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Hugo's Pleine Mer and the “Great Eastern”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

G. H. Gifford
G. H. Gifford*
Affiliation:
Tufts College
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Extract

The poem Vingtième Siècle (Pleine Mer—Plein Ciel) forms the climax of the Légende des Siècles, and presents in mythical form a picture of man's ascent through science, out of a state of ignorance, slavery and hatred, into one of enlightenment, freedom and brotherly love. Hugo typifies the idyllic future by an air-ship, (Plein Ciel), the sombre past and present by the colossal steamship “Léviathan,” (Pleine Mer). The same idea, of the deliverance of man through science, had found expression in Le Satyre; but there locomotive, steamer, and airship were equally honored as factors and symbols of man's emancipation, one leading up to and merging into the other. The invention of the steamship was specifically celebrated in the lines:

      Qui sait si quelque jour, grandissant d'âge en âge,
      Il ne jettera pas son dragon à la nage,
      Et ne franchira pas les mers, la flamme au front! (ll. 611–613)

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 45 , Issue 4 , December 1930 , pp. 1193 - 1201
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1930

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References

1 P. Berret, La Philosophie de Victor Hugo (1854–1859), et Deux Mythes de la Légende des Siècles: Le Satyre—Pleine Mer-Plein Ciel, Paris, 1910,' pp. 106–108. See also Berret's edition of the Légende des Siècles, Paris, 1920, II, 789.

2 While the ship was on the ways she was uniformly called the “Great Eastern,” but often referred to as the “monster ship” or “leviathan ship” (see Illustrated London News, passim). On Nov. 3, 1857 she was christened “Leviathan,” and so designated in the press of the next few months. In November 1858, she was purchased by a new company and resumed the name “Great Eastern.”

3 Berret: La Philosophie de Victor Hugo, etc., pp. 107–108.

4 The manuscript of Pleine Mer-Plein Ciel, bears the date of 9 avril 1859, with a note stating that the last seven stanzas of Plein Ciel were written in June 1858, directly before the serious attack of anthrax which nearly cost Hugo his life. In Berret's view, “il est de toute évidence que le poème entier a été composé en dérivation de ces sept dernières strophes; Plein Ciel est l'amplification des idées qu'elles contiennent, et Pleine Mer n'a été aussi largement développé que pour créer une antithèse équilibrée.” (Berret's edition, II, 788.) Note however, that a provisional table of contents for the Petites Epopées drawn up in 1857 (see the introduction to Berret's edition, I, xli), contains under the rubric Vingtième Siècle the title Léviathan. This might indicate that the conception of Pleine Mer dates back to 1857. There is no way of deciding with certainty, since no brouillons of Pleine Mer have survived, and only one insignificant one of Plein Ciel. It is quite likely that the Leviathan of 1857 was not a ship but a monster, as in Dieu, a poem of 1855.

5 Elliott Grant in his admirable French Poetry and Modern Industry, 1830–1870, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1927, pp. 131–132, quotes Berret and accepts his interpretation. Berret's introductory note to the poem in his edition (Légende des Siècles, II, 789), contains further inaccuracies which do not materially affect the interpretation of the poem. Thus he describes the “Leviathan” as having been “constructed” in 1853, whereas work on her was not begun until May of the following year. It speaks of her designer, I. K. Brunei, F. R. S., as “un ingénieur français.” He gives her seven masts instead of six, and represents her first voyage as an attempted passage to Australia. He says she “contained 1000 passengers,” whereas in 1859 she was fitted out to accommodate 4000. Finally he gives 1865 as the date when she received the name “Great Eastern.”

6 Hugo speaks of the “colossal bowsprit” of the “Léviathan.” The “Great Eastern” had no bowsprit, which was something of an innovation; but if Hugo had felt scruples on that score he would have had to abandon the effective rich rime (ll. 134, 135) of beaupré: empourpré.

7 In the lines in question (141–151), Hugo seems to have drawn upon the forgotten poem of Lesguillon, Napoléon au camp de Boulogne (see Berret, ad loc.). It is very likely that Hugo had in mind the recent challenge of Maxime Du Camp in the preface to Les Chants Modernes, calling upon the poets to create a poetry of machines. (See Berret's edition, pp. 798–799 and Grant, op. cit., ch. III). One contemporary reviewer, A. Claveau, lauded Hugo for having created in Vingtième Siècle “cette poésie de l'usine après laquelle on prétend que nous soupirons.” Cf. the quotation in Grant, op. cit., p. 134.

8 Hugo did not read English, but other members of his family circle did. The Illustrated London News was among the periodicals which came to Hauteville House. Of course he was constantly receiving visitors.

9 The statistics .... seem almost to partake of the fabulous.“ (Illustrated London News, Nov. 7, 1857, p. 449.)

It was seriously computed that the Great Eastern's dimensions exceeded those of Noah's ark. (See, for example, The Leviathan Steamship, H. G. Clarke, London, 1858, p. 24.)

“We feel on entering the ship in the ship-yard an overwhelming sense of man's corporeal insignificance .... such as was experienced when for the first time we stood beneath the dome of St. Paul's.” (I.L.N. May 30, 1857, p. 519.)

10 We can cite no exact parallel to this statement, but the dimensions of the “Great Eastern” were frequently translated into terms of London geography, especially St. Paul's and the Monument. So, for example, in an article in the Quarterly Review of March, 1856. In a pamphlet of 1859 one finds, “length on the upper deck 692 feet, within twenty-eight feet of double the length of the height of St. Paul's.” (All about the Great Eastern Steamship, London, W. H. Smith and Son, p. 10.) Cf. also the passage quoted in the preceding note.

11 “You may make comparisons by watching a Scotch or Irish steamer or East Indiaman, as one or the other passes beneath the hull of the ‘Great Eastern‘”. (I.L.N. Dec. 11, 1858, p. 548.)

12 “Surveyed as she appears on the stocks, she looks like what she is intended to be—a vast floating city—a mighty home on the deep; .... an iron town destined to bridge oceans, and bring the nations of the earth closer together, [This last conception is eliminated by Hugo, such a rôle must be held in reserve for the air-ship of the twentieth century] .... an epic of iron, a sublime embodiment of the might and majesty of England.” (The Great Eastern Steamship, London, H. G. Clark, 1857.)

13 I.L.N., June 13, 1857, p. 584.

14 “.... le capitaine, placé sur son estrade entre les tambours des roues, ne saurait, à l'aide d'un porte-voix, se faire entendre à 100 mètres de distance ..... Aussi est-il question d'employer, le jour et dans les circonstances ordinaires un sémaphore;—la nuit et par les temps brumeux, des fanaux colorés. On a proposé même .... d'établir à bord un télégraphe électrique.” (Magasin Pittoresque, 1857, XXV, 19. Cf. L'Illustration, 14 nov. 1857, XXX, 327, and I.L.N., Nov. 7, 1857, p. 450.)

15 Such a launch, with two masts and an enormous funnel appears in a drawing published in the Illustrated London News of Dec. 4, 1858, entitled “the ‘Great Eastern’ as she will appear at sea.” (No such craft appears in the drawings made after the “Great Eastern” was actually fitted out and went to sea.)

“Il embarquera sur le pont vingt grandes embarcations, .... et en arrière des tambours, deux steamers à hélice de trente mètres de long.” (L'Illustration, 14 nov. 1857, XXX, 327.) See also I.L.N., Nov. 7, 1857, p. 450.

16 In the original MS version “Cherbourg” figures in place of “Madère.”

17 I.L.N., May 23, 1857, p. 488.

18 Of the two pamphlets published by W. F. Clarke, that of 1857 shows seven masts, that of 1858, six.

19 Apparently Hugo thought that the screw of a steamer, like the screw of his visionary air-ship, created a vacuum and sucked the craft after it. Cf. the quotations given by Berret (La philosophie, etc., 126, 127). Especially reminiscent of the line in Pleine Mer is the following, from a letter written by Hugo in 1865: “La palette de l'hélice par la brusquerie de sa percussion fait le vide. Admirable contre-coup des grandes découvertes, la vis sans fin d'Archimède s'envole, troue l'espace et emporte l'homme derrière ille.” (Berret, loc. cit.)

20 “La coque du bâtiment a deux enveloppes distinctes, et peut avoir la première défoncée sans risquer de sombrer.” (L'Illustration, 26 sept. 1857, XXX, 194.)

When Hugo comes to describe the last state of the “Leviathan” he conveniently forgets that a wrecked iron ship will not float.

21 “Le bâtiment sera allumé par le gaz fabriqué à bord chaque jour, et par la lumière électrique; en sorte qu'il marchera de nuit, avec des feux allumés. (L'Illustration, 14 nov. 1857, XXX, 327.) Cf. I.L.N., Nov. 7, 1857, p. 450.

22 See Berret: La philosophie de Victor Hugo, etc., p. 106.

23 I.L.N., Feb. 5, 1859, p. 123.—Similar ideas are expressed in a leading article of the Times (Jan. 25, 1859, quoted in the I.L.N. of Jan. 29, pp. 109–110).

24 Actes et Paroles, Paris, Hetzel, 1883, II, p. 23. See also pp. 35, 66 for grievances against England and “la presse royaliste-bonapartiste de Londres.”

25 See Berret's edition, II, 472 ff., 534 ff.