Boulogne-Billancourt

The education of the giant Gargantua, a character created by François Rabelais (c. 1483–1553), requires special care regarding physical exercise under humanist principles. Therefore, Gargantua swims fiercely in the Seine. There is no precise location for this episode of the novel. But we can imagine that these swimming sessions take place, for example, in Boulogne where Ponocrates, the tutor, sometimes takes his young pupil for him to relax away from the big city.

A sonnet about the Seine? Would it be the first?—after so many verses dedicated to the river under the form of odes, romances and ballads. This heptasyllable sonnet is tight, punchy and words fly at every stanza. Laurent Tailhade (1854–1919), always provocative, announces a barcarole, the song of the Venetian gondoliers, and instead gives us a ferocious rant about the fashion of his time. Verse after verse, he criticizes inland waterway transport as well as the bourgeoisie. He also mocks the Sundays spent on the water and captures the true image of the company Ad. Godchau, specialized in clothing for men and children, that exploited the Japanism trend in its advertisements. The contrast between the song announced and the poem served, unashamedly highlights the gap between Venice and Paris. However, the counterpoint is also a musical game. The Grand Dictionnaire universel du XIXe siècle (1866–1877) describes Barcarolles as “certain pieces whose rhythm imitates the rocking of a wherry on the waves.”

This text reminds us how much Céline was fascinated by the “movements of rivers”.
Louis-Ferdinand Céline (1894–1961) was fascinated by the movements of rivers, which he wrote about in all his novels. In D’un château l’autre, he mentions the spectacle of the Seine contemplated from his house located in Haut-Meudon, where he used to write. He recalls the restaurant “La pêche miraculeuse”, in the first decades of the 20th century, and the “pigeon shooting” on Ile Seguin in Boulogne-Billancourt, that he used to attend as a child.