The Subversion of the Narrator in Mérimée's La Vénus d'Ille

Mérimée considered La Vénus d'Ille his best story. Its chief interest is not as legend or detective story, but as a detailed psychological depiction of the narrator. The latter unconsciously holds his repressed sexuality in check with the defenses of satiric detachment, erudition, and displacement. These fail each in turn. So when the magical wish-fulfillment of a sexual rival's death occurs, the narrator must take refuge in superstition in order to avoid confronting his frightening rage and envy. Mérimée shows why and how this unreliable narrator becomes unreliable. (LMP)