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the book collector On December 29, 1826, just days after Lepage was acquitted, Pierre-Denis Peyronnet, the Minister of Justice, proposed a new law that imposed harsh new sanctions and penalties on the press; he called it ‘the law of justice and love.’ It was anything but that, and upon hearing of its severity, one legislative deputy left the chamber shouting: ‘You might as well propose a law for the suppression of printing in France, for the benefit of Belgium.’26 The reaction to the proposed law was swift and powerful, from members of the Academy to the public at large—the majority of the country was horrified and protested. The bill was withdrawn in April, but it and other manifestations of repression resulted in a bill of impeachment for Villèle, who was removed from office in 1828, presaging the July Revolution of 1830 in which Charles X was forced to abdicate. Perhaps the little dictionary was the last straw for the ultra-conservative government, or perhaps it was a coincidence, but the desire to impose heavy restrictions on the press followed the Dictionnaire’s court case. Lepage, undeterred and perhaps inspired by the government’s failure to pass the repressive law, wrote (with his friend and frequent collaborator Emile Debraux), two satiric works in 1827 on his former tormentors. The first, Villèle aux Enfers, was a satiric verse on the punctilious prime minister. A witty mention in the newspaper Le Figaro observed that the ‘underworld’ (Enfers) in the title must be a mistake—His Excellency was known to reside on the rue de Rivoli.27 The second work, Peyronnet devant Dieu, satirized the authoritarian justice minister. Lepage went on to a successful career as a singer and writer of popular songs. An ardent voice for the people, anti-royalist and member of the emerging bohemian class, he sang his way to fame in the goguettes of Paris, the many small, working-class bars/cafés devoted to communal singing, drinking and socializing where tory about one of their subjects in their Biographie Nouvelle des Contemporaines (1820– 25), although they had the last laugh when they published an account of their prison experiences in their best-selling works Les Hermites en Prison (1823) and a sequel, Les Hermites en Liberté (1824). 26. The law proposed new restraints and regulations on printers, including restrictions on the ownership and editorship of political journals; prohibitions on publishing anything on living persons without their permission; and the imposition of a substantial stamp-tax on periodicals. It would have wiped out the printing industry in France. 64
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pavement nymphs and roadside flowers goguettiers often sang about love and women, including prostitutes, with lyrics using some of the other names for nymphes, as in ‘Le Boudoir,’ a popular 19th century ditty: Voyez-vous, lion, rat, grisette, Encombrer le sacré parvis; Par Notre-Dame-de-Lorette A l’enfer criminels ravis ? Aux frais minois qu’on y contemple, Aux parfums sentant leur terroir, On se dit : quel est donc ce temple ? Est-ce une église, est-ce un boudoir? Can’t you see, lion rat, grisette, That by cluttering up the sacred space Around Notre-Dame-de-Lorette You’ve thrilled the criminals in hell? To the fresh little faces one sees there To the perfumes redolent of a bazaar One asks, what then is this temple? Is it a church, or is it a boudoir?28 Church or boudoir? Sacred or profane? Virtue or vice? Lepage’s Dictionnaire, a vestige of the libertine spirit of the Revolution, and Parent’s encyclopedic analysis, an example of Enlightenment values of reason and science, embody these opposing sides of the French dilemma regarding prostitution after the Revolution. Much ink and paint were utilized to address the problem in the 19th century through the work of numerous writers and artists who brought the hazy subject of prostitution into clearer focus. Yet the actual issue remains unresolved. Hundreds of French words for ‘prostitute’ indicate that the popular preference (at least for men) was the boudoir; art and literature, ditto. But for women, the choice was not quite so clear. Denied access to many of the rights promised by the Revolution, including education and gainful employment, many women had no alternative except the boudoir. It might have been a choice, but it was one of last resort and all the synonyms for prostitute—whether as ethereal as nymphe or as sordid as salope—did not disguise the cruelty and misery that lie beneath prostitution. These are the dismal facts to which Flaubert alluded in his own honest admission of prostitution’s appeal.29 Parent claimed as much nearly two decades earlier in the blunt style of a statistician: 27. Le Figaro, 26 November 1826, p. 4. Interestingly, it was Balzac who printed the anti-Villèle poem and many other of Lepage and Dubraux’s works. 28. La goguette ancienne et moderne. Choix de chansons nationales, Paris: Garnier Frères, 1874, p. 249. 29. Quoted at the beginning of this essay, Flaubert’s admission was written in a letter to his lover Louise Colet in June, 1853. 65

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the book collector

On December 29, 1826, just days after Lepage was acquitted, Pierre-Denis Peyronnet, the Minister of Justice, proposed a new law that imposed harsh new sanctions and penalties on the press; he called it ‘the law of justice and love.’ It was anything but that, and upon hearing of its severity, one legislative deputy left the chamber shouting: ‘You might as well propose a law for the suppression of printing in France, for the benefit of Belgium.’26 The reaction to the proposed law was swift and powerful, from members of the Academy to the public at large—the majority of the country was horrified and protested. The bill was withdrawn in April, but it and other manifestations of repression resulted in a bill of impeachment for Villèle, who was removed from office in 1828, presaging the July Revolution of 1830 in which Charles X was forced to abdicate. Perhaps the little dictionary was the last straw for the ultra-conservative government, or perhaps it was a coincidence, but the desire to impose heavy restrictions on the press followed the Dictionnaire’s court case.

Lepage, undeterred and perhaps inspired by the government’s failure to pass the repressive law, wrote (with his friend and frequent collaborator Emile Debraux), two satiric works in 1827 on his former tormentors. The first, Villèle aux Enfers, was a satiric verse on the punctilious prime minister. A witty mention in the newspaper Le Figaro observed that the ‘underworld’ (Enfers) in the title must be a mistake—His Excellency was known to reside on the rue de Rivoli.27 The second work, Peyronnet devant Dieu, satirized the authoritarian justice minister.

Lepage went on to a successful career as a singer and writer of popular songs. An ardent voice for the people, anti-royalist and member of the emerging bohemian class, he sang his way to fame in the goguettes of Paris, the many small, working-class bars/cafés devoted to communal singing, drinking and socializing where tory about one of their subjects in their Biographie Nouvelle des Contemporaines (1820– 25), although they had the last laugh when they published an account of their prison experiences in their best-selling works Les Hermites en Prison (1823) and a sequel, Les Hermites en Liberté (1824). 26. The law proposed new restraints and regulations on printers, including restrictions on the ownership and editorship of political journals; prohibitions on publishing anything on living persons without their permission; and the imposition of a substantial stamp-tax on periodicals. It would have wiped out the printing industry in France.

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