Flaubert: Revue Critique et Génétique (Jul 2011)
« Au fracas de la foudre, les animaux intelligents s'éveillèrent »
Abstract
Félix Pouchet, in Heterogeny or Spontaneous generation Treatise (1859), argues, against Pasteur and Milne-Edwards, for the existence of a « genesical force » inside matter at the beginning of the universe, still active in the formation and transformation of species. Flaubert read Pouchet’s book when he was writing Salammbô. On August 5th 1860, he wrote to madame Jules Sandeau : « I mingle my Punic readings (which are not light) with other serious jokes. I now dedicate myself to my friend doctor Pouchet’s bulky book on spontaneous generations. » This interlacing of archaeology and science is precisely what I will examine in my paper, through the genetic study of a passage of Salammbô (chapter III) where Flaubert rewrites the Phoenician cosmogony in the light of modern spontaneism.
