," and the social imagination as a critical problem: these stories of crime also provided the format "l'imaginaire du crime ou criminel imaginaire?" and motifs for a broader social discourse on "de‐ (p. 156). The author does not focus on the conflu‐ generation" in turn-of-the-century France. In the ence of the social reality and literary representa‐ conclusion, Kalifa refrains from making authori‐ tions of crime; rather Kalifa is attuned to the gap tative claims about the perversity or normality of created in the social imagination by the over-rep‐ this mass culture of criminality, but appropriates resentation of violence in mass-cultural depic‐ its characterization by Le Gaulois, "a dreadful tions of crime, when the underlying social reality mirror which transforms terrifying images into was actually different. Here, Kalifa's argument reality" (p. 304), as a useful historical perspective could be strengthened by the inclusion of addi‐ for "looking awry" at the Belle Epoque. tional crime statistics, which would emphasize North American historians of France will fnd even more strongly the cultural influence of the Kalifa's book a valuable supplement to Robert imaginary aspects of these crime stories. Nye, Crime, Madness, and Politics in Modern I also fnd Kalifa's intertextual practice of France (1984), Ruth Harris, Murder and Madness teasing out cultural and social contours from (1989), and Edward Berenson, The Trial of these crime stories preferable to the "archaic Madame Caillaux (1992). L'Encre et le sang devel‐ mentality" of murderous peasants approach sug‐ ops a complex historical feld that illuminates cul‐ gested by Alain Corbin in The Village of Cannibals tural connections among the sensationalist mass (trans. 1992). At the outset of the book, Kalifa in‐ circulation press, popular stories of crime and sists upon the historically specific nature of the vengeance, political debates on public security, criminal milieux, and rejects recourse to "biologi‐ and fn-de-siecle currents of social psychology. By cal fxity" or "primitive mentalities" to explain the focusing upon the mass cultural depiction of social persistence of crime. A direct parallel may crime, the evidential basis for Kalifa's historical be difficult to establish between the works of Kali‐ reflections is socially more widespread than the fa and Corbin; the criminal tales in L'Encre et le professional discourses of law, medicine, and par‐ sang are modern and predominantly Parisian, liamentary debates emphasized in Nye and Har‐ whereas Corbin's story relies heavily upon the ris. Kalifa also charts in some detail the intricacies pre-modern aspect of his villagers' lives. Still, of the historical context within which Berenson's there is a critical advantage in Kalifa's eschewal of micro-history functions. In sum, Kalifa has per‐ the "savage" versus "scientific" mind distinction of formed the valuable service of establishing a an earlier, and in our post-colonial era somewhat "from below" cultural perspective on crime in suspect, school of French anthropology (cf. G.E.R. France in the pre-Great War era.