Copyright (c) 2009 All rights reserved. http://works.bepress.com/bkennell Recent documents in Brian G. Kennelly en-us Thu, 15 Oct 2009 12:04:55 PDT 3600 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/22 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/22 Thu, 25 Jun 2009 16:29:34 PDT Brian G. Kennelly http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/21 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/21 Fri, 29 May 2009 15:14:04 PDT Brian G. Kennelly http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/20 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/20 Wed, 11 Feb 2009 15:05:37 PST In his recent biography of Jean Genet, Edmund White tells of the dramatist's fascination with the Pope. Genet purportedly revealed to Laurent Boyer, his "exécuteur testamentaire" at Gallimard, that if ever the Pope invited him to the Vatican, he would accept in a second. The ecclesiastical pomp of the center of power of the Catholic Church intrigued him to no end (Jean Genet 497). For those who know anything of the life or works of France's celebrated "poète maudit," it probably comes as no surprise that Genet never did receive such an invitation. He did, however, indulge his fascination--and on his own terms. In the 1950s he wrote "Elle1," a one-act play that stages the complicated recitation of an autobiographical poem of and--at least at the outset--by the Pope. In this posthumously published drama, a Photographer has been invited to take photographs of the Pontiff for mass distribution among Catholic believers worldwide. Despite the primary task of the Photographer--to photograph the Pope--he is first invited to hear the Pontiffs recitation of this poem in five Chants. Entitled "Les Sanglots du Pape," it traces the difficulties experienced in his becoming Pope: in Chant I how he moved from shepherd to head of the Catholic Church and how he became progressively isolated because of it; in Chant II what he had inside of him that permitted him to be chosen as the Pope; in Chant III how he sought for the means by which to best represent his image as Pope; in Chant IV how the image of the Pontiff exists for everyone in the world except himself; and, finally, in Chant V how he attempted to rid himself of the image of Pope and return to his simple existence as shepherd. But while the Pope has initially offered to recite this personal poem to the Photographer who has never heard it before, by the fourth Chant the Usher--who is also present--takes over its recitation. Surprisingly, by the end of the fifth Chant it is the Photographer himself who recites it. The Pope himself has long since left the stage. In her Lire le thèâtre, Anne Ubersfeld notes: "Le personnage sur scène est parlé en principe par un seul comédien (et s'il y a des distortions, elles sont ressenties en tant que telles) [.]" (254). How are the "distortions" inherent in the shift in roles of the Photographer from audience of the Pope to performer for/of the Pope underlined in "Elle"? Are they anticipated within the Chants themselves? And can they be traced through the changing manipulation of words and structures in the announcements, endings, and (ex)changes of the five Chants of "Les Sanglots du Pape"? Brian G. Kennelly http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/19 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/19 Wed, 28 Jan 2009 15:04:53 PST Brian G. Kennelly http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/18 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/18 Tue, 14 Oct 2008 10:45:31 PDT Brian Kennelly http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/17 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/17 Mon, 06 Oct 2008 09:24:29 PDT Brian G. Kennelly http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/16 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/16 Tue, 23 Sep 2008 09:19:36 PDT Brian G. Kennelly http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/14 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/14 Wed, 09 Apr 2008 16:55:54 PDT At the relatively early age of 38, the French poet Olivier Larronde died of an epileptic fit in October 1965. At that time, he had only published two poetic collections, Les Barricades mystérieuses (in 1946) and Rien voilà l'ordre (in 1959), with his third collection, L'Arbre à lettres, only appearing in print in 1966. Despite his limited literary output, Larronde had been considered by Paul Guth in September 1959 as "[u]n des sommets de la poésie Française depuis la guerre" ("Olivier Larronde poète" 114) and was hailed one month after his death by Jean Cau as "l'archange poète de l'après-guerre" ("Olivier Larronde" 72). Larronde's reputation as a great poet grew when he was honored posthumously as the first recipient the following month of France's first Prix de Littérature. And yet his works still remain largely unstudied by critics. The Modem Language Association Bibliography database, for example, does not list a single study on any of them. Were one, some three decades after Larronde's death, to rephrase in the past tense the question posed rhetorically by Bernard Pivot shortly after Larronde was awarded the literary prize, "[l]e prix [de] Littérature Ie sauvera-t-il du silence auquel il semblait condamné?" ("Larronde des vivants" 161), one would - given the test of time and with the confidence bolstered by it - have to answer in the negative. Brian G. Kennelly http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/13 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/13 Wed, 09 Apr 2008 15:50:14 PDT Publishing online is an increasingly prevalent means for scholars to test their ideas. But what of its challenges? Focusing on an ill-fated Web site dedicated to the polemic French writer Louis-Ferdinand Céline, and on a proposed hypertextual edition of his most multilinear and multisequential work, this paper asks how to reconcile the need of academics with the bullheadedness of publishers who resist the renegotiation of copyright and the marketplace it (once) enabled. Brian G. Kennelly http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/12 http://works.bepress.com/bkennell/12 Wed, 09 Apr 2008 11:43:59 PDT The text of Jean Genet's Les Bonnes that is taught and performed most regularly is the shorter of the two versions of the play published side by side by Jean-Jacques Pauvert in 1954. It is considered the third and final acting script used in the first production of the play. Material from the earlier versions of the play, unused by Louis Jouvet who first directed it at the Thèâtre de l'Athénée in Paris in 1947, went unperformed and is, some fifty years after the premiere of Les Bonnes, essentially unknown. The first version of the play dates from 1943 and includes the roles of the milkman Mario and Monsieur in addition to those of the sister-maids Claire, Solange, and their mistress, Madame. It is jealously guarded by a private collector. The longer version of the play published by Pauvert is considered the second acting script used during rehearsals for Jouvet's production. Brian G. Kennelly