Anca Mitroi
178
pearance of this tradition is seen as a loss characteristic of the modern
age. Opposing the oral tradition of fantastic stories in Romania and
modern France, Ghika comments: “On ne conte plus. Quelques
vieillards ont conservé ce talent comme le souvenir d’un siècle éteint.
On ne cause plus, on pérore: le forum a tout envahi. Nous mourrons
par la parole.”
29 Verne’s commentary on traditional storytelling is
quite similar, as he nostalgically deplores the disappearance of legends
in a too pragmatic nineteenth century: “D’ailleurs, il ne se crée plus de
légendes au déclin de ce pratique et positif XIX
e siècle […]”.
30
However, if the villagers of Werst do not invent new legends, Verne
explains that they preserve and cultivate their traditions and “ces
légendes qui prennent volontiers naissance dans les imaginations
roumaines”.
31 Paradoxically, such considerations about the naïve attachment to legends and even the lack of sophisticated education
might have been seen positively by Romanian readers: in nineteenthcentury Transylvania, as “[t]rue Romantics, more and more Romanians turned to the unspoiled ‘people’ as the repository of some pristine
national wisdom and virtue”.
32 If the Transylvania of the Château des
Carpathes seems to be inhabited by “noble savages” as relics of a frozen past, this should not surprise us: Jean-Pierre Picot points out that
Verne often sees in certain territories, like Scotland for Paganel, or in
this case, Transylvania, “[un] haut lieu du passé”.
33 This also means
that even if Verne totally effaces the real Transylvania, its actual economic and cultural development and its ties with Western Europe, he
creates an imaginary land similar, on one hand, to Nerval’s idyllic
Valois with all its legends and relics of the past, and, on the other, to
the Romantic discourses of Dacian legends and illusory pure origins
which are so familiar to Romanian readers.
Yet the most striking omission in Verne’s Transylvania is one
that could be taken either for an inexplicable mistake or for a political
statement, that is the total absence of Hungarians and Austrians in a
___________________________
29 Soubiran-Ghika, La Valachie moderne, p. 19.
30 Verne, Château, p. 8.
31 Verne, Château, p. 29.
32 Gabro Barta and Istvan Bona, History of Transylvania, trans. by Adrienne Chambers-Makkai et al. (Budapest: Académiai Kiadó, 1994), p. 473. On this aspect of
Romanian nationalism, see also Anne-Marie Thiesse, La Création des identités
nationales: Europe XVIII
e
-XX
e siècle (Paris: Seuil, 1999), pp. 95-100.
33 Jean-Pierre Picot, “Parodie et tragédie de la regression dans quelques œuvres de
Jules Verne”, Romantisme. Revue du Dix-neuvième siècle, 27 (1980), 109-27 (p. 111).
178
pearance of this tradition is seen as a loss characteristic of the modern
age. Opposing the oral tradition of fantastic stories in Romania and
modern France, Ghika comments: “On ne conte plus. Quelques
vieillards ont conservé ce talent comme le souvenir d’un siècle éteint.
On ne cause plus, on pérore: le forum a tout envahi. Nous mourrons
par la parole.”
29 Verne’s commentary on traditional storytelling is
quite similar, as he nostalgically deplores the disappearance of legends
in a too pragmatic nineteenth century: “D’ailleurs, il ne se crée plus de
légendes au déclin de ce pratique et positif XIX
e siècle […]”.
30
However, if the villagers of Werst do not invent new legends, Verne
explains that they preserve and cultivate their traditions and “ces
légendes qui prennent volontiers naissance dans les imaginations
roumaines”.
31 Paradoxically, such considerations about the naïve attachment to legends and even the lack of sophisticated education
might have been seen positively by Romanian readers: in nineteenthcentury Transylvania, as “[t]rue Romantics, more and more Romanians turned to the unspoiled ‘people’ as the repository of some pristine
national wisdom and virtue”.
32 If the Transylvania of the Château des
Carpathes seems to be inhabited by “noble savages” as relics of a frozen past, this should not surprise us: Jean-Pierre Picot points out that
Verne often sees in certain territories, like Scotland for Paganel, or in
this case, Transylvania, “[un] haut lieu du passé”.
33 This also means
that even if Verne totally effaces the real Transylvania, its actual economic and cultural development and its ties with Western Europe, he
creates an imaginary land similar, on one hand, to Nerval’s idyllic
Valois with all its legends and relics of the past, and, on the other, to
the Romantic discourses of Dacian legends and illusory pure origins
which are so familiar to Romanian readers.
Yet the most striking omission in Verne’s Transylvania is one
that could be taken either for an inexplicable mistake or for a political
statement, that is the total absence of Hungarians and Austrians in a
___________________________
29 Soubiran-Ghika, La Valachie moderne, p. 19.
30 Verne, Château, p. 8.
31 Verne, Château, p. 29.
32 Gabro Barta and Istvan Bona, History of Transylvania, trans. by Adrienne Chambers-Makkai et al. (Budapest: Académiai Kiadó, 1994), p. 473. On this aspect of
Romanian nationalism, see also Anne-Marie Thiesse, La Création des identités
nationales: Europe XVIII
e
-XX
e siècle (Paris: Seuil, 1999), pp. 95-100.
33 Jean-Pierre Picot, “Parodie et tragédie de la regression dans quelques œuvres de
Jules Verne”, Romantisme. Revue du Dix-neuvième siècle, 27 (1980), 109-27 (p. 111).