Charles lutwidge dogson et la vie artistique victorienne : les journaux et les lettres, chroniques des excentricites d'un reclus monomaniaque ou temoignages de l'integration d'un amateur eclaire?
Institution:
Université Marc Bloch (Strasbourg) (1971-2008)Disciplines:
Directors:
Abstract EN:
Describing charles lutwidge dodgson's journals and correspondance as an exceptionally rich account of the reception of works of art among the most enlightened fraction of the educated mid-and late-victorian british, middle-class sounds highly paradoxical, considering the still prevalent, caricatural view of his personality that would restrict 'lewis carroll"s cultural practices to a compulsive accumulation of perceptions of little girls, on the stage as well as on canvases or wet-collodion plates. And yet, an objective examination of the impressive amount of data and judgments those private papers have to offer on half a century of artistic life, from the hundreds of theatrical performances and concerts he attended to the scores of exhibitions, art galleries and studios he visited, all his life long, brings out the truly unique wealth of this hardly ever studied corpus. It enables to draw, at last, the subtle and balanced portrait of a refined amateur, no more fascinated by childish innocence than many of his contemporaries, sharing in other such typical features of the audiences of the time as the primacy afforded to staging over textuality, to performers over playwrights, to verisimilitude and finish over the artist's right to individuality of expression. His true originality lies rather in his unprejudiced approach of art, guided exclusively by his own conscience and free-will, in which were grounded his obstinate attempt at conciliating his deep christian faith with his love for a stage still subject to many ecclesiastical authorities' obloquy, his sincere denunciation of vice and its apology as a defiling of human and divine love, his perception of the chronologically or geographically distanced nude as a hymn of praise to the perfection of the creator's work.
Abstract FR:
Presenter le journal et la correspondance de c. L. Dodgson comme un temoignage d'une richesse exceptionnelle sur la reception des oeuvres d'art de la seconde moitie du dix-neuvieme siecle britannique au sein de la frange la plus eclairee de la classe moyenne victorienne semble paradoxal, tant la personnalite de 'lewis carroll' a ete caricaturee, et sa consommation culturelle reduite a une quete obsessionnelle des representations de fillettes, sur scene comme sur toile ou sur plaque. Pourtant, un examen objectif de la masse considerable d'informations et de jugements rapportes par ces ecrits intimes tant sur les centaines de pieces de theatre et de concerts auxquels il assista que sur les expositions de tableaux ou de photographies, ou les ateliers d'artistes, qu'il frequenta toute sa vie, fait ressortir le caractere unique, tant sur le plan quantitatif que qualitatif, de ce corpus encore inexploite. Il trace le portrait enfin nuance d'un amateur eclaire, ni plus ni moins fascine par l'innocence enfantine que nombre de ses contemporains, et partageant avec eux des traits aussi caracteristiques du public victorien que la primaute accordee a la mise en scene sur le texte, aux interpretes sur les dramaturges, au fini et au respect des lois de la nature sur le droit de l'artiste a l'expression individuelle. Sa veritable originalite reside bien plutot dans son approche de l'art denuee de prejuges, ne prenant pour guide que sa propre conscience et son libre arbitre, cherchant obstinement a concilier sa foi profonde et son amour pour une scene encore honnie par de nombreuses autorites ecclesiastiques, denoncant dans le vice et sa glorification une atteinte a la dignite de l'amour humain, image de celui de dieu pour l'homme, mais percevant le nu distancie comme un hymne d'action de grace a la perfection de l'oeuvre du createur.