Voyage dans le cristal

by George Sand, Francis Lacassin (Preface)

L'intérêt de Sand pour le fantastique est bien antérieur à la dernière décennie de sa vie. Il se manifeste dès 1839 par un Essai sur le drame fantastique, important pour sa définition de l'univers fantastique : "Ni en dehors, ni au-dessus, ni en dessous, il est au fond de nous." Les trois contes présentés ici- Laura ou Voyage dans le cristal (1865), L'Orgue du titan (1876), Le Géant Yéous (1873) -, sont fantastiques au sens propre par le rôle ambigu assigné au supernaturel, déroutant pour la raison. Avant même d'en arriver à la conclusion que le surnaturel est dans l'homme, George Sand s'était montrée novatrice en refusant de croire que les hallucinations "sont uniquement l'ouvrage de la peur". Jusqu'ici, nul critique ne paraît s'être avisé que, précurseur de Jean Giono et du réalisme champêtre, de l'écologie, du féminisme, George Sand était aussi précurseur du récit fantastique moderne. Préface de Francis Lacassin

Genres: Fiction, Fantasy, France, French Literature, Novels, Classics, Science Fiction Fantasy

240 pages, Pocket Book

First published January 1, 1864

About the author

Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin de Francueil, best known by her pen name George Sand, was a French novelist, memoirist and journalist. One of the most popular writers in Europe in her lifetime, being more renowned than either Victor Hugo or Honoré de Balzac in England in the 1830s and 1840s, Sand is recognised as one of the most notable writers of the European Romantic era. She wrote more than 50 volumes of various works to her credit, including tales, plays and political texts, alongside her 70 novels.
Like her great-grandmother, Louise Dupin, whom she admired, George Sand advocated for women's rights and passion, criticized the institution of marriage, and fought against the prejudices of a conservative society. She was considered scandalous because of her turbulent love life, her adoption of masculine clothing, and her masculine pseudonym.

Reviews

[Katie Lumsden]

A totally strange book. I’m not sure whether or not I liked it!

[Alex Sarll]

George Sand is probably more widely known as a scandalous historical badass these days than she's actually read, though I suppose you could say the same of Byron, so there's no shame in that. But in so far as I did have any idea of her work, I really wasn't expecting this. Slotting into the subgenre I've yet to persuade anyone else to start calling 'green ink fantasy', this geological fantasia recalls the likes of The Green Child and A Voyage to Arcturus in the way the disjointed plot mostly feels like a fig-leaf for the narrative voice's intent and at times alarming desire to tell the reader all about their vision of the Ideal. And the notions of eternity, the rhapsodies inspired by close examinations of gemstones and of ice – those are wonderful, prose poems well worth a read. Considered as a novel, though... Our hero, whose name I've already forgotten, wants to marry his teenage cousin Laura, even though she's pretty dull when he's not transfixed by geode-inspired visions, which feel a lot like they could be outright hallucinations. When he's in those, she speaks to him and tells him that though she's promised to another in the mundane world, really she'll always be with him in this ideal and eternal world. No, that's not at all creepy. And did I mention that the main reason she can't marry him in the everyday sense is that her family don't think there's enough of an age difference? Yeah. But if you think that's aged poorly, just wait until the Inuit supporting characters turn up later, because oh boy the narrator has some treats in store for you then. So anyway, yer man subsequently meets Nasias, allegedly Laura's dad, who turns out to be a gem-supplying mystery man at the museum, and also an absolute psycho. Together they head off to the frozen North looking for an entrance to the hollow Earth - all of this, incidentally, in a book published in 1864, the same year as Jules Verne's Journey to the Centre of the Earth. With a few key differences, not least that while Professor Lidenbrock could be an arse, he wasn't quite so prone to massacring everyone he met on his expedition, the narrator obviously excepted. Also, they're being guided by a vision of Laura, who at this stage has become a sort of shining star, which is to say she's only a whisker away from being a literal sexy lamp. The obligatory giant fauna, exotic fauna and scenes of natural wonder soon turn up, before a resolution which on one hand works as a brilliant inversion of the puerile idealism that has brought us this far, and on the other I'm fairly sure was already, even 150 years ago, a cliche when resolving a tale of the fantastical. In summary: a very strange book.

[Chavelli Sulikowska · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not sure what George Sand was on when she penned this!? A short, obscure fantasy novel that from what I could tell would it’s way all too slowly to a rather pointless end... boo hoo Georges, where was your usual flair???

[Celia T · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mlle Dupin I don't know what the fuck this was but I loved it

(Strongly recommend that you read this book while high. I didn't, but I feel like it really would have enhanced things)

[Peregrine · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book reads more like a fever dream than anything else I can think of to describe it. Some of that is the psychological thriller aspect of it as written, and some of it is the lost in translation aspect, not from French to English, but from 19th to 21st century. I know little of this thread of European thought, but the story seems to be imagining a fantastic struggle between science and mystery. Darwin had written; Creationism was taking its first blows. How to imagine reality, then? Must beauty disappear in the face of materialism? Are faith and insanity radically linked? These are some of the themes that haunt this story. "Haunt" is a word that comes, I think, from having 21st century eyes, even though those eyes began to see soon after the halfway point of the 20th century. The science fiction in the book is unbelievable now; racism and colonialism abound, and yet the struggle of the times comes through. Worth reading as an historical marker, and inspires me to check out more of George Sand's work.

[Brona's Books · Rating 1 out of 5]

Thankfully I read and thoroughly enjoyed Mauprat a decade or so ago. If I had started my George Sand journey with Laura: A Journey into the Crystal, it may have ended right here. This is the weirdest little book I think I have ever read.

I have no idea it’s purpose, or what Sand intended me, or any other reader, to take from it. Was it a dream fantasy or a science fiction horror story? Was it a coming of age love story or a philosophical ramble? Who knows?

It’s only saving grace was it’s slimness, so that I could read it in a couple of quick sessions, scratching my head the whole time. I tried to research it, but no-one else seemed to know either. I only found publisher notes and second hand book sales. On Goodreads one and two star reviews abounded. I’m not the only one who found it to be incoherent, uninteresting, disjointed, heavy-handed, and just plain odd.

Laura’s special ability is one that allows her to transport herself inside a geode. Or is it? Maybe it’s just her cousin, Alexis who can get lost inside the brilliant world of a geode. However it works, Alexis meets Laura in the geode and it is here they fall in love. Or do they?
Full response here - https://bronasbooks.com/2021/05/30/la...

[Benjamin Chandler · Rating 3 out of 5]

George Sand wrote a Hollow Earth novel? Almost.

This is an odd little book to say the least. The majority of it revolves around the narrator's relationships with geology and his cousin, Laura. His feelings towards minerals is a bit love/hate, but those toward Laura are more adoration/obsession. Along the way, the narrator has visions of being inside a geode with his beloved cousin, and there are evocative descriptions of crystal mountains and gem-laden valleys. The story shifts about two-thirds through and our plucky storyteller joins his weirdo uncle on a journey to the north pole to see if the Earth itself is one giant hollow geode.

At times it seems like the book is a heavy-handed series of metaphors for science vs art, ideals vs realities, obsession vs true love. Maybe it is. The adventure during the last third follows much of what writers of the same era concocted when creating lost lands untouched by humanity, which is kind of fun, but one might expect more from a name as prestigious as George Sand. Sand herself writes in the book's intro that the whole thing's just a fairy tale to amuse, so maybe I shouldn't take it all so seriously.

[Hikachi · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think it's a good thing that I read this at the same time with reading Paprika. However, it's not that engaging. Not sure if it's a matter of translation, or simply because it's not modern enough. But I remember I love Frankenstein and reading some H.G. Well's. So I guess that's not the real problem here.
It's a story of suppressed passion. Disguising under various flowery words and some trance-like experience. It's not quite impressive. For a first time experience with a George Sand's, I'm not blown away.

[Inge Van Delft · Rating 1 out of 5]

Nah, this was a chore to read. Poorly written, with an incoherent story line. The author seemed to be trying really hard to show off all her knowledge of geodes and crystals, but forgot that for the average reader her level of technical knowledge is not that interesting. I also had a feeling she might have been high on something while writing this. I wasn't the only one in the bookclub who didn't like the novel - in fact, the majority found it wanting in one way or another.

[Asunlectora · Rating 4 out of 5]

La verdad es que el libro está escrito de una manera preciosa. Un leguaje muy cuidado, unas descripciones maravillosas, una imaginación increíble... No lo he investigado, pero parece escrito o inspirado en la época de las grandes expediciones exploratorias científicas, aunque transcurre por mundos fantásticos.

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

This sounded pretty interesting but it gets bogged down by technical scientific geology terminology too much. It's also unclear whether the whole thing was a dream or not, and really falls apart near the end because of this.

Recommended for rock enthusiasts only.

[Wyatt Fields · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 it's interesting for how short this book was, it took me over a month to get through it.. a very weird fever dream of a book, although i enjoyed all the fantastical sequences. don't know if i liked it or not!

[Susu · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fantastic storyline intertwined with deep thoughts on love, souls and death. A little heavy and old-fashioned, but beautifully crafted.

[Danielle · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF at 50%. So trippy, I just couldn't focus and get into the story right now.

Might return to it later. It was a quick, genre-bending story.

[Patricia Monger · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is interesting mainly because it's weird. Like if H.P. Lovecraft got together with some rockhound to write a teen romance.

[Iris · Rating 2 out of 5]

67%

[Dingaling · Rating 3 out of 5]

a bit of a mixed bag. the fantasy elements, the fever journeys were fun, the plotting was a bit of a drag. the racism also disappointing.

[Nino Largeaut · Rating 4 out of 5]

bien fantastique, bien intéressant mais HYPER étrange, le narrateur est complètement paumé, ça rend la lecture moins facile

[Daniel · Rating 3 out of 5]

What the actual fuck was this book

[Nicola · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not that I don't appreciate what Sand was trying to do - there's echoes here that lead all the way to Jules Verne and others - but this was so clinical and descriptive that I found it a struggle. Though I'd perhaps add half a star for the fleeting and horrifying image of Nasias, broken and dragging himself forwards over the grounds of the crystal garden even then that we blow past in barely half a sentence - there's an entire horror story in Nasias and the diamond waiting to be told.

[Parsnip · Rating 3 out of 5]

Plongée inattendue dans l'écriture de George Sand, lecture que je ne regrette pas du tout mais pas un coup de cœur pour autant.

J'ai surtout aimé la première histoire, malgré un ton assez monotone et distant que j'aurais aimé voir plus évoluer au fil du récit. Les images du pays des cristaux sont très belles, originales, elles s'imposent indéniablement à l'esprit et émerveillent. La naïveté du protagoniste est quant à elle plutôt agréable à suivre, elle accompagne très bien lea lecteurice dans le récit avec beaucoup de naturelle. L'histoire n'était peut-être pas assez ambitieuse à mon goût, j'aurais aimé qu'elle s'engouffre pleinement dans des élans tragiques et un peu camp comme Dracula peut le faire pour que tout soit pleinement exploité, la brièveté du récit l'a un peu bridé. Il en va de même pour les personnages, à l'image de ceux de contes ils restent plutôt sagement unidimensionnel et c'était un peu lassant à la fin.
Les autres histoires m'ont beaucoup moins marqué'e, la base était plutôt solide mais leur exécution est restée trop proche du conte pour me convaincre réellement.

TW : discours colonialistes et racistes

3,25/5

[UnderTheNorthStar · Rating 4 out of 5]

George Sand dedicated this book to her daughter and after reading it, understand why. I didn’t get from the book what most people did - my reading followed a different track.

Written during the time when science and religion/magic were starting to conflict, she addressed this from a psychological point of view in a time before psychology was born. Written the same year as Jules Verne’s ‘Journey to the Center of the Earth’, and contemporaneous with many of the early budding science fiction styles, it is rare, being written by a woman in a sea of male speculative fiction. I would say ‘Laura: A Journey into the Crystal’ is a female answer to Verne’s male one. She sees beyond the wild scapes and bravado of these early explorers in fantastical derring-do. She looks, with a twist ending and a clear eye, at what she sees is the psychology of this literature.

She introduces this with Laura and Alexis’ first excursion into the crystal geodes. It is Laura who enables Alexis to visit this inner landscape and he meets his anima there in his vision of Laura. This is not spelled out - it wasn’t until the end it comes into place. He becomes obsessed with this world, leading to the fantastical Verne-like adventure that follows. The ending brings it full-circle to a surprisingly prescient understanding, considering the era. At that point, 10 years before Freud was born, there was no psychological verbiage to explain animas and animuses and what they cause the male or female to envision in their outer world.

It’s written in the style of the time, which makes it more difficult for modern readers to appreciate. Like many adventure stories of this era, there’s the casual dismissive racism, the bolstering of fantastical happenings with the pseudo-reason of science, which drag these old speculative fiction stories down for me. I’m sure anyone who’s read similar stories recognises the phenomena.

The story is small, obscure, and odd, yet it speaks to an understanding that maybe the more popular and well-known fantastical adventure stories of the era didn’t. I’ve read a few blurbs that ask whether it’s science fiction or a dream. George Sand herself called it a fable. So, as fable, it’s an inner journey into self, and George Sand uses the verbiage of the masculine speculative fiction of the day as her vehicle to explore it. Her conclusion was not what I thought it might be. I think she was brilliant.

[Anna Hasselqvist · Rating 5 out of 5]

An ecstatic fever dream of a novel. The narrator is a young lost man, who is studying geology under his uncle. Then he reconnects with his cousin, Laura, who can travel through the crystals on display in the geological museum. While he falls in love with her, she takes him on drunken, dreamy rides through crystal worlds.

I love old school science fiction. I have always thought George Sand is cool and all, mostly cause I loved Chopin as a teenager, but I've never read anything from her before. This book is a gem. And the fact that she was one of Dostojevskijs literary influences? Makes her even more cool.

I'll definitely read more from her, which makes me happy, since I haven't read many French classics compared to e.g. Russians. As you might have understood by now, I love to slowly but thoroughly dig into an authors bibliography. Def adding George Sand to the list.

[Val’ · Rating 2 out of 5]

She must have had some good weed. Didn’t like it tho.

[Elina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very weird, but in the best possible way.