The political, social and religious issues in Hervé Bazin’s novel: Vipère au Poing.

(Index to the notes that follow)


SECTION ONE
THE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL ISSUES

The social rank of the Rezeau family and their political sympathies
M. Rezeau’s definition of the social divisions

The political sympathies of the Rezeau family:-

  1. The Rezeau are Anti-Republican.
  2. The Rezeau are Royalist.
  3. The Rezeau are on the right–wing of French politics - Possibly the far right. 

The attitude of the Rezeau to the other French political parties

The characteristics of the Rezeau’s  political and social standpoint

  1. The class consciousness that influenced the opinions of the Rezeau family
  2. The empty ostentation of the Rezeau’s social class
  3. The decline of the wealth and influence of the social class to which the Rezeau belonged.
  4. The Rezeau are forces of reaction.

SECTION TWO
BAZIN’S DEPICTION OF THE CONTEMPORARY CHURCH


Mme Rezeau’s description of the place of the Rezeau family in French society
Portraits of admirable Catholics in the book

  1. The Grandmother
  2. The Abbé Templerot.
  3. The priest tutors

The dominant impression of religion conveyed by “Vipère au Poing”

 

Hatred that replaced love when Paule Rezeau returned from China

  1. How Mme Bazin banished love from her Catholic home.  Her harsh regime
  2. The cruelty with which Folcoche  enforced her regime
  3. Folcoche’s use of lying and deceit in her war against her children
  4. The extreme violence of the children’s retaliation

The factors in Hervé Bazin’s critical view the contemporary Church

  1. The evil that devout people are capable of.
  2. The danger of religious observation becoming an empty show.
  3. The oppressiveness of exaggerated religiosity.
  4. The danger of religious fervour becoming bigotry and intolerance
  5. Criticism of the authoritarianism of the Church.
  6. The influence of mercenary considerations upon the Church.
  7. The sexual morality of the clergy

The effects of this all-pervasive Christian education on Jean

  1. His rejection of religion
  2. His rejection of authority
  3. His incapability of true love

Conclusion
In the final pages of the book, Jean sums up the experience of his education.

The political, social and religious issues in Hervé Bazin’s novel: Vipère au Poing.


SECTION ONE
THE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL ISSUES

The social rank of the Rezeau family and their political sympathies

In his depiction of the Rezeau family in this book, Bazin give us a picture of a Conservative, Catholic, upper middle-class family in France of the 1920s and 1930s.. We know from our study of the autobiographical elements that this picture is closely based on the real-life story of the family of the author.

The Rezeau are members of a social elite- the Spiritual Bourgeoisie of France. 
Page 67: M. Rezeau teaches his sons that they belong to the superior caste of the spiritual bourgeoisie. He divides the French middle classes into three sections:

The political sympathies of the Rezeau family:-

Le 14 juillet 1927 — mais oui, elle avait tenu si longtemps! — le 14 juillet, jour anniversaire de «leur» république et fête de la liberté,
The Rezeau family dissociated themselves from the French republic and did not share the celebrations of the common people of the day that marked the advent of democracy in France.

La petite histoire ne vous a sans doute pas dit que Claude Rezeau, capitaine vendéen, entra le premier aux Ponts-de-Cé, lors de l'avance éphémère de l'armée catholique et royale. (On chante depuis: (catholique et français».)

 

M. Rezeau kept quiet about the political party that he favoured : "L'Action francaise" - the movement of the extreme right wing Catholics.   Their newspaper, which had the same name,  had disappeared from the house since the Pope had condemned its views and the only newspaper found in the home now was the Catholic newspaper, “la Croix”, in which Jean’s Uncle, René Rezeau, sometimes wrote a leading article, Page 66: -
Le parti de son cœur, M. Rezeau ne le nommait jamais. Depuis sa condamnation par le pape, L'Action Française avait disparu de La Belle Angerie. On n'y lisait plus que La Croix, où, parfois, le grand-oncle pondait un leader.

The attitude of the Rezeau to the other French political parties

The bête noire of the Rezeau family was the radical party led by Édouard Herriot.  This party was the main party of government in this period, until the rise of the Socialists in 1936.  Most historians would not share M. Rezeau’s viewand would rate them as moderates.  They had angered M. Rezeau by holding who their party congress of 1928 (in appropriately, as we mention above) in the Royalist town of Angers.  Also they were strongly anti-clerical and had insinuated that the right wing parties were financed by the Church Page 66 -
 La bête noire, l'opprobre de ce temps, le génie malfaisant de la franc-maçonnerie s'appelait M. Herriot, l'homme qui avait eu le toupet de dire, en plein congrès radical tenu par bravade en la bonne ville  blanche d'Angers, que le coffre-fort dans l'Ouest est souvent scellé d'une hostie.

Jean’s father regarded Radicalism as the serious but detestable political opinion of a rabble of little shopkeepers.  (N.B. Rezeau snobbery) Page 66-
Le radicalisme représentait pour mon père l'opinion sérieuse, mais détestable de la boutiquaillerie française.

To him, the Socialists and the Communists were unmentionable, as they were nothing else but thieves and murderers Page 66-.
Ne parlons pas des communistes, ni même des socialistes: on ne discute pas le bien-fondé  des sentiments politiques que peuvent avoir les voleurs et les assassins. Or, ces gens-là, que sont-ils d'autre?

The characteristics of the Rezeau’s political and social standpoint

a The class consciousness that influenced the opinions of the Rezeau family

Their offensive social snobbery
Jacques Rezeau, Jean’s father, regarded it as “exorbitant” that the French Radicals would give as many rights to the common people as his privileged class enjoyed.

The common people aroused feelings of distaste in members of this elite: Page 67:
…..le peuple, non pas populus, mais plebs,  ce magma grouillant d'existences obscures et désagréablement suantes ... le peuple (à prononcer du bout des lèvres comme «peu» ou même comme «peuh!») le peuple cela se considère comme l'entomologiste étudie la termitière, en faisant des tranchées et des coupes, qui écrabouillent quelques insectes pour le plus grand bien de la science et de l'humanité.

 It was the practice for the upper classes to patronise the common people from time to time.  Their father taught them that it was necessary, of course, to love and help them when reasonable, and this was performed through the Catholic charities.  They would say to them "good day my good fellow" etc. where appropriate, but anything else was Bolshevism.

Certainly the Rezeau would not go to the seaside where they would have to rub shoulders with them.  Thus it was a novel experience for Jean, when, after his escapade in Paris, his father drove him back along the coastal roads. He had never seen the sea before. The family was not in favour of seaside holidays, which were expensive and the social objection is stated frankly Page 94 :
 Chacun sait que sur les plages on est obligé de se commettre plus ou moins avec les boutiquiers enrichis et la canaille des congés payés.

The local farmers were mere serfs, not entitled even to be referred to as “. Monsieur ……..”.  All the men over the age of 40, even when unmarried are called “père”, page 24:
Le titre de père, en Craonnais, est obligatoirement accolé au nom des hommes, même célibataires, qui ont dépassé la quarantaine et n'ont pas droit, de naissance, à s'entendre appeler «monsieur». Il est officiellement employé en chaire.

Jean is guilty of the same caste arrogance.  When he gets off the train at Montparnasse station, he asks directions from the ticket collector, and has the social grace not to take offence, when the latter addresses him in the “tu” form.  Jean’s reply is a haughty "Thank you my good man”.  Page 126 —
Tu prends la direction Etoile, tu changes à Trocadéro……….
Ce tutoiement est déplacé, mais nous devons avoir beaucoup d'indulgence envers la bonne volonté des petites gens. C'est une tradition familiale, qui, assure M. Rezeau, a fait notre popularité dans le Craonnais. Je lâche un «merci, mon brave!» tellement juste de ton que l'employé du métropolitain en reste médusé, (Frozen with surprise)

Jean later asserts his class superiority over the Pluvignec’s valet and a chambermaid - then over their butler. Jean had been addressed by the servants as  “monsieur” and its repetition began to irritate him.  He addressed the butler in a way to assert his rank equal to that of the Pluvignec’s.  Page 128 –Jean to the butler: —
Comment vous appelez-vous, mon ami?
Félicien Darcoulle, pour servir monsieur .
La déférence de son dos s'accentue. Il a compris. Je chasse de race.

Jean’s upper class arrogance is particularly shocking in his attitude after he has had sex with Madeleine.  She confides to him her love (Page 156)
Page 156. Faut croire que j'ai bien de l'amitié pour toi, tu sais!
He is deeply indignant that she, a farmer’s daughter has the presumption to use the intimate « tu » form to someone of his social class:
Ca, non, je ne le supporterai pas d'elle, Ni d'une autre. Mais d'elle surtout! De quel droit me tutoyer ?

The author’s explanation of his low view of the local peasantry
The author deplores his family’s snobbery and his own at that time, but, to some extent, he is able to rationalise his contempt for the peasantry of the Craonnais area of France, where the Rezeau ancestral home is situated. In his view, the population is made up of degenerate Gauls.  They are of poor physical stock, puny and sickly, Page 9:
De race chétive, très «Gaulois dégénérés», cagneux (knock-kneed),  souvent tuberculeux, décimés par le cancer.

The peasant girls might be pretty, but that would not last long. Both the Abbé Trubel and Jean found the charms of the daughters of the Huault family at the Vergeraie tenant farm, irresistible, but Jean knew that in a few years, Madeleine, like the rest would put on weight and waddle like a duck.
 
Jean, the incorrigible rebel, was contemptuous of their meek submission to the priest and the lord of the manor,  “leur grande soumission envers la cure (presbytery)et le château”- Page 9.  The inferiority of the men was denoted by the fact that they were not addressed as “monsieur”.  After the age of 40 their title of “père”, was used even by the priest from the pulpit.  On the other hand they addressed the Rezeau children as “monsieur”, page 24
D'abord le père Perrault. (Le titre de père, en Craonnais, est obligatoirement accolé au nom des hommes, même célibataires, qui ont dépassé la quarantaine et n'ont pas droit, de naissance, à s'entendre appeler «monsieur». Il est officiellement employé en chaire.)

There were tilting gates at regular intervals on the local roads  which bore the initials of the landowner, because this wass semi-feudal territory, page 83:
Tous les cent mètres, une barrière à bascule, ….. Elles portent, peinte en blanc, les initiales du propriétaire, et ces initiales, qui sont souvent les mêmes durant des kilomètres, nous rappellent que nous sommes ici en terre quasi féodale.

In a country where many Republicans were engaged in a struggle against the power of the church, the local peasants remained unquestioning, dutifully attending mass and sending their children to church schools to prepare them for lives as goatherds and unpaid farm lads- Page 9.

Similarly after fifty years of democracy, they used to vote for half a dozen viscounts to represent them in the Chamber of Deputies, instead of getting deputies elrctedwho would support their interests.  They were all serfs at heart, Page 9:
Presque tous sont métayers (Tenant farmers) , sur la même terre, de père en fils.  Serfs dans l’âme…
Bazin believes that, at the time that this story starts (in 1923), this was probably the most backward area of France, page 8:
Ladite région, à l'époque où commence mon récit, c'est-à-dire il y a environ vingt-cinq ans, était du reste beaucoup plus arriérée que maintenant. Probablement la plus arriérée de France.

He gives a withering description of the local peasantry -they are suspicious, set in their ways, often alcoholic, all are serfs at heart.
Page 9: ……..les hommes., les indigènes conservent la moustache tombante, la coiffe (headgear) à ruban bleu, le goût des soupes épaisses comme un mortier(mortar), une, une méfiance de corbeaux, une ténacité de chiendent (Couch grass); quelque faiblesse pour l'eau-de-vie de prunelle(Sloe-gin) et surtout pour le poiré (Perry) Presque tous sont métayers (Tenant farmers) , sur la même terre, de père en fils.  Serfs dans l’âme…

 (b) The empty ostentation of the Rezeau’s social class

Jean tells us that, although the name of the Rezeau family home, “La Belle Angerie", suggested a place for angels but the name was, in reality, an adaptation of its original name “la Boulangerie”and this is what it had once been.   However, this former bakery had been built with a fine facade giving the appearance of a manor house, and thus possessed a style favoured by the French middle classes in the past century.  The house was set in large grounds and a principle of the middle class home of the period was that the number of rooms should be proportional to the size of the estate.  After conversion this house had 32 rooms and countless outhouses. 

It was this prestigious but oversized house that Jacques Rezeau inherited, in the 1920s, to accommodate himself, his wife and three sons.  

Jacques Rezeau spent fr.6000 each year to hold a reception for all the notables of the region, from the Duchess at the top of the list down to the pharmacist, who narrowly scraped in at the bottom.   The sole purpose of this expenditure was to maintain their social standing. M. Rezeau saw it as a way of carrying out all the necessary courtesies at one go, but Jean calculated the extravagance, Page 52:
Six mille francs! Avec cette somme, à l'époque, on habillait décemment une famille pendant deux ans. Six mille francs! Le sixième de nos revenus environ.

The book relates the most crippling expenditure that Jacques Rezeau’s social status imposed upon him.  This was the reception to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the election of his Uncle, René Rezeau, to the French Academy.   Jean’s father was determined that the celebrations should take place at his house in the Craonnais, as he was the head of the senior branch of the family. Mme Rezeau was unenthusiastic as they simply could not afford this huge expense but her husband argued that such a great honour for them demanded great sacrifice.  Resigned to this, his wife sounded action stations, for the elaborate preparations, Page 144
-  « Tant d'honneur exige de courageux sacrifices ». Alors, résignée, Mme Rezeau sonne le branle-bas.

The tribute to René Rezeau was a resounding success, but the cost forced Jean’s father to sell some of the shares that they depended upon for the family income and this memorable day was followed by savage economies.

The truth was that for years the Rezeau had been playing a role and had been straining to keep up a lifestyle that they could not afford.  At the end of the day of celebration for René Rezeau, Jean’s father had been filled with pride and said it was charming.  Jean spelled out to himself the grim truth that there was nothing charming about spending money they could not afford on self-glorification, page 147:
Mais tant d'argent dépensé pour la gloire, alors que nous manquons de nécessaire, est-ce vraiment charmant?

c. The decline of the wealth and influence of the social class to which the Rezeau belonged.

It appears that the money problems of the Rezeau family had already existed in the first decade of the twentieth century or even earlier.  At this period, the social and financial reforms of the Republican were impacting on the living standards of the traditional privileged elite.  Jean tells us that in 1913 the finances of the Rezeau family were in such a bad state that it was absolutely necessary for Jacques Rezeau to marry a rich wife.  He was very successful in this, marrying Paule Pluvignec, a very rich young lady, from an eminent family of bankers and statesmen, who brought a very generous dowry of three hundred thousand francs, page 11:
Elle avait trois cent mille francs de dot. Trois cent mille francs-or.

She was not the woman that Jacques had fallen in love with but Jean describes the marriage of Jacques and Paule as, page 11:
……… cette union, rendue indispensable par la pauvreté des Rezeau.

Thanks to his wife’s money, Jacques Rezeau had been able to live like a man of means until the world economic crisis of the Wall Street crash and the Great Depression hit France in the mid 1920s. By 1926, France was on the verge of economic collapse and the new Prime Minister had to to take stringent measures to reduce the deficit- by raising taxes.  In the fight against inflation, the franc lost four fifths of its value against the dollar.   This 1928 devaluation of the franc hit very hard those members of the French middle class dependent upon investment incomes, like the Rezeau family.

In his heated argument with a Communist in their third class railway compartment, M. Rezeau voices his grievances against the social reforms of the Republican government and its punitive taxation of those on investment incomes:
Page 138 - — Quand plusieurs générations, dit-il, ont édifié patiemment une fortune et qu'on la voit s'effondrer en quelques années d'une démagogie financière qui s'en prend systématiquement aux porteurs de rentes, il n'y a pas de quoi être fier de son pays!

The decline in fortune and lifestyle was marked by a notable cutback at the time when Jacques Rezeau succeeded to the family estate. Previously they had had two homes, but from then on they had live the whole year in the Belle Angerie, out in the country, in the damp and cold Craonnais region.

Their snobbish objection to working to earn a living
When Jacques Rezeau was teaching law at the Catholic University of Shanghai he was earning a salary, admittedly very modest.  On returning to France, after the death of his mother, Jacques Rezeau gave up his teaching to live off his incomes, in accordance with the traditions of his social class.  Although the Rezeau family found themselves in increasingly severe financial difficulties, Jean’s father’s sense of personal dignity would not permit him to enter paid employment.  Jean realises that this is not an option when he is hoping that his father will find the money to send the three boys to a Jesuit college, safe from their mother. His father did not say this, but Jean recognises that it would seem dishonourable for M. Rezeau to obtain paid employment to help them out.

Page 107 Il n'y a que les petites gens qui sont obligés de travailler pour vivre. Cet horrible préjugé, hérité de nos ancêtres nobles, avait encore cours dans la famille, malgré la nécessité où se trouvaient déjà bon nombre des nôtres de monnayer leur activité.

The miserable living conditions under the outward show
The financial problems meant that their living conditions were very difficult and far inferior to those of their much less grand bourgeois neighbours. Not only did they not have electricity, but they had no gas supply and for lighting they were dependent on oil lamps.  They had no running water and very inadequate sanitation.  There was one W.C. next the parents’ quarters, but in the rest of the house, there were just toilet buckets, which had to be carried through the house for emptying. Heating was inadequate and it was a cold damp house.

They did not eat well and Jean tells us that the children were quite simply hungry.  When Father Trubel was sacked, he commented that he would not miss the dreadful diet that he had endured, page 44:

 Mais oui, mon bon monsieur, je quitte votre maison de fous. Vos haricots rouges commençaient à m'écœurer.

The priest was there, resident in the house as tutor to the three boys, precisely because the family could not afford the fees for them to go to the Jesuit College. M. Rezeau volunteered this information to their local priest, page 58.

It was in order to provide his rebellious teenage sons with this college education that the impecunious, M. Rezeau was forced to set his dignity aside and ask for financial help from his wife’s parents, members of the financial bourgeoisie that he despised.   He achieved little for his pains and reviewed his futile self-abasement bitterly during their third class journey home page 136:
Ce n'est pourtant pas le jour de me plaindre. Ton grand-père m'a signé un chèque de cinq mille francs. Une aumone! J'en suis pour ma courte honte.

 Although many of the privations were the deliberate schemes of the sadistic mistress of the house,  they were also caused by the family poverty and the priority given to expenditure on empty ostentation.  Abbé IV had been scandalised when he found out that the family could afford only one new suit to be worn by the three boys in turn.  They would wear the suit in relay at the annual reception, , Page 52:
— J'avoue ne rien comprendre aux usages de cette maison, osa-t-il nous dire. Vous dépensez une somme considérable pour donner une fête et vous n'avez rien à vous mettre sur le dos.
This comic pantomime neatly summed all the features of the financial predicament in which the Rezeau family found itself in the 1930s and yet, thay had been leaders of the spiritual bourgeoisie in France for centuries.

d The Rezeau are forces of reaction.
Their social ideas which the Rezeau represented would have meant turning back the clock. At the start of the book, the author is sardonic about the respect granted to his uncle, René Rezeau, and about his uncle’s reactionary views.  Jean mockingly asks for respect as nephew of this this world famous novelist:-
Page 9. Tenez-vous bien et respectez-moi, car c'est mon grand-oncle. Le retour à la terre, le retour de l'Alsace, le retour aux tourelles, le retour à la foi, l'éternel retour!
It was this same uncle, to whom tribute was paid at a gathering of the whole Rezeau family in 1929, to celebrate the 25th anniversary   of his election to the French Academy.  This momentous day filled Jacques Rezeau with pride.  Spotting Jean, he took his arm and asked him if he understood today what a family the Rezeau was like. He answered his own question.  "It is charming" he says. Jean says to himself it is charming but it is a complete anachronism.
Page 147 - — C'est charmant! dit papa, en se caressant la pomme d'Adam, qu'il a aussi proéminente que le nez.
Oui, c'est charmant, c'est désuet, … Mais ces paysans, traités en serfs en plein vingtième siècle, n'est-ce pas aussi désuet?

Society is changing and the Rezeau  are being left behind
The balance of population is changing. The ordinary people are swarming into urban areas and depopulating the country districts, where they had lived as slaves and they are turning their backs on the old traditions and ideas to which the Rezeau family clings.
Page 147 ; il peuple les trains de banlieue qui dépeuplent ces campagnes asservies, il ne connaît plus l'orthographe des noms historiques, il pense mal parce qu'il ne pense plus vôtre ……….

It is the common people who have the ideas, the vitality and the numbers and Rezeau are backward and do not know what is going on.  The ordinary people are alive and those of the Rezeau’s social class are dying – Page 147:
et pourtant il pense, il (le peuple) vit, infiniment plus vaste que ce coin de terre isolé par ses haies, il vit, et nous n'en savons rien, nous qui n'avons  même pas la T S. F. pour l'écouter parler, il vit, et nous allons mourir.

Jean recognises that the very existence of his social class is a challenge to the modern world and its survival is very precarious:
Page 147, Mais ma haine à moi devine notre raison d'être, surtout, de ne plus être, elle devine combien cette fête est un défi jeté au siècle

Jean foresees that, as a left-wing activist he will have a hand in the decline of previously privileged families  like his own- a decline begun by the devaluation of their investments and of their prejudices, page 148:
….. je serais un des plus détestables artisans de l'irrémédiable décadence, préparée par la dévaluation des préjugés et des titres.

However, in spite of himself he has some affection for parts of this tradition and for some of the members of his social class. Thus he confirms softly to his father, that it is charming adding for himself alone that one would say that it was their swan song


Page 148-. Oui, c'est charmant. On dirait le chant du cygne.

Section 2
Bazin’s depiction of the contemporary Church


Mme Rezeau’s depiction of the place of the Rezeau family in French society
Mme Paule Rezeau reminds the children of the role that they are required to play as members of a leading Catholic family, Page 36:
Nous ne sommes pas pour rien la souche d'où jaillissent tant de défenseurs de la foi, écrivains, prêtres ou religieuses. 

  1. Portraits of admirable Catholics in the book

Although most readers would agree that the Rezeau family does not paint an edifying picture of their religion as they practised it, some qualify this negative viewpoint by claiming that Bazin’s novel does not attack the church itself, only certain members of it in a certain time and place. They point to the favourable portraits of devout Catholics, which are found in “Vipère au poing” .

  1. The Grandmother

Jean deeply loved and respected his Grandmother who was a very devout Catholic and a very admirable lady.
On the night after his mother had collapsed at evening prayers, Jean finds it hard to go to sleep, remembering the sudden death of his grandmother. The love that he had felt for his Grandmother is in total contrast with his feelings for his mother.   He hopes that God, who made such a bad mistake on that day is going to make up for it now.
Page 51 - Je ne dormirai que très tard. C'est que je me souviens de la mort de grand-mère. Ce désastre avait été très vite consommé. Est-ce que Dieu, qui se trompa si lourdement ce jour-là, aurait l'intention de réparer son erreur?

Under the rule of Grandmother Rezeau, the principles applied were honest and sound.  Their grandmother and uncle and the governess might have seemed hard at times but they were never unjust. The children had never doubted the excellence of their principles even if the children had observed them themselves with hypocrisy, page 35.
Un an après la prise du pouvoir par notre mère, nous n'avions plus aucune foi dans la justice des nôtres. Grand'- mère, le protonotaire, la gouvernante avaient pu nous paraître durs, quelquefois, mais injustes, jamais. Nous ne doutions pas un instant de l'excellence de leurs principes, même si nous les observions avec hypocrisie. En quelques mois, Mme Rezeau eut ruiné cette créance salutaire.

In contrast with the atmosphere in the house with Folcoche in charge, the Rezeau Catholic home was a happy home when Jean’s Grandma was mistress of the house.  Jean has a vision of the scene in La Belle Angerie, during his father’s youth.  On one evening, during the time when Mme Rezeau was in hospital, the evening sun fell on the tapestry of Cupid and Psyche. The longstanding family tradition was for all present to exchange the kiss of peace. No kiss was exchanged on this occasion but in this moment their father must have had memories revived of sweeter days with his sisters and perhaps other girls, one of whom he loved.
Page 62. Non le baiser de paix n'eut pas lieu. Mais le mépris du tendre, pour un instant, devint seulement la pudeur du tendre, Notre Père... Notre père qui étiez si peu sur la terre, quel souvenir ressuscitait en vous? Quelle vision d'une Belle Angerie, peuplée de jeunes filles, vos sœurs, vos amies, parmi lesquelles votre cœur avait peut-être choisi?

Jean saw his Grandmother as a perfect example of how Grandmothers should be.  She was the only member of the household to take effective action against the viper. When the little boy went back to the house carrying the viper, he was surrounded by panic.  His governess, his aunt (an Imperial Countess), his uncle, a servant, were all were terrified.  All retreated except his grandma, who stepped forward and made him drop the snake with a sharp blow from her lorgnette. At that his uncle Michel Rezeau, the cassocked apostolic protonotary, assured that the snake was dead, began to stamp on it to kill it all over again, page 5:
Mais grand'mère, plus brave, parce que, n'est-ce  pas, c'était grand'mère, s'approcha et, d'un brusque coup de face-à-main, me fit lâcher le serpent, qui tomba, inerte, sur le perron.  Jean understands that she did it quite simply because she was Grandma.

2) The Abbé Templerot.

In the book, we meet a priest who is a very impressive and sympathetic personality.  This occurred when M. Rezeau went on a car trip to visit old friends and to do some genealogical research.  He took Frédie and Jean with him and his sons had the opportunity to meet the priest who had saved their father’s life, when they were comrades in the 1914-1918 war. When he was hit by a bullet in no man’s land, the Abbé Templerot had carried him back to French lines. He is a giant of a man and has the strength as well as the bravery.  Their father is emotionally overwhelmed to see him.
The priest is also a sociable, merry fellow and there is in his house none of the oppressive religiosity they have been used to. He lavishly wines and dines them.  There is a comfortable atmosphere and he has a housekeeper who brings Jean cocoa in bed. He is so unused to these attentions that this event remains a more important date in his life than his first communion.

3) The priest tutors

Jean’s portrait of his priest tutors is not unfavourable in spite of their faults.  There was priest number four, who confided in them his view that it was nonsense to spend money on an extravagant reception, while the children had nothing to wear, and he said so to Jean Page 52:
— J'avoue ne rien comprendre aux usages de cette maison, osa-t-il nous dire. Vous dépensez une somme considérable pour donner une fête et vous n'avez rien à vous mettre sur le dos.  The priest was sacked.

Priest V only stuck their harsh regime five days and then made off slamming the doors behind him. He protested to the parish priest.
The next priest to come as tutor was a member of the order of the Immaculate Mary - his name Baptiste Vadeboncoeur, from Quebec. A stereotype of piety - his speech was full of pious clichés - but he was a good peasant experienced in many sports in fishing and tree climbing. He accepted everything about their education. He had an immense handkerchief and this seemed to hide reality from him.
When, at the end of the book, Jean contemplates the ending of his family traditions, he admits to feeling some pain as there were people, who were part of it for whom he felt affection, page 148:
Et je souffre un peu, j'en souffre, parce que, malgré moi, je ne les déteste pas tous.
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The dominant impression of religion conveyed by “Vipère au Poing”- The unedifying picture of Mme Rezeau’s Catholic home

In spite of the detail of totally admirable Catholics in the book, the dominant theme of the book does not give an edifying view of the effect of religion in our lives.  The story which Hervé Bazin tells, based upon the personal experience of his own life, is the massive hypocrisy of a leading French Catholic family, which, while observing the most extreme religious devotion, led lives that made a mockery of true Christian values.

  1. Hatred that replaced love when Paule Rezeau returned from China

From the day of her return from China with her husband and youngest son, Jean’s mother systematically replaced the Christian principle of love with her personal regime of hatred.    Jean soon becomes aware that the only verb that applies in their family is the verb to hate. 

In the years that immediately followed, it became clear that since their Mother had taken control, the children were not growing any bigger physically- all that grew was their hatred, page 46:
Non, la seule chose qui eût grandi en nous, disons-le, c'était un certain sentiment, impossible à mesurer, mais qui eût encombré des kilomètres sur la carte du non-Tendre, si elle existait. Dans cet ordre d'idées, nous avions atteint le gigantisme.

From first meeting her, they had no wish to call her maman.  Now the three boys had their own name for her “Folcoche”, a contraction of folle and cochon and there is no love in that name.

The Rezeau children become so used to living in an all-enveloping atmosphere of hatred, that when their mother has to go into hospital they felt lost without the evil that she engendered.  La Belle Angerie seemed empty without her. They were satisfied but not happy. They were disorientated like heathens deprived of their nasty Gods.
Page 61. Nous étions désorientés.  J'imagine assez le désarroi des adorateurs de Moloch ou de Kali, soudain privés de leurs vilains dieux. Nous n'avions rien à mettre à la place du nôtre. La haine, beaucoup plus encore que l'amour, ça occupe

The hatred of all three sons becomes so strong that when the news comes that their mother is dying, they dance around in a circle and sing a song of delight page 70:
Ces trois enfants dénaturés, …………….. , ces trois enfants, voilà soudain qu'ils manifestent un affreux enthousiasme, qu'ils se donnent la main pour une ronde infernale et braillent à qui mieux mieux sur l'air des lampions:
Folcoche
Va crever,
Folcoche
Va crever,
Folcoche
Va crever . . .

Mme Rezeau recognises and accepts that her son hates her, and she tells him that even though he hates her, he is the son who is most like her.
Page 57. Tu me détestes, je le sais. Pourtant je vais te dire une chose: il n'y a aucun de mes fils qui me ressemble plus que toi, Page 57:

As a result of the tutelage of Folcoche, hatred is a main element of the poison of the viper which Jean Bazin will carry around with him for life- Page 171.

2 How Mme Bazin banished love from her Catholic home.  Her harsh regime

Jean’s mother established her loveless rule immediately on her return to France, before she had even got to know them again. When they meet her on the station platform, the boys are deceived at first by a smile on her face and rush to greet her, but their Mother, clears them away with strong, well-aimed-slaps. Having landed on their backs, the boys sob. Mme Rezeau asks if that is how pleased they are to see her and blames their recently departed grandmother for their attitude.  As the two boys greet their youngest brother, for the first time, their mother quickly breaks up their meeting and, with the encouragement of a kick in the shins, gets the boys to carry the suitcases.  The case that Jean has to carry is too heavy for him at 8 years of age, but a kick in the shins gives him strength. 

From the boys’ earliest years, when they were in their Grandmother’s care, religion was built into their daily life with mass said at home every day. When Mme Rezeau took over, after the death of M. Rezeau’s mother, religion continued to play a major art in the family’s daily routine, but Mme Rezeau added her own refinements to make it an instrument of her oppression.  She instituted her own rules.  The timetable which she set for them was cruel. The day was planned to be filled with study or worship from 5 a.m. to 9:30 p.m.,. Mass was said straight after the boys got up - once they had made their beds.  After the evening dinner there are prayers in the chapel.

Mme Rezeau’s deliberate intention was to keep the boys in suspense and destroy all their pleasures:
Page 31. Affirmer son autorité chaque jour par une nouvelle vexation devint la seule joie de Mme. Rezeau. Elle sut nous tenir en haleine, nous observer, remarquer et détruire nos moindres plaisirs

A further series of reforms after the introduction of the timetable had been to restrict the children’s freedom of movement dramatically and to give the children the duty of raking and weeding the drive. The farmers were amazed to see young gentlemen doing this menial work. The children were profoundly angered. Their Mother watched over them in spite of the cold. 

Her third new reform made the children wear heavy peasant clogs. For some weeks their father resisted but as always he gave way.
Page 33. Papa résista quelques semaines. Il n'avait pas vu sans déplaisir ses enfants transformés en petits serfs. Sa conception de l'honorabilité en souffrait. Mais, comme toujours, il céda.

Her fourth reform was to allow them only four francs spending money.   Their mother searched them and seized their purses and all objects of value - gold neck chains - baptismal cups, which they never got back. Her fifth reform was to put locks on all cupboards, so that they could not help themselves to food.

One year after Folcoche had taken over, the children were cold and hungry. Only the youngest brother was more favoured. He was rewarded for good behaviour and betrayal of his brothers with an occasional gingerbread- which Jean knew to be a present to the children from their  grandma Pluvignec.

As well as a physical cold (she had had their oil heaters removed from their bedroom), there was also a moral cold and hunger which the children felt, page 35:
Déjà, nous avions faim, déjà, nous avions froid. Physiquement. Moralement, surtout. ……….. Un an après la prise du pouvoir par notre mère, nous n'avions plus aucune foi dans la justice des nôtres.

In yet another reform, Mme Rezeau took the guilt that their religious instruction had given from earliest child hood and turned it into a means of control and humiliation Mme Rezeau decided that there should be public family confession each day and that she would act as a Mother confessor.  This gave her a splendid expedient for getting into the privacy of their venial or other faults, Page 35: 
Quel admirable biais pour entrer, toute casquée, dans l'intimité de nos fautes vénielles ou autres!

Although Jean regarded this reform as comic, its malicious effects were apparent from the very first confession.  Marcel was the first to confess and used it to indirectly accuse his eldest brother of taking his book. His mother granted herself the right to forgive him, Page 36 :
Allez! le bon Dieu, votre Père et moi, nous vous pardonnons

3 The cruelty with which Folcoche  enforced her regime
When they first met their mother on the station platform, the boys had learnt that she would use both hands and feet to enforce her authority.  Her stinging slaps became part of their daily routine.

At the start, the boys had a kindly governess, Ernestine, to take their part.  When the governess saw the slap that Mme Rezeau gave Frédie, for vomiting the castor-oil that she had forced on him onto her dressing gown, the governess intervened.  The immediate result was that, once Ernestine was out of the room, Mme. Rezeau gave Frédie two further spoonfuls of castor oil. The later result was that Ernestine was dismissed and the regime of violence had free rein.  Even before he had reached twelve years of age, Jean had hardened himself and even when she slapped him hard, he hardly flinched.  Jean convinced himself that his cheeks built up sufficient resistance not go red at her strikes.

Mme Rezeau had recourse to any tool handy for her punishments. When Jean failed to position his hands on the table in accordance with her strict rules of etiquette, she stabbed his hands with the prongs of her fork, drawing blood   At this even her timid husband protested, page 32:
— Tes mains, Brasse-Bouillon! cria Mme Rezeau.
Et, comme je ne les remettais pas assez vite sur la table, un coup de fourchette, dents en avant, vint les ponctuer de quatre points rouges.  
— Avec le dos, Paule! Avec le dos. Cela suffit, gémit  papa…………

The thrashings that she inflicted on her sons amounted to gross physical abuse.  One particularly violent  beating occurred after their father had taken the boys on a hunting expedition.  On their return, M. Rezeau had met criticism from his wife and, forgetting himself, had made a bad-tempered response to her. Mme Rezeau waited to vent her spite at her husband’s insubordination to her  on the children.  As soon as she got her sons on their own,  she let loose with her hands, her feet and her shouting.  Usually she was only too happy to tell them what they had done wrong, but this time there was no explanation.  - Even Cropette, her favourite, was included for the first time in his life.  When Jean’s turn came, he fought back.  At this Mme. Rezeau turned on him alone and beat him for a quarter of an hour until she was exhausted. At supper that night, M. Rezeau must have noticed the bruises - but his cowardice got the upper hand.
Page 42- Il fronça les sourcils, devint rose. Mais sa lâcheté eut le dessus. Puisque cet enfant ne se plaignait pas, pourquoi rallumer la guerre?

This incident occurred after they had liuved through two years of the Folcoche experience. These were two years when the boys were rigged out in hypocrisy and rags, every hair and every hope clipped short.
Page 43. Depuis deux ans, déjà - deux ans! savez-vous ce que c'est? nous vivions affublés d’hypocrisie et de loques, tout cheveu et toute espérance tondus de près.

When the boys got bigger, Mme Rezeau needed to  get the priest to administer such punishment. One incident was after Mme. Rezeau had found the boys’ hidden food store. In reprisal, she decreed that Frédie as the eldest would be whipped.  As modesty prevented her from executing this punishment on the bare backside of a fifteen year old boy, and as M. Rezeau avoided the task. Although the priest was designated, it was Mme. Rezeau who went out to select from the shrubbery a hazel switch, suitable for inflicting sufficiently painful stripes.  Frédie howled with pain, but Jean was contemptuous of him, Page 101


Traquet, sans enthousiasme, accepta l'office de bourreau, et nous pûmes entendre des hurlements significatifs du côté de la chambre de Frédie.
— Le salaud! murmurait Cropette avec conviction.
— Frédie ferait mieux de se taire, répliquai-je. Il manque de tenue. Si c'était moi . . .

The beating was unjustified, but Folcoche had added a further sentence- that Frédie should be confined to his room for a month.  In fact, previously Mme Rezeau had had a much more ambitious hope of imprisoning her sons.  When all the horses that drew the family carriages died, of glanders as it transpired, Mme. Rezeau investigated for weeks, certain that the children had poisoned them and that she could get them sent to a reformatory.  However they were innocent and the boys remained at home where the pious, treacherous routine of the Rezeau resumed, page 46: 
Et le traintrain, pieux et perfide, reprit son cours

4 Folcoche’s use of lying and deceit in her war against her children
As the children grew older, this supposedly pious lady began to use lies and deceit. To her mind. the children might have grown up but they were still her children and  were entitled only to obey and to act as guinea pigs to the fancies of her power Page 108:
Nous sommes toujours ses enfants, nous sommes donc toujours des enfants, qui n'ont que le droit d'obéir et de servir de cobayes aux fantaisies de sa puissance, à l'exercice de ses prérogatives.
With Frédie now fifteen, she felt a new urgency.. Previously she had acted in the name of justice, but now with the children approaching 16 - 15 - 14 she chose new tactics, abandoning all Christian and social pretences.  Jean tells us that previously she had taken good care to keep up appearances but now….
Page 108 - …….  Elle se gardait bien de la vengeance gratuite, conservait la forme, mettait en avant tous  les prétextes chrétiens, légaux et sociaux, bref, étayait sa sévérité sur une béquille de justice. Dorénavant, il n'en sera plus ainsi.

As she set out to prove the strength of her authority, there was no longer room for any compromise. From now on civil war would rage in their home, page 108:
On ne peut plus transiger sur rien. La guerre civile ne quittera plus la maison. 

In the following weeks Folcoche made the least trifle into a blazing row.  The civil war went on. She over-salted the soup - she pulled off their buttons and tore their clothes to accuse them. Later, Jean understands that his mother intends to plant her purse in his room so that she can accuse him of its theft and get him evicted from his own home.  Only by elaborate precautions is he able to thwart her scheme.

5) The extreme violence of the childrens retaliation

As the children grew older, they fought back under Jean’s leadership and finally some of their actions were extreme and shocking.  They had started with trivial annoyances for their mother: Jean put bird droppings on her chair out of doors. He damaged her stamps. The children urinated on her flower beds and put disinfectant on her hortensia.

However the children reached the point where they were planning their mother’s murder.   After she served up a skate which had gone off and insisted that they ate it eat it (page 114), they got the idea of poisoning their mother,  Straight after the meal, they went to the medicine cupboard and Jean stole 100 drops of his mother’s belladonna medicine to put an overdose in his Mother's coffee next day.  However, Mme. Rezeau was immunised against the drug and merely suffered violent diarrhea.

They then made an attempt to drown her.  This murder opportunity occurred when the children had gone boating on the River Ommée.  They had gone beyond the limits set by Mme. Rezeau  and on their return they found Mme. Rezeau waiting for them on the bridge. When she tried to step into the boat, Jean veered so sharply that his mother fell in the water.  The boys deliberately lost their oars so that they could not rescue her.  Nevertheless, with indomitable will, Mme. Rezeau pulled herself out, in spite of being debilitated by her recent operation.
 
Before the arrival of Folcohe this had been a Catholic home where peace and love reigned.  Under Folcoche this was a Catholic home where civil war and violent hatred reigned. M. Rezeau was being driven frantic by these rows.
Page 112. Pauvre papa !  Il ne savait plus que faire ni que dire. Cette femme et ces enfants déchainés ne prêtaient plus à ses migraine- que des oreillers de cris.

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The issues in Hervé Bazin’s critical view the contemporary Church.

  1. The evil that devout people are capable of

The story of Rezeau family, as told by Hervé Bazin appears to demonstrate that although the observance of the practices and rituals of religion can be a positive inspiration for many people, they do not in themselves guarantee moral virtue.  A committed believer like Jacques Rezeau did not doubt that the procedures of his faith imparted a real grace and it was for that reason, he was afraid that if Father Trubel was not a regular priest, the masses he had performed for them could be invalid, Page 44:
— Je me demande si, par hasard, vous ne seriez pas interdit . . . si vos messes étaient valables!

Bazin’s book shocked and scandalised the public because it showed the depth of malice and evil that a devout and meticulously observant Christian was capable of towards her own children.  Her refusal to help her impoverished sister-in –law Mme Torure, showed that her delinquency in Christian compassion was general.

2) Religious observation becoming empty show.

This is the error of the Pharisee in Jesus’s parable (Luke 8 9-14), who gives thanks that he is not like the rest of men.  We are reminded also of the religious zealot, Tartuffe, in Molière’s comedy. Bazin continually depicts the religiosity of his family as a hypocritical outer show. In his summary of what his family stands for Jean asks, page 147:
Mais cette hypocrisie qui jette la cape sur nos dissensions, notre sécheresse de cœur et d'esprit, nos mites et nos mythes, est-ce encore respectable?

The importance of outer show is demonstrated in the competition between the families of the Catholic elite to outdo each other in holiness. 

M. Rezeau had been unenthusiastic about his wife’s idea of open family confession. However, when she reported that the Kervazec family, who were their rivals in public esteem as leading Catholic family in their region, held such family confessions, the case was made.  She told her husband, page 36:
… la confession familiale quotidienne. J'ai entendu dire que les Kervazec la pratiquent depuis longtemps.  Suprême argument! Les Kervazec sont, dans le canton, la famille rivale en sainteté. Ils ont donné un cardinal à la France.

A Rezeau- Kervazec religious status battle takes place at the annual reception given by the Rezeau family.  Mme Rezeau was walking through the grounds of their home on the arm of M. Kervazec, when she espied a sinner on whom she could demonstrate her strict Christian standards.   Her victim was her son, Jean, with whom she was angry for another reason.  She reproached him for stuffing himself with cake, even though he hadn't eaten any. M. Kervazec, the nephew of a cardinal joined in this unfair reproach and gave him a sermon on the sin of greed, repeatedly using the word “wicked”. Folcoche then outdid him in offended virtue.  She branded Jean a “wicked” boy and ordered him back to his room.  Jean was sickened by this pathetic performance.

3) The oppressiveness of exaggerated religiosity.

Although Jean remembered warmly his Grandmother’s love and care, he tells us that even in those early years, he and his brother did not totally go along with excess of religious devotion. Religion merged with all everyday activities and Jean gives a comic report of his governess’s words while dressing him. She was intermingling the daily prayers with exhortations not to get his shirt dirty and to wipe his bottom properly.
Page 13 -14. — Allons! dépêchez-vous, paresseux! ... Remercions le bon Dieu qui nous donne encore cette journée pour le servir ... C'est le jour de changer votre chemise, Brasse-Bouillon. Au nom du Père et du Fils ... Tâchez de la garder propre. Quand on va aux waters, on s'essuie convenablement. Notre Père qui êtes aux cieux ..., etc.
It is certainly not with approval that he tells of an incident of personal self-mortification as a child.  As the little boy imagined that he had committed some sin, he had tightened a piece of string around his waist until it cut into his flesh. The next morning, his governess awoke himand was shocked to see the marks made by the string on his body. She brought his grandmother, who reproached him but admired him for his religious devotion.  She told the governess, Page 14 :
Surveillez ce petit, Mademoiselle. Il m'inquiète. Mais je dois avouer qu'il me donne aussi de bien grands espoirs.
Later in the book, he comments on the unfortunate result of this aspect of his Grandma’s upbringing - they had been taught to be suspicious of all human actions and to detect potential sin in every intention. Jean’s mother was to turn this attitude into a repressive dogma, page 29:
Page 29 - Nous étions déjà habitués à la mentalité de la méfiance, d'origine sacrée, qui cerne tous les actes et mine les intentions de tout chrétien, ce pécheur en puissance (potential  sinner). Du soupçon, Mme Rezeau fit un dogme.

4) Religious fervour becoming bigotry and intolerance

M. Jacques Rezeau is a sad figure and perhaps the basic tragedy of his life was that he had married a woman that he did not love..  He had been in love with a Protestant girl, but Uncle René had stepped in to prevent the marriage.  Jacques Rezeau had ultimately married Paule Pluvignec who was a Catholic and was able to continue the family’s religious traditions – with a vengeance!  Unfortunately, she was unqualified to be a wife and mother as she was incapable of love. Unguarded comments from M. Rezeau let slip that there was little conjugal love on his part either.  Alone in the car with his sons, he made the following comment under his breath, Page 83:
-Où peut-on être mieux qu'au sein de sa famille?
Puis, d'une voix de basse-taille:              
-Partout ailleurs!            

To the Rezeau family the English were heretics
Even though they admired the English enough to speak their language exclusively at the dinner table each evening, the Rezeau condemned the English national Church as heresy. To them the English were: les hérétiques d’outre-Manche, page 35.

The restriction of intellectual freedom by the church
M. Rezeau was a man of learning, but he focussed his studies only on approved ideas and academic works approved by the Church.  We are told that M Rezeau, who lectured to his children in very correct French was the champion of everything that had been judged safe from the encyclopedic list of censored materials in the Vatican's Index, page 67:
Le bon ton, le bon goût, les bonnes manières, le droit, le droit canon, tous les substantifs précédés de l'adjectif bon ou de l'adverbe bien, tous les jugements rectifiés, tous les imprimatur, tous les nihil obstat de cette encyclopédie du nom qui s'appelle l'Index, toute l'honorable décalcomanie des images d'Epinal trouvaient en lui leur meilleur champion.

Jean  saw his family as plaing the role of censors.  They were among the elite of contemporary society, whose role was to apply the brake and safety control to modern thought.  Although the M. Rezeau was at the forefront of the progress of science, he strove to make all his science into dialectic for the faith.  When they applied themselves to discover the laws of physics of biology and botany, their aim was to draw from their findings valid arguments which could be used in the disputations of theology, which was the one and only true science.

M. Rezeau showed the same narrow-minded intolerance, when he took Jean on a tour of the capital.  He chose only those monuments of Paris linked with historical events sufficiently Catholic and right wing to meet with his approval- He would not go to les Invalides as the tomb of Napoleon was there and he had persecuted Pope Pius VII.

In his review of the changes in the modern world, which Jean made at René Rezeau’s celebration, he expresses confidence that the age of church censorship and restriction of freedom of thought is coming to an end, page 147
Le monde s'agite, il ne lit plus guère La Croix, il se fout des index et imprimatur

5) Criticism of the authoritarianism of the Church.
Under the regime of Folcoche, religion becomes a means of gaining power over others.
Mme Rezeau uses the practice of public confession within the family to subjugate her children, Page 35: 
Quel admirable biais pour entrer, toute casquée, dans l'intimité de nos fautes vénielles ou autres!

Bazin sees the disciplines of the Church as one of the instruments by which the peasantry have been subjugated as serfs through the centuries (see earlier notes).

Mme Rezeau regards authority as god-given and she is certainly not on her own in this.  When she finally agrees to send Jean away to the Jesuit school, she tells him that he will learn to respect the divine principle of authority, Page 165:
— Mon garçon, tel est aussi mon désir. Je suis lasse de vos révoltes et, plus particulièrement, des tiennes. Les jésuites se chargeront de vous apprendre à respecter  le  divin principe d'autorité.

6) The influence of mercenary considerations upon the Church.

Through the centuries, one of the most frequent criticisms made against the institutional churches has been the large amount of money they require to function and often the means by which they raise this money.  It was a major issue in the religious Reformation of the 16th century.

Bazin touches on this mercenary aspect. He describes the local priest making a weekly visit to collect the family’s weekly contribution to the local church and other monies including the family’s donation to “Peter’s Pence”- the contribution of Catholic parishioners to the upkeep of the Vatican. 

There is a sense that the status of the family in the Church was affected by the family wealth.  Generosity in respect of the Church’s financial requirements could lead to privileges such as indults to have mass said in the home. Money played a role when Priest number five, after only a few days at La Belle Angerie made off slamming the doors behind him. He protested to the parish priest about conditions at the house, but the latter had too much consideration for the name and the donations of the Rezeau, which kept the church school going.   However, this priest went to the Archbishop who was unhappy about the reports of the treatment of the priest tutors and of the Rezeau children.  He ordered the local priest to intervene and M. Rezeau and the priest had a most uncomfortable interview.  The Church finally let the matter subside, when M. Rezeau made a donation of 2,000 Francs to the parish.

7) The sexual morality of the clergy

An incident in the book touches on this very topical issue.  The priest in the white cassock,
the Abbé Trubet had a weakness for girls.  He was dismissed by M. Rezeau for putting his hands where he shouldn’t on the eldest daughter of the Huaults and it then comes to light that he had previously been sacked by his mission in Africa for the excessive attention he gave to the African girls (Page 23).

The effect on Jean of the education that he received

  1. His rejection of religion

A conclusion that Jean reaches is that God is indifferent. A prayer that they used said that no-one who prayed to the blessed Virgin was left wanting. He had prayed to this lady on the strength of this promise and she had done nothing to soften Folcoche, Page 50:
La bonne blague! J'ai tout essayé auprès de cette dame, sur la foi de ces paroles. Elle n'a jamais rien fait pour adoucir Folcoche.

Chance has given Jean a mother who has turned him against his heritage.  As a reaction to the experiences of his childhood, Jean finishes with a revolt against God himself - Page 141:
Toute la vie, tu vomiras cette enfance, tu la vomiras à la face de Dieu qui a osé tenter sur toi cette expérience.

All faith seemed a fraud.

2) His rejection of authority

He saw all authority as a scourge and rebelled against it.  As a result they began to commit  senseless acts of vandalism.When the boys were out on genealogical outings with their father, they took the opportunity for acts of vandalism in the churches visited. Jean recognises that these were detestable things to do, but he explains that this impiety was the corollary of their revolt against their Mother. For the rest of his life he was automatically antipathetic to the things that his mother used to favour.

He rejected moral rules and regulations, seeing principles as nothing more than immense prejudices,(page 170).  His upbringing had taught him to regard “sin” as something purely arbitrary, used for the sake of discipline and an excuse for punishment.  Page 150-
Je n'éprouvais aucun dégoût d'ordre mystique, aucune appréhension de péché. Le péché? La bonne blague! Un mot, un prétexte à punitions, une entorse au règlement de l'Eglise, aussi arbitraire que le règlement de Folcoche

3) His incapability of offering or accepting true love

From their experience of divine love, Jean and Frédic assume that if human love is the same as God’s then the idea of its benign character must be nothing more than a blooming joke: page125
Page 125, L'amour, comme dit Frédie, si c'est la même chose que l'amour de Dieu dont on nous rabâche les oreilles depuis des années, ca ne doit être encore qu'une fichue blague.

Throughout his life, he will be suspicious of all love.  He will discourage it and disavow it, page 169:
Toute foi me semble une duperie, toute autorité un fléau, toute tendresse un calcul. Les plus sincères amitiés, les bonnes volontés, les tendresses à venir, je les soupçonnerai, je les découragerai, je les renierai. L'homme doit vivre seul. Aimer, c'est s'abdiquer. Haïr, c'est s'affirmer. Je suis, je vis, j'attaque, je détruis. Je pense; donc je contredis. Toute autre vie menace un peu la mienne.

He reasons with himself that women are receptacles for men's needs Page 152
Ce besoin naturel, car tu le penses tel, est-il donc si gênant de le faire à deux? Tu voulais rester pur, idiot. Est-ce qu'on retient ses glaires, lorsqu'on a envie de cracher? L'hygiène publique a inventé les crachoirs comme Dieu a inventé les femmes. La pureté n'exige pas la rétention, mais l'exutoire

Thus we see his disgraceful attitude to the peasant girl, Madeleine, whom he seduces (see earlier notes).  Instead of love he will carry the viper of hatred with him for life (page 171).

Conclusion

Jean’s  final summary


His destiny is his own - but Folcoche has given it its preface and cheated it by means of his upbringing. So he has to reject all this education she had filled him with. Thus he sees principles as nothing more than immense prejudices, respectability is hypocrisy and the only virtue is force. The power of "me" Number 1 against "love"  Number 2 and "God" Number 3.
Page 170
Puissance de moi. La véritable puissance 1 de 1, contre la puissance 2 (l'amour)) et la puissance 3 (Dieu défini par les trois directions de l'espace ou par ses trois personnes). Puissance qui n'a pas besoin d'être plusieurs pour être quelque chose. Je répète: puissance de moi. Tel est l'archange qui terrasse le serpent

He killed the viper, but still he brandishes a viper throughout life, the viper of hatred - of the trouble maker - of despair - of the man with a taste for misfortune. Thanks to his Mother, he walks through life driving people from him with this viper in his fist Page 171 :
Haine, politique du pire, désespoir ou goût du malheur ! Cette vipère, ta vipère, je la brandis, je la secoue, je m'avance dans la vie avec ce trophée, effarouchant mon public, faisant le vide autour de moi. Merci, ma mère! Je suis celui qui marche, une vipère au poing.

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