Transgression and guilt, the relationship to law in Charles Nodier’s early novels Le rapport au droit dans les premiers romans de Charles Nodier

Nodier’s heroes place themselves at some remove from the law: the narrator of Stella is an outlaw, Adolphe disguises himself as a woman, Jean Sbogar steals and kills, the narrator of Moi-même shows himself to be licentious, and Gaston de Germancé rebels against social conventions. Analyzing the irreverent figure of the writer that Nodier cultivates, this article explores a critical relationship with the law and details the ambiguities of heroism based on the transgression of rules.