The sweet liberty of the trenches’
Capitaine Conan by Roger Vercel and Bertrand Tavernier
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12914746 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Luc Rasson (University of Antwerp, corresponding author), Stacie Allen (University of Antwerp), Martin Hurcombe (0000-0001-5232-4224, University of Antwerp) |
| Year | 2013 |
| Volume | 6 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 302-312 |
| Publication date | 2013-10-11 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of War and Culture Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1752-6272 • E-ISSN: 1752-6280 |
| Publisher | Routledge (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1179/1752628013y.0000000001 |
| OpenAlex | W1970228014 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 4 |
World War I has given rise to a vast literature inspired by a pacifist interpretation of the events. Generally accepted during the war years, the Great War was mostly condemned afterwards, especially from 1929 onwards. This myth of a senseless war in which soldiers are perceived as victims rather than actors has been challenged by Roger Vercel, himself a veteran, in his 1934 novel Capitaine Conan. The main character is a gung ho soldier who takes pleasure in killing and who wonders how veterans who used to be war lovers are going to cope with the return to civilian life. In 1996, French filmmaker Bertrand Tavernier adapted Vercel's novel to the screen. This article wants to confront novel and film without having recourse to the over-used dichotomy of faithfulness against betrayal. The point is to asses how Tavernier translates into his own filmic discourse the way Vercel described the frustration of a happy warrior who is aware that he will never be able to adapt to civilian life again. By opposing the myth of the happy warrior to the myth of the absurd war, Roger Vercel and Bertrand Tavernier tell us something about the difficulty, or even the impossibility, of being a veteran. However, the film's reinterpretation shows a shift in meaning that may be the consequence of decades of pacifist discourse on the Great War
Aesthetics · Art · Betrayal · Epistemology · Impossibility · Interpretation (philosophy · Literature · Meaning (existential · Mythology · Pleasure · Political science · Psychoanalysis · Reinterpretation · Spanish Civil War · History · Law · Military History and Strategy · Philosophy · Psychology · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies · World Wars: History, Literature, and Impact
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |