Errant Vice

No one has done more than Brian Stableford to introduce the work of the fin-de-siecle French author Jean Lorrain (1855-1906) to English language readers. This indefatigable translator has given us Lorrain's key decadent novel Monsieur de Phocas (1901) as well as the novellas and short story collections Nightmares of an Ether-Drinker, The Soul-Drinker and Other Decadent Fantasies, and Masks in the Tapestry. So, first of all, a big thank you to Mr Stableford for his much-appreciated work. Long may it continue!Le Vice Errant (1902), here translated by Brian Stableford as Errant Vice (published by the estimable Snuggly Books) was originally released as a series of stories in the French newspaper Le Journal in 1901 and a year later brought together as a portmanteau novel. The early parts of the novel concern opium smoking, a farce with a corpse, a spate of strange masked murders in foggy London, and a rather creepy, bittersweet love story. By the time we reach the main section of the novel, 'Corners of Byzantium: The Noronsoffs', we have been introduced to the principal narrator, Monsieur Rabastens, a 55-year-old doctor who has been living in Nice for 25 years. Due to his trusted medical status he has gained access to the private and not so private lives of the richest residents in the area, and now he is ready to spill the beans. Nice is where the main action takes place, though other towns along the balmy Cote d'Azur (French Riviera) such as Cannes and Menton, and the casino at Monte Carlo, also play their part. Nice is also where Jean Lorrain was living when he wrote this novel, having decamped from Paris to the coast for health reasons. Living with his mother, his career would go on for a few more years until his untimely and somewhat bizarre death in 1906.At the centre of events is Wladimir Noronsoff, a fabulously wealthy 40-year-old Russian prince who lives in a suitably ostentatious villa by the sea, along with a frequently changing cast of employees and visitors. Jean Lorrain modelled this extravagant character on the notorious Roman emperors Nero and Heliogabalus, who he had read about in The Twelve Caesars by Roman historian Suetonius (named in the novel). Lawrence Alma-Tadema's painting, 'The Roses of Heliogabalus' (1888), while not referred to by name (though Alma-Tadema is), had also obviously caught Lorrain's eye and, as in the painting, so in the novel, roses and falling rose petals symbolise not just beauty but also lurking danger and death.Needless to say, the amount of decadence in Errant Vice is perfectly dizzying and darkly comedic. No, let's not forget this flamboyant author's wicked sense of humour. Nothing much - apart from the vile cruelties perpetrated by the aforementioned Roman emperors - is off-limits to the bisexual, lascivious, capricious, hugely egotistical and dreadfully insecure Wladimir Noronsoff, whose health is unsurprisingly failing (yes, there's more than a hint of self-deprecating autobiography here). Lorrain lists these excesses in vivid detail. I think it's fair to surmise that Jean had a lot of fun creating Wladimir. The novel is an amazing sensory experience, a feast of exquisite descriptive prose: of human emotions at their most ragged and refined, of sumptuous interior and landscape design, of dazzling costumery and perfumery, of heavenly scents and foul odours. Yet, among the raging hysteria, tearful sentimentality, bitter betrayal, there are welcome moments of tenderness and affection between Wladimir and his long-suffering mother, the Princesse Benedetta. It's these sharp contrasts in mood, so expertly juxtaposed, that make this a wonderful novel to submerge yourself in. Yes, Errant Vice is definitely the deep end, and so probably not the best place to start if you're a newcomer to the work of Jean Lorrain, which is certainly an acquired taste. Better to be begin with one of the collections of short stories. However, if you've already enjoyed Monsieur de Phocas and Monsieur de Bougrelon in translation, then take the plunge!