"The incorrigible" convicts faced with the power of words

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• Today, "Les incorrigibles" by Patrice Quélard, published on March 3, 2022 by Éditions Plon.

Marceline Bodier, bookstagramer and contributor to the

Books reading group, recommends

 by Patrice Quélard, published on March 3, 2022 by Éditions Plon.

His favorite quote:

There, in the middle of the tangled vines and venerable trees which pitilessly disputed the supremacy to reach the light, he acquired the certainty that man only found real happiness in osmosis with preserved nature.

Why this book?

• Because when Patrice Quélard writes a historical novel,

  we can be sure that the setting is impeccable and as elaborate as that of Pierre Lemaître in A

  u voir-là-haut

  .

  He relied on abundant documentation on Guyana and the prisons, where most of the plot takes place: in particular,

  Au prison

  and

  L'homme qui s'évada (Adieu Cayenne)

  by Albert Londres, who had himself met several ex-convicts in the 1920s. Thanks to this, he literally resuscitated the "incos", convicts who had escaped several times and were imprisoned in the worst camp in Guyana.

• Because the subject may be difficult, it is treated

  with great humanity.

  The living conditions in the penal colony are reproduced with meticulousness, to help us better understand the psychology of those who are imprisoned there.

  If you think it's "tough guys" being portrayed, you're right.

  But what are tough guys if not men who are “no longer masters of themselves” because “constantly under the gaze of their peers”?

  Tough guys who cry not when they're humiliated, but when they're treated like humans…which doesn't happen often.

• Because a transversal and strong theme of the novel

  is that of the power of words.

  In prison, the escapees are protected by the others if they pay a price: “telling”.

  When Cognard tries to save a thief, it is by referring to Jean Valjean.

  And when he meets a woman, everything is unblocked when she finds how to qualify the silence between them: “Nothing made Cognard more uncomfortable than stories without words.

  Only the verb allowed him to maneuver, to turn into derision, to play down finally, where silence left him disarmed.

  »

• Because the novel is lightened by humor.

  Sometimes Cognard flirts with the superhero who understands everything and knows how to neutralize the worst adversaries, sometimes he discusses... with his horse.

  And he reveals his favorite pastime: reading "advertisements" in

  L'illustration

  .

  No doubt the announcements are from the era… I thus discovered that a century ago, there was no need for social networks to promise our ancestors miracle cures for just about everything, including recolor white hair or "neutralize the harmful work of nicotine as you go along"!

• Because at the beginning of the 20th century in Europe,

  industrialization and its gigantism were exhilarating, but they fell into “industrial death”.

  So by going to Guyana, it was not towards inhumanity that Cognard went: on the contrary, he moved away from the continent which "[abandoned] nature as it embraced 'modern civilization', while this […] had perhaps never been so barbaric.

  This setting may have made the horror of the prison possible, but also, contrary to the rest of the story in Europe, the return of a humanism embodied by Cognard.

  
  

The essentials in 2 minutes

The plot.

 The book is built on the alternation of two stories, until they come together: that of Cognard, who returned from the Great War to Saint-Nazaire, and that of Talhouarn, a convict several times escaped who knows the worst camp. Guyana, Charvein, that of the "incorrigible".

Characters.

 Cognard, ex-gendarme, and Talhouarn, convict, seem to be on two antagonistic camps, but in fact, both oppose the same adversaries: the hierarchy of the convicts.

Cognard, as a humanist, and Talhouarn, as a prisoner, but with the same “social intelligence”.

Places.

 The novel takes place on three continents that the 1910s devastated: Europe with the Great War, Africa with the prisons of Biribi, South America with those of Guyana.

With a fixed point: the hovel of Talhouarn's mother, or rather, the imprint she left in his heart.

The time.

 The 1910s were not the best decade, whether men lived through the Great War, like Cognard, or escaped it by being deported, like Talhouarn.

Here is a double point of view which singularly widens the vision which we have of the beginning of the 20th century!

The author.

 Patrice Quélard, prolific author of often historical novels, publishes the continuation of the adventures of Léon Cognard, ex-policeman who had enabled him, a year ago, to gain the price of the novel of the national gendarmerie chaired by Maxime Chattam.

The Great War succeeded for him!

This book was read with

 always the same admiration for an author whose novels are clearly masculine, but whose finesse allows me to identify with myself.

I, too, might think that “The pain lessened a bit over time, but it felt like he felt the need to rekindle it on a regular basis”.

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20 Minutes of Context

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