FROM THE CULT OF THE “SELF” TO THE ANCESTOR CULT: TRILOGY THE CULT OF THE SELF BY MAURICE BARRÈS

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FROM THE CULT OF THE “SELF” TO THE ANCESTOR CULT: TRILOGY THE CULT OF THE SELF BY MAURICE BARRÈS

Journal Title: Studia Litterarum - Year 2016, Vol 1, Issue 1

Abstract

The debut of Maurice Barrès, his trilogy The Cult of the Self immediately won the reader’s attention. In the 1890s, his works evoked increasing interest. His contemporaries read them as a fascinating narrative about the drama of European consciousness and the attempts to overcome this drama. However, after the author’s death, the interest of readers and researchers to his works decreased that may be explained by his fascination with ideas of nationalism, or boulangisme, especially during the war. The writer was accused of nationalism, however his nationalism was but a “replica” of his early ideas about the “culture” of “the self.” According to Barrès, all major themes of his work were reﬂected in the frst trilogy of The Cult of the Self. Later in his career, revealing the typological similarity of the processes taking place in the inner “self” and within the nation, he wrote about degradation of the “self” and degradation of the nation in parallel. Portraying “the disease of the century” and seeking its recovery, Barrès introduced the theme of the ancestor cult as a means of moral redemption in his late work. The present study of linguistic, cultural, and historical properties of Barrès’s work intends to introduce one of the greatest turn-of-the-century writers into the Russian academic context.

Authors and Affiliations

Vera V. Shervashidze

Keywords

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EP ID EP26082
DOI 10.22455/ 2500-4247-2016-1-1-2-128-139
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