J'accuse! & The Dreyfus Affair
Header Photo: Front page cover of the newspaper L'Aurore of Thursday 13 January 1898, with the letter J'accuse, written by Emile Zola about the Dreyfus affair. Click here for larger image.
Essential Reading:
The Dreyfus Affair: The Story of the Most Infamous Miscarriage of Justice in French History
The Dreyfus Affair (1894 - 1906): Text >>
Paul Valéry >>
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The Dreyfus Affair (1894 - 1906)
Source. France, a country so often shaken apart and split in the past and yet somehow always managing to maintain a stubborn national pride, was shaken and split apart for a dozen years or more by the Dreyfus affair, which began in 1894. The excitement of the case invaded French literature and went far beyond the borders of France if only in that it projected a pattern of twentieth-century experience. The case even became the germ of a new nation, for it inspired the Austrian journalist, Theodor Herzl, to found the Zionist movement that eventually led to the creation of Israel.
The Dreyfus case grew out of the confusions of the Third Republic, founded while the French people were still dazed from the unexpected and abrupt defeat the Prussians had dealt the empire of Napoleon III in 1870 - 71. The Commune raged for a while in Paris and then, after the establishment of a republic, the opposition groups within the country - the radical, monarchist, and church ("clerical") - fought in their different ways against the government, the last two often leagued together, both of them allies of the miltary clique. The self-centeredness and inefficiency of that powerful military clique had been important elements in the loss of the 1870 -71 war, as Emile Zola had demonstrated in his novel Le Debacle (1892; The Downfall). But the miltary tribe, with its monarchist and clerical allies, remained in a strong position under the republic.
Anti-Semitism, one of the dominant features of the Dreyfus affair, was the brand of the conservatives, especially of the miltary. Disappointed over the failure of the chocolate soldier, General Boulanger, to seize power in the country in 1889, the conservatives a few years later felt jubilantly revengeful over the collapse of the Panama Canal Company, for which they held the Jewish bankers responsible. The Panama scandals were the subject of Leurs Figures (1902; Their Figures), a novel by Maurice Barres, one of those violently opposed to the freeing of Captain Alfred Dreyfus (1859 - 1935), accused by the French army clique of selling miltary secrets to the Germans. Dreyfus was a highly efficient officer, a Jew on the general staff whom the army early in 1895 had hustled off to life imprisonment on the inferno of Devil's Island
The circumstances of the case are so well known now they need but a mention: the forgery and suicide of Commandent Hubert Joseph Henry, the palpable guilt of Commandent Count M.F.C. Walsin-Ezterhazy, and the refusal of the miltary to accept the fact of Dreyfus' innocence even after the fierce efforts of Lieutenant Colonel Georges Picquart on his behalf. The most enduring feature of the whole affair was the brouhaha which resulted from the intervention of Emile Zola (1840 - 1902), leader of the naturalistic school. In 1898, when Zola became convinced that Dreyfus was the victim of acute injustice, he wrote a famous open letter which showed how powerful an author's opinions could be.
This letter, now known as J'accuse!, appeared on the front page of l'Aurore (The Dawn), a liberal newspaper which the journalist - politician, Georges Clemenceau, had recently helped to found. Addressed to President of the Republic, Felix Faure, J'accuse! surveys the whole case, clamors against its injustice, and spells out names chiefly miltary. Among Zola's accusations are: "I accuse General Billot of having had in his hands the certain proofs of Dreyfus's innocence and of having concealed them, thereby outraging humanity and outraging justice, for political motives and to save the face of the general staff... I accuse General Boisdeffre and General Gonse of having made themselves accomplices in the same crime, the first no doubt because of his religious prejudices, the other perhaps out of that esprit de corps which aims to make the war office into a sanctuary that must not be attacked... I accuse the war office of having in l'Eclair and l'Echo de Paris, to misdirect public opinion and conceal its own errors... I accuse, finally, the first court martial of having violated all human right in condemning an accused man on the basis of a secret document, and I accuse the second court martial of having officially covered up this illegality, committing in turn the judical crime of knowingly acquitting a guilty" - and such like ringing phrases.
Zola's enemies brought him into court on charges of libel and, after a trial marked by hoarse dramatics and shrill comedy, the jury found him guilty. To avoid imprisonment and fine Zola fled to England, but returned a year lter when the government brought Dreyfus back from Devil's Island for a retrial. General Marquis Gaston de Gllifet, minister of war, although not one of the Dreyfusards, incurred the anger of their opponents by attemting to have the matter definately setled After more clumsy comedy, Dreyfus was finally pardoned by the new president, Emile Loubet, in 1899, although he didn't receive full exoneration until 1906.
The backing of Zola by the radical-socialist Clemenceau, a future premier, apparently had a political motivation. And it turned out that the victory of radical and liberal forces in the Dreyfus affair so discredited the conservatives that in the years before the First World War the republicans and socialists dominated the government.
The liberal factions in the legislature established old-age pensions and put through other reform measures, as well as passing laws which limited clerical activities. Large-scale attempts at strikes usually failed, but unions thrived. It was almost the revolution again, without the terror.
More/Source: Twentieth Century French Literature
Links
The Dreyfus Affair (1894 - 1906): Text >>
Paul Valéry >>
Sartre >>
Camus >> Jean Cocteau's Raymond Radiguet Biography >> Jean Cocteau >>
Alain Fournier >> Andre Gide >>
Links >>
Posters available at Allposters.com >>
Advertise here >>
Dreyfus Affair Books and Dvds available @ amazon.com
