Notorious Writer's Prison On Exhibit At French National Library

By Nancy Mattoon

The Most Iconic Painting Of Revolutionary France,
Liberty Leading The People by Eugene Delacroix. (1830)
(Image Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.)

On November 9, 2010 the National Library of France opened a major new exhibit on Paris's most notorious prison, The Bastille. A jail may not be the first subject that springs to mind as the basis for a national library exhibit, but if any slammer can be called "the writer's prison," it is the Bastille. By chance and by design, the French Kings who had the power to imprison anyone, for any reason--or for no reason at all--wound up jailing some of France's most famous, and most infamous, 18th century writers.

A Portrait Of Voltaire At Age 24,
By Catherine Lusurier d'après Nicolas de Largillière, c. 1778.
(Image Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.)

The Bastille's most well known literary inmate was the historian and philosopher Voltaire. Like many who were unceremoniously dumped in the Bastille, he was imprisoned for a crime he did not commit. And like many writers before and after, Voltaire's alleged "crime" was insulting a member of France's royal family. In 1717 Voltaire was accused of penning a satirical verse mocking Philippe D'Orleans, Regent of the Kingdom. He cooled his heels in a cell for nearly a year, until the real author of the poem was unmasked.

The Bastille was not an equal opportunity prison. Well-to-do prisoners were allowed to furnish their own cells, making them homey and comfortable. Voltaire must have had a desk brought in on the double. A writer to the core, he made use of his unexpected vacation from the distractions of everyday life to pen his first play, Oedipe. Upon his release, the play was produced, became a hit, and Voltaire's career as a writer had begun.

Alas, the wit that made Voltaire a prime suspect in the previous poetical crime had not been dulled by his stretch in a cell. His clever remark at the expense of a nobleman once more ended with a dreaded lettre de cachet, the all-purpose arrest warrant of Kings. Prisoners had no trial, no judge, no jury. It was straight to the Bastille. Most inmates never even knew what had earned them a few months--or years--at His Majesty's pleasure. This time Voltaire only left the Bastille with a promise to exit the green, green grass of home forever, and begin a new life as an English expat.

An Etching Of the Bastille From:
Goudemetz, H.
Historical Epochs of The French Revolution.
London: R. Crutwell, 1796.
(Image Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.)

Voltaire was far from the only literary luminary to vacation in the Bastille. While the prison's accommodations varied greatly depending on the inmate's wealth, one could never accuse the Bastille's wardens of sexism. Both men and women were relocated to this temporary home-away-from-home. No one took greater advantage of the co-ed quarters of the Bastille than famed memoirist, Madame de Staal de Launay. In 1718 she landed in a cell as part of a plot to depose Philippe d'Orleans. During her two years in stir, she carried on a legendary love affair with fellow prisoner, the chevalier de Menil. As detailed in her memoirs, their status as prisoners proved less of an impediment to their trysts than the unwanted attentions she received from her jailer, the chevalier de Maisonrouge.

The Only Accurate Portrait of The Marquis De Sade,
Drawn By Charles-Amedee-Philippe van Loo in 1760.
(Image Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.)

The most notorious writer to serve time in the Bastille was the patron saint of pornographers, the Marquis de Sade. The Marquis was what we would today term a "recidivist" spending 32 of his 74 years in various prisons and insane asylums. Ten of those years were whiled away in the Bastille. De Sade's last stretch in the prison was his most infamous. In 1784 he was transferred to the Bastille from his previous quarters in the dungeons of the prison at Vincennes. He remained in the Bastille for five years, during which he wrote his most famous work Les 120 Journées de Sodome. Having to make do with the writing materials at hand--and fearful that his scandalous writings might be confiscated by prison authorities--the manuscript was written on a continuous scroll, which was then hidden in his cell.

The Original Manuscript Of
Les 120 Journées de Sodome.
(Image Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.)

By 1789 the rumblings of the French revolution had begun. On July 2 of that year, De Sade noticed a crowd gathering beneath his cell, and began shouting, "They are killing the prisoners in here." A small riot ensued, and De Sade's jailers packed the trouble maker off to new digs in a nearby insane asylum. (Left behind was his precious manuscript, so carefully squirreled away. Though De Sade wept "tears of blood," believing his magnum opus to be lost forever, the scroll was in fact recovered from his cell. It remained unpublished, however, until 1904.)

Less than two weeks later the Bastille was stormed and looted. While some claim the prison was targeted as a symbol of injustice, censorship, and despotism, the motive of the revolutionaries was probably more practical. Large amounts of gunpowder and weapons were housed in the prison. When the cell doors were unlocked for the last time on July 14, 1789, only seven prisoners remained: four forgers, two lunatics, and a young "sexually deviant" nobleman.

An Anonymous Etching Of The Man In The Iron Mask, c.1789.
(Image Courtesy of La Bibliotheque Nationale de France.)

Voltaire, Madame de Staal de Launay, and the Marquis de Sade were merely the best known of the Bastille's literary inmates. Others included François de La Rochefoucauld, Rene Auguste Constantin de Renneville, and Louis Pierre Manuel. And many writers made wonderful fictional use of the prison's unique setting. Alexandre Dumas wrote The Man In The Iron Mask, one volume of The Three Musketeers, based on tales of a mysterious real-life masked prisoner in the Bastille. And Dickens's Tale of Two Cities revolves around the eighteen-year imprisonment there of Dr. Alexandre Manette. The Bastille also figures in works as diverse as The Scarlet Pimpernel, A Little Princess, and Les Miserables.

The French National Library's exhibit, La Bastille, or Living In Hell continues in Paris through February of 2011. Whether or not you can visit the show in person, it serves as a reminder that the written word can be a dangerous thing. Given the choice of losing their liberty or putting down their pens, writers over the centuries, and throughout the world, have chosen to live in chains. We owe it to them to protect freedom of expression and freedom of the press whenever, and wherever, they are threatened.

__________

Books Banned, Author Imprisoned

The human rights organization, Amnesty International, marks Banned Books Week (September 26- October 3, 2009) by reminding us that in some parts of the world, the price for freedom of expression is the loss of personal freedom. Librarians generally note the week with displays of books targeted for removal from school and public libraries by would-be censors. While this is a serious matter, it in no way compares to the restrictions placed on controversial books and authors worldwide.


Amnesty International's website highlights the cases of writers, journalists, and documentarians who have literally risked their lives in the
attempt to uphold civil liberties. One such case involves
Iranian writer Emadeddin Baghi. Mr. Baghi is the author of more than 25 books, six of which have been banned in his homeland. But censorship has been the least of the consequences he has faced for expressing an opinion contrary to that of those in power.


The author first went to prison in 2000, when he was given a three-year sentence for “attacking national security” by writing about the killing of dissident intellectuals in the late 1990s. After his release in February 2003, he founded the Society To Defend Prisoners’ Rights. Detained at Tehran’s airport in October 2004 as he attempted to travel to New York to receive the Civil Courage Prize, an award given for defending human rights, his passport was confiscated and he has since been unable to leave the country.

Emadeddin Baghi was subsequently sentenced to another prison term in July 2007. He appealed that sentence, and in 2008 was acquitted of charges of “activities against national security” and “publicity in favor of the regime’s opponents.” Also in July 2007, Baghi’s wife and daughter were given three-year suspended prison sentences and five years probation for taking part in a series of human rights workshops in Dubai. The charge was “meeting and colluding with the aim of disrupting national security.”


In October 2007, Baghi was arrested and questioned about his activities as a prisoner's rights advocate. He was then accused of “publishing secret government documents.” While his family was in the process of delivering bail money, they were told that, instead of being released on bail, he would immediately serve a suspended one-year prison sentence imposed in 2003 when he was found guilty of “printing lies” and “endangering national security.”


On December 26 2007, while in solitary confinement in Tehran’s Evin prison, Baghi suffered a seizure. He was hospitalized, and suffered a second seizure. He was returned to prison the following day. In January 2008, he was granted medical leave for hospital treatment until April, after which he suffered yet another seizure, as well as a heart attack, in his cell. Released from prison on October 5, 2008, Emadeddin Baghi continues to be an advocate for civil liberties in Iran. He now faces new charges relating to his criticism of the treatment of other human rights defenders who have been imprisoned.

Mr. Baghi's story is far from unique. Amnesty International's website details many similar stories of the repression, harassment, and imprisonment of writers who have the courage to express unpopular or forbidden ideas. Most of us would be unwilling to risk such grave consequences in defense of freedom of speech. The bravery of these authors in defending the written word reminds us of the importance of preserving the ability to write and publish material that challenges the tyranny of those who rule by fear and intimidation.

Posted by Nancy Mattoon

Library Nixes Final Exits

In what would seem to be the smart move for a library that values live customers, Vancouver Public Library has opted to cancel a scheduled workshop on how to commit suicide.

The Australian-based suicide advocacy organization, Exit International, has been denied the use of a room for the workshop to be held in early September. The booking was cancelled by city librarian Paul Whitney, upon receipt of advice from attorneys and the Vancouver Police Department. Whitney stated he was told: "In what, for lawyers, I would describe as fairly unambiguous language that the program as presented by Exit International would be in contravention of the Criminal Code."

Section 241 of the Canadian Criminal Code states that it is an indictable offense to counsel or aid or abet any person to commit suicide. The maximum sentence if convicted is 14 years, whether a suicide takes place or not. "This seems sort of, fairly clear to us," Whitney told the media. The two part workshop was to consist of a public discussion on the politics of the assisted suicide movement, and then a private lesson for persons over 55 years of age on specific ways to commit suicide that would include information about which drugs to take, how to obtain them, and how to ingest them. It was this private part of the program that caused the library to cancel the event.

Exit International is now planning to hold a workshop on assisted suicide elsewhere in Vancouver in early November. Meanwhile the group hopes the library will rescind the ban. David Eby, executive director of the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, said the association will be meeting with the library's board of directors in an effort to have the ban lifted. He said the library was inappropriately restricting free speech by preventing the right-to-die group from discussing suicide methods with members of the public.

Exit International founder Dr. Phillip Nitschke admits his group's workshops are controversial, but says his organization wants to help the terminally ill decide when and how they die. "What we do at these gatherings is to, first of all, explain to people why we think it's a good idea to know how to kill yourself peacefully and reliably."

John Hof, president of Campaign Life Coalition British Columbia believes that the library made the right decision. He observed that carrying a book about an illegal activity is not equivalent to holding a seminar on how to accomplish such an activity. "I am certain the Library has books about robbing banks, making bombs, and all sorts of other illegal activity. Can we expect 'how to' workshops on these things in the near future and will the Civil Liberties people be lining up to defend the rights of those presenters too? People who give lessons on how to kill people, be it yourself or someone else, should be dealt with by the police and charged with aiding and abetting."

Criminologist Russell Ogden says the proposed workshops focus on content that is already readily available in other publications, including books in the Vancouver Public Library dating back to 1991. "We have the curious circumstance where the publication of the material is apparently fine with the public library but talking about it is not," he said.

Librarian Whitney stands by his decision to cancel the workshop: "Freedom of speech and access to information are core values for us, but having said that, the library was not prepared to be party to a probable criminal offense, which could result in the loss of life."