University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for its Department of Romance Studies

A NOTE ON CHRONOLOGY IN "LA RELIGIEUSE"

Author(s): Philip Stewart
Source: Romance Notes, Vol. 12, No. 1 (Autumn, 1970), pp. 149-156
Published by: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for its Department of Romance
Studies
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/43800650
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A NOTE ON CHRONOLOGY IN LA RELIGIEUSE

by Philip Stewart

even very good writers sometimes get their own accounts confused and
construct sequences of events which, if objectively checked out, prove
to be completely incongruous. Chronology in novels was in any case
pretty primitive up to 1700 (La Princesse de Cleves is, as always, an
exception); one finds general improvement thereafter but still many
were the novelists who did not pay close attention to time distribution,
whether or not their works as a whole were solidly organized. Chronol-
ogy was an aspect of technique which it took novelists collectively a
long time to master, and even late in the process one encounters oc-
casional blunders, some of which, like the two-year pregnancy of
Rosanette in l'Education sentimentale , are relatively famous. 1 Flaubert
was a meticulous writer, so this was an anomaly ; but mistakes of this
sort are hardly rare among the very numerous writers who somewhat
carelessly strung events together. In addition one happens upon occa-
sional chronological absurdities: of a natural order, when Fanny in
Cleveland gives birth to two children at six weeks' interval ; 2 or of a
logical order, as in Mme Simonin's assertion in La Religieuse that the
letter she is writing was sent yesterday. 3
It seems reasonable to conjecture that if the author has not been
keeping track, such errors are likely to reflect a distortion of time which
is in part a function of his conception of the novel or the character:

1 See Joseph Pinatel, "Notes vétilleuses sur la chronologie de l'Éducation

sentimentale in RHLF, 1953, pp. 57-59.
2 Œuvres choisies de Prévost (Paris, Leblanc, 1810), 5, 273. Properly speaking,
this is not a chronological error, since the two deliveries are described in the
same paragraph and the interval clearly specified.
3 Diderot, Œuvres romanesques, Garnier edition, 1962, p. 266. All subsequent
page references to La Religieuse, also in this edition, are indicated by numbers
in parentheses.

149

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 150 ROMANCE NOTES

Fanny's life is chock-full of events, but F

and drawn-out. It has been pointed ou
Marivaux and Diderot both indicate ag
flatly contradict the stories' chronology, by
of all her experience, "ages" too quickl
corroboration for her continuing innocenc
this suggestion fairly convincing but som
application if one is aware just how comm
at least in the eighteenth century. Writers o
been made and do not always feel it is w
them, even in further editions of thei
certain lack of concern for such petty ma
finds disconcerting.
An interesting case in point is La Relig
the incongruities have been observed alre
siderably underestimated. Miss Mylne not
once counts up and gives herself "à peine
reader too has been keeping account, ... i
is well over twenty-one when this remar
are right, twenty-three is more like it. In fa
a fairly compact and intense story really
not sure that a method of minute analys
is always a fruitful way to approach an u
novel is put together, but it does seem to me
is potentially as great as it is here betwe
it is worth the trouble to define with som
fictional "facts" are.

We know to begin with that Suzanne was sixteen and a half years
of age when her sisters were both successfully married off (237); she
had already been at the convent of Sainte-Marie, where she had been
sent to get her out of their suitors' eyesight, for some undefined length
of time. One wonders, incidentally, when she indicates that some two
years later or so both sisters have "beaucoup d'enfants" (242, 250). Let

4 The Eighteenth-Century French Novel (Manchester University Press, 1965),

pp. 200-201.
s Ibid., p. 200.

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 A NOTE ON CHRONOLOGY IN "LA RELIGIEUSE" 151

us assume that that period at Sainte-Marie during which her sisters

married lasted only a few months, and call this, in terms of the novel,
Year 1. With reference to the "Préface- Annexe" we could give this
year a specific date, but there are two reasons for not doing so : first,
such a method would obligate us here to work backwards, since the
date given in the "Préface- Annexe" (1760) attaches to the end of
the novel, the time at which Suzanne writes her story; also it is a
purely exterior indication and would artificially compensate for the
lack of any such precise referent in the novel itself.
Sometime towards the middle of Year 1, then, Suzanne began her
noviciate, which lasted two years (238), or until the middle of Year 3.
It was a peaceful period about which she tells us almost nothing, and
at the end of which she publicly refuses to take her vows. A month later
she is returned to her parents' home, where she is imprisoned six months
more (247-48): this brings us to the end of Year 3. Her mention that
it was then winter time (251) makes the schema we have set up com-
patible with the calendar. But we note that Suzanne is already off
somewhat on her own age because she alludes to herself as "une fille
de dix-sept à dix-huit ans" (251), whereas she is more like nineteen.
At least half a month later (256) she is taken to Longchamp, having
finally consented to do as her family wishes ; this is about the beginning
of Year 4. Soeur Moni has just begun a three-year term as Mother
Superior of that convent (258). At this point again the chronological
indications become minimal. The next useful one we can locate is the
death of M. Simonin on a January 5 (266), and that of Soeur Moni
at the end of the same month: but both of these events come
considerably later. Working backwards from this January, we mu
include two more years of noviciate since she entered Longchamp (
preceded by a postulate of unspecified length, and followed by a pe
of dementia and total amnesia designated only as "des mois ent
(264). The only way this is possible is to situate the two deaths in
January of Year 7, which would, reasonably enough, allow six months
or so for the postulate. (It is true that she had already been through a
noviciate, but it is also true that Longchamp took her with some reserva-
tions about her past record and might therefore have been in no hurry
for her to take her vows.) This chronology, by the way, is consistent
(but just barely) with the earlier assertion that the Mother Superior of

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152 ROMANCE NOTES

Longchamp changed every three ye

that office when she dies, and it has
she began in early Year 4.
Mme Simonin died "the same year"
at the end of the same calendar year
Suzanne situates these events: "Mon
supérieure sur la fin du même mois, e
(266). This impression is confirmed by
time she has mentioned the three dea
besides the fact that although she com
first two ("la fin du même mois"), no
death occurred at anywhere near the
then, after a late autumn trip (265),
of what transpired in that year does
nòte. One cannot argue, however, th
"sandwiches" between these events of Year 7, because what follows
centers around the idea of the lawsuit brought by Suzanne, which
decidedly follows her mother's death.
Her fall from grace in the convent under the new Mother Superior,
Sainte-Christine, may well have begun during that interval, but at any
rate, it extends into Year 8 and becomes ever more severe, particularly
when she is suspected of writing something against the interests of the
convent. It leads to her spending three days in a cachot but she is
rehabilitated in time for her needed assistance in the musical programs
of Lent; she tells about a conversation with Soeur Saint-Ursule on
Good Friday (282). It is just after this that her incipient lawsuit is
made known to the Superior; she becomes a paria and is officially
pronounced dead by the sisters. The day of the Feast of the Ascension
(forty days after Easter) she finds the door of her cell locked so that
she cannot attend Mass: very soon thereafter she is saved from her
physical misery by the visit of the Vicar (M. Hébert). It is on this
occasion that Suzanne says, "je comptais mes années, je trouvais que
j'avais à peine vingt ans" (301). I suspect that the use of the verb
compter betrays that Diderot has himself just made an effort to figure
out how old his heroine is, and if that is so, he counted badly. For
unless I have myself so erred, this is about May of Year 8 and Suzanne
has to be at least twenty-three and a half years old. Some months later,

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 A NOTE ON CHRONOLOGY IN "LA RELIGIEUSE" 153

in fact, early in her stay at Sainte-Eutrope, she tells her new Superio
she is not yet twenty (344).
Suzanne loses her suit, undergoes an amende honorable and a mont
of penitence, an illness and a "very long" convalescence (321) ; Soeur
Ursule dies; Suzanne is removed from Longchamp to Sainte-Eutro
d'Arpajon, where she observes over some length of time, and describe
to us in résumé, the behavior of the members of the community. Th
takes us through the winter (she speaks of the "rigueur de la saison
on p. 355) ; in the spring of Year 9 she brings suit against Longcham
to recover her dowry. The next temporal indication - except for vagu
notations here and there, such as "le lendemain" or "plusieurs jours"
(337) - comes with her confession and partial enlightenment by Pèr
Lemoine on Pentecost Eve (seven weeks after Easter). In the next few
days (373) she wins her suit and Lemoine is replaced as directeur
Sainte-Eutrope.
There follows the long mélancolie of the Mother Superior, which
extends "des semaines entières" (376), "des mois entiers" (377),
- ending, along with the main body of the novel, with the famous
confessions, which must be in the fall of Year 9. Several months later
(387) the Mother Superior dies, and soon after her, Soeur Thérèse. Some
indeterminate time later, Suzanne flees Arpajon ; and it is at least half
a month after that before she writes her story (389). She does not men-
tion cold weather as being a problem, so we might place her flight in
the spring of Year 10: in any case, it could not be before very late
in Year 9. Thus at the time she writes, Suzanne is about twenty-five
years of age. In addition, Sainte-Christine could at this date still be
Mother Superior of Longchamp, as earlier stated, (319) - but again
just barely - without running over her three-year term.
On at least one score, we should now exonerate Diderot: the only
overall inconsistencies in the chronological outlay of the book concern
the age Suzanne, at various times, attributes to herself, which does not
coincide with any objective account. Aside from that, however, despite
the paucity of precise points of reference within the story, the chronol-
ogy is perfectly well structured. 6 This seems to imply that even if

6 It is understood here that we are not talking about such isolated errors as
Mme Simonin's letter mentioned earlier, or trifles like the slight error on the
dates of Port-Royal indicated by Henri Bénac in note 197 of the Garnier edition

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154 ROMANCE NOTES

Diderot's "count" of the years did not co

grasp of the cyclical aspect of time - rev
feast days - was consistently on target.
Could one go further, and maintain that
"realistic," given the relatively atemporal
must concede that in other respects Suzan
seem to be conditioned by the realities of
notes hours of the day (249, 255, 276), bu
tant part of that life, where the day is segm
and bells mark the hour for each activity
Suzanne seems to have none other than the Church calendar: all the
dates given are in function of religious occasions (e. g. second day of
Christmas), and the only notions of time of year which her memory
retains, aside from the cold of winter, relate to important Church
occasions: Easter, Lent, Ascension, Pentecost. She recalls the exact
date of her father's death (January 5, or the day before Epiphany), but
not that of Soeur Moni, although the latter no doubt was much more
significant to her. It seems likely, therefore, that Sister Suzanne might
not have been ordinarily conscious of her exact age. That would at
least justify her need to count up. Still, it is difficult to accept that,
once having counted, she could miss by better than three years and
in her own not-too-distant memory shorten seven years to four.
There is another sort of problem that comes up in the way Suzanne's
memory functions, or at least in the way she tells things. I am not refer-
ring here to her "impossible innocence" in relating, with complete
incomprehension, things which by the time she writes she must under-
stand, but to her habit of confusing the specific incident with the
general description, slipping from passé simple to imperfect tense and
vice versa. Properly applied, such a transition can be part of a normal
technique: it is found in La Princesse de Cleves , where a synopsis of
a conversation between Mme de Chartres and her daughter almost
imperceptibly ends up a direct quotation ; 7 it is also common for a

(p. 873). For a more complete discussion of the various mistakes in the novel,
see Georges May's Diderot et " La Religieuse " (New Haven and Paris, 1954),
pp. 204-08.
7 In Mme de Lafayette, Romans et Nouvelles (Garnier ed. 1961), pp. 263-64.
The same transition occurs in a conversation between M. de Cleves and Mlle de
Chartres on pp. 258-59.

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 A NOTE ON CHRONOLOGY IN "LA RELIGIEUSE" 155

character meeting another ( passé simple) to then tell us something about

the new person (imperfect, or even present - as when Suzanne de-
scribes the Mother Superior of Sainte-Eutrope, pp. 328-30). But in this
novel, and particularly in the scenes describing Sainte-Eutrope, narrative
time seems to become very obscure, just as her observations about her
lawsuit and monastic life are awkwardly and confusingly blurred into
what is supposed to be the actual wording of Manouri's plaidoyer
(309-11).
For example, in one of the key scenes describing the behavior of the
Mother Superior (340-46), it is extremely difficult to locate the different
elements, not in terms of the overall chronology, but simply in relation
to each other. The scene opens with a page of description and dialogue
(passé simple ), then comes a paragraph of general sociological com-
mentary (present tense). Except for the fact that it sounds a little too
much like Diderot talking, this is all right. The next paragraph goes
into the imperfect as time distends and Suzanne draws on other oc-
casions : "Je voyais croître de jour en jour la tendresse que la supérieure
avait conçue pour moi." Dialogue is introduced into this part of the
relation as well, but this too is acceptable if it is not too complex, since
we can assume that it distills the gist of more than one such encounter.
But while describing the advances of the Superior - in some detail,
but still in the imperfect tense - Suzanne suddenly reverts to a passé
simple :

elle m'exhortait en bégayant, et d'une voix altérée et basse, à redoubler mes

caresses; je les redoublais; enfin il vint un moment ... où elle devint pâle
comme la mort...

This continues for some time and the impression that this is an
isolated occasion is confirmed by an explicit comparison between the
specific and the general: "Les autres fois, quand je sortais, elle
m'accompagnait jusqu'à la porte... ; cette fois-ci à peine se leva-t-elle."
It would seem that we have rejoined the scene begun earlier, although
even to come to that tentative conclusion the reader would have to
grapple with the text for some time. Even that explanation, however,
will not stand up, for Suzanne says that when she returned to her cell
"je fis un petit sommeil, quoique je ne dorme jamais le jour" (346):
daytime it is not, for the scene had begun with a comment by the

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 156 ROMANCE NOTES

Mother Superior on the lateness of the

commencer votre histoire de Sainte-Ma
entrez, vous me donnerez une petite leço
no conceivable reason for speculating tha
As Georges May has pointed out, Didero
read only a page at a time. 8 The kind
mentioned does not upset the reader m
obvious unless at some point one does a d
exactly is happening ; it is likely, nonethe
of imprecision. But again Diderot seem
going to be too interested in what is bein
petty pickings ; and in terms of the auth
writing, that seems to describe just what
is to say that what matters to Diderot is
not even accurate to say that technical p
it is never even seen as a problem, it does
is writing about an experience of convent lif
of precise recollections and more general
is writing about an experience of Suzann
twenty years old and innocent. It was to
rules of the trade and the attention of the public demanded that
the vision coincide more scrupulously with its constituent elements.

Harvard University

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