Odyssée funèbre de l'homosexuel bis?

Rereading Tony Duvert's "Interdit de séjour"

Author(s): Brian G. Kennelly
Source: Dalhousie French Studies, Vol. 106 (Summer 2015), pp. 3-22
Published by: Dalhousie University
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/26380207
Accessed: 10-07-2023 06:11 +00:00

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms

Dalhousie University is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to
Dalhousie French Studies

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Odyssée funèbre de l'homosexuel bis? Rereading
Tony Duvert's Interdit de séjour

Brian G. Kennelly

Une antilittérature est [...] inséparable du temps où elle a lieu, son

image du monde n'est pas l'hypothèse d'un futur de la perception et
du sujet, mais la réécriture aventurée de ce que le présent étouffe et
cache de lui-même.

Tony Duvert, "La Lecture introuvable"

^ fier being hailed as "le jeune auteur qui monte, qu'on ne va pas tarder à citer et à
/7 imiter" (Poirot-Delpech), the polemical novelist and diatribist Tony Duvert suffered
from indirect, insidious censorship (Phillips 13). Having in 1973 received France's
prestigious Prix Médicis for his fifth novel Paysage de fantaisie, lauded as a "très grand
livre" (Chapsal 74), Duvert's works thereafter all but disappeared from the public eye. As
a consequence, now more than a half-decade after Duvert's death, most of his dozen
works of fiction as well as his two book-length essays remain unknown by the general
public and overlooked by most critics. The Modern Language Association International
Bibliography, for example, only lists a handful of studies on him.
Despite Duvert's short-lived critical acclaim during the twenty years of "notoriety"
he might have enjoyed as a literary figure from 1969 to 1989 (Benderson, "Politics" 5),
the relative paucity of critical engagement since then with Duvert's œuvre "clandestine"
(Simonin 423), "honni ou oublié" (Gobille 30), can probably also be explained by the
author's portrayal of non-mainstream sexual relations, including homosexuality,
sadomasochism, and necrophilia. In the wake of the "new puritanism" encouraging
chastity that had emerged with AIDS in France in the 1980s (Phillips 10), Duvert's
unapologetic promotion in his "littérature renversante" ("Lecture" 13) of
"pédhomophilie," the interest he showed for what he calls the "fruit mûr" of "garçons
impubères" (L'Enfant 21) coupled with the non-consensual sexual violence, the
"startling" aggression and alienation" (Benderson, "Diary" 11) characterizing their
troubling content was shunned. As Académie Goncourt member François Nourrissier
posits, the themes privileged by Duvert "sent[ent] le soufre" (7). Indeed, as historian
Anne Simonin suggests, Duvert's literary output was consequently "écrasée par [son]
opprobe" (423).
Those who have been able to look beyond the controversial themes of the bulk of
Duvert's works typically mention the formal innovation, the "technique savamment
élaborée" (Dalmas) at their heart. Bruce Benderson, Duvert's American translator, for
instance "roots" the author firmly in the nouveau roman ("Family" 8). Simonin sees
Duvert first and foremost as "l'écrivain qui [en] marque la sortie" (417). John Phillips
believes that Duvert's style reflects a "clear allegiance" to it (152). And reviewer Allen
Thiher suggests that Duvert's early works resemble what the prose of the poète maudit
Jean Genet might have become were it to have been rewritten by Alain Robbe-Grillet, the
so-called "pope" of the New Novel (249).
To date Duvert's creative process in and between works has been explored only by
us. Focusing on Duvert's early writing technique, we draw attention to the
comprehensive, if not "obsessive" revisionism that we argue is evident in the author's
novels from the late 1960s and early to mid-1970s. In our study of what we deem the

Dalhousie French Studies 106 (2015)

-3

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 4 Brian G. Kennelly

"promiscuous" and "abusive" textuality flaunted across the two published versions of
Duvert's first novel, Récidive, we claim that in rewriting the 1967 version then
republishing it in 1976, Duvert not only makes the ludic and self-conscious work more
"readable," as Thiher suggests in his review of it, but broadens its scope. As such, Duvert
provides the first of the three novels he rewrote (with Portrait d'homme couteau and
Interdit de séjour) a complex intertextual dimension for the "recidivism" it rehearses
from cover to cover as well as between the covers of both of its published versions
("Rewriting" 138). In our subsequent analysis of Portrait d'homme couteau, Duvert's
second rewritten novel, we furthermore point to an overlooked theoretical text by the
author, "un texte en forme d'éditorial sinon de manifeste" (Poirot-Delpech), as indicative
of the creative process at play in and between its 1969 and 1978 versions. At the same
time as Duvert belittles the "grand récit bourgeois" by which public schools in France
"balzacise[nt] ou flaubertise[nt] les enfants, plus qu'elle[s] ne les alphabétisent]"
("Lecture" 6) and embraces "les ratages, les incohérences, les contradictions, les blancs et
les marginalia de ce récit social—fiction mal faite" (9), in this contentious text he
underscores the liberatory potential of "unwriting" and rewriting:

La première des libérations, et peut-être la seule qui importe est donc de

désécrire les formes du sujet, de son corps, de son désir, de sa violence, et de
réécrire ce que le langage en a tu—même si ce devait être leur inexistence.
Cette tâche aventureuse peut délivrer la parole et celui qui parle ; « le sexe et la
drogue », comme disent les journaux, contribuent sans doute à la désécriture;
mais on ne voit que l'art qui réécrira. Double condition pour que le réel social
cesse de demeurer au sein même de celui qui le refuse—en son désir, sa
perception, sa jouissance ("Lecture" 15-16, emphasis added).
As with Récidive, in Portrait d'homme couteau Duvert's distinctive process of
unwriting and rewriting is revealed in the very techniques criticized by the entrenched
and traditional literary establishment as out of place, unworthy of fiction.1 We thus note:

both versions of both novels are foils for a strategy of subversion in which
unwriting is a precursor for and basis for rewriting. Expanding upon techniques
of the New Novel typically applied with a single version of a work, unwriting
in Duvert's novels is exemplified through rewriting across versions of a work.
("Rape," emphasis added)
Now in addition to the second versions of Récidive and Portrait d'homme couteau,
Duvert published a second version of Interdit de séjour? Initially penned between
September 1967 and March 1968, Interdit de séjour was first published in 1969, or at the
same time as Portrait d'homme couteau. Although then published in a "nouvelle édition
refondue" in 1971 (II: 215),3 the work long remained inaccessible: "« interdit à la vente
aux mineurs de dix-huit ans »," à 1' « exposition » et à la « publicité »" (Simonin 415). It
would therefore seem logical to assume that this work also fits within the same
subversive parameters as those of his first two rewritten novels. As such his rewritten
third novel can be understood to constitute the last piece in a set of rewritten works that
the author intended to be read intertextually, or across their two published versions.

1 Examples include: the sequences riddling Duvert's novels within and across their published versions with
unexpected blank spaces; their jarring syntax; their sentence fragments; their narrative alternatives; their ironic
precisions; their editorializing; and their privileging of generative themes over more conventional literary
norms of plot, suspense, and character (Stoltzfus 114).
2 John Phillips is incorrect in asserting that Duvert's first novel was "the only work which he considered
important enough to rewrite" {Forbidden 152).
3 Roman numerals in parenthetical references throughout this article indicate the published version of the novel
being discussed.

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Tony Duvert 5

While Duvert does not abandon the aforementioned textual strategies he employs in
Récidive and Portrait d'homme couteau, he adds to his creative repertoire in Interdit de
séjour most notably through typographic and onamastic manipulation. How then do
typographic and onomastic changes further exemplify and develop Duvert's trademark
unwriting through rewriting across both of the published versions of Interdit de séjour?
How, for instance, does the 1969 version of the novel, with its distinctive mise-en-page
and multiple sections of capitalized text, shed light on the 1971 version? How do changes
within and to the extensive lists of names featured in this work, as well as the addition of
text to and the cuts of text from it, help us better understand the importance of intentional
and comprehensive rewriting—what Cathy Jellenik calls the "aesthetics of reiteration"
(294)—in Duvert's early works?
While warning readers of the novel's graphic detail, which he observes is "plus que
scabreux et cru," reviewer André Dalmas also notes the originality of Duvert's mixing of
time frames in the 1969 version of both Portrait d'homme couteau and Interdit de séjour:

ce qui est tout à fait neuf [...] c'est la transformation subie par la notion de
temps romanesque. Présent et passé, mêlés dans le récit, sont en réalité, et en
même temps, le présent d'hier et celui d'aujourd'hui, le passé d'hier et celui
d'aujourd'hui. Si bien que les choses, les êtres, révèlent, à tout instant, en même
temps que leur nature, les stigmates de leur vieillissement, ceux de la ruine, de
la décomposition et de la mort.

In the latter portion of his review of both novels, where he refers specifically to
Interdit de séjour, Dalmas further ties the original textual layout of Duvert's third novel
to its strange content. He suggests that the mysteries of the long funereal homosexual
Odyssey that Duvert unveils in the work lie within its convoluted, obsessively developed
typography:

Interdit de séjour se présente comme la longue odyssée funèbre de

l'homosexuel, à la fois individu et foule, mais protégé quand il se trouve au
sein de cette foule. Le livre se lit par étages successifs et sur plusieurs colonnes.
Et cette typographie particulière accentue, développe jusqu'à l'obsession,
l'impression fuyante que donne le récit ininterrompu de ces randonnées
nocturnes où lieux et villes ouvrent, devant les yeux du narrateur, des abîmes
d'étrangeté.

If the jarring, Mallarmé-like4 textual layout of the 1969 version of Interdit de séjour
accentuates the random juxtaposition of the myriad sexual encounters revealed in the
work and thereby differentiates it from most other literary works, Duvert's stripping of
this "experimental" (Sebhan 142) typography from his 1971 version of the novel is what
strikes the reader first in the rewritten work. The myriad blocks of text that Duvert
arranges side by side in the first version, as though in dialogue or overlapping each other,
are what he most noticeably wrote out of the later "version revue" (II: 215).
First Pages
These typographical differences are already apparent from the start of both versions of
Duvert's novel. In the 1969 version, seven blocks of text are juxtaposed with four blocks
of text in smaller type in two fragmentary and inconsistently spaced columns. Of the
blocks of text of larger type: one occupies the page from left to right but contains three
irregularly spaced sequences that suggest missing parts; one takes up the right-hand side

4 Although not a poem, the complexity of the graphic, spatial, and visual inscription in the first published
version of Interdit de séjour is suggestive of Stéphane Mallarmé's "Un Coup de dés," which for Johanna
Drucker "remains a touchstone of both historical and aesthetic reference for all subsequent twentieth-century
typographic experimental poetry" ( Visible 50).

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
6 Brian G. Kennelly

and straddles part of the left-hand side of the page; one takes up the left-hand side and
straddles part of the right-hand side of the page but contains an irregularly spaced
sequence that also suggests a missing part; two occupy the left-hand side with one of the
two containing an irregularly spaced sequence that again suggests a missing part; and two
occupy the right-hand side. Occupying either the left-hand or the right-hand side of the
page only, the blocks of text of smaller type give readers the illusion, at first glance, that
Duvert's text is arranged into two equally spaced columns: three occupy the right-hand
side of the page; and one occupies the left-hand side of the page. By laying out his text in
such a way in the first published version of his novel, Duvert presents a work of multiple
linguistic "constellations" (Shingler 65). Highlighted in the heterogeneous mise-en-page
is the proliferation of sexual encounters, the dynamic series of many intersecting events
and couplings (Bowie 142). As a result, the semantic integrity of Duvert's novel seems
stripped, its narration scattered, jumbled up by a multiplicity of voices that all combine in
various ways, that participate at the same time in more than one syntactic structure
(Shingler). Indeed, the "semblants de narrateur" (Chapsal 74) within it all seem to
compete for a say and to be read first in the same way that the cast of characters whose
voices they represent all compete for the same pool of sexual partners and strive to be
noticed first. With readers of the first version of Interdit de séjour constantly aware of the
spatiality of the page, the order of reading—like the order of sexual encounters portrayed
impressionistically in and between the text's columns—is thereby "improvised" (McHale
192), or decided on the fly.
By contrast, the text of the second version of Duvert's novel is all of the
same type size and thus visually, at least, less convoluted and complicated.
Although in removing the columns of text in the 1971 version Duvert seems to
make reading it less improvisational, he does still manage to preserve its
distinctively cacophonic and disjointed nature. Thus on the first page there
remain irregularly spaced sequences in three blocks of text that suggest missing
parts and that bespeak complex, multi-layered, non-linear (Shingler 67)
narration; two in the first block of text; one in the fifth; and five in the sixth.
These first pages of each version of the novel are duplicated side-by-side for
easy comparison at the end of this article.
Now in addition to Duvert's stripping of the distinctive typography from the
second version of his novel, he makes cuts to the text itself. What he chooses to
preserve, for example, from the first page of the first version takes up a mere
one third of the first page of the second version. The remainder of this page
contains reworked text from the following page-and-a-half of the first version
(Page 8 and half of Page 9). In other words, in the reworked version of his novel
Duvert condenses his text by collapsing two-and-a-half pages into one.
Not only does Duvert modify the length and typography of his novel
between its two published versions. He moreover makes changes to many of the
sections of the text that he does choose to retain. Like the typographical changes
we have already noted, these changes to the text itself are also readily evident
from the first page of both versions. Take, for instance, the very first block of
text in each. They are similar from the start: both suggest desolation, ruin, and
the passage of time. But they also reveal differences in number, syntax, and
logic. In the change from
des immeubles sans vitrine, sans porte ni passants,
personne sous les porches creux, déserts, jardins cer
tains soir j'étais enragé l'été passait, un peu plus clair
chaque jour
to

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Tony Duvert 7

des immeubles sans vitrines, sans lumières ni portes, la

nuit déserte et les squares embrumés l'été passait, un peu
moins clair chaque jour marcher des heures au long,
s'épuiser, marcher sans fin, chercher encore

the nouns "vitrine" and "porte" in the first line of each are pluralized, the noun "passants"
is replaced with with the noun "lumières," and "sans porte ni passants" is syntactically
shifted to "sans lumières ni portes" in the second version. More striking, the second and
half of the third line of the first version is barely recognizable in the second version of
Duvert's novel. In the change from

personne sous les porches creux, déserts, jardins cer

tains soir j'étais enragé
to

la
nuit déserte et les squares embrumés

a sense of desertion ("les porches [...] deserts" and "la nuit déserte") is all that these
sections of Duvert's text seem to have in common. As if further to underline the lack of
light ("sans lumières") highlighted in its first line, in the second version the fact that the
days were growing shorter ("l'été passait, un peu moins clair chaque jour") seems,
moreover, more logical than the lengthening days ("l'été passait, un peu plus clair chaque
jour") that are suggested in the temporal disjointedness, the "temps sans temporalité"
(Robbe-Grillet 243) of the first.
Duvert's reworking of this portion of the first block of his text renders it more
logical. He fiirthermore cuts from his text the questions following it: "où étais-je?" and
"combien d'années?" However in making the second version of the work less self
conscious, it is no less ambiguous. For at the same time as removing the first of these
questions, which separates the first and third blocks of text of the novel's first version,
Duvert marries them in the second version. As a result,

cinq, six huit heures sans

but, marcher, prendre pa
tience, m'user, seule idée,
sans volonté

is incorporated—along with a shift from the first person to the third person—into the first
block of text of the second version as

marcher des heures au long,

s'épuiser, marcher sans fin, chercher encore

with the noun "heures," the verb "marcher," and the synonyms "m'user" and "s'épuiser"
remaining as the only recognizable elements of the text. Duvert furthermore weaves
pieces of the ninth and tenth sections of text from his first version into the third section of
the second version:

cinquante francs perdus j'ai

aimé un petit Tunisien

je le lèche, longue fente

percée d'une imberbe
coupure (j'ai pris ces sa
les habitudes sur des
corps trop jolis)

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
8 Brian G. Kennelly

from the first version thus becomes in the second version:

j'enfile un petit Arabe égaré je lèche sa fente

une coupure imberbe il faut les torcher avant de s'en
servir

If Duvert's substitution of the relatively general "un petit Arabe" for the
geographically more specific "un petit Tunisien" of the first makes the nationality of the
sexual partner being described more ambiguous or inclusive in the second version, in
revising his work Duvert also makes the sexual act itself more blatant as he consistently
does throughout the revised version of his novel. The general direct object pronoun that
suggests the licking of a person ("je le lèche") is therefore replaced in the second version
with the specific body part that is licked ("je lèche sa fente") as well as with a comment
on the relative cleanliness thereof ("il faut les torcher avant de s'en servir"). Whether this
body part requires cleaning or not, the adjective describing the rear end, or the
metaphorical "cut" in the body of the pre-pubescent boy from which the narrator derives
his oral pleasure is, however, hairless in both versions, and the specific placement of the
adjective—like the tongue of the narrator—is not an issue: "percée d'une imberbe
coupure" in the first and "une coupure imberbe" in the second.
Nicknames

These differences that are already obvious from the first page of both versions of
Duvert's novel anticipate the differences of varying degrees all underlined in the mobile,
impermanent, anonymous, random, and illicit encounters it stages between tricks, drag
queens, and gigolos, and which are played out, "constructed and deconstructed" (Phillips
150) throughout and across both versions of the novel. As we have already seen on the
first page of each version of the novel, much of the shorter, 215-paged second version
follows the general order of the longer, 248-paged first version. This thereby suggests
that in reworking his text Duvert strove, at the macrotextual level at least, to preserve its
overall sequencing. The later version of his novel is, moreover, consistently stripped of
the striking columnar typography of the earlier version.5 In place of the vertically
oriented and intersecting blocks of text of the 1969 version, the 1971 version privileges
blocks of text that are horizontally oriented instead. A case in point that dramatically
enacts this shift from the vertical to the horizontal is a funereal list of often sexually or
scatologically suggestive nicknames that can be found near the end of both versions of
the novel and that conjures up a colorful cast of characters, renowned for their sexual

5 In addition to its striking columnar typography, the 1969 version of Interdit de séjour is also notable for its
one-time incorporation of an unusual font to represent the graffiti one can read in railway bathrooms:

folle j'allais à la gare Saint

Lazare avec d'autres folles, mes
copines, on s'ennuyait certains
jours malgré ces dessins dans
les W.C.:

Grandes Pines Empalant des Femmes qui Ecar

tent leur Con
(non signés)
(1:14)
Neither this block of bathroom graffiti—with the verb "écarter" spread across two lines, as though to
underline the action of the loose women to which it draws attention—nor the font meant to represent it is
duplicated in the 1971 version. However, Duvert makes repeated use of a similar font to differentiate text
types in the beginning sections of the novel he published in 1970, Le Voyageur. Warranting further study, it is
as though in the 1969 version of Interdit de séjour the author is briefly rehearsing a technique that will also
distinguish his next work from all his others.

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Tony Duvert 9

distinctiveness. This "registre des croque-morts," evokes cruelty, depravity, and nobility.
At times hilarious and tragic, legendary and outlandish, it is comprised of:

noms qui disent leur cruauté la veulerie salace et vicieuse de leurs actes,
l'image éteinte, brouillée mais simple comme un rôle de pantomime, qu'ils
avaient conçue d'eux-mêmes, titre d'une cour lointaine, brutale, repères d'une
contrée dessinée dans les taches d'un drap où les orifices déposent leur miel, les
sexes moulent leur forme, les glandes, les bouches bavent de sommeil—on les
murmure aux jardins, sur les seuils, dans les baisers d'accueil, comme l'urine
dont les chiens mouillent leur chemin familier, les fauves leur nourriture, on en
marque les inconnus avant que l'obscurité des danses et des alcôves les
engloutisse [....] (1:236).

As though anticipating the shift between versions of this list of nicknames from the
vertical to the horizontal, Duvert repeats it within the 1969 version in the pages directly
preceding and following the list. The long, thin columns of text comprising Pages 234
and 235 before the list, for example, give way to the dense and exclusively horizontal text
of Pages 241, 242, and 243 after it, respectively. In the second version of Interdit de
séjour, Duvert reorganizes, condenses the 256 nicknames that in the first version stretch
over nearly five pages into one-and-a-half pages of "mots silhouettes sans lesquels on ne
s'identifiait pas et dont les folles marquaient chacun" (II: 202). Despite being a longer
list—comprised in the 1971 version of 304 names instead of the 256 of the 1969 version,
because the names are organized horizontally they ultimately occupy less space in
Duvert's text. But more than merely making the revised list more compact by stringing it
horizontally across the page, Duvert also alters it, therefore mirroring again at the
microtextual level of his novel the unwriting and rewriting process that he amplifies at
the macrotextual level throughout and between its two versions.

Besides the differing spatial arrangement and length of the two lists of nicknames,
there are several additional notable differences. First, 49 names (about one-fifth) from the
1969 version of the novel are modified slightly in the 1971 version. Consider, for
instance, the names from the first column (Page 236) that are duplicated in Illustration II
above with their equivalents in the second version (also duplicated above, in Illustration
III) and in which the following changes occur: "Croquederche" becomes "Croque-au
derche"; "Bouffechiottes" becomes "Bouffe-aux-chiottes"; "Chaudelance" becomes
"Chaude-lance"; "La Mensongère" becomes "la Menteuse"; "La Demi-mal" becomes "la
D'mi-mal"; "Burneflamme" becomes "Burn'en-flammes"; "La Victorieuse" becomes "la
Victoire"; "La Vermicelle" becomes "Vermicelle"; and "Pochette-Surprise" becomes "la
Pochette." These microtextual differences duplicate punctuational or spelling changes
that Duvert makes elsewhere between the published versions of his novel. Of the full 49
names in the list that have been slightly modified, all but one of them appear in a
different order, or "slip" to a different position in the list in the 1971 version. Only "La
Vaseline" (I: 238) / "la Vas'line" (II: 203), named after the petroleum-based product
intended to enhance sexual pleasure by reducing friction, enabling one sexual organ to
slip more easily into another—but which, because it does not itself move position in the
list—ironically does not enact "slippage." Thus "Vit-en-fleurs" follows "Cornebite" just
as "Décrasse-fente" follows "Doigt-curieux" in the 1969 version (I: 237), whereas in the
1971 version "Vit-en-fleur" follows "la Mémé" (II: 202) and "la Décrasse" follows "la
Gironde" (II: 203). These changes in the order of names also parallel changes in the order
of blocks of text that are made elsewhere in the novel. Similarly, of the 133 names that
Duvert does not change elsewhere in the 1971 version, only sixteen of them—or about
one-sixteenth—appear in the same order as in the 1969 version. Thus, for example, "La

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
10 Brian G. Kennelly

Glacée"6 follows "La Merveille," "La Sept-ciels" follows "la Colique," and "La Scritch"
follows "La Scratch" (I: 238; II: 202) in both versions of Duvert's text. This partial
respect for the order of some of the names, like the changes we have just noted, is played
out repeatedly in other textual sequences between versions of the novel too. Indeed, 117
of them—or nearly one-half—appear in different places in the reworked list. Thus "La
Monsieur" follows "Tournelune" in the 1969 version but follows "l'Enjouée" in the 1971
version, just as "La Sons-et-parfums" follows "La Scritch" in the former but "la Colibri"
in the latter (I: 238; II: 202). Also striking is that 74—or nearly one-third—of the names
from the 1969 version have no apparent equivalent in the 1971 version. No matter how
clever or colorful, sexually suggestive nicknames such as "Bave-en-tasse" or "Jouit-sous
clef' (I: 238) exist in the 1969 version of the novel alone. Similarly, there are 122 new
names featured in the list from the 1971 version: these comprise the 74 names from the
1969 version that have no apparent equivalent in the 1971 version, the 48 additional
names by which Duvert extends the list, and therefore represent between one-third and
one-half of the new list.

Capitalization
Just as the scent of urine by which dogs mark their spot can with the passing of each new
canine be diluted, compounded, resurrected, or intensified, in reordering, reworking this
ephemeral list of onomastic "silhouettes" from the shadowy past, Duvert dramatizes the
shifting, contested spaces of the dynamic homosexual underworld. Furthermore, the
changes Duvert makes to the list of names between both published versions of his
novel—like the changes we have already discussed between the first page of each version
of the novel— rehearse myriad additional changes he makes elsewhere in Interdit de
séjour. Played out again and again across and between both published versions of this
novel—whose very title suggests both illegality and impermanence—we therefore see
minor differences (in capitalization and punctuation, for example) juxtaposed with more
significant differences such as the dislocation and fracture of the novel's narrative form.
As in Récidive and Portrait d'homme couteau, they duplicate the novel's presentation of
homosexual identity as fluid: "constantly self-questioning, constructed from fragments of
memory and fantasy"; as well as "both criminalized by and alienated from the
surrounding society" (Phillips 154).
Take capitalization, for instance. Between the two versions of his novel, Duvert
preserves it in some cases but writes it out in others. Just as the capitalization of the
letters "J" and "C" is respected in the nicknames "La Jumelle" and "La Capote," for
example, in both versions of the list of names (I: 239; II: 203), in a sequence where
Duvert uses capitalization as a strategy to highlight the pleasure experienced by one of
the many random sexual partners in the novel, he preserves it. As a result, what in the
1969 version reads as

ils gémissaient encore, leur voix gonflait, m'explosait dans

les oreilles, ils allaient jouir
OH C'EST BON BON DONNE-LE MOI TU BAISES BIEN CHÉRI
DÈS QUE JE T'AI VU TU ENTENDS MON CHÉRI TU ENTENDS!
DÈS QUE CHÉRI TU B JE T'AIME TU ENTENDS TU BAISES
BIEN CHÉRI C'EST A MOI C'EST A MOI C'EST LE MIEN
RENDS-LE MOI JE TE DIS DE ME LE RENDRE DONNE-LE
DONNE-LE MOI C'EST A MOI TU BAISES BIEN TOI JE PEUX

6 Note that in the 1971 version, the first letter of the definite article is not capitalized, whereas it is capitalized in
the 1969 version. This is because the 1971 version lists the names horizontally, as though in a block of text,
whereas the 1969 version lists them vertically. It is also notable that in the second version the names are not
separated by commas and presented rather as one monolithic block.

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Tony Duvert 11

DIRE QUE TU ES UN HOMME TU ES UN VRAI HOMME TOI

CHÉRI OH PLUS FORT C'EST BBBBBBB
(1:64)
is collapsed and transformed in the 1971 version into the more grammatically
correct

ils se branlaient je les branlais entre mes dents je

tranchais me vengeais ils ne gémissaient plus leur voix
gonflait explosait OH C'EST BON BON DONNE-LE-MOI
TU BAISES BIEN CHERI DES QUE JE T'AI VU TU
ENTENDS MON CHERI TU ENTENDS DES QUE
CHERI TU JE T'AIME TU ENTENDS MON CHERI TU
BAISES BIEN CHERI DONNE-LE DONNE ENCORE
C'EST A MOI C'EST LE MIEN RENDS-LE-MOI JE TE
DIS RENDS-LE TOUT DONNE DONNE-LE C'EST A
MOI AH TU ME BAISES BIEN TOI JE PEUX DIRE
T'ES UN HOMME UN VRAI HOMME TOI CHERI OH
PLUS FORT C'EST TROP BBBBBBBBB
(H: 50)
Yet this is not to say that this textual sequence is identical in both versions. For
besides the change in the number of lines that sets up the sequence, between the 1969 and
the 1971 version there are changes in syntax, spacing, and agency. Similarly, within the
capitalized sequence itself—and just as we see in the changes to the list of nicknames
between versions of the novel, between "Belle-Burette" and "Belles-burettes" or "La
Dame-Jeanne" and "la Dam'jeanne" (I: 237; II: 203), for instance—there are subtle,
easily overlooked changes between versions: accents on the capital letters "É" and "È" in
the 1969 version but not in the 1971 version; a missing hyphen in the three imperatives of
the 1969 version ("DONNE-LE MOI," "RENDS-LE MOI," and "DONNE-LE MOI") but
which are added in the 1971 version; an exclamation mark after "TU ENTENDS" in the
1969 version; the removal of the first letter "B" which presumably is intended to suggest
the verb "baiser" after "TU" and before "IE" in the 1971 version; the addition of "MON
CHERI" after "TU ENTENDS" and before "TU BAISES BIEN" in the 1971 version; the
change from "C'EST A MOI C'EST A MOI C'EST LE MIEN" in the 1969 version to
the more emphatic, more urgent "DONNE-LE DONNE ENCORE C'EST A MOI" in the
1971 version; the change from "JE TE DIS DE ME LE RENDRE" in the 1969 version to
the more pressing, sexually greedier "JE TE DIS RENDS-LE TOUT" in the 1971
version; the change from "DONNE-LE DONNE-LE MOI" in the 1969 version to
"DONNE DONNE-LE" in the 1971 version; the addition of the direct personal pronoun
"me" in "TU ME BAISES BIEN" in the 1971 version; the removal of "QUE" and the
contraction of the subject and verb in "JE PEUX DIRE T'ES UN HOMME" in the 1971
version; the removal of "TU ES" before "UN VRAI HOMME" in the 1971 version; the
change from seven letters in the "BBBBBBB," which again presumably suggests the
adverb "bien" of the 1969 version, to nine letters in the more exaggerated and drawn out
"BBBBBBBBB" of the 1971 version, which are also preceded by the adverb "TROP"
thereby reinforcing the erogenous pleasure upon which the whole sequence insists.
Capitalization might be preserved in this sequence, but in others it is not. Just as
block capitals can be used for emphasis, or to underline sexual pleasure as we see above,
in another section from the 1969 version of his novel Duvert uses block capitals to
highlight the frustration of the shadowy narrator as he screams to be let back inside after
his mother locks him out:

et cette sale roulure le soir mainte

nant ma mère m'enfermait tournait la

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 12 Brian G. Kennelly

clef de ma chambre emportait cette

clef sortait se faire bourrer par
mon beau-père du jour, racolé sur les
Champs-Elysées, devant les vitrines,
ou dans un bar snob

PUTAIN DE GARCE D'ENCULÉE je gueulais contre la porte,

si ça pouvait ameuter les voisins, je gueulais des heures
jusqu'après minuit VIEILLE CONNE DE PUTE DE CON DE
MERDE DE FOUTUE MAQUERELLE D'ENFOIRÉE DE FOUTUE
CHIASSE VA TE FAIRE ENDOSSER SALOPE OUVRE-MOI TU EN
TENDS LA PORTE GARCE DE PUTAIN DE GARAGE A BITES
je savais causer mais les meilleures je ne m'en souvenais
jamais d'ailleurs elle ne rentrait pas avant quatre heures
du matin, j'étais endormi
(I: 102)
Despite the continued use of swear words by the frustrated narrator in the later
version, because Duvert removes the block capitals in the 1971 version of the novel, this
sequence reads as less stridently urgent. Although Duvert makes changes to the text
itself, it is no different—typographically speaking—from the small-lettered sequences
that directly precede and follow it:

mais j'avais commencé à la gêner ma mère

elle décidait de m'enfermer le soir avant
d'aller à son boulot elle me poussait dans ma chambre
tournait la clef et l'emportait quelle brute elle racolait
n'importe quel type sur les Champs-Elysées devant les vitri
nes ou dans un bar snob elle ne rentrait pas avant de s'être
fait bourrer le con et le porte-monnaie la putain de garce
d'enculée je tapais aux murs j'essayais d'ameuter les voisins
je criais la moitié de la nuit vieille conne de pute de foutue
morue je t'endosse salope garce de putain de garage à bites
je cherchais tous les gros mots que je savais j'en faisais vite
le tour on m'a trop bien élevé quand elle se couchait enfin
vers quatre heures je m'étais endormi
(II: 80)
As we have already noted, besides changes in capitalization such as these, Duvert
also reworks sections of text between both versions of his novel in much the same way
that he does with many of the nicknames on the list discussed earlier. At the
macrotextual, organizational level the two published versions of Interdit de séjour can be
considered similar because they are both broken up into twenty-one unnamed,
unnumbered and parallel sequences.7 Within many of these parallel sequences, however,
Duvert both adds to and excises text between the 1969 and 1971 versions of his novel,
again underlining through unwriting across versions the impermanent, circulating nature
of the encounters he chooses to privilege and reorder as though in an ever-shifting
"puzzle dont les pièces se refusent l'une l'autre" (Duvert, Récidive 130-1).

7 The breaks occur on the following pages: 14, 24, 29, 38,49, 60, 68, 74, 82, 94, 115, 128, 146, 150, 164, 168,
181, 191,198, and 204 in the 1969 version; and 11, 19, 25, 33,40,47, 52, 56,65, 73,92,103,121,123, 137,
143,155,161, 166, and 169 in the 1971 version, respectively.

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Tony Duvert 13

Erection /Expansion
Representative of the ten sequences of various lengths in the 1971 version of the novel
where Duvert adds new text that is not found in the 1969 version8 is this one in which the
narrator discusses the measures to which he goes to arouse one of his sexual partners at a
nightclub. The 1969 version9 reads:

l'ennui c'est qu'il ne bandait plus guère il devenait paresseux avec moi il lui
fallait beaucoup d'alcool pour se réchauffer les organes (l'air chaud fait
monter) on passait des soirées dans cette cave rue Grégoire-de-Tours il me
faisait danser de la plus obscène façon puis assis me pelotait carrément jusqu'à
m'emmener parfois aux toilettes pour m'aimer tout de suite sans ces choses
spéciales autour de lui sans la possibilité de provoquer les gens il ne s'excitait
plus il tenait à ce que je m'habille de la plus voyante façon alors qu'au début il
en avait horreur lorsqu'on nous appelait messieurs-dames il était aux anges
m'envoyait un gentil clin d'oeil disait: elle est gentille ma femme hein on fait un
gentil couple [....] (1:151-2)
By contrast, the expanded, more detailed 1971 version reads this way:

l'ennui c'est qu'il ne m'enfile presque plus il devient paresseux avec

moi il lui faut des litres d'alcool pour être en forme et je veux bien qu'il se
soûle puisque c'est moi qu'il n'aime plus qui l'empêche de bander ivre il
me supporte encore on passe des soirées dans le sous-sol dancing de cette boîte
une cave humide froide mais les clients c'est de la jeunesse pas trop putain
nous on danse obscène il pèse sur mon ventre il ouvre sa chemise il glisse les
mains sous mon froc et me pelote les fesses il m'enfonce un doigt dans le trou
pour le sentir se décontracter avec la musique et les pas ce sont de bonnes
danses quand on se colle l'un contre l'autre sinon on s'ennuie être à un mètre
de distance (ils ont placé des glaces au fond et les types dansent devant tout
seuls ils s'admirent en train de se tortiller ils arrivent là ils ne regardent
personne ils se tortillent devant eux-mêmes deux ou trois heures ils repartent
enchantés) lui quand c'est ça il s'assoit il boit et sans prévenir il me tire aux
toilettes il ne ferme pas la porte il me déculotte sort sa belle queue très raide et
m'encule comme un chien les garçons qui se lavent les mains viennent lorgner
mais s'ils entrent il leur envoie des coups de pied sans s'arrêter je rigolerais
bien si je n'étais pas là vrai con agrippé au tuyau de la chasse d'eau pour
soutenir les secousses il faut qu'il nous exhibe et qu'il provoque les gens
sinon pas de baise possible il veut que je m'habille de plus en plus voyant et
collant tandis qu'au commencement on était très discrets surveillés corrects et
si on nous dit messieurs-dames il est aux anges il me lance un clin d'œil il
répond Ah oui elle est chouette ma femme ah ça comme numéro! (II: 125)

Unlike the shorter 1969 version, which is recounted in the imperfect tense, the longer
1971 version is recounted in the present tense, thereby rendering the action more
immediate and direct. Additionally, like other sequences that Duvert alters between
versions of his novel, it is more graphically provocative than the equivalent sequence in
the 1969 version. The bother of a partner with difficulties getting an erection ("il ne
bandait plus guère") thus becomes the bother of a partner who no longer has penetrative
sexual relations with the narrator ("il ne m'enfile presque plus"). Similarly, just as the

8 These sequences can be found on the following pages: 26-28, 77, 108-109, 151-152, 170, 220, 221, 221, 241,
and 242 in the 1969 version; and 21-23, 58-59, 85-87, 124-125, 144-145, 188, 190-191, 191-192, 204-207,
and 207-209 in the 1971 version, respectively.
9 As it is typeset, this block of text is much narrower and more compact in Duvert's published novel.

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
14 Brian G. Kennelly

relatively vague "beaucoup d'alcool" of the first version is made slightly more specific as
"des litres d'alcool" in the second version, so too are the reasons behind the erectile
difficulties of the narrator's partner ("c'est moi qu'il n'aime plus qui l'empêche de
bander"). Whereas in the 1969 version we learn little about the interior of the nightclub,
the 1971 version provides details both about its décor and clientèle: the mirrors on the
walls which enable the self-admiring dancing style of the patrons. In keeping with this
move to greater detail between versions of the text, specific body parts are also privileged
in the 1971 version: the general "me pelotait" is therefore more targeted in "me pelote les
fesses" and leads directly to anal stimulation ("il m'enfonce un doigt dans le trou").
Furthermore, where in the 1969 version the narrator's partner takes him to the toilets to
make love to him discretely ("pour [l']aimer"), the 1971 version is less innocuous, more
exhibitionistically jarring: indeed without warning, the narrator is literally dragged to the
toilets and penetrated like a dog. Finally, while in the first version provocation is not a
possibility ("sans la possibilité de provoquer les gens") in the second version it becomes a
necessity, if not a requirement for sex: "il faut qu'il nous exhibe et qu'il provoque les
gens sinon pas de baise possible."

Reduction /Disruption

If by expanding portions of the later version of his novel Duvert can lend more graphic
color to it, what then does he achieve when he cuts text from it? Consider the dramatic
textual repercussions of Duvert's cutting from the 1971 version the sequence found some
four-fifths into the 1969 version. It involves discussion of plans for an upcoming
marriage between two anonymous characters—both designated uselessly, as is the person
inviting the narrator, by the capital letter "N."—and therefore seems strikingly out of
place in a world where multiplicity, impermanence, and infidelity are the norm, where
serial circularity and the exchange of sexual partners are favored over the permanent,
sanctified bonds of committed relationships. In the 1969 version the narrator gets invited
to the wedding right after he has earned himself 20 francs masturbating yet another
complete stranger:

et dès que je fus sorti de la

tasse où j'avais branlé un type
pour vingt francs, N. apparut
et m'invita au mariage de N.

comment ça, N. se marie?

oui, avec N.
dix types branlés dans la jour
né s'il fait beau cela fait deux
cents francs et avec deux cents
francs on peut aller faire la
folle dans trois ou quatre bars

et qui sera au mariage?

il y aura des garçons et des filles, c'est
à-dire que tout le monde se déguise, je
les cherche, il faut que tout le monde
soit là, il n'en manquera pas un, tu
parles un soir où on enterre sa vie de
folle fille ça compte
en quoi tu te mettras?
moi je vais me travestir

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Tony Duvert 15

en homme

il y aura un banquet on mangera on

roulera sous la table et puis une
partouse monstre

(I: 208)
No mention is made of a wedding in the 1971 version, by contrast. Instead, it
privileges the orgy that in the first version will surely follow the marriage banquet and
reads the following way:

j'entrais dans la tasse je demandais vingt francs au type pour le branler dix types
branlés en une journée si c'est les vacances et qu'il fait beau je les trouve et j'ai
deux cents francs et avec deux cents francs je peux aller faire la folle dans trois ou
quatre bars ou m'acheter des chaussures une copine entrait dans la tasse elle
m'invitait à une partouse je disais non elle disait mais si et m'expliquait qui serait là
et je disais oui et Ça tombe bien j'ai pas encore joui aujourd'hui Alors garde tes
forces elle disait on serait bien vingt oh ma vieille ce qu'on va s'envoyer j'étais
content ma soirée serait oui oui oui et je lui demandais si on pourrait se travestir elle
croyait que oui elle avait même une idée loufoque s'habiller en homme je lui
demande comment c'est et elle dit
(II: 170)
More striking than the fact that in the 1969 version the narrator is invited by an
unnamed acquaintance to a wedding between two unnamed parties after which there will
be a huge orgy, and that in the 1971 version the narrator is invited to an orgy only with no
mention of a wedding, is that starting on Page 211—reminiscent of the long list of
sexually suggestive nicknames we discussed earlier—and stretching some nine pages
across the columns of text and in different font size in the 1969 version alone are the
names of the thousands of wedding guests.10 The first four blocks of names are
duplicated by way of example below:

tu es sûr qu'ils seront là?

mais oui il y aura Basile
Rigobert Lucien Guillau
me Arcadius Félix Marcel
Antoine Sébastien Vincent
Raymond Timothée Paul
François Ignace Biaise
Gilbert

et Romuald Valentin Théo

dule Gabin Sylvain Pépin
Gérard Mathias Nestor
Montan Casimir Adrien
Thomas Jean Grégoire Za
charie Cyriaque Cyrille
Joseph Victorien Emma
nuel Gontran

10 In many instances, invitees share the same name. Examples of the "tas de types en double triple et plus" are:
"les sept Lucien," "les dix-huit Marcel," "les trente-huit Paul," "les quarante-neuf François," "les cent-quatre
Michel," "les sept cents Bernard," "[l]es neuf cents Jean," and "[l]es deux mille Eléonore" (I: 212).

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 16 Brian G. Kennelly

et Jonas Amédée Hughes Ro

chard Isidore Célestin Albert
Christian Macaire Léon Jules

Anicet Parfait Théodore Geor

ges Gaston Marc Marcellin
Frédéric Robert Ludovic Atha
nase Auguste Stanislas Désiré
Grégoire Mamert Servais Pa
côme Honoré Pascal

(1:211-12)
Of course, having unwritten the wedding from the 1971 version of his novel there is
no longer any need for a list of wedding guests. Not only does the anonymity of the orgy
therefore take center stage in the later version of the novel, but in writing the wedding
and list of invitees out of his work in favor of the orgy alone Duvert further underscores
the randomness and juxtapositions, "l'embarras du choix" (I: 212) by which sexual
interactions at orgies are characterized. More importantly, by completely cutting the
names of guests invited to celebrate and sanctify permanence, by writing them entirely
out of the second version of his novel—and thereby not just reordering or modifying
them as he does with the list of nicknames—Duvert also "cuts loose" the subsequent
pages in his text. He thus rehearses textually the various combinations and
recombinations that one might imagine sexually at a party whose very goal is the
circulation and repetition of no-strings-attached pleasure. For while the 1971 version of
Duvert's text more or less respects the order of the 1969 version up until this point, with
Duvert's cutting of the wedding from it and the showcasing of the orgy alone, it becomes
increasingly difficult for readers to determine the logic behind what sections of his text
Duvert chose to preserve, to "marry" with others, and why. Here, for example, and in
order is how the text from the 1969 version plays out—with varied modifications of
content in each case—in the 1971 version: two lines, starting a new section of text from
the 1969 version (I: 204) are found half-way down the page that also starts a new section
of text in the 1971 version (II: 169); nine lines further down the same page of the 1969
version (I: 204) are found at the bottom of the same page of the 1971 version and
extending—this time as seven and not nine lines—onto the page thereafter (II: 169-170);
the three segments of text in small font from the left-hand column that we have cited
above and which come four pages later in the 1969 version (I: 208) directly follow the
seven lines already mentioned and appear in a compact segment of fourteen lines in the
1971 version (II: 170); six lines that come six lines later in the 1969 version (I: 209)
directly follow the fourteen lines of the 1971 version but are now five lines; a more than
half-page section directly following the six lines in the 1969 version is found in the 1971
version some two pages later than the five lines and extends over two pages; the short
section directly following the more than half-page section in the 1969 version (I: 209) is
found nearly a page after the preceding section from the 1971 version (II: 174); two
segments of text—one from the right-hand and one from the left-hand column—in the
1969 version and that come more than three pages after the short section just mentioned
in the 1969 version (I: 213) is found in a compact textual clump in the 1971 version
nearly three pages before the section just mentioned in that same version (II: 171); a half
page section spread out across two columns in the 1969 version and that directly follows
the section we have just described (I: 213) comes more than a half-page after the compact
textual clump and stretches over two pages (II: 171-172). In other words, text is moved
both forward and backward with no apparent rhyme or reason between the 1969 and 1971
versions of his novel just as participants at an orgy might move from partner to partner or

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Tony Duvert 17

from body part to body part with no particular rationale other than unbridled, insatiable
desire.

Shifts in Text Between Versions of Interdit de séjour

1969 Version 1971 Version
Page 204 Page 169
Page 204 Pages 169-170
Page 208 Page 170
Page 209 Page 170
Page 209 Pages 172-173
Page 209 Page 174
Page 213 Page 171
Page 213 Pages 171-172

Further underlining the textual disruptiveness triggered by the author's removal of

any mention of matrimony from the 1971 version of the novel are the nearly fourteen
new pages of text that follow and that have no recognizable equivalent in the 1969
version. Just as writing the wedding out of the second version of his novel privileges the
orgy and writing the names of the attendees out of the text respects the anonymity of all
the attendees, this entire rewritten section of Duvert's novel—following the sections
highlighting random textual recombinations—is essentially as unrecognizable as the three
characters all labeled uselessly as "N." in the 1969 version. Stability and permanence are
thereby again trumped in this underworld whose raison d'être is sexual exchange by
multiplicity and novelty in the same way as entire sections of text from the 1969 version
of the novel are in the 1971 version reconfigured or written out of it.
♦ **

Having amply expanded the techniques of the New Novel that are typically app
within a single version of a work by exemplifying rewriting across both publi
versions of Interdit de séjour as well as through his "fiction mal faite" ("Lecture"
and across the two published versions of both Portrait d'homme couteau and Réci
Duvert predictably tires of textual experimentation. Although typography still plays a
in his next novel, Le Voyageur, and his subsequent novels, Paysage de fantaisie
Journal d'un innocent, are written in a non-traditional style, each of these work
notably published in a single version only. Moreover, Duvert ultimately reverts i
later novels to "fairly traditional modernist techniques" (Thiher, L'île 595) and in
aggressively militant extended essays on childhood sexuality and man-boy relation
to "expressing his ideas as clearly as possible" (Brongersma 9). Indeed, the auth
admits:

si j'ai besoin de moyens qu'on peut appeler traditionnels, c'est parce que
parle d'autres choses. Ce ne sont plus du tout les mêmes sortes d'individus,
mêmes sortes de personnages, les mêmes sortes de situations. Et à chaq
chose ses moyens. Il est impossible de mettre en scène comme je l'ai fait d
petites familles bourgeoises, ouvrières, paysannes etc... tout ça ensemble da
le même paquet, en écrivant comme j'ai écrit Interdit de séjour, par exemp
Ca n'est pas faisable. ("Non" 16)

The innovation and experimentation showcased in Duvert's early prose wor

played out in the "désécriture" between their versions and most strikingly obviou
Interdit de séjour through typography, onamastics, capitalization, and textu
recombination, ultimately lends itself to them alone and the contexts that only t
privilege. The rewriting Duvert thrice flaunts within and across versions of a text ca
understood therefore to be only passingly "recidivist," confined to, contained within
between versions of his first three novels alone. Beyond this textual triad, rewri

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
18 Brian G. Kennelly

unwriting, unwriting through rewriting proves to be an outgrown subversive strategy. Out

of place, written out as an option from the start in Duvert's later works, it too is, for all
intents and purposes, "interdit de séjour."

California Polytechnic State University

WORKS CITED

Benderson, Bruce. "Innocence on Trial : The Politics of Tony Duvert." Diary of a

Innocent. By Tony Duvert. Trans. Bruce Benderson. Los Angeles : Semiotext(e)
2010. 5-13.
."Introduction : The Family on Trial." Good Sex Illustrated. By Tony Duvert. Trans.
Bruce Benderson. Los Angeles : Semiotext(e), 2007. 7-13.
Bowie. Malcolm. Mallarmé and the Art of Being Difficult. Cambridge : Cambridge UP,
1978.
Brongersma, Edward. Loving Boys : A Multidisciplinary Study of Sexual Relations
Between Adult and Minor Males. Vol. 2. Elmhurst, NY : Global Academic
Publishers, 1990.
Chapsal, Madeleine. "La fête cruelle de Tony Duvert." L 'Express, 1973. 74-5.
Dalmas, André. "Portrait d'homme couteau," "Interdit de séjour" de Tony Duvert. Rev.
of Portrait d'homme couteau & Interdit de séjour, by Tony Duvert. Le Monde. 30
August 1969.
Drucker, Johanna. The Visible Word: Experimental Typography and Modern Art, 1909
1923. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1994.
Duvert, Tony. L 'Enfant au masculin. Paris: Minuit, 1980.
. Interdit de séjour. Paris: Minuit, 1969.
. Interdit de séjour (nouvelle edition refondue). Paris: Minuit, 1971.
. "La Lecture introuvable." Minuit 1 (1972): 2-21.
. Récidive. Paris : Minuit, 1967.
. "Tony Duvert : non à l'enfant poupée." Interview with Guy Hocquenghem and
Marc Voline. Libération. 10-11 April 1979. 15-16.
Gobille, Boris. "Mai-Juin 68: Crise du consentement et ruptures d'allégeance." Mai-Juin
68. Paris: Editions de l'Atelier, 2008. 15-31.
Kennelly, Brian. "Rape Fantasy Redux? Textual Victimhood In and Between Versions of
Tony Duvert's Portrait d'homme couteau." Dalhousie French Studies 101 (2014):
93-103.
. "Rewriting, Rereading Récidive." Dalhousie French Studies 67 (2004): 135-42.
Jellenik, Cathy. A Tripartite Approach to Rewriting in Marguerite Duras, Annie Ernaux,
and Marie Redonnet. Thesis: U. of Colorado, 2005.
McHale, Brian. Postmodernist Fiction. New York: Methuen, 1987.
Nourrissier, François. "Préface." L'île Atlantique. By Tony Duvert. Paris: Minuit, 1979.
7-9.
Phillips, John. Forbidden Fictions : Pornography and Censorship in Twentieth-Century
French Literature. London : Pluto Press, 1999.
Poirot-Delpech, Bertrand. Paysage de fantaisie, de Tony Duvert. Le Monde. 18 January
1973.
Robbe-Grillet, Alain. "L'exercice problématique de la littérature." Le Voyageur : textes,
causeries et entretiens (1947-2001). Ed. Olivier Corpet. Paris: Christian Bourgois,
2001.237-45.
Sebhan, Gilles. Tony Duvert: L'enfant silencieux. Paris: Denoël, 2010.
Shingler, Katherine. "Framing the Text: Mallarmé's Un coup de dés and the Arts of the
Book." Framed! Essays in French Studies. New York: Peter Lang, 2007. 53-72.

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
TonyDuvert 19

Simonin, Anne. "L'Ecri

Editions de l'Atelier/Ed
Stoltzfus, Ben. "The A
International Fiction R
Thiher, Allen. Rev. of
(1980) : 595.
. Rev. of Récidive. By T

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 des immeubles sans vitrine, sans porte ni passants, des immeubles sans vitrines, sans lumières ni portes, la
personne sous les porches creux, déserts, jardins cer nuit déserte et les squares embrumés l'été passait, un peu
tains soir j'étais enragé l'été passait, un peu plus clair moins clair chaque jour marcher des heures au long,
chaque jour s'épuiser, marcher sans fin, chercher encore
je rentrais dor
où 6tais-je
ou étais-je?? mir
mix dansaans
une chambre malpropre, ion me prêtait ça, il y
une cnamore

avait
avaitl'eau 1'eau
cinq six huit heures sanssans j'enfile un petit Arabe
j'enfile un égaré je lèche sa fente
pet:
but, marcher, prendre -papa une
unecoupure coupure
imberbe il faut les torcher
imberbeavant de s'en il
servir
tience, m'user, seule idée,
ces
cessoirs
soirsoù oil
honteusement
honteusement
j'ai j'ai
sans volonté je m'enfermais des jours entiers, je traînais sur mon
ddpleurer
dû pleurersursur
monroon
argentargent
— —
perdu,
perdu,volé, donné
vol£, donnS lit, seul,
seul, kà me branler, mi
me crever lentement, je puais, je me
reniflais,
reniflais, je
je d6coupais
découpais de:
des pornos, je me soûlais un peu
combien
combien d'années
d'armies
? ? ses

aisselles
aisselles sanssans
poils m'e
poils m'écœurent je lui fais baisser les
des années au long je je
traversais ce ce
traversais bras
bras(il(ilsourit
sourit de de
biaibiais quand on l'encule et fronce le
ventre,
quartier —- peur au ventre, minable,
minable, sourcil
sourcilsisiles
lescoups sont
coups sont trop forts — puis il baise à son
perdu, corps de brouillard
lillardsenti
senti tour
tour etetdecharge
décharge dans
dansl'exl'extase légère d'un pet)
ment progressif d'être e invisible
invisible le sommeil et
un
unnoyau
noyau
très dur
tris
se faisait l'obscurit6
l'obscurité
dur se faisait vidaient les i les rues, chaque soir une ville nou
vidaient
en moi soucicux
soucieux de ma velle
velle se
sedressait,
dressait,inhabits
inhabitée, où rôdaient les flics, les voyous,
seule image les clochards et les tantes : cet univers infirme était à
nous sur les boulevards on croisait encore de jeunes
je courais après tous et tant d'autres silhouettes, souples et vives, solidement incarnées je me
sans même oser tomber amoureux
réfugiais dans un jardin public, j'allais m'asseoir, j'attendais,
la poche vide, je bandais sur d'impossibles bestialités, bon
cinquante franc« perdus j'ai
aimé un petit Tunisien heurs anciens où des images, un secret revivaient, qui
avaient dû me jeter là, dans la nuit où je ne reconnaissais
je le lèche, longue fente plus rien courir des pissotières aux jardins, aux hôtels,
percée d'une imberbe payer, s'humilier, se mentir rien qu'un brouillard où l'on
coupure (j'ai pris ces sa navigue les yeux clos, personne n'existait (on singe la
bon marché après tout je les habitudes sur des
regardais mon mince pécule fon corps trop jolis) dureté, on invente des tactiques de repli, protection, sauve
dre miette à miette entre leurs garde, changer d'être ou de corps)
mains placides loin d'ici, dans la pé
nombre, l'appel d'un plaisir qu'on ne désirait plus, aperee
7
7

Illustration I: The First Pages of Both Versions of Interdit de séjour

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 autres ceux de la noce, d'une noce n'importe laquelle je ré Grêle-aux-fesses
Cornebite
pète leurs noms qui disent leur cruauté la veulerie salace Vit-en-fleurs
et vicieuse de leurs actes, l'image éteinte, brouillée mais sim Rebelote
ple comme un rôle de pantomine, qu'ils avaient conçue Doigt-curieux
d'eux-mêmes, titres d'une cour lointaine, brutale» repères Décrasse-fente
La Poivrée
d'une contrée dessinée dans les taches d'un drap où les
La Nitouche
orifices déposent leur miel, les sexes moulent leur forme, L'Embourrée
les glandes, les bouches bavent de sommeil — on les mur L'Embouquée
dins, sur
mure aux jardins, surles
lesseuils,
scuils,dans
danslesles baisers
baisers d'accueil.
d'accueil, UEnfléchée
LrEnfl6cf
comme l'urine dont les
le dont les chicns
chiens mouillcnt
mouillent leur chemin L'Encornée
L'Encorc
L'Enchâssée
L'Ench&
familier, lesauves
fauves leur nourriture,
leur nourriture,ononen
enmarque
marqueleslesincon
incon L'Embro
L'Embrochée
nus avant queje l'obscurite dcs des
l'obscurité danses et desetalc6ves
danses les
des alcôves les L'Enfourchée
L'Enfoui
engloutisse -—ilsilss'alignent
s'alignent1&,
là,sursurleleregistre
registredes
descroque
croque L'Enchatonnée
L'Enchat
morts et je répète
p&te ces cesnoms
nomsetetje jeris
risetet
je je
pleure
pleure
: : L'EncuW
L'Enculé
Vice-vers
Vice-versa

Croquederche Compte-]
Compte-fiente
Bosse-au-chibre
Bowe-au
Douce-crampe
Douce-crarape
Miss Truitonne
Miss Truitonne Tringle-«
Tringle-en-l'cci)
Miss Platine Tour-Eifl
Tour-Eiffel
Con-en-fête
Con-en-fi
Miss
Miss Gruyire
Gruyère
Bouffechiotteg
Bouffechiotteg L'Endocf
L'Endocaldeuse
Chaudelance
Chaudelauce LaRfrve
La Rêveuse
La Forei
Foreuse
La Mensong&re
La Mensongère
La Frclon
Frelon L'Emmai
L'Emmancheuse
Ijsl Demi-mal
La Demi-mal La Rivet
Rivcteuse
L'Artifice
L'Artifice La Plant
Planteuse
L'Enfileu
L'Enfileuse
L^Embccqueuse
LTEmbccqueuse
Bunwflamme
Bumeflamme L'Encave
L'Encavense
Canne-à-sucre
Canne-a
Tannegamin
Pieds-devant Vit-de-pi
Vit-de-pierre
Miss Multicolore Roule-patin
Roule-pa
Miss Blenno NocesAl'j
Noces^d'argent
L'Avaleuse Tournevi
Tournevis
La Victorieuse Belle-Bui
Beîle-Burette
La Griffeuse La Retoi
La Retournée
La Poussive L'Enervée
L'Enervfi
1a
La VcrmiceHc
Vermicelle L'Incubée
L'Incubdi
La Défunte L'Envahie
La Serrure La Fendue
La Masseuse La Passoire
La Toutou La Grossesse
La Sucette Tiremorve
Petite-mort Coquin
FrôIefiHe Mousse-au-ci cl
Pochette-Surprise Saillegousse
Triple-z'œufs Motopompe
Miss Barbouze Bite-à-mouches
Tournedos Sous-marin
Langue-de-velours Fous-moi-donc

236 237

Illustration II: Partial List (1969 Version of Interdit de séjour)

(List continues through Page 241)

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 cri le piaillement murmure que ta bande inventait en les Trois-six miss Pétrole la Poète la Chipée la Gironde la
apercevant images brouillées simples comme un rôle de Décrasse 2a Minette la Gaulliste la Pégase la Pompon la
pantomime titres d'une cour imaginaire toponymie d'un ter Vicaire la Mornifle la Pie-douze la Condom la Minouche
roir dessiné par les taches d'un drap où 1« corps déposaient la Chimique la Bigorne l'Aspirante lTEntrefesses la Fricasse
leur miel moulaient leur forme noms prononcés dans les la Musclés la Violée la Pavoise la Tlton la Pochette Baise
squares les bottes et les baisers d'accueil mots silhouettes en-biais Sans-façon Doux-fiasco Mange-tout Chaude-lance
sans lesquels on ne s'identifiait pas et dont les folles mar Sous-marin Pique-nique Barbe-au-nœud Pain-de-sucre Bran
quaient chacun comme les fauves arrosent d'urine leur che le-bas la Chapelle la Fossette la Goûteuse la Vampire la
riture
min et leur nourriture et vite
et vite desigaaient
désignaient les avant
les inconnus inconnus avantDonneuse
Don la Craquette la Ice-cream la Jumelle la Vas'line
es danses
que l'obscurité des danses et des
et des alcdves
alcôves ne les engloutisse lalaFRidée la Troussée la Piauleuse la Pendule la Dam'jeanne
ne les engloutisse
oyeuse
énuméraient la Joyeuse la D6funte
la Défunte la Tigresse
la Tigresse la Merveillela Merveille lalaCCapote l'Arroseuse la Pourléche la Reluque la Poireaute
iteuse
la Glacée la Menteuse la Griffeuse
la Griffeuse la Poussive
la Poussive la Chatouillela ChatouiUe lalaTTassée l*Espionneuse la Repasse la Suceuse la Pompeuse
la Meurtrie la MéméM£m6 Vit-en-fleur
Vit-en-fleur Tournedos
Tournedos Grêle-aux Grfele-aux- lala TTigeuse l'Embueuse la Pipeuse la Brouteuse la Plumeuse
mc Pisse-au-rond
fesses Oignon-blanc Pisse-au-rond Midi-une VcrmicellcRe
Midi-une Vermicelle Re- I'Err
l'Embecqueuse la Fumeuse la Scalpeuse la Cigarière Roule
rour-Eiffel
belote P'tit-salé Tour-Eiffel l'Avaleuse l'Avaleuse
la Rêveuse l'Enervéela Rfeveuse patin TEnervie pathTournevis Belles-burettes Canne-à
Noces-d'argent
avahie la
la Blécharde l'Envahie la Colique
ColiquelalaSept-ciels
Sept-ciels la Frip6e
la Fripée la la sucr
sucre Bosse-au-chibre Vice-versa Coup-de-frein Jambes-en
helala
Pâlotte la Nitouche Danseuse
Danseuse miss miss
TruitonneTruitonne miss Platine l'air
miss Platine l'air Passe-partout Chaud-couloir Gode-à-blanc Burn'en
miss Pépettes laSerrure
Serrure la laMasseuse
Masseuse la Toutou
la Toutou la Sucette plon
la Sucette plomb Sans-déduit Levres-d'bronze Bande-en-long Bande
argouillelalaPoivrée
i'Arlésienne la Gargouille Poivrfie la M&asse
la Mélasse la Dardante en-1;
la Dardante en-large Fous-moi-donc Couille-veuve Quatre-cents coups
l'Incubée la Fenduedue la Gagneuse
Gagueusela la Passoire
Passoire la Chamelle Ro&
la Chamelle Rossignol Echalote Porte-en-l'air l'Abaisse-langue Tourne-à
'6t6e
la Zoizeau la Pétée miss
miss Souris
Souris missmissGruyère Gruyire la Cafard gauc
la Cafard gauche Tourae-à-droite Déchire-moi Y-va-d'cinq Frise-aux
igt-curieuxTubulure
Petite-mort Doigt-curieux Tubulure Bouffe-aux-chioUes mici
Bouffe-aux-chiottes miches Mords-mes-fruits la Baisée la Pinée la Niquée la
^asse-noisettes
Veuve-poignet Casse-noisettes Vit-de-pierre
Vit-de-pierre Main-gluantc Cas<
Main-gluante Casée la Tringlée la Guisée la Cassée la Limée la Sabrée
is Defile
Fait-ses-frais miss missGiclée
Défile miss Giclle miss
miss Piquouze
Piquouze miss miss lalaCGrimpée la Riv'tée la Ramée la Tronchée la Misée la
se-mottes
Blenno miss Rase-mottes la la F6d£r£e
Fédérée la Festival
la Festival la Cro la Cro- Saut Sautée la Fourrée la Godillée la Burinée la Matraquée la
magnon la Militry ry lalaPathétique
Path6tique la Scratch la laScratch
Scritch missla Scritch miss
Ramonée Ran la Défoncée la Forée la Foutue l'Em
la Biscuitée
Multicolore la 'olibri
Colibri la Sons-et-parfums
Sons-et-parfums la la Pique-et-coud man
Pique-et-coud manché l'Enfilé l'Enviandé l'Enfléché l'Enchâssé l'Embroché
l'P'tit-ramoneur Notre-père Montre-tout Passe-lacet Bite-en l'Enfifré l'Empaffé rEnfoiré JTErabouqué l'Entubé l'Enfoncé
beurre Pied-d'oiseau Vent-arrière Tire-bouchon Tape-au l'Encavé l'Enfigué l'Encroupé l'Envergué l'Embourré l'Em
trou Sabre-au-clair miss Barbouze miss Fréquente miss Sans bagué l'Endauffé l'Enfourché l'Encorné l'Epinglé l'Entrappé
un la Frelon la Purée la D'mi-mal l'Artifice la Gondole la lTEmprosé I'Enchatonné l'Endocaldé l'Entroufigné l'Encré
Victoire la R'tournée la Grossesse l'Encloquée ITSmbossée ils passaient courbaient la tête devant la fosse et s'éloignaient
l'Arrondie la Paillasse la Venin la Papouüle l'Enjouée la la noce est gentille dans les fleurs les chansons pas loin d'une
Monsieur la Funèbre la Pelure la Raseuse la Non-lieu l'Ex buvette ombragée ils couraient un peu soûls les rues se sont
purgée miss Pav'tons miss Ramdam miss Titi miss Raccroc vidées les pissotières murmurent comme des fontaines le
la Baba la Glouglou la Frimante la Colosse la Gripp'sou ciel se calme l'air rafraîchit et mes nouilles cuisent sans sel
la Sexuelle la Rieuse la Tartouze la Bergère la Sucrette la il faudrait de l'eau de mer ou des larmes il écrivait achevait
Gâteuse la Momie la Pébroc la Matave la Narine la Bibi sa lettre je la lirais demain je ne la recevrais pas il se
la Convole la Nini Pieds-devant Mousse-au-ciel Peau-de-soie trompait d'adresse parlait d'une autre ville une autre cham
Burn'en-flammes Va-et-vient Attrape-mouches Croque-au bre un autre temps j'ai pris les fleurs des jaunes petites fleurs
derche Douce-crampe Triple-z'œufs Lang'de-vlours Cul-en grenues avec du blanc autour elles en arrachaient des poi
joie CroÛte-aux-cils Chaud-et-froid la Juteuse la Revan gnées en se faisant foutre faute d'oreiller à mordre il habi
che la Rythmique la Pâmée la Sans-nom la Lichaille la tait là près de la gare un rez-dc-chaussée en plein boulevard

202 203

Illustration III: Complete List (1971 Version of Interdit de séjour)

This content downloaded from 115.43.77.83 on Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:11:11 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms