Abstract:
Rémy de Gourmont and the Young Lawrence Durrell: A
Creative Nexus
by
Ray Morrison
In Pied Piper of Lovers, the eighteen-year-old protagonist, Walsh
Clifton, tells how he searches new book lists for workds contining ideas
with which he can agree. At the end of that novel Ruth tells him that he
has become "De Gourmont's faun" (371). What has not been considered
in discussing this strange novel and much of Durrelll's other early and
middle work is the influence of Rémy de Gourmont, the French writer
and critic, who lived from 1858 to 1915. In an interview Durrell confesses
he has been a European since he was eighteen. Living as though he were
not a part of Europe, he claims, was going against the grain of what was
nourishing to him as an artist. No doubt he absorbed some of his fascination
for the Continent from literary heroes like T. S. Eliot, Richard Aldington,
D. H. Lawrence, and Norman Douglas. In a 1957 letter to Aldinton,
a translator of Gourmont's works, Durrell writes: "I have been a stubborn
Aldinton fan for many years and owe you many a debt of gratitude for introductions
to French writers like De Gourmont whom I would otherwise not have encountered.
. . . you were once kind enough to answer an enthusiastic effusion of mine
when I was eighteen" (Lifelines 3). This early contact with
Gourmont's work became a relationship that was to shape and enrich Durrell's
writing for years to come.
Deus Loci 1 (1992): 97-109.
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