Civilisation

Excerpt from Civilisation: 1914-1918

This impression is the creation of the particular style of M. Duhamel. It is not by the vigorous simplicity of a Guy de Maupassant that he achieves his effects, nor by the exact observation which one might expect of him as a doctor of medicine. His strength lies in the violent imagery with which he intensifies his descriptions, giving the impression of life and feeling to inanimate objects. He thus often produces the effect of a monstrous dream or nightmare.

Emile Zola was a past master of this method; but, in his case, too often, the subject did not lend itself to such treatment. M. Duhamel does not lay himself open to this objection. No style could be more appropriate than his for expressing the cold precision of the machinery by means of which this so effectively organised war has ruined our world.

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