La Première Guerre mondiale à la breughélienne : sur Breughel à l’Yser de Franz Hellens

Abstract

The article shows the importance of a tale “Breughel à l’Yser” in the context of the Franz Hellens’identity transformation which takes place during the First World War. On the one hand, in his tale Hel-lens refers by different means to the Breughel’s oeuvre continuing in that way the myth of Belgian writer perceived as a heir of the Flemish painters. On the other hand, via the landscape, the typical element of the Flemish master’s style, the writer introduces the elements of fantasy into a realistic de-scription of a battlefield, creating in that way his own aesthetics of “fantastique reel” (fantastic reality). Thus, this tale enables to examine how Hellens passes fluently from the “inherited identity” to the matu-re writer’s identity.

Keywords

• hellens
• brueghel
• fantastic reality
• first world war