Writer 1879: Solitary Journey in France

Chapter 43 This is a debt owed by the entire nation of France! (Seeking monthly votes!)
Ernest Renan stood up angrily, pointing at Lionel, his voice trembling: "You sewer rat, you Alpine bumpkin... how dare you... how dare you..."

Gaston Boischer, seeing that he was about to say something that would embarrass Sorbonne in front of Hugo, quickly interrupted: "Professor Renan, mind your manners! Let Lionel finish speaking first."

He then turned to Lionel and said, "Mr. Sorel, please don't forget your manners!"

He was also very troubled. For a century, France had wavered between monarchy and republicanism, and many of these ideas could not be eliminated overnight.

Ernest Renan was undoubtedly a first-rate Middle Eastern linguist, positivist philosopher, and excellent writer, but also a die-hard who hoped for the restoration of the Bourbon dynasty.

This kind of thinking may only be eradicated from French soil when this generation dies out, and even their next generation dies out.

Lionel nodded slightly to Gaston Boischer: "Very well, Professor Boischer. I will now tell Professor Renan the answer to this question—"

As Lionel spoke, he moved from the area where his chair was placed to the center of the room, facing the conference table, and began his reply in a much colder tone:
“Professor Renan, you asked about observation. Yes, I was indeed a bookworm holed up in my study in the Alps. But I came to Paris and then lived in the 11th arrondissement, the 11th arrondissement that you will probably never set foot in.”

Aren't those cheap pubs and workers' cafes in District 11 just like my 'Edelweiss Pub'? I used to eat at even cheaper and noisier little restaurants after class to save money.

I observed the workers, apprentices, and down-on-their-luck artists. I watched how they bought wine with their few copper coins, how they watched intently as the owner poured the wine, and how they argued over a cheap side dish.

Their caution, their predicament, their defense of even the smallest rights—in this respect, no different in Paris or the Alps—and of course, you would never set foot in these little taverns.

The two consecutive "You will never set foot there" left Ernest Renan blushing, unable to refute them.

He came from a privileged background. Although not from an aristocratic family, his father had served as a court official under Louis XVIII and lived his entire life in a detached house in the first arrondissement of Paris. Naturally, he would not go to the cheap pubs and cafes that Lionel mentioned.

Lionel's statement did not end there, but became increasingly harsh: "As for the old guards... In the past few decades, how few old men have been selling matches or trinkets in the cold wind on the streets of Paris, wearing faded old uniforms and the Order of Saint Helena pinned to their chests?"

If, in the past, you had taken the time to visit the Luxembourg Gardens, you would have seen an old man lying on a peeling bench, murmuring about the sound of the Jena cannon.

From Paris to the Alps, such elderly people were once everywhere; they were the seeds of the 'Old Guard' in my heart. The truth of literature, for professors, is not merely about measuring every inch of land with their own feet! It lies even more in the insight of the heart!
I can show you the details of those "short-coat gangs" right away; but the old guard's soul has already groaned and withered away in a corner you'll never see.

Lionel's gaze was so intense that Ernest Renan dared not meet his eyes.

Lionel concludes: "Imagination? It is responsible for forging my observations into a whole, flesh and blood—Old Guard! Reference? No, Professor, it is a gift from life, plus the eyes and heart of a writer."

Ernest Renan fell silent upon hearing this; Lionel had indeed spoken of a field he had never ventured into.

He couldn't deny the truth of what Lionel had said, but he also couldn't tolerate a lowly commoner daring to offend him like that.

Ernest Renan quickly found the "flaw" in Lionel's words and sneered: "That sounds nice, Mr. Sorel. But the old guard you describe keeps emphasizing the 'honor of the Guard' and the slogan 'Long live the Emperor,' as well as the worn-out uniform he insists on wearing."

Don't forget, France is a republic now! You've written about a character so immersed in past glories, so out of touch with reality, making him the protagonist of a tragedy—oh my god, are you a Bonapartist sympathizer? Or are you dissatisfied with the current state of the republic?

As soon as the question was asked, the professors immediately erupted into chaos. Paul Jannet even stood up and said, "This is not within the scope of today's inquiry. Lionel, you don't need to answer."

Even Victor Hugo frowned. In today's world, where the republic is largely stable, political stance has little impact on those who have achieved success—for example, Ernest Renan was an open supporter of the Bourbon dynasty, but he could still maintain his position in academia through his scholarship.

But for young people just starting out, this is a matter of life and death. In an era where everyone has a distinct label, if you get labeled incorrectly, it means being ostracized by the mainstream.

Gaston Boischer also said, "Political stance is irrelevant to the subject of this inquiry, and Lionel can choose not to answer."

Ernest Renan chuckled and sat down—he didn't really care whether Lionel answered the question or not; in a sense, it would be better if Lionel didn't answer.

In this way, he could plant a seed in people's minds that "Lionel Sorel is a 'Bonapartist' and 'opposes the republic'."

Unexpectedly, Lionel calmly declined Paul Jannet and Gaston Boischer's offer: "Thank you both, but I can answer that question."

He glanced around at Professor Sorbonne and Victor Hugo before speaking: "Professor Boischer, Mr. Hugo, professors. What the old guard upheld was not a specific political system—neither empire nor kingdom."

What he upheld was a 'promised honor' and a 'betrayed loyalty.' He represented all individual lives that were exploited, consumed, and ultimately ruthlessly abandoned by grand political slogans.

Lionel's tone became deep and intense, with a tragic intensity, as if he had transformed into the "old guard," moving everyone present: "After Waterloo, the Bourbon dynasty abandoned him; the farce of the restoration of the empire had nothing to do with him; what can he expect from the current republic?"
His military uniform was the only remaining evidence of his self-identity; his slogans were the faint candle that kept him from a complete mental breakdown.

I wrote about his stubbornness, his disconnect from the times, and his tragedy not to evoke nostalgia for the old system, but to raise a question—

When a regime, a movement, or an era comes to an end, what becomes of the dignity of the ordinary people who burned their lives and devoted their loyalty to it? What becomes of them? Does society have a responsibility to remember them, rather than simply ridicule or forget them?
This has nothing to do with Bonapartism or republicanism, Professor Renan. It's about human dignity, about the debt of history, about the sacrifice and oblivion of the insignificant individual that can happen in any era and under any system.

The tragedy of the old guard is my way of expressing my mourning for the fate of all individuals who are "used and discarded." This mourning is an echo I hear from the spirit of "liberty, equality, fraternity" of our great French Republic.

"Dear Professor Ernest Renan, haven't you heard this echo?"

Ernest Renan was speechless when questioned. He abruptly stood up from his seat, grabbed his cane, and left the editor's office without a word.

As the door slammed shut and the sound faded into the air, a deathly silence fell over the Sorbonne's journal editor's office, broken only by the occasional crack of firewood being torn apart by the flames in the fireplace.

Lionel did not sit down, but remained standing tall.

For the past two months, the economic hardship, family changes, and class disparity had brought him a great deal of repression and anger, which was finally released at this moment through this inquiry and through Ernest Renan's vicious questions.

In the suffocating silence, someone suddenly began to clap slowly, one clap at a time.

All eyes turned to the source of the applause, Victor Hugo, who sat at the head of the conference table. His deep gray eyes shimmered with a hint of moisture, and his aged, wrinkled hands clapped together slowly but powerfully, the applause deep yet resounding throughout the room.

"...Debt. The debt of history. Mr. Sorel, you used that word. Yes, society is in debt. In debt to those who have been forgotten, crushed, and deprived of their voices."

Hugo stood up, his burly but hunched body casting a huge shadow over the entire table in front of him.

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