“Alexandre Dumas was not cheesy, just not taught …”

In the Lagarde and Michard, there was not a line on him. Therefore, And it comes from his misunderstanding with the romantics

Paris Match. For example, Have you grown up with Alexandre Dumas?

Jean-Christophe Rufin. Therefore, Yes. Furthermore, this is one of the two authors with whom I grew up, the other being Alain-Fournier, during my lonely childhood in Bourges … Furthermore, I was very early in contact with his work, in particular “the three musketeers”. Consequently, During my medical studies, when I reread it, he gave me confidence.

He was a cheesy author in the 1960s, when “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just you discover it.

He was not cheesy, just not taught … In addition, in the Lagarde and Michard, there was not a line on him. Therefore, And it comes from his misunderstanding with the romantics, Victor Hugo in mind. Therefore, They believed at the time that Dumas was part of their school, but he had nothing to do. However, He simply had the same sensitivity as them, so they dubbed him. For example, But. Furthermore, when Dumas began to collaborate with other authors, they gave him a bad trial, thinking that he was going to prostitute literature after having overlapping the theater.

Some criticisms of the time even murdered him.

Dumas had too much facilities, he had too much fun. Furthermore, So, yes, there was a little contempt for him … For example, It’s interesting because it highlights the divorce between posterity and the university. “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just Nevertheless, Sainte-Beuve, Brunetière said that he was doing the sub-literature. Similarly, And Dumas at the time did not stand up. In addition, It was not until the 20th century to dissipate the misunderstanding, in particular thanks to cinematographic adaptations. Furthermore, We find the same thing at Romain Gary, very read today, or Simenon, which I love …

Dumas did not see things in terms of race. Consequently, but rather in social terms

What has surprised you the most by immersing yourself in his life?

I discovered that his life was really a novel: a wild childhood, in the woods, a late familiarity with history. For example, It was a self-made-man before the hour, when his mother wanted to make him a seminarian or a notary … Consequently, His great luck was the restoration, a moment when everything collapsed, after the heroism of the Napoleonic period. Therefore, “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just It is also the birth of a powerful social movement. Meanwhile, which will be inspiring for him which was fascinated by the Republic and also by questions of poverty. However, But the most important element for me is the fact that he is mixed.

Element that he never evokes in his work.

It was rather stoic in the face of fairly disgusting attacks. Furthermore, Even his friends made fun of him, his way of spending his money. Furthermore, He bought out external signs of wealth, necklaces, bracelets, rooms … Consequently, Charles Nodier. who loved him very much, said as soon as he saw him arriving: “Ah you Africans, the charms, it’s your thing …” The caricatures in the press were incredible violence, it was depicted as a monkey. But he has never campaigned against slavery, he was quite neutral with regard to colonization. Because he did not see things in terms of “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just race, but rather in social terms. It was more important for him to show that a black man could succeed. he whose father was the son of a slave and the mother of notable.

Dumas wanted to make a fortune. he wanted to get out of his condition, but while continuing to live as a proletarian.

You devote a chapter to his relations with women. Was Dumas a great lover or a narcissistic pervert?

It is very special: it was raised by women. He was only married once. and he was fascinated all his life by the same type of women, the actresses, the singers. He was in an almost pathological form of infidelity. But I do not see him as a pervert. there has been a lot of respect from his part towards all these ladies, he has always paid the pensions and that is “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just partly what ruined him. Because basically he had an inability to live a serene story.

His fascination for money seems almost normal to you …

He wanted to make a fortune. he wanted to get out of his condition, but while continuing to live as a proletarian. It was the great misunderstanding of the 1848 revolution. When he wanted to run for the elections, he did not realize that he had become a big bourgeois. He could no longer embody the Republic, it was not how the voters saw him and he was bana. If we put end to end his works. we have a form of fresco which shows the progression of feudalism at the monarchy, then to the Revolution. It is not easy to see, because we no longer read everything he wrote, but such was his project. It has been reduced to a soap opera. Additionally, It would be “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just described today as “king of the Turner page”.

For an author like you. to immerse yourself in the life of another writer, is it exciting or restriction?

It requires sympathy. I could not write on a writer which I do not feel close to. I like Dumas, Romain Gary, Colette or John Le Carré, because they had a life before writing. They talk to me because it is also my story.

When you, the doctor, did you want to write?

I always wanted it. but I was raised by a “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just mother who worked, who had no money and to whom I could hardly say: “I want to be a poet.” Medicine allowed me fairly quickly to be independent, since, at 23, I was an intern at the Paris hospitals. During my guards at La Salpêtrière. in the Louis XIV building, I imagined coaches arrive, I dreamed of leaving.

Because what you lived as a doctor was too violent?

Violent… and too little creative. Writing is romantic. It is a way to multiply your life. to live other nights, to invent characters, to make them evolve as you please …

When I think about it, it was very risky to leave the public service to become a writer.

After the publication of your first novel, your patients do not ask you only ordinances, but also autographs.

Yes, that’s the time I had to choose my life. And, when I “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just think about it, it was very risky to leave the public service to become a writer. But I knew that, if I wanted to go to writing, I had to get there. I wanted it to be my life.

Is your relationship to writing today the same?

The difference from that time is that I can live from what I do. My current concern is rather in the other direction: I can write, but I have to continue to live. This is why I always accept new experiences, trips, missions or a position of ambassador …

Stories to tell, there are everywhere. You just have to open your eyes, the ears

Are you sometimes afraid of having nothing more to say?

Yes, but it never happened to me. Stories to tell, there are everywhere. You just have to open your eyes, ears and know how to take them “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just at the right time. When my friend Benoit Gysembergh tells me about his grandfather who had decorated his dog, it became “the red collar”. Dumas had the same talent.

Seven years ago you invented the character of Consul Aurel. To better remember your years of ambassador?

During my three years of ambassador to Senegal. I saw and experienced a lot of things I was not allowed to talk about. As with a boat, the two best days in an embassy, it’s when you enter it and when you leave. [Il rit.] The romantic form has imposed itself to tell these stories differently. I am convinced that fiction is more powerful than the test. No essayist had scheduled for September 11 or the fall of the Berlin Wall. There is something more visionary in a novelist. When I wrote “Globalia” (2003), it was a description before the time of eco -racing and radical “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just ecology. I am not Mrs. Soleil for all that. [Il rit.] But what makes me the happiest is when I manage to match fiction with anticipation.

When I knew Claude. he was really sixty-eight, he went on a soap box and he ignited a room

Your boyfriend Senator Claude Malhuret made a lot of talk about him, through his vitriol speeches on the political class. Do you understand this craze?

When I knew Claude, he was really sixty-eight, he went on a soap box and he ignited a room. He forced himself for a whole part of his life to be a frequentable and moderate politician, mayor of Vichy. Today, he no longer has the hope of having a national role. So he lets go. returns to this kind of tribunish power, very ambiguous, by the way, because he is greeted both by the left and “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just by the right. But. if we read between the lines, his attacks on Mélenchon in particular, he is now much more to the right, he who started as a leftist. Basically, he is very macronist.

And you ?

I am one of the people who no longer have many illusions or hope on this character. This is why I have never engaged in French politics. I do not want to have to defend a position, a decision in which I do not believe. If you asked me to choose between Viagra and Bayrou, I am not sure that I would choose Bayrou.

When Boualem Sansal was imprisoned. I proposed that it is eliminated in a vacant chair, a way of emphasizing the importance that France gives to its writers. My colleagues did not follow me.

You have tried in vain to be elected as a perpetual secretary “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just of the French Academy. What relationship do you have with your peers now?

I see them less … When Boualem Sansal was imprisoned. I proposed that it will be made to a vacant armchair, a way of emphasizing the importance that France attaches to its writers. My colleagues did not follow me. Sociologically, the Academy has changed, the writers are in the minority. Most members are teachers, Nobel Prize winners, enarchs. But as it has four centuries of existence, it is not the first time that there have been such mistakes. It will change … Finally, I hope.

Why not resign?

You can’t really resign from the Academy. And I don’t want to because I like this institution. If I don’t feel very well there right now. I’ve felt very well before and I’m very proud to be part of it. In my opinion, it should bring more recognition to writers. Dumas has “alexandre dumas not cheesy, just nourished two hopes all his life. one to marry, the other to enter the academy, which is in my opinion two signs of deep depression.