198
NATHALIE SARRAUTE
But do we read like this? Obviously, we do not. Our view
is
a
broader one that takes in
everything
the words suggest to us. For
words, whether we want them to or not, have significance. Unlike
musical sounds, plastic shapes or colors, they do not assert themselves
as such, are not self-sufficient. They are perceived as having mean–
ing and are necessarily dependent upon it. No reader ever reads a
text as though it were in a foreign language whose meaning he could
not follow.
If
this
were the case, he would very soon lay the book
down. Words, then, fortunately or unfortunately, are tied to a mean–
ing with which we never cease to charge them.
If,
therefore, I were to reread these passages,
if
we reread them
the way any reader does, we should see, to begin with, that what we
have here is descriptive writing. This is the result neither of chance
nor choice. I did not look for it. For it is well known that descrip–
tion is the dominant feature of Flaubert's books. It might even
be
said that his entire work is nothing but a vast succession of descriptive
passages, that through description,
his
famous objectivity and beauty
of form are realized.
Shall we then take a brief look at these descriptions? Their prin–
cipal virtue, a parnassian one, is utmost precision. The stiff, unwaver–
ing sentence immobilizes its object and confers upon it outlines that
neither tremble nor blur. We follow every detail of these outlines,
details that have been chosen to make the picture stand out. The
sharp lines, the exact shades of color, the brilliance of style, the rather
solemn swaying of these beautiful, rhythmic, perfectly constructed sen–
tences, act as a glaze that will protect the picture from the wear of
time and guarantee it eternal life. And so we look. The words are
there inviting us to do so.
(Just here, I must beg your indulgence. I warned you that I was
going to regard
this
work without preconceived ideas and as though
it were a recent event. Now let's be quite sincere and say what these
beautifully chiseled, rhythmical sentences evoke in us.)
The words, heavy with meaning, as much because of what they
signify as because of their sound, their place, their relationship to
one another, create images in us.
They force us to draw and paint pictures in our mind's eye-the
task that descriptive form constantly demands of the reader. And so,
as the lulling sentences succeed one another, we hastily compose pic–
tures, lovely pictures, noble in line and rich in color. But once the
