René Etiemble
Leading the fight against the threat of Franglais

Douglas Johnson
Thursday January 31, 2002
The Guardian

At the Sorbonne, professor René Etiemble, who has died aged 92, was simply
"Etiemble" and, bearing that single name, appeared as the equal of Balzac
and Flaubert, untrivialised by any all-too-ordinary Christian name. Tall,
authoritative, with serious things to say, he commanded respect, and fitted
the role, even after one learned that he used only his surname, because it
was difficult to put his first name before Etiemble, as it created an
awkward hiatus.

But he is best known in England for Parlez-Vous Franglais? (1964). This was
the grammarian's defence of the French language, against the invasion of
Anglo-Saxon words and phrases. Etiemble was not so much fighting against "le
weekend" or "le jogging" as seeking to prevent a decline in written and
spoken French. He welcomed enrichment of the French language when, for
example, it came from the young generation's slang. He was cynical about
legislating against foreign words; and he had a lively sense of humour. Told
that there was official research to replace "le fast food" he reputedly
suggested "un MacDo".

In the years following the 1944 liberation, when intellectuals and authors
were being urged to commit themselves, he wrote, "Everyone must get
involved, and join a party, the party, the only, only, only party that is
never wrong, that is to say our party. And cursed be those who join the
other party, the only, only, only party that is never wrong, the other
unique party, that is to say their party." He made fun of intellectuals who
had themselves photographed in poses of deep thought, holding carefully
chosen works of literature.

His father died when he was three; his mother worked in a sweatshop. Born in
Mayenne, he won a scholarship in 1929 from the lycée de Laval to the Ecole
Normale Supérieure, where he discovered Chinese civilisation and became an
expert on the Chinese language.

All his life he promoted his belief that Europeans should cease to make
Europe the centre of their preoccupations. In 1937, while teaching in
Chicago, he visited Mexico and encountered pre-Columbian civilisations. In
1943, while associated with Free France, he opened a French department at
the new University of Alexandria, where he worked with the blind Islamic
scholar, Taha Hussein, and founded the cultural review, Valeurs.

His mission to promote non-European studies was lifelong. As the Sorbonne's
professor of comparative literature (1955-78) he interrupted Raymond Aron,
who was explaining how the anthropology degree course began with Montesquieu
and Rousseau, saying that he was exasperated by this continued insistence on
French thinkers. Why not begin with the Chinese and Arabs? He published some
50 masterpieces of the literature of these and other civilisations in the
series Connaissance de l'Orient.

He published on many subjects. Before the second world war he worked with
Jean Paulhan and the Nouvelle Revue Française, on the rise of fascism and
the Paris riots of 1934, and attacked Stalinist Russia in 1936. His novel
about a young boy growing up in religious and educational establishments,
Enfant De Choeur (1937), scandalised some critics, and Blason D'un Corps
(1961) was dismissed as erotic. His major literary work was his three-volume
study of Rimbaud, Le Mythe De Rimbaud (1952-70).

He was married twice, with an adopted daughter.

· René Etiemble, writer and academic, born January 26 1909; died January 7
2002


Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002

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