Bribri and Ma Biche
And what about spouses? Spouses thrive and flourish. By the way, why, you may ask, do I write “spouses” instead of wives? Lofty style, my dear sirs, that’s why. The bourgeois, whenever he has recourse to lofty style, always says “mon épouse”. And though other classes simply say ma femme – my wife – like everywhere else, it is better to follow the national spirit of the majority and use the lofty style of speech. It’s more characteristic. Besides, there are other names as well. When the bourgeois is in a sentimental mood or wants to be unfaithful to his wife he always calls her ma biche – my doe. And conversely a loving wife in an excess of dainty skittishness calls her darling bourgeois bribri, to the great delight of the bourgeois.
Bribri and Ma Biche always thrive but now more than ever. It is, of course, understood (tacitly, almost) that Ma Biche and Bribri must, in our troubled times, serve as models of society’s virtue, harmony and blissful state, and as a reproach to the odious nonsense of absurd communist tramps; but apart from that, Bribri becomes, maritally speaking, increasingly amenable every year. He understands that his Biche cannot be kept back, whatever is done or said, that a Parisienne is made to have a lover, and that a husband cannot avoid a couple of horns. He will naturally keep mum while his savings are still meagre and his possessions few. However, as soon as he has both, Bribri becomes more exacting in every way, because he then acquires a great respect for himself. He begins to consider Gustave in a different light too, particularly if the latter is no more than a ragamuffin and has but few possessions.
In general, a Parisian who has a little money and wants to get married chooses a wife who also has a little money. Not only that, but they go through each other’s accounts first, and if they discover that francs and possessions are equal on either side, they unite. This happens everywhere else too; but here the law of the equality of pockets has developed into a peculiar custom. For instance, if a girl has so much as a penny more than a would-be suitor, she will never be allowed to marry him, and a better Bribri is then looked for. Besides, love matches are becoming increasingly impossible and are regarded as almost indecent. The reasonable custom which invariably demands the equality of pockets and the marriage of fortunes is rarely broken – more rarely, I should think, than anywhere else. The bourgeois has organized his wife’s money excellently well to his own advantage. That is precisely why he is often ready to close his eyes to his Biche’s escapades and not to notice a number of annoying things, for otherwise, in case of disagreement between them, the question of the dowry can raise its ugly head. Besides, should his Biche ever take to following fashion beyond her means, Bribri would take note but voice no objection; his wife might ask less for her dresses. Ma Biche is then much easier to deal with. Anyway, as marriages are for the most part marriages of fortunes and very little attention is paid to mutual affection, Bribri himself is not averse to letting his glances stray away from his own Biche. Thus it is best not to interfere with each other. In this way more harmony reigns in the home, and the beloved names – Bribri and Ma Biche – are ever more frequently murmured by the loving couples.
As a matter of fact, to be quite frank, Bribri has even here succeeded in securing his own position. The police officer is always at his disposal. Such is the law of which he is himself
the author. If the worst comes to the worst and he finds the pair of lovers en flagrant délit,* he can even kill them, without having to answer for his actions. Ma Biche knows this and approves it.
A long period of protection and guardianship has reduced Ma Biche to such a state of mind that she neither complains nor dreams, as in certain other barbarous and ridiculous countries, of, for instance, receiving a university education, joining clubs and becoming a Member of Parliament. She prefers to lead her present ethereal and, so to speak, canary-like existence. She is decked out in fine clothes and gloves and taken for drives, she dances, she sucks sweets, superficially she is received like a queen and superficially men are at her feet. This form of relationship has been worked out with a surprisingly high degree of success and decorum. In short, the rules of chivalry are observed, and what more can she want? She will not be deprived of Gustave. Neither does she want her life to have a virtuous and noble purpose etc. She is really quite as much of a capitalist and quite as niggardly as her husband. When the canary years are over, when, that is, Ma Biche can no longer dupe herself about being a canary, when the possibility of a new Gustave becomes an absolute absurdity to even the most fervent and self-satisfied imagination, she suddenly undergoes a rapid and unpleasant metamorphosis. Gone are daintiness, finery, skittishness. For the most part she becomes a bad-tempered housewife and a church mouse, who helps her husband to hoard his pennies. A sort of cynicism suddenly takes hold of her; lassitude, spite, coarse instincts, pointless life, cynical talk – all suddenly make their appearance. Some even become slatternly. Of course, this is not always the case, there are other more cheering phenomena too, of course; similar social relationships can also be observed elsewhere – of course – but… in France all this is more natural, more genuine, more spontaneous, fuller, it is all more national. Here is the source and embryo of the bourgeois form of society which now reigns throughout the world, in general imitation of the great nation.
Certainly Ma Biche is queen – superficially. It is difficult to imagine the exquisite politeness with which she is surrounded, the importunate attention which is paid to her everywhere in society as well as in the streets. The refinement of it is amazing, but it is sometimes so mawkish that for any honest soul it would be unbearable. The obvious sham of it would cut him to the quick. But Ma Biche is herself a great rogue and… that is all she wants… she will always get her way and will always prefer devious means to the honest and straightforward: the results, she thinks, are more certain and she gets more fun. And for Ma Biche intrigue and fun is everything; it’s the whole point. But then, look at the way she is dressed, at the way she walks along the streets. Ma Biche is simpering, affected, unnatural through and through, but this is precisely what captivates people, especially those who are blasé or partly depraved and who have lost all taste for fresh and natural beauty. Ma Biche has a very under-developed personality; she has a bird’s brain and heart, but on the other hand she is dainty, she has the secret of innumerable little tricks and shifts which subjugate you and make you follow her as a piquant novelty. But in fact she is rarely beautiful. There is something evil in her face, even. But it does not matter, the face is mobile and cheerful and possesses to the highest degree the secret of counterfeiting feeling and nature. Maybe what you like about her is not that she achieves the natural by means of the counterfeit, but you are fascinated by the actual process of achievement by counterfeit, the art of it fascinates you.
The Parisian for the most part does not care whether it is true love or a good counterfeit. He perhaps even prefers the counterfeit. A kind of eastern view on women is gaining currency in Paris. The camellia is more and more in fashion. “Take the money and dupe me as well as you can – give me a counterfeit imitation of love, in other words”: that’s what is required of a camellia. Very little more is required of a wife, at least that is all that’s asked of her, and there is therefore tacit indulgence for Gustave. Besides, the bourgeois knows that in her old age his Biche will enter fully into his interests and show a great deal of zeal in helping him to amass his fortune. She helps him a lot even in her youth. She sometimes carries on the whole trade, lures in the customers and is, in fact, his right hand, his chief clerk. And in the circumstances, he naturally forgives her her Gustave.
In the streets woman enjoys inviolability. No one will offend her and she is always given the right of way. Whereas in Russia any woman who is not quite old cannot make a step in the streets without someone – some soldier or debauchee – peering under her hat and trying to effect an introduction.
However, in spite of the possibility of Gustave, the ordinary, ritual form of relationship between Bribri and his Biche is quite charming and frequently naive. In general almost all foreigners are incomparably more naive than the Russians. This struck me immediately. It is difficult to explain this precisely – it is a thing that must be noted for oneself. Le russe est sceptique et moqueur,* say the French about us, and this is, in fact, so. We are greater cynics and appreciate our national patrimony less, do not like it even, anyway have not the highest respect for it and do not understand it; we meddle in European affairs and take the whole of humanity as our field without ourselves belonging to any nation, and therefore naturally adopt a much cooler attitude to everything, rather as if we were performing a duty – and we are certainly more detached.
But I am digressing. Bribri is sometimes very naive. When walking round the little fountains, for instance, he will start explaining to his Biche the reason for the fountain’s upward jet; he explains to her the laws of nature, parades to her face his national pride in the beauty of the Bois de Boulogne, floodlighting, the play of the grandes eaux* in Versailles, the triumphs of the Emperor Napoleon and the gloire militaire; he takes delight in her curiosity and pleasure and is himself very pleased.
The most rascally Biche is also fairly tender to her spouse, and her tenderness is real and not counterfeit, in spite of her husband’s horns. I do not pretend of course, to be able to take roofs off houses, like Le Sage’s Devil.* I am only telling of things that have struck me, things I have observed. Ma Biche might say to you: “Mon mari n’a pas encore vu la mer,”* and her voice betrays a sincere and naive sympathy for him. It means that her husband has not yet been to Brest or Boulogne or somewhere to have a look at the sea.
You must know that the bourgeois has certain very naive and very serious needs, which have almost become a general bourgeois habit. For example, apart from the need to make money and the need for eloquence, the bourgeois has two other needs, two most legitimate needs, hallowed by general custom and to which he adopts an extremely serious, well-nigh pathetic attitude.
The first is to see the sea – voir la mer. The Parisian sometimes lives and works in Paris all his life and does not see the sea. Why should he? All unbeknown to himself he has a strong, a passionate desire for it, puts off the journey from year to year, because he is usually retained by business, grieves, and his wife sincerely shares his grief. There is, in general, a great deal of sentimentality in all this, and I have great respect for it. At last he succeeds in finding time and money, gets ready and goes off “to see the sea” for a few days. On his return, he tells his impressions in rapturous and florid style to his wife, his relations and his friends, and all his life he treasures with delight the memory of having seen the sea.
The bourgeois’s other legitimate and equally strong need is to se rouler dans l’herbe.* The fact is that as soon as a Parisian leaves town, he loves, and even considers it his duty, to lie on the grass for a bit; he does it with dignity and the feeling that he thereby communes avec la nature,* and is particularly delighted if someone watches him at it. In general, the Parisian out of town considers it his immediate duty to become at once skittish, breezy and even dashing, in fact to appear natural and near la nature.
L’homme de la nature et de la vérité! Could it have been Jean-Jacques who first instilled in the bourgeois this intense respect for la nature? As a matter of fact, the Parisian allows himself to have these two needs – voir la mer and se rouler dans l’herbe – for the most part only after he has gained respect for himself, is proud of himself and regards himself as a human being. Se rouler dans l’herbe can be ten, twenty times sweeter when it takes place on one’s own land, bought for money earned by one’s own toil. Generally speaking, on retirement the bourgeois likes to buy a piece of land somewhere, acquire a house, a garden, his own fence, his own hens, his own cow. It matters not if it is all on a microscopic scale – the bourgeois is childishly, touchingly delighted: “mon arbre, mon mur,”* he constantly repeats to himself and to all his guests and never thereafter ceases from repeating it to himself throughout his life. That is when it becomes sweeter than ever to se rouler dans l’herbe. To perform this duty, he will always have a lawn in front of his house. Someone once told me of a bourgeois who could not get grass to grow on the spot intended for the lawn. He tried to grow it, watered it, put down turf brought from elsewhere – but the soil was sandy and he had no success, nothing took. It was just his luck to have that type of soil in front of his house. Then, it seems, he bought himself artificial lawn grass; he went to Paris specially for it, brought back a round piece of turf, about two yards in diameter, and used to spread it out every afternoon in order to satisfy his legitimate need of lying in the grass even at the cost of self-deception. At the first flush of delight at the acquisition of property, a bourgeois is probably quite capable of doing this, so that there is nothing inherently improbable about it.
But let me say a couple of words about Gustave. Gustave is, of course, similar to the bourgeois, i.e. he is a clerk, a tradesman, a civil servant, homme de lettres, officer. Gustave is really Bribri, only not married. But that does not matter, what matters now is what Gustave pretends to be, what he masquerades as, his present appearance and disguise. The ideal Gustave changes with the times and is always represented in the theatre in the aspect in which he is familiar to society. The bourgeois is particularly fond of the variety theatre, but he is even fonder of melodrama. The humble, the cheerful variety theatre is the only form of art which it is almost impossible to transplant to another soil; it can live only in the place of its birth, which is Paris. The bourgeois is fascinated by it, but it does not fully satisfy him. He cannot help considering it a mere trifle. He wants the sublime, he wants the utterly high-minded, he wants sentiment – and melodrama contains all this. The Parisian cannot live without melodrama. Melodrama will not die so long as the bourgeois lives.
It is interesting to note that variety too is now gradually changing. It is still cheerful and screamingly funny as it always has been, but nowadays a new element is creeping in – that of moral preaching. The bourgeois loves lecturing both himself and his Biche, and considers it his essential, indeed his sacred duty to do so at every turn.
Besides, the bourgeois now rules autocratically; he is a force; and the little scribblers who write variety and melodrama are always flunkeys and always flatter force. That is why the bourgeois now always triumphs even when held up to ridicule, and in the end he is always told that everything is all right. Presumably this information completely reassures the bourgeois. Every faint-hearted person who is not certain of success in whatever he undertakes feels an acute need for
self-delusion, self-encouragement and self-comfort. He even begins to believe in happy auguries. This is precisely what happens here. But melodrama presents lofty characters and lofty models; it has no humour – instead, you have a deeply moving triumph of all Bribri loves and admires so much. What he likes most is public peace and the right to save money in order to have an assured home. That is the spirit in which melodramas are now written. And that is the spirit in which Gustave is now presented. Gustave is always the true measure of what at any moment the bourgeois considers to be the ideal of unutterable high-mindedness.
Formerly, a long time ago, Gustave was supposed to be a kind of poet, artist, unrecognized and downtrodden genius suffering persecution and injustice. He put up a praiseworthy struggle and the whole thing always ended with the vicomtesse, who was secretly in love with him, and whom he treated with contemptuous indifference, uniting him with her ward Cécile, who never had a penny before, but who was suddenly discovered to have an immense amount of money. As a rule, Gustave revolted against this and spurned the money. But then his work was crowned with success at an exhibition. Three funny English lords immediately burst into his flat and offered him a hundred thousand francs each for his next picture. Gustave laughed at them contemptuously and declared in bitter despair that all men were rascals, unworthy of his brush, and that he would not offer up art, sacred art, to the profanation of pygmies who had not noticed till then how great he was. But the viscountess would burst in and declare that Cécile was dying of love for him and that therefore he should paint pictures. At that point it would dawn on Gustave that the viscountess, his former enemy, as a result of whose machinations not a single one of his works had ever been accepted for exhibition, is secretly in love with him; and he realizes that she used to try to get her own back on him merely out of jealousy. Naturally, Gustave immediately takes the money from the three lords, after giving them a piece of his mind once again, thus affording them great pleasure, runs off to Cécile, agrees to take her million and forgives the viscountess, who departs to her country house; he duly arrives, and settles down to children, a flannel vest, a bonnet de cotton* and evening strolls with his Biche around the lovely little fountains, whose quiet plash reminds him, of course, of the permanence, stability and serenity of his earthly happiness.
Sometimes it happens that Gustave is not a clerk, but some oppressed and downtrodden orphan, who in his heart of hearts nurtures unutterably noble sentiments. Suddenly it is discovered that he is by no means an orphan but the legitimate son of Rothschild. He gets millions. But proudly and contemptuously Gustave spurns these millions. Why? Because eloquence demands it. At this point in bursts Madame Beaupré, who is in love with him, but married to a banker who is his employer. She declares that Cécile is about to die of love for him and that he must go and save her. Gustave guesses that Madame Beaupré is in love with him, swipes the millions and, after swearing at everyone in most foul language, because humanity has not the likes of him for unutterable high-mindedness, he goes to Cécile and is united with her. The banker’s wife departs for her country house, Beaupré is triumphant because his wife, after having hesitated on the brink of perdition, remains pure and undefiled, and Gustave settles down to having children and strolls out in the evening around the lovely little fountains whose plash reminds him etc., etc.
Nowadays unutterable high-mindedness is more often than not represented by an army officer or a sapper or something, mostly in army uniform and inevitably with the ribbon of the legion of honour “bought at the price of his blood”. This ribbon, by the way, is horrible. The bearer of it becomes so conceited that one can hardly meet him, or sit in the same carriage or next to him in the theatre or meet him in a restaurant. He almost spits at you, swaggers about shamelessly in front of you, he swaggers so much, he snorts and chokes, so that you end up by feeling sick, you have a bilious attack and are obliged to send for a doctor. But the French love it.
It is a remarkable fact too, that on the stage very special attention is now paid to Monsieur Beaupré as well – far more, at least, than formerly. Beaupré has, of course, made a lot of money and acquired very many things. He is simple and straightforward and made a little ridiculous by his bourgeois habits and the fact of being a husband; but he is kind, honest, magnanimous and unutterably high-minded in the act, in which he must suffer from the suspicion that his Biche is unfaithful to him. But in spite of everything he magnanimously decides to forgive her. She turns out, of course, to be as pure as a dove: it was all a joke on her part and, though she had been carried away by Gustave, Bribri with his crushing magnanimity is dearer to her than anyone else. Cécile naturally is as penniless as ever, but only in the first act; later on it turns out she has a million. Gustave is as proud and contemptuously high-minded as ever, only he swaggers more because he is an officer. The things that are dearest to him in the world are his cross, bought at the price of blood, and “l’épée de mon père”.* Of his father’s sword he talks everywhere constantly and irrelevantly; you do not even understand what it is all about; he swears and spits, but everyone treats him with respect, while the audience weeps and claps (literally weeps). He is, of course, penniless – this is a sine qua non. Madame Beaupré is in love with him, of course; so is Cécile, but he has no inkling of that. Her love makes Cécile grunt and groan throughout the five acts.
At last it begins to snow, or something like that. Cécile wants to throw herself out of the window. But two shots are heard under the window and everyone flocks in: enter slowly Gustave, pale and with his hand bandaged. The ribbon bought at the price of blood sparkles on his coat. Cécile’s slanderer and seducer has been punished. Gustave at last forgets that Cécile loves him and that it is all Madame Beaupré’s tricks. But Madame Beaupré is pale and frightened, and Gustave guesses her love for him. However, another shot is heard. This is Beaupré committing suicide out of despair. Madame Beaupré gives a scream and rushes to the door, but in comes Beaupré himself, carrying a fox or something he had just killed. Ma Biche has had her lesson and will never forget it. She clings to Bribri, who forgives everything.
But then suddenly Cécile gets a million and Gustave is again in revolt. He does not want to marry. Gustave makes a fuss, Gustave uses bad language. It is quite essential that Gustave should use bad language and spurn a million, otherwise the bourgeois will never forgive him; there would not be enough unutterable high-mindedness. Please do not think that the bourgeois is inconsistent with himself. Don’t you worry: the million will not avoid the happy couple, it is inevitable and in the end always appears as a reward of virtue. The bourgeois will never be untrue to himself. In the end Gustave takes the million and Cécile, and then begin the inevitable little fountains, cotton nightcaps, the plash of water etc., etc. In this way there is a lot of sentiment and unutterable high-mindedness by the sackful, and the triumphant Beaupré, crushing everyone with his family virtues and, above all, the million which appears like nemesis, like a law of nature, to which all honour, glory and worship etc., etc.
Bribri and his Biche leave the theatre completely satisfied, reassured and comforted. Gustave accompanies them and furtively kisses the hand of another man’s Biche as he helps her into the cab. All is as it should be.