Au seuil des guitounes
Paris, Flammarion, 1926.
1 vol. (120 x 185 mm) of 276 p. and [2] f. In wrappers.
Signed presentation inscription: “à Léon Bourgeois, en amical hommage. Maurice Genevoix.”
The third of Genevoix’s war narratives, Au seuil des guitounes (“guitoune,” a term of North African origin used in military slang to mean a tent) covers the period from 20 October to 3 November 1914, recounted over a fortnight. It directly continues Sous Verdun and Nuits de guerre, and shares their constraints: written contemporaneously with the events, the narrative could not escape military censorship, and an entire passage was removed on p. 119. The excised passage is enough to explain its fate: “[…] It’s always the same: those who know nothing are just the ones who command.” Eight years after publication, the passage was still missing, and was only restored from 1928 onward.
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