Quand _Refus global_ devient "Refus global" : l'histoire d'une réception partielle

Total Refusal, the pamphlet, is not "Total Refusal", the text written by Paul-Émile Borduas and co-signed by 15 members of the group of artists called the Automatists. Based on this distinction between the pamphlet and its eponymous text, and from the observation that the part eclipses the whole in the critical discourse about this work, this thesis aims to explain the occultation of the pamphlet in Quebec’s social and artistic history. From the study of the reception from 1948 to 2008, I question the construction of the common narrative surrounding the work, from which the pamphlet is excluded. In this regard, I uncover which obstacles impeded the pamphlet’s path of reception, preventing the constitution of a unified and coherent discourse, and limiting its place in history. These obstacles, identified from a corpus that includes 639 secondary semiotic objects (« objets sémiotiques secondaires » (OSS), as proposed by Brigitte Louichon), derive from (1) pragmatic factors such as the heterogeneous composition of the work or its availability; (2) institutional or historiographical factors, such as the disciplinarisation of the cultural field and the influence of the Quiet Revolution’s narrative on the literary history; and (3) human factors, based on the role of writers and critics in the reception of the work. The different stages of the reception are thus considered: from the horizon of expectation (Jauss) to the productive reception (Link), through the publication, the first reviews, the reeditions, the academic lectures, the historicization and the entry of the work in the collective memory as a symbol or an hypotext. However, rather than this classic path of reception, I am concerned with its opposite side, that is, the difficulties and deviations of the reception of Total Refusal pamphlet.  This thesis is divided in three parts. The first part, theoretical and methodological, positions my argumentation in the fields of cultural history and reception studies, and presents various considerations about the formation of the corpus and the processing of the data.  The second part is concerned with the horizon of expectations and the first reception. Such is a critical time for the survival of the work, as showed by Hans Robert Jauss and Daniel Chartier. Notably presented are the lock effect (Cambron) of the dismissal of Borduas on the constitution of the reception narrative, as well as the ethical and aesthetic criteria throught which took place the hierarchization of the value of the components of the pamphlet. The third part covers the subsequent reception (1950-2008) in which I continue the study of the obstacles that still prevents the integration of the pamphlet in history. Furthermore, this section examines the parallel, fragmented and autonomous receptions which enable the survival of Total Refusal, occasionally and partially, outside the common narrative formed around "Total Refusal".  These three types of reception, together with the different categories of OSS (direct, indirect, hypertextual, metacritical and fragmented), are part of heuristic tools developed to explain the partial reception of the pamphlet Total Refusal. In accordance with the quantitative and environmentalistic approach of the cultural history, Total Refusal is perceived as a microcosm of the culture in which some works are selected and others disregarded. The analysis of a wide and varied critical corpus enables the understanding of, not only the events leading to the consecration of the eponymous text or the relative neglect of the pamphlet, but also the critical trends, marginal publications, isolated critics, etc. which, embedded in the blind spots of the reception, provide the pamphlet and its components with a way to bypass the dominant discourse. Overall, the study of the reception of the pamphlet Total Refusal has helped change the critical focus from "Total Refusal" to Total Refusal. In addition, it lead to new ways of considering the reception of marginalized works and highlighted selected criteria in the constitution of the history and cultural memory in Quebec since 1948.

Keyphrases: Objets sémiotiques secondaires, Total refusal, Partial reception, Critical reception, Common narrative, Cultural history, Pamphlet, Secondary semiotic objects