"A grant noise": The Performance of Sound in the "Cent nouvelles nouvelles"
This article, assuming that the dimension of sound in the theatricality of Cent nouvelles nouvelles hasn’t been enhanced enough, observes that the evocation of some sounds completes and enriches the motives and situations that are at the basis of the theatrical content of the work. It also highlights the idea that by the narrative taking a comedic performative direction, the traces of sound in the text are thus as much signs of a dynamic of conflict as a troubled universe marked by mistrust. The text that finds its power in this aesthetic of conflict is less forged by the common narrative basis of other narrations than by the surplus of performance and sound. As a result, the article concludes with the reflection that the visibility and audibility of a body of text can’t stop themselves from assuming a performative charge. If sound doesn’t add anything to the story-telling, it adds a sure value to the narration.