III. ‘Notice on Diderot’s Rameau’s Nephew’ (in Über Kunst
und Altertum, iv. I, 1823)
In the year 1805 I translated Rameau’s Nephew by Diderot from the manuscript, which the publisher took away with him with the intention of publishing that as well once the public had taken notice of the translation. The French invasion in the following year, the passionate hatred of that people and their language which this provoked, and the long drawn-out period of misery that ensued prevented the project, which has not to this day been carried out.
However, in 1818, when it was planned to add the complete works of Diderot to the Collection of French prose writers and a provisional advertisement to this effect was published, this hidden manuscript was also mentioned, which was apparently known only through a German translation from which the editors gave an account of the content of this strange work in some detail, at the same time translating one or two passages back into French, not infelicitously. While not prepared to consider the work a masterpiece, they still found it worthy of the original pen of Diderot, which probably amounts to the same thing.
The matter was mentioned a few times afterwards, but without further success; finally, in 1821 there appeared in Paris Le Neveu de Rameau dialogue, ouvrage posthume et inédit par Diderot, and caused a great stir, as was only fitting. For a time people thought it was the original, until in the end the humorous practical joke of its being a back-translation was discovered.
To date I have not been in a position to make a comparison: but Parisian friends who were the cause of it and who accompanied the person who undertook it every step of the way assert that the work has turned out well, and would indeed have finished up better still, had the young, talented, and fiery translator stuck closer to the German.
Whether the name of this good man is already well known I could not say, nor do I consider myself at liberty to reveal his identity, although he was good enough to make himself known to me by sending me a copy as soon as the work appeared. (pp. 796–7)
EXPLANATORY NOTES
RAMEAU’S NEPHEW
[Epigraph] Vertumnis … iniquis: ‘A man born when every single Vertumnus was out of sorts’ (Horace, Satires, 11. vii. 14; trans. H. R. Fairclough, Loeb edn.). Vertumnus was god of the changing year and could assume any shape he pleased. The reference is, in the first instance, to the mercurial personality of ‘Him’; but it may also refer to ‘Me’. On the relevance of this satire to the text more generally, see the Introduction.
Palais-Royal: these are the public gardens, then larger than now, situated behind the Palais-Royal. The Allée de Foy, a favourite haunt of prostitutes, was on the east side; the Allée d’Argenson was on the west side of the gardens.
Café de la Régence: this café, run by Rey from 1745, was situated in the Place du Palais-Royal. It was celebrated as a gathering-place for the best chess-players; Diderot himself used to go there to watch chess.
Cours-la-Reine …Champs-Elysées: the Cours-la-Reine and the Champs-Elysées were both public spaces then situated outside the city boundaries; both enjoyed dubious reputations after dark.
as it pleases: Diderot greatly admired the sixteenth-century comic writer Rabelais. His ‘monk’ is Frère Jean des Entommeures from Gargantua (1534), but this particular dictum is largely of Diderot’s own invention.
Mérope’s soul: heroine of Voltaire’s tragedy of that name (1743); Frederick the Great thought it an ‘incomparable tragedy’. Voltaire’s tragedies are now unperformed and scarcely read; but for Diderot’s generation they represented the peak of tragic art, surpassed only by Racine.
Mahomet: Voltaire’s tragedy Mahomet (1742) is a strident attack on religious intolerance. Leaving nothing to chance, Voltaire dedicated the play to the pope.
Maupeou: eighteenth-century French politics is marked by a power struggle between the parlements (judicial bodies in Paris and the provinces, under Jansenist influence) and centralizing royal authority. Maupeou, who became chancellor in 1768, acted decisively to suppress the parlements. The philosophes in general, and Diderot in particular, were hostile to Maupeou’s reforms, and therefore uncomprehending of Voltaire, who, against the ‘liberal’ tide, supported Maupeou in a series of pamphlets written in 1771.
Les Indes … ‘Nuit, éternelle nuit’: Les Indes galantes is an opéra-ballet by Rameau. The air ‘Profonds abîmes du Ténare, | Nuit, éternelle nuit’ is sung by ‘Envie’ in the first act of Rameau’s opera Le Temple de la gloire (the libretto is by Voltaire); the opera was performed in celebration of France’s victory at the battle of Fontenoy (1745).
Three Centuries … Heritage: The Three Centuries of Our Literary Heritage (1772), by the Abbé Sabatier de Castres, is a literary history hostile to the philosophes.
Soubise’s coachman: the Hôtel de Soubise had very large stables where tramps used to sleep; the building now houses the Archives Nationales (in the Rue des Francs-Bourgeois).
jacket!: see frontispiece, p. xxxvi.
‘Come into my cell …’: a well-known anticlerical song, which begins: ‘Come into my cell, | Follow me, beautiful Ursula; | With voluptuousness | Let us temper our austerity.’
o stercus pretiosum: ‘O precious manure.’
Concert spirituel: these were regular concerts of religious music held at the château of the Tuileries (which no longer exists) from 1725. Virtuoso violinists Ludovico Ferrari and Carlo Francesco Chiabrano performed there in 1758 and 1751 respectively.
Allée des Soupirs: on the west side of the Luxembourg gardens.
she’s eight: it is tempting here to identify ‘Me’ with Diderot, whose daughter Angélique was born in 1753. She received her first lessons in the harpsichord at the age of eight, i.e. in 1761, the approximate date of a number of the incidents referred to in this work. Angélique went on to become a highly talented harpsichordist.
her little count: the singer had a long-running affair with the Comte de Lauraguais, which was briefly broken off in late 1761. Diderot announces this news to his mistress Sophie Volland in a letter written from Paris on 2 October 1761: ‘The little Comte de Lauraguais has gone off and left Mademoiselle Arnould’ (Diderot’s Letters to Sophie Volland, 96–7).
Friends of Music … angel: the Concerts des amateurs were a series of regular concerts, founded in 1769, and held at the Hôtel de Soubise.
Le Mercure galant: Boursault’s play Le Mercure galant (1679) was revived in 1753, when Préville enjoyed great success, playing at least five different roles.
nothing but a wit: a reference to Mme Du Deffand’s famous put-down of Montesquieu’s De l’esprit des lois (The Spirit of the Laws), that it was nothing but ‘de l’esprit sur les lois’ (‘spirit/wit about the laws’).
all else is vanity: echo of Ecclesiastes 1: 2.
round my neck: compare what Diderot wrote on 2 October 1761 to Sophie Volland: ‘I can’t continue to live on the incense of posterity. A delicious meal, a touching book, a walk in a cool and solitary spot, a conversation where you open your heart and give your emotions free rein, a strong feeling which brings tears to your eyes, makes your heart beat faster, takes your breath away, and plunges you into an ecstasy, whether it comes from hearing of a generous deed or from the love you feel for someone, health, gaiety, freedom, leisure, comfort; these are the things that make up true happiness. I shall never be happy in any other way’ (Diderot’s Letters to Sophie Volland, 97–8).
memory of Calas: Jean Calas, a Protestant, was unjustly put to death in Toulouse in 1762 for the murder of his son; Voltaire mounted a public campaign for the righting of this judicial wrong, publishing such works as his Traité sur la tolérance (Treatise on Toleration, 1763). Calas was finally rehabilitated in 1765, as a direct result of Voltaire’s relentless campaigning. ‘Me’ here contrasts Mahomet, the work of art attacking religious intolerance (see note to p. 12 above), with practical action to combat the same evil.
Le Portier … Aretino: the Histoire de Dom B … [Bougre], portier des Chartreux (1741), by
Gervaise de Latouche, is one of the classics of eighteenth-century French obscene literature. The ‘positions’ refer to a group of sixteen sonnets by Pietro Aretino (1492–1556) accompanying engravings of sexual positions by the artist Giulio Romano.
jaws snap shut …: some details of this description recall d’Holbach, as Diderot describes him to Sophie Volland in a letter of 1 November 1760.
Ingenii largitor venter: (Lat). ‘The stomach, purveyor of genius’: the expression is from Rabelais (Le Quart Livre, 1552), and echoes the prologue to Persius’ Satires.
Zara: Palissot’s play Zarès was a failure when it was first performed at the Comédie-Française in 1751.
Le Faux généreux: Bret’s play L’Orpheline ou le Faux Généreux (The Orphan, or the False Benefactor) played for only five perfomances at the Comédie-Française in January 1758. The work is exactly contemporary with Diderot’s play Le Père de famille (The Father of a Family), and the two men felt themselves to be in competition, especially since the plots of the two plays were somewhat similar.
Les Philosophes: Palissot’s comedy Les Philosophes was first performed at the Comédie-Française in May 1760; it ran for fourteen consecutive performances, a success for the period. The play satirizes the philosophes, and Diderot in particular.
the lady theologian: reference to a play by the Jesuit Bougeant satirizing the Jansenists: La Femme Docteur ou la Théologie janséniste tombée en quenouille (The Lady Doctor, or Jansenist Theology Fallen into Female Hands, 1731).
L’Avare … Tartuffe: Molière’s comedies L’Avare (The Miser, 1668) and Tartuffe (1664) were in the repertoire of the Comédie-Française at this time, and already well established as classics.
Opéra-Comique: the Opéra-Comique was formed by the merger in 1759 of the Théâtre de la Foire and the Théâtre des Boulevards; in 1762 it absorbed the Comédie-Italienne.
L’Avant-Coureur … Le Censeur hebdomadaire: these are all journals known for being hostile to the philosophes.
qui siedo … due coglioni: ‘I’m sitting here always like a monstrous dick between two bollocks’; it was common practice to cloak obscenity in Italian.
Messer Gaster: jokey name for the stomach, taken from Rabelais (Quart Livre, ch. 57).
per fas et nefas: (Lat.) ‘come what may.’
dangerous scoundrels ever: the play in question is Helvétius’s L’Homme dangereux, refused by the Comédie-Française in 1770, and finally performed in 1782.
Bertinhus: a nickname for Bertin, in which the name of his mistress is conflated with a pseudo-Latin ending -us.
equal… in the sky: Genesis 15: 4–6.
san-benito … in readiness: the philosophes regarded the Inquisition and its practice of the auto-da-fé, in which ‘heretics’ were burned at the stake, dressed in a penitent’s gown or san-benito, as emblematic of religious intolerance. See, for example, the description of an auto-da-fé in chapter 6 of Voltaire’s Candide.
Vivat … imperator: (Lat.) ‘Long live Mascarille, king of the rogues’; a quotation from Molière’s L’Étourdi (11. xi).
‘I’m a poor devil … my treasure’: these two quotations of songs are imprecisely quoted from Duni’s L’Ile des fous (The Island of Fools, 1760), scenes 4 and 9 respectively, where they are sung by the miser Sordide.
‘My heart’s forsaking me’: aria from the opéra-comique Maréchal-ferrant, music by Philidor, performed at the Foire Saint-Laurent in 1761.
musices … source of melody: expression cited in Capella’s Artes liberales (1658).
kick in the pants: the ‘Querelle des Bouffons’, a struggle between ‘traditional’ French music and ‘new’ Italian music, was triggered when the Bouffons italiens were invited to perform at the Opéra (1752–4). It was the performance in Paris of these works of Pergolesi which caused a sensation: his Stabat Mater was performed at the Concert spirituel in 1753; La Serva Padrona (The Servant-Mistress) was seen in Paris in 1746 and 1752, and it was the performance of this work at the Opéra on 1 May 1753 which ignited the Querelle; his Tracollo medico ignorante was also given in Paris in 1753. The philosophes, in particular Diderot and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, favoured Italian music over French, as being more natural and more melodic, and more able therefore to imitate the passions; they saw French music, embodied by Rameau, as rigid, rule-bound, and inexpressive.
Tancrède … ran forever: these are the works typical of the ‘old’ French school which have been displaced by the Italians. Tancrède (1702) and L’Europe galante (1697) have music by Campra; Issé (1697) by Destouches; Les Indes galantes (The Gallant Indies, 1735), Castor et Pollux (1737) and Les Talents lyriques ou Les Fêtes d Hébé (1739) are all by Rameau; Armide (1686) was set by Lully to a libretto by Quinault.
Rebel and Francœur: directors of the Opéra from 1757 to 1767, who had to face up to the growing rivalry of the Opéra-Comique.
back alley: the Opéra was then situated in the Palais-Royal, and was reached from the gardens by a cul-de-sac. The theatre (which had once been Molière’s) burned down in 1763, and did not reopen until 1770.
Peintre … son modèle: Le Peintre amoureux de son modèle (The Painter in Love with His Model), an opéra-comique by Duni, his first to a French text, enjoyed an enormous success when it was first performed in 1757 at the Foire Saint-Laurent.
‘Go and see… Jean’: the refrain of a popular song; the insinuation is ‘you can bank on it’.
Ragonde and Platée: Les Amours de Ragonde (1742) is a comedy by Destouches, with music by Mouret. Platée (1745) is a burlesque comédie-ballet by Rameau which parodies the Italian style of singing.
their own tongue: the view that the Italian language was particularly suited to music, unlike French, was defended notably by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Ironically, the (real) Jean-François Rameau maintained the opposite view in his Raméide.
La Plaideuse: La Plaideuse (The Lady Litigant, 1762), a comedy by Favart with music by Duni.
I am a worthless wretch … si sta: these extracts of arias (in French and Italian in the original) are taken from Duni’s L’Ile des fous and Pergolesi’s La Serva Padrona.
‘Ah, j’attendrai’: from Roland’s monologue in Lully’s opera Roland (1685).
‘Pale torches … oblivion’: Télaïre’s aria (inaccurately cited) from Rameau’s opera Castor et Pollux (1737). In Diderot’s novel The Nun, Suzanne Simonin sings this aria, one of the most famous in French Baroque opera, when she first arrives at the abbey of Longchamp (see The Nun, trans. R. Goulbourne, Oxford World’s Classics, 24).
Maximes … Pensées: two of the greatest classics of the French seventeenth century, and manifestly unsuitable for musical setting.
Plunge your dagger … reason: this is a random mixture of extracts from Racine’s tragedy Phèdre (1677).
‘Rinaldo’s conqueror (if any such exists)’… Indes galantes: from Armide’s aria in Lully’s Armide et Renaud, and from the chorus in the Inca act, scene 3, of Rameau’s Les Indes galantes.
boulevard: after 1759 the ‘unofficial’ theatres (as opposed to the Comédie-Française and the Opéra) obtained permission to establish themselves along the busy boulevards to the north of Paris.
chimney-sweep: reference to Mme Favart playing the role of Mme Bontour in Favart’s Soirée des Boulevards (1758).
L’Enfant … perdu et retrouvé: L’Enfant d’Arlequin perdu et retrouvé (Harlequin’s Child Lost and Found), an adaptation from Goldoni given in Paris by the Comédie-Italienne in 1761.
Punchinello: this traditional figure from commedia dell’arte retained his place in the works put on every August at the Foire Saint-Laurent.
Memnon’s statue: a colossal statue near Thebes (one of a pair) was damaged in an earthquake in the year 27, and thereafter it gave out a musical sound as soon as it was struck by the first rays of the sun (said to be the voice of Memnon greeting his mother, the Dawn).
Rameau's Nephew and First Satire (Oxford World's Classics) Page 17