by Théo Varlet
And they saw minarets appear, sharply outlined against the sky, terraces and palm trees, crenellated walls garnished with archers and arbalesters. On a tower, the bishop and his clergy were brandishing aspergillums. The breach was opened in a cloud of dust. Cavalrymen in burnooses launched forward at a gallop, returning waving severed heads with a striking realism...
“There’s a poilu!” an overexcited voice in the crowd suddenly exclaimed, during a confused episode of a brawl in the nave of a church.
A poilu in the Middle Ages! The interrupter was jeered. Such an anachronism on the part of the scenarists would be too stupid…but the film, with all its great spectacle and luxury of depiction, merited criticism nevertheless.
“It’s well-made, I admit,” the colonel concluded, leaning toward Renard’s ear. But even so, one can see that they aren’t people of the 14th century. Those fellows have obviously just taken off their false collars to put on coats of mail. They’re all very well, these historical reconstruction films, but they always reek of fakery!”
Afterword
Loose ends and Inconvenient Knots
La Belle Valence was written in a era when it was considered compulsory that a work of fiction must leave the world of the present unaffected—i.e., that its plot must be “normalized,” all ad hoc innovations being somehow tidied away in order that the status quo could remain unaffected. It is therefore not surprising that the narrative voice of the text, like the principal characters, does not even consider the issue of whether their trip into the past might have altered history—any such alteration being, of course, literally out of the question.
It was not until 1939 that L. Sprague de Camp, in the magisterial Lest Darkness Fall—perhaps the finest science fiction novel of its era—bit that particular bullet and allowed a timeslipped hero bent on introducing the civilization to the past to obtain a measure of success—without, in so doing, canceling out the history that had produced the hero, enabled the novel to be written and given it meaning, in a seeming flourish of textual suicide. Our modern familiarity with such texts allows us to take in our stride the assertion of de Camp’s narrative voice that his hero has simply started an “alternative branch” of history that will grow “sideways” into some kind of “parallel world.” Blandin and Varlet were not equipped to make that imaginative leap—or, if Blandin was, Edgar Malfère, acting on behalf of their potential readers was not, and instructed Varlet to put that particular plot twist in irons.
Because of prevailing a priori assumptions, therefore, there was no way that La Belle Valence could end except with the massive tidying-up of the final chapter, in which the Great War is allowed to resume its course and the returned soldiers their roles therein, without any disturbance of any conspicuous kind. Modern readers will probably feel as disappointed and frustrated by this imaginative pusillanimity as contemporary readers might have been had things not worked out according to their conservative expectations. There is, however, clear evidence in the text that, even though the characters and the narrative voice observe a strict pact of silence with regard to the possibility of time paradoxes, the authors were well aware of the potential logical problems, and might perhaps have been prepared to undertake a bolder solution to them, had they been allowed—or had circumstances prompted them to write a sequel.
The most interesting feature of the narrative as recorded, in fact, is not the way it tidies up its plot into a slightly untidy but nevertheless conclusively-sealed knot, but the way in which it carefully leaves certain loose ends awkwardly dangling. The dangling in question is undoubtedly deliberate, and might even qualify as calculatedly provocative, so it makes perfect sense, having finished the novel, to return to some of the questions that the plot conspicuously refuses to answer, and speculate as to what possibilities are thus opened up.
The first such question, which is raised explicitly but not answered, is: “What happened to Monocard?” We are told that he and the “Saint-Cyriens” took refuge in the attics of the University when the Castilian army attacked, and that they held out there until morning, but we are not told what became of them when they could no longer hold out. Obviously, Monocard was not captured or killed, or he would certainly have been put on the pyre with Geronimo and the cadavers of the murdered troopers—which was not the case—so what did become of him?
Even if he managed to escape from Valencia to remain stranded in the past, of course, de Lanselles might still have remained impotent to carry forward his civilizing mission, especially if most of his Saint-Cyrien acolytes had perished in the battle—but it is not impossible that one man, adopting cunning methods, might have succeeded at least in introducing some small changes into the pattern of history, as L. Sprague de Camp attempted to demonstrate.
Corollary to this question is, of course, the issue of why none of the innovations introduced by the timeslipped soldiers survived. Having been introduced to the secrets of distillation, gunpowder, lithographic printing and the bicycle, would the Valencians really have forgotten them entirely, even if the Inquisition condemned them as unholy? And what about the Cordovans, with whom Renard was in communication? Perhaps they did not have the technological sophistication, as yet, to build printing-presses with movable type, but why could they not have simulated a typewriter? Then again, there is one innovation introduced by the time-travelers that could not possibly be contained or canceled out, as the text explicitly informs us: syphilis. Whether or not one accepts the common thesis that syphilis was imported to Europe from the Americas after 1492, there is no doubt that the appearance and spread of the disease a century and a half ahead of its time would have made a significant difference to the subsequent pattern of history.
Perhaps, though, if a disease was the most significant factor capable of changing 14th century history, it was another disease that prevented it doing so. The text never makes any comment on the significance of the choice of the year 1341, mainly because it has no particular significance in the chronicles of European history—but it is not so far removed from one that has: 1348 saw the emergence of the single factor that probably had a greater and deadlier influence on the progressive course of European history than any other: the advent of the Black Death. Perhaps it was the slaughter of a third of Europe’s population by that uniquely destructive plague that wiped out all trace of the innovations deliberately or accidentally introduced by Renard’s timeslippers, including any modifications subsequently made by Monocard, thus preserving the history we know (and cannot entirely hate) from fatal disruption.
As to that, we can only speculate, because the authors never produced the sequel that would have tracked Monocard’s continuing adventures and endeavors in the dangerous world of the 1340s. Given that he could remember that the papacy was in Avignon at the time, though, it is unlikely that he did not remember the imminence of the Black Death, and his first priority, once he was certain that he was stranded in the past, would surely have been to take up arms against it. Alas, he knows nothing about sulfa drugs, let alone penicillin, but he does know something about modern hygiene and he knows that rat fleas probably played some part in spreading the plague before it became directly transmissible from human to human. Surely he could have used that knowledge to help himself, and others…and any help he rendered might have lessened the disaster sufficiently to change history.
As well as these corollaries, however, the question of what happened to Monocard also has an inverse counterpart, which is equally intriguing. What happened to Tortorado? We know that he fell into the depleted Seille while temporarily unsighted, but we have no reason to believe that the fall killed or injured him. We know, too, that both banks of the Seille were within the perimeter of the Machine’s operation. We have every reason to believe, therefore, that he could have been transported, alive and well, to the Western Front in 1917.
That was, of course, a very dangerous place to be, especially for a man as confused—matagrabolized, even—as Tortorado would have been, on finding himself dragg
ed into what he would surely see as a kind of Hell, but we know that he is a man capable of great determination, tenacity and ingenuity, and not everything is against him. He is, after all, in a world where the Dominican Order still exists, if not the Inquisition, and in which Latin is still the language of a Catholic Church that is not without power and influence.
If he can only make it to a monastery...
Like the sequel following Monocard’s exploits in the 14th century, the sequel detailing Tortorado’s trials and tribulations in the 20th century remained unwritten, but perhaps not unimagined—and even if it was unimagined by Blandin and Varlet, it need not stay that way. We, at least, are free to wonder, and are by no means shackled by the same narrative assumptions and prejudices that prevailed in 1923. We are not in the least afraid of alternative histories; indeed, we love them. For us, therefore, there is no intimidation, editorial or otherwise, requiring us to tone down our flights of fancy.
We know, too, that what has been learned cannot really be unlearned, shells and the Black Death notwithstanding. We know that if the mysterious Englishman who filled that enchanted cellar in Port-sur-Seille with lovely booze could design and build a hyper-Wellsian time machine, then so could someone else—and another thing the text refuses to tell us is what happened to the black notebook. In the fullness of time—in the fullest possible meaning of that phrase—Renard and Dupuy might well be able to go time-traveling again, and might even be able to meet up with Tortorado in a more complex narrative context than simply trying to settle old scores in the most vulgar fashion imaginable. In time—somewhen and somewhere—any and all of them might yet make contact with Monocard again; and after that, the possibilities become endless…which is, of course, exactly what Pope Geronimo the Alcoholic Anarchist Antichrist wanted them to be.
And who among us cannot sympathize with that glorious dream?
Notes
1 Translated in a Black Coat Press edition as The Martian Epic, ISBN 978-1-934543-41-2.
2 Biographical and bibliographical details of Théo Varlet’s career can be found in the introduction to the Black Coat Press edition of The Martian Epic. Black Coat Press has also published a translation of his solo novel La Grande panne (1930) as The Xenobiotic Invasion, ISBN 978-1-61227-054-8.
3 Translated in a Black Coat Press edition as Doctor Lerne, ISBN 978-1-935558-15-6.
4 Jean-François, Chevalier de La Barre was beheaded and burned at the stake in 1766, having been accused of mutilating a crucifix. There is a subtle symbolism in this choice of parking spot, correlated with the fact that their first one, within the grounds of the Basilica, proved direly unsafe.
5 Paregoric elixir, initially devised in the 18th century by Jakob Le Mort as a treatment for “asthma” (then a much broader label than now) was essentially a mixture of camphor and opium, sometimes with other ingredients. By 1917, its most popular use was as a treatment for diarrhea.
6 Ninette and Rintintin were two supposedly cute but rather grotesque rag dolls, which were adopted as mascots by the French forces in the Great War, pictures of which were very widely distributed to the troops in the form of postcards.
7 Henri Gouraud was the general in command of the French Fourth Army in the latter half of the Great War.
8 What we nowadays think of as “the Spanish Inquisition”—which was established by and answered to the monarchs of Aragon and Castille—was not founded until 1480. The infamous Tomás de Torquemada was appointed its Inquisitor General in 1483 and held the position until his death in 1498. The Inquisitorial method of persecuting heresy, with the aid of torture, had been instituted by the papacy in the 12th century, and was entrusted to the Dominican Order in the 13th century, but Inquisitorial tribunals tended in those days to be ad hoc affairs set up to deal with special circumstances, like the infamous “Cathar crusade” that united France by means of vicious slander and mass slaughter. It is, therefore, extremely unlikely that there was a permanent Inquisitorial organization in Valencia in 1341, let alone that it could wield tyrannical power as this one does. The novel is, however, an extended apologue rather than a historical reconstruction, so it is fully entitled to its poetic license.
9 One of the most common tortures employed by the Inquisition (because it required no special apparatus) was to force interrogatees to drink enormous quantities of water, which distended their gut painfully, threatening ruptures.
10 This formula is not part of the standardized exorcism ritual, but is an instruction to the (alleged) heretics and demons to go back to Hell permanently. Most of the Latin speech is improvised by the authors, although a few familiar formulae are included.
11 Aptly named because his name is a slang term for fear.
12 Jean-Henri, or “Masers” de Latude, incurred the displeasure of Madame de Pompadour for some minor offence to her dignity, and was imprisoned, first in the Bastille and then in the Châtelet and at Charenton; although he escaped several times, he was always recaptured and remained locked up for a total of 35 years, thus acquiring a legendary status he would presumably rather have avoided.
13 Système D [System D] is a euphemistic derivative of the verb se démerder [to get oneself out of the shit], referring to actions employing initiative and improvisation—often of an illicit nature—to get out of trouble.
14 Melissa, in this context, is a plant in the mint family cultivated for use as a balm.
15 Jean de Joinville (1224-1317) accompanied Louis IX on one of his crusades, and was persuaded to write his chronicle by the king’s widow; Joinville thus became a major factor in establishing the posthumous reputation of “Saint Louis,” and in consolidating the myth of the crusades as a saintly endeavor rather than an epic adventure in terrorism, massacre, pillage and rape.
16 Crude eau-de-vie.
17 Literally, the leader of the chorus.
18 The spagyric art is the concoction of herbal medicines using alchemical principles; in the 14th century almost all medicine was so based.
19 In 1917, French prostitutes could work legally, provided that they were registered with the local police, and were issued with serial numbers for identification purposes.
20 “The Madelon,” whose actual title, Quand Madelon, comprises the first two words of the song, was composed in 1914, with music by Camille Robert and lyrics by Louis Bosquet; it became extremely popular during the war, partly because it is about soldiers chatting up a girl and partly because it is one of the few songs with that subject that is not obscene. It became a kind of patriotic anthem, considered worthy to be coupled with the Marseillaise.
21 The missing word is “clap” (as in syphilis), which was a major problem reducing the effectiveness of the armies involved in the Great War. Monocard’s interjection reflects the common belief that the disease had been introduced to Europe by sailors returning from the Americas; it now seems more likely that different strains of the spirochete were endemic on either side of the Atlantic, and that the reciprocal importation of the exotic strains, to which no immunity had built up, wreaked havoc in America and Europe alike, but that hypothesis had not yet been advance in 1917.
22 The production of artemisia-based absinthe had been banned in France in 1915, primarily because of the damage inflicted on the war effort by its consumption. The consumption of Pernod rocketed in consequence, the color and taste of the anise-based liqueur being not dissimilar to that of absinthe, but the replacement of Pernod by a kind of absinthe in the repertoire of the timeslipped soldiers—the Artemisia maritima cited here presumably has the same properties as Artemisia absinthium—would have been accompanied by a considerable increase in toxicity. Many of the other products of the amateur distillers would probably have been polluted by similarly toxic methyl alcohol.
23 Saint-Cyr-l’École near Versailles was the site of an elite military academy founded in 1802, an approximate analogue of Sandhurst or West Point.
24 The French verb matagraboliser [approximately, to confuse], rarely used except in literary texts,
has no English equivalent, but that is surely an omission in need of repair. If not me, who? If not now, when?
25 Although often translated as “a word to the wise,” a more pedestrian translation would be “the wise need few words.”
26 Paroles d’un croyant (1834; tr. as Words of a Believer) by the rebellious priest Robert de Lamennais is an aphoristic denunciation of the present world order, especially of monarchy and the Church’s role in supporting it. Although the author was not excommunicated he was expelled from the clergy in consequence.
27 In the accepted manner.
FRENCH SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY COLLECTION
Henri Allorge. The Great Cataclysm
G.-J. Arnaud. The Ice Company
Richard Bessière. The Gardens of the Apocalypse
Albert Bleunard. Ever Smaller
Félix Bodin. The Novel of the Future
Alphonse Brown. City of Glass
Félicien Champsaur. The Human Arrow
Didier de Chousy. Ignis
C. I. Defontenay. Star (Psi Cassiopeia)
Charles Derennes. The People of the Pole
Alfred Driou. The Adventures of a Parisian Aeronaut
J.-C. Dunyach. The Night Orchid; The Thieves of Silence
Henri Duvernois. The Man Who Found Himself
Achille Eyraud. Voyage to Venus
Henri Falk. The Age of Lead
Charles de Fieux. Lamékis
Arnould Galopin. Doctor Omega
Edmond Haraucourt. Illusions of Immortality
Nathalie Henneberg. The Green Gods
Michel Jeury. Chronolysis
Gustave Kahn. The Tale of Gold and Silence
Gérard Klein. The Mote in Time’s Eye