The first reviews I found come in The Egoist, where the able book reviewer Muriel Ciolkowska writes on French literature from wartime Paris. Barbusse's prior novel, L'Enfer, was reviewed by several of the periodicals. That book (which I haven't read) seems to have been a kind of super-decadent parable of a peeping tom in a hotel room... something very different than Le Feu. Ciolkowska reports her fascination with L'Enfer in the February 1917 issue--she also mentions that he has just won the Croix de Guerre elsewhere in that issue. But we're going to look at Le Feu, not L'Enfer. Here's a link to the issue containing her long review--once on the MJP site, click "View PDF" to open the issue.
May, 1917: The Egoist, Muriel Ciolkowska, 55-57.
Ciolkowska is a very interesting figure in her own right, providing a running commentary on the war's effects on literary Paris--but I'll proceed to her thoughts on Le Feu. Her long review of the book appears in the May 1917 issue, printed just after H.D.'s fantastic poem "Eurydice." The review, beginning on page 55, begins with a translation of Barbusse's army citation, which praises his morality and his courage. Ciolkowska, who loves a hero, does this very much on purpose.
Ciolkowska is one of my favorite truly obscure writers from the era. Her articles are a running commentary on the war's effects on literary Paris--but I'll proceed to her thoughts on Le Feu. Her long review of the book appears in the May 1917 issue, printed just after H.D.'s fantastic poem "Eurydice." The review, beginning on page 55, begins with a translation of Barbusse's army citation, which praises his morality and his courage. Ciolkowska, who loves a hero, does this very much on purpose—she’s going to talk about the political controversy of Le Feu and does this to get out ahead of any kneejerk reactions against Barbusse’s internationalist views. Only, I sense that she’s been changed by reading the book, too—her own occasionally jingoistic pro-French nationalism has found itself challenged by this book. It’s telling that she lingers on its form, its politics, and its rejection of the past and tradition; something quintessentially modernist at least in Ciolkowska’s reading of it. On form, she does complain that his use of soldier’s slang makes it difficult to follow. If Ciolkowska has trouble with the French… well, I downloaded the French and the English versions, but I sense that I might end up spending more time with English. But on modernism, what better than this selection she makes from the book:
“‘In a word, the enemy is the past. The perpetrators of war are the traditionalists, steeped in the past… for whom an abuse has the power of law because it has been allowed to take root, who aspire to be guided by the dead and who insist on submitting the passionate, throbbing future and progress to the rule of ghosts and nursery fables.”
Ciolkowska then comments: “Verily the criminals are those who echo, ‘because it was, it must be.’”
It’s a heck of a review, so good that Margaret Anderson reprints the key points (fully cited) in The Little Review next month. That deep questioning on the part of Ciolkowska ends up not being fully resolved: she writes in August (p. 106) that Barbusse concentrates too much on the sacrifices of the lower classes, ignoring those of the upper classes.
Here are a few more reviews, some covered at more, some less length depending on my arbitrary interest in each. I've listed them chronologically, but read Reed/Bryant if you have to pick just one.
August 1917: The Seven Arts, Paul Rosenberg, p. 518-520.
The review in Seven Arts is passionate, emphasizing the revolutionary character of Le Feu and praising it to the skies—it is Euripides for the modern era. This issue of Seven Arts opens with an article by John Reed—a nice coincidence, as I’ll be covering his reading of Le Feu below.
September 1917: The New Age, anonymous (possibly A.R. Orage) p. 453
The New Age takes note of the importance of Le Feu: “This book is not a mere record, it is an apocalypse.” Apocalypse meaning literally, a lifting of the veil. The review is short, but emphasizes (like all of the book’s reviews) the truthful quality of the narrative.
October 1917: The Masses, Louise Bryant and John Reed, p. 5-6
Husband and wife Louise Bryant and John Reed’s account of Le Feu is embedded in an article on the general state of the war, published in the October 1917 issue of the brilliant New York-based socialist magazine, The Masses. This is the penultimate issue of The Masses, just before the journal is shut down due to wartime censorship. The duo is famous for Ten Days that Shook the World and Six Months in Red Russia, accounts of the October Revolution and its aftermath. The date of this issue is somewhat portentous.
Reed/Bryant’s reading is actually very similar to Ciolkowska’s—but even more intense, because while Ciolkowska is gradually coming around to Barbusse’s position, The Masses has inhabited it all along. The article explains “ ‘Le Feu,’ by Henri Barbusse… to my mind is the biggest thing next to the Russian revolution that the war has so far produced.” Pretty intense. Reed/Bryant believe that the internationalist, pacifist book reflects the realities of French public opinion—that it is the harbinger to a revolution.
February 1918: The Crisis, W.E.B. Du Bois, p. 190.
To oversimplify--at this point, Du Bois was pro-war. He admires the French African troops fighting for France, and admired France's attitude towards them. Rather than reviewing Le Feu, he excerpts a passage praising French African troops. That's very characteristic of his editorial style--he uses quotation rather than commentary whenever possible, and is always willing to let a text stand on its own merits or demerits. Photography has a similar effect--here's an image and caption from May 1917 that illustrates the point (do check out the caption):
I'll leave it at that, for now--there's more, but those are the best I found. The upshot is that Le Feu had an immediate international impact. It was very highly praised--I only found one letter to The Little Review complaining that it was overrated, and of course Ciolkowska's strange waffling about social class and suffering mentioned above.
