Sur l'antisémitisme de Maurice Barrès (1) : De l'enfance à la veille de l'affaire Dreyfus

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On the Antisemitism of Maurice Barrès. From Childhood to the Eve of the Dreyfus Affair, by Michel LeymarieBarres’ antisemitism did not begin with the Dreyfus Affair. As a young journalist and novelist, Barres socialized with Drumont, the author of La France juive, and one of Drumont’s intellectual mentors, the racialist Soury. Supported by General Boulanger, Barrès was elected as a “revisionist” candidate in Nancy in 1889 after a violent campaign in Le Courrier de l’Est, where he exploited xenophobia and antisemitism and denounced republicans affiliated with the government : opportunism was “the party of the Jews,” Rothschild was “an infamous name.” A self-proclaimed socialist, Barrès cultivated nationalist passions in La Cocarde (1894-1895) and wanted “France for the French :” it was there that he wrote, among other articles, “The Parade of Judas” after the degradation of Captain Dreyfus. On the eve of the publication of Les Déracinés (1897), his so-called “national-socialism” (not to be confused with the later brand of “National Socialism” associated with the Nazi Party) had fell out of favor. Soon after that, Barrès’ militant antidreyfusism dispelled any residual confusion concerning his actual ideological and political orientation.