Chapter 39 Interrogation

Although shocked, Lionel still removed his hat and bowed in accordance with etiquette.

Pressing his hat against his chest, he first bowed slightly to Gaston Boissier: "Good morning, Professor Boissier."

Then came the other professors he recognized and who had taught him.

Finally, he saluted Victor Hugo, who was seated in the chair of honor: "Good morning, and it is a great honor to meet you, Monsieur Hugo!"

Hugo nodded in return: "Good morning, Monsieur Sorel."

In truth, Professor Gaston Boissier was deeply displeased. He had not expected Hippolyte Taine's words to be anything other than a fit of pique, let alone that he would actually bring Hugo along.

Ever since delivering his address and serving as honorary president at the inaugural International Congress of Writers and Artists last year, Hugo had rarely appeared in public.

Even literary colleagues wishing to see him typically had to visit his residence on Avenue d'Eylau.

Who could have anticipated that he would arrive at the Sorbonne at such an early hour today, accompanied by Dean Henri Patin directly into the journal's editorial office, expressing a desire to inspect the student submissions for this year's Poetry Festival?

By that time, Gaston Boissier had already sent Registrar Douin to the classroom to summon Lionel, intending to question him about the details of writing The Old Guardsman to eliminate any suspicion of ghostwriting.

Upon hearing of this, Victor Hugo had "readily" requested to observe the interrogation. Immediately thereafter, several other professors from the Faculty of Arts also entered the editorial office, ostensibly to pay their respects to the great Hugo.

What was originally meant to be a small-scale internal inquiry had now escalated into a major event that shook the entire faculty.

Gaston Boissier could ignore Hippolyte Taine, and he could even disregard Henri Patin, but he could not simply overlook Victor Hugo.

The elderly man, approaching eighty years of age, was not only an exceptional writer but also an acutely perceptive politician, adept at using his inflammatory speeches and romantic works to stir up storms of public opinion.

Although he was old—and everyone felt he was bound to pass away at any moment—who could be certain that the fire within his heart had finally extinguished?

Was not his presence at the Sorbonne today a signal of some kind?

Everything was far too coincidental. Gaston Boissier swept his gaze over his colleagues serving on the journal's editorial board, trying to discern who the "mole" was, but ultimately found no answers.

At the same time, he felt a headache coming on from the underlying maneuvering and calculation.

Hippolyte Taine's invitation to Hugo to evaluate the students' work was undoubtedly a manifestation of his dissatisfaction with Dean Henri Patin's attempt to "secure preferential entry" for Lionel.

Yet that old fox Henri Patin had turned the tables by preemptively inviting Hugo right into the room where Lionel was being questioned. This exerted immense, invisible pressure on Gaston Boissier: should any flaw emerge during the interrogation, it would be the professors who lost face; but if it were proven that The Old Guardsman was a piece of ghostwriting, Lionel would naturally never have any hope of rising in prominence.

Whichever the outcome, the end result would be the Sorbonne losing all its dignity.

The only possible happy ending was for Gaston Boissier and the other professors to pose their questions with "decorum," and for Lionel to answer with "composure," thereby verifying that The Old Guardsman was written by Lionel's own hand.

A tempest of thoughts churned within Gaston Boissier, yet his expression remained completely unperturbed as he said to Lionel: "For anyone, it is an honor to have Monsieur Hugo present to listen to an author expound upon their own work.

"Your submission this year, The Old Guardsman, is exceptionally brilliant—far surpassing the level of an ordinary Sorbonne student. It has naturally aroused our curiosity, and we hope to understand the circumstances under which you created this masterpiece.

"Monsieur Lionel Sorel, do you need to review your work once more before we begin?"

Realizing at last why he was standing here, Lionel could not help feeling a mixture of exasperation and amusement. Write poorly and they reject it; write well and they suspect you. Being a student at the Sorbonne was truly difficult.

Nevertheless, not a shred of fear touched him. Instead, with absolute confidence and steadiness, he nodded toward the assembly of venerable scholars and professors, and most importantly, toward Hugo: "The Old Guardsman was written down by me word for word. I do not need to read it again.

"Professor Boissier, I can begin immediately."

Hearing this, Gaston Boissier breathed a secret sigh of relief. Regardless of whether it was ghostwriting or not, Lionel's attitude demonstrated that he was thoroughly familiar with The Old Guardsman.

He gestured for Lionel to sit in an empty chair prepared specially for him, and a transcribed copy of The Old Guardsman was still offered to him.

To everyone's surprise, Lionel declined the transcript: "Give it to a professor who doesn't have a copy, please. I don't need one."

His attitude set off a buzz of murmurs among the professors present. The Sorbonne had no shortage of arrogant young aristocrats; but a commoner youth possessing such calm and composure tinged with pride had never been seen before.

Even Hugo could not suppress a look of admiration, turning to whisper something to Paul Janet beside him, which elicited a light chuckle from the latter.

When the room grew quiet once more, Professor Gaston Boissier stood up, paced over to Lionel's side, and—much like posing a question to students during a regular lecture—looked down at him from above:

"Lionel, let us begin with your literary stance—for it is difficult to engage in any writing activity without being influenced by the principles we hold dear.

"Are you, then, a Naturalist? Or a Realist? Or perhaps you are about to tell us that you are a Romanticist?"

This final question brought smiles to the faces of all the professors who had read The Old Guardsman, and even Hugo's white beard twitched slightly.

Realist literature had flourished from the late 18th to the mid-19th century, advocating for the "faithful representation of objective facts," restoring things as people knew them, and describing everyday, ordinary activities and experiences in human life as objectively as possible.

Stendhal's The Red and the Black and Honoré de Balzac's The Human Comedy were both representative works of realist literature.

Naturalist literature, on the other hand, was the ultimate development and mutation born from Realism.

It absorbed the scientific theories of the 19th century, such as biology and genetics, positing that pathological hereditary conditions determine all human psychology and behavior. It was a creative philosophy that pursued pure objectivity and truth, interpreting human actions from physiological and genetic perspectives.

After 1850, as writers like Gustave Flaubert and Émile Zola successively stepped onto the literary stage, Naturalism swept forward and became the mainstream of the French literary world.

In the context of 1879, calling The Old Guardsman either Naturalist or Realist would be entirely defensible; labeling it Romanticist was purely a joke.

Even Hugo himself had to admit that Romanticism was essentially dead and buried in Europe.

Lionel answered without a moment's hesitation: "I refuse to let my writing be defined by any single doctrine, but if I must slap a label on the specific work that is The Old Guardsman, I suppose it would be 'Realism'."

Lionel's answer caught everyone somewhat off guard.

In today's French literary world, wearing the badge of a particular literary school was a shortcut to entering the inner circle. Especially in an environment drawing this much attention, explicitly stating one's ideological inclination meant the news would spread across Paris in no time.

For instance, the Naturalist Salon held every Tuesday evening by Georges Charpentier was a gathering of Naturalist writers organized by the highly influential publisher Monsieur Charpentier—an inner circle that ordinary writers would break their heads trying to enter.

Lionel's reply was, frankly, rather arrogant for someone relying solely on his talent.

Suddenly, Professor Gaston Boissier leaned down, staring directly into Lionel's eyes: "You call The Old Guardsman realism—yet your narrative perspective is nearly cold-blooded.

"A young tavern assistant witnesses the decline and fall of a former imperial hero without a single ripple of emotion, even displaying a sort of numb 'gleam of amusement.'

"Such a pen is exceedingly rare in contemporary French literature—whether in Realism or Naturalism.

"Monsieur Zola's works also deal with hardship, yet his narrators are filled with anger or sympathy. Tell me, why did you choose such a 'dehumanized' perspective?

"Does this imply a lack of basic compassion on your part toward the characters you write about—that poor old guardsman? Does this run counter to the humanist spirit that literature ought to possess?"