Definition of the uchronie

The Uchronie is a literary kind attached to the Science-fiction. It is always delicate to give a definition which is neither too vague (with the risk to include too much, including works openly non-uchronic), nor too precise (with the risk to exclude too much, including works openly uchronic). We all the same will test we with the exercise in this article.

Side of the dictionaries

The word “Uchronie” is absent from majority of the dictionaries.

It is present in the Petit Larousse Illustré of 1913 but it completely disappeared from small the Larousse and small Robert from today.

The Larousse dictionary of the XIXe century gives the following definition:

UCHRONIE (n.f.): Utopia applied to the history; logically remade history such as it could have been.

The Trésor of the French language computerized gives a broader definition:

fictitious Time; imaginary evocation in time. to see the definition

This first outline of definition was specified since by the various theorists of the uchronie, even if meanwhile, it disappeared from our dictionaries.

Attempt at definition

A rather total definition, which will be refined in the continuation of the article, could be this one:

“ Account being held in a world in any point similar to ours until a certain event, which, it, differs from what occurred such as we know it. It is what one will call, thereafter, divergent event. This account will have, in addition, to be interested in a substantial way in this new History. ”

Exclusion of the close types of accounts

As promised, we will refine or more precisely will exclude certain types of accounts which approach the Uchronie, but which is not.

Accounts of voyages in time

We thus exclude from this definition the accounts of voyages in time. Those are novels in which the characters have the capacity to reach various times of their temporal screen, in particular past, which could justify of their presence here. Moreover, the majority of these accounts propose a History different from ours, with very the presence of a divergent event, and they are often interested in a substantial way in the effects of this change and thus in the new History. In spite of these common points, these accounts are not uchronic.

Indeed, if we exclude them, it is because they put in parallel several possible Stories, a first and a second, even much more; Stories made possible following a voyage in the past on behalf of the characters and of the actions which they could there make. But these new Stories could exist only by one intervention external with the traditional course of the things. We are interested only in the divergent Stories which, if one can say, diverged from themselves.

Accounts of temporal police forces

For the same reason, we a fortiori exclude a kind connected with that from the voyages in time, that of the temporal police forces , where, vis-a-vis the possibility of changing the past, of the “ guards of Time ” take care that this one does not differ from a certain line.

Ground accounts (S) parallel (S)

These first distinctions being made, it is advisable to operate others of them.

We also exclude from our matter certain accounts of parallel worlds or more precisely of parallel Grounds.

Those which propose a whole series of parallel Grounds (at least two) with possibilities of passing from the one to the other do not return in our reflection. Reason while being that these various Grounds feed the ones then the others, their respective Stories influencing itself, they also, one the other. These accounts thus do not respect the criterion of a different History by itself.

The accounts which propose parallel Grounds, each one constituting a coherent world in oneself with an own History and any means “of passing” from the one of these Grounds to the other, correspond well, them, with our definition.

It as should be specified as this type of accounts proposes sometimes Grounds parallel with topology or the physical laws different from those which govern our world (in particular worlds where the magic “walk”). These accounts are naturally excluded from our matter.

Return to the attempt at definition

We are thus returned from there at the point where the novels which interest us can be defined as being those being held on a Earth parallel and similar to our for the physical topology and laws, without bond between this one and that of the reader, nor with any other potentially existing.

Pierre Corbell, in his article the Uchronie, an old science inspires a new sub-genus summarizes this situation well: “ At the beginning, the authors simply imagined the possibility of travelling in time, as much towards the future that towards the past. Then, one imagined the possibility of changing the events leading to the present. Then, of the authors proposed the coexistence, peaceful or not, several universes with different stories. It any more but did not remain to cut the umbilical cord with “our” universe and to work out in a scenario a coherent universe, as complex as that which we call the history, but which would be, for its members, true “universe”. The scenario which installs its characters in a complete and coherent universe, without bond with any other universe, which it is ours or another, represents the pole of the pure Uchronie. ”

To insist, let us note well that the accounts which interest to us must present a different History, without there not being some another, which would be the History of reference. The uchronic History of the world must be for the protagonists only and single Histoire.

New particular cases to be excluded

We interest maintaining in two types of account which could return in our definition but that one will exclude for various reasons on which we will return: accounts of secret history firstly, and the accounts revisionists or negationnists secondly.

Secret history

To summarize, the secret history is an account which develops the traditional thesis of the “ one hides us all, one says anything to us! ”. A certain event would have occurred in the past, but which, for generally obscure reasons (conspiracy, reason of State, etc…), did not reach the posterity. The accounts of secret history thus try to restore the truth and to update the secrecies of the history.

The Napoleonean epopee gave to the secret history its most fertile compost. Let us quote, inter alia, Napoleon (a) of Rene Jeanne, the Second life of Napoleon, 1821 - 1830 of Louis Millanvoy and the Second life of Napoleon Ier of Pierre Veber.

The secret history limiting itself “to add” events with the known historical screen, those serving as well as possible as new explanations with the events which followed them, does not constitute a Uchronie because these new events do not change the general course of the History. Napoleon can not be exiled with Sainte-Hélène and to run happy days with the sun of Provence, its mode does not remain less deposed about it in the manner than one knows.

The accounts negationnists

Certain accounts uchronic are negationnists. The Négationnisme is the speech which consists in disputing or to deny the reality of the Jewish Génocide perpetrated by the mode Nazi during the Second world war. This negation passes by the dispute of reality, the width, the methods of the genocide, as well as will of the Nazis to make it. The negationnists car-indicated themselves under the term of revisionists to be associated with the historical or political step “ traditional ” with the Révisionnisme.

Eric B. Henriet, in the revisited History, Panorama of the Uchronie in all his forms comments that “ the raison d'être of the Révisionnisme does not have absolutely anything to see with the literary fields which interest us. The purpose of he is not to imagine a world based on the assumption “and if…” On the contrary! He denies the raison d'être even this assumption by proclaiming like true truth a different history. ”

Indeed, the accounts negationnists are not, like the uchronies, a exercise of thought. This quotation of Pierre Versins summarizes well why they are to be excluded: “ the Uchronie has a defect it is the total lack of realism at the base. It should be taken for what it is, like a particularly attractive and interesting play of imagination, without forgetting that it is by its study that one can reach most easily the country of conjecture. Always, moreover, she is proposed to us like an attempt at re-creation of the History and not like the History itself. ”

What is really not the case of the accounts negationnists of a Robert Faurisson, to quote most known.

However, there exists a considerable number of uchronies which exposes a world where the forces of the Axe would have finally gained the Second world war. But, even if in their world, the holocaust can not exist, their matter is not to deny or reduce its reality in our History. Thus, one cannot decently include his uchronies with the texts negationnists.

Limits of the uchronie

Very uchronic

Does the question arise now of knowing if one can consider that any historical account so much is not very fictionalized is a Uchronie? Emmanuel Carrère affirms: “ In truth, any work of fiction, if it does not concern anticipation, modifies the past (the sum of all the famous events to be itself produced until the moment when the writer takes the feather) some manner. Any form of romantic account effleure the Uchronie, insofar as it integrates into the screen of a known history of the imaginary events. ”

And the author to quote the example of the Battle of Waterloo in which did not take part Fabrice Del Dongo. Stendhal, into Chartreuse of Parma , thus slips a foreign grain of sand there and consequently a version of the history delivers to us such as it was not, such as it could have been. However, this troublemaker potential, who could be the agent of a serious disordered state, such as the transformation of the dull plain into a French victory, does not affect the total course of the history. Indeed, if one returns to our definitions, one of the criteria stipulated that the novel was to propose a different History and to be interested in it in a substantial way.

Anticipations: uchronies a posteriori?

As let us specify, to be quite clear even a posteriori, as anticipations are not and will be never uchronies. 1984 of George Orwell did not become a uchronie in 1985. In this case of figure, it is rather simple to see that it was not about a uchronie, but for certain texts, the distinction is harder to make.

It is the case, in particular, for many English texts written before or at the beginning of the Second world war, and which described the world on the assumption that the Axe would gain this one. But Murray Constantine with Swatiska Night and Douglas Brown with Lost off Eden (appeared in 1937 for the first and 1940 for the second) are projected in the future by describing a England invaded by the German army, and do not write a Uchronie at all.

However, presenting in their book the table of a History which did not occur, a contemporary reader will have evil to differentiate them from true a Uchronie. All that to say that it is necessary well to pay attention to the date of writing, which is sometimes the only means of differentiating a uchronie from an exceeded anticipation.

Uchronies of fiction

To finish some with all these exclusions, let us announce a particular type of uchronies. They are the uchronies of fiction, i.e. of a uchronie fascinating like reference a world resulting from a fiction. For example, a text presenting the state of the Empire after Luke Skywalker did not succeed in destroying the Black Star would constitute a Uchronie fiction. This particular assumption does not have, to our knowledge, not treated yet.

On the other hand, in this category of accounts, let us announce Paris conquers the universe , of Gregory Benford and David Brin, where the Martians tripodic of the War of the worlds of H.G. Wells ransack Paris and where one needs a brilliant intuition of Jules Verne so that the Land ones turn over finally the situation.

Etymology

Before concluding this chapter from definition, we interest in the etymology and the creation of the word “Uchronie”. This one was invented by Charles Renouvier (1815 - 1903), French philosopher, who make use of it to entitle his book Uchronie, the Utopia in the history , published for the first time in 1857. “Uchronie” is thus a neologism of the XIXe century based on the model of Utopie (word created in 1516 by Thomas More to be used as title with its famous book), with “U” privative and, in the place of “topos” (place), “stopwatches” (time). Etymologiquement, the word thus indicates a “not-time”, a time which does not exist.

However, it is appropriate as of now pointing out that Renouvier is not the first to have written a Uchronie. It is simply that which invented the mot. Since one is with being spoken about the origins, the studies hold Louis Geoffroy and his Napoleon and the conquest of the world, 1812 - 1832 like the first true uchronie. But as Emmanuel Carrère underlines it, “ unless reading all the Portuguese literature of XVIe century, I do not see any means of knowing the Portuguese uchronies of XVIe century, if it there of A. ”

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