Réécritures et jeux intertextuels dans Les Confessions du comte de *** de Charles Duclos
Rewriting and intertextual games in Les Confessions du comte de *** by Charles Duclos

Summary/Abstract: Les Confessions du comte de *** (1741) by Charles Duclos belongs to the tradition of the 18th-century libertine novel. It features an initially naive and inexperienced hero who gradually becomes a libertine before finally being “converted” by sincere love for a virtuous woman. Duclos’s novel refers directly to Claude Crébillon’s Égarements du cœur et de l’esprit, of which it represents a sort of continuation and completion. In order to bring his hero’s “conversion” to a successful conclusion, Duclos uses a whole range of intertextual references – to classic novel but also to his own works – particularly when it comes to the love story between the Count of *** and Mme de Selve. The happy ending of the novel gives an answer to Crébillon who refuses to conclude Les Égarements du cœur et de l’esprit but this apparently positive answer contains a part of scepticism by showing that lasting happiness is not compatible with love as a passion.

• Details
• Contents