André Malraux: A Study in Comparative Mythology

Abstract

Andre Malraux shares the ethic of engagement, commitment, and responsibility as later expressed by Sartre. His aim is not tranquilization, as in the nineteenth century, but disturbance, to make man aware of his condition and defend him against it. He has deliberately espoused his historical situation and has devoted his art and his life to the search for a cure for what he considers to be the fundamental cause of humanity's illness -- the disintegration of the image of man. Gaetan Picon, in my estimation, has put it aptly when he states, "a une litterature individualiste et bourgeoise, liee au culte de la difference individuelle et a la civilisation de plaisir, et dont le theme presque unique a ete la sensualite amoureuse, Malraux oppose une litterature de la fraternite virile; et a la psychologie des individus, la tragedie de la condition de l'homme."

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