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Stout, Érik, «L’écriture du voyage dans les longs romans de l’abbé Prévost», Montréal, Université de Montréal, thèse de doctorat, 2024, 294 p. Dir. : Ugo Dionne. Codir. : Philippe Despoix.
Studies devoted to the novels of Abbé Prévost generally state that the various places visited by his characters form the conventional setting for stories devoted primarily to the exploration of the human heart. According to this view, the numerous trips in his novels are but a secondary element when compared with the moral exploration that primarily structures his writings. Such a consensus seems all the more justified given that many of the places described by Prévost he never actually visited, nor did he systematically take the time to document himself properly. Yet without denying the conventional nature of the geographical frameworks exploited by Prévost, this study aims to demonstrate that the theme of travel is a crucial element in understanding both his poetics and the moral aim of his novels. More specifically, it is postulated that the narration within his novels is taken over by a “reluctant traveller,” a character who is constantly on the move while embodying a critique of the classic conception of the pedagogical journey. There indeed exists within Prévost’s characters an oscillation between a discourse that claims to only want calm and rest, and actions that reflect a perpetual search for movement and novelty. This tension usually ends up leading to a derailment of the trip. As such, the figure of the reluctant traveller goes against the idea of progress generally associated with the notion of travel under the Ancien Régime.
Keywords : Abbé Prévost, roman-mémoires, travel writing, poetics, Ancien Régime, retreat
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