Jules Romains, or the Perils of
Deification
Etiemble
"[ME WAS WHEN,
disguised as a gangster or a pimp and flanked
by some gay dogs, Jules Romains used to sit on the terraces of chic
cafes and startle the old fogeys. Time was
wh~n,
anxious to ridi–
cule the commercial press and the reputations it fabricated, Jules
Romains proclaimed "Prince of Thinkers" some wretched hack
named Pierre Brisset, bamboozling the great, the solid, the all–
knowing newspapers and for .a moment
transformi~g
Brisset into
Bergson. Time was when Jules Romains, writing
Boen,
conceived
a man so corrupted by money as to want a
Battin
created which
would classify people according to their wealth, a
Who's Who
which would be the
Almanach de Gotha
of high finance. Time was
-it was during
the
war, the other one, the little one-when Jules
Romains knew how to express the essence of it all in a few words:
Europe! je n'accepte point
Que tu meures dans ce delire
Ils auront beau pous.ser leur crime
l
e reste gar
ant
et gardien
De deux ou trois choses divines.*
Time was (I was not yet born) when Jules Romains did himself
honor by such words as: "We would have wept to have caused pain
to Claude! or Verhaeren."
How times have changed! President of the P.E.N. Club, M.
Jules Romains presides all over the place; he gives an "official"
lecture at Medan; he submits to the Senate, which condescends to
take an interest, a
Plan for the 9th of July;
he tries to 'bring
together,' as they say, Germany and France, advises Daladier,
knows "the King's man" and the secrets of the gods; he persuades
himself that he has "a position unique ... in Europe, and even in
*Europe,
1917.
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