Literature Review

The Inimitable Tesson

4 reading minutes

written by Jonas Follonier · December 10, 2019 · 0 comment

The great traveller and writer Sylvain Tesson is back in bookshops with The snow leopard. A book that is polished from cover to cover, profound from beginning to end, and one you simply cannot put down until you’ve finished it. Tesson, who recounts his quest for the snow leopard in Tibet alongside photographer Munier, is a classic—and this is a certainty simply because he is inimitable.

Sylvain Tesson is a fascinating figure. Because he is a man of long journeys and long stories. Because he is one of France’s finest writers. Because he is an increasingly reactionary environmentalist voice—and one that carries weight. Because he is free. The general public knows his half-frozen face, the result of a drunken night during which the writer indulged in one of his wildest passions: climbing rooftops. The incident took place in Chamonix. By the purest of coincidences, I found myself at the scene of that terrible incident today, very much as I write this column. Fate, when you’ve got us in your grip.

Understanding That We Don't Understand

This extraordinary figure is therefore publishing a new story as the year draws to a close, The snow leopard, published by Editions Gallimard. On Monday, November 4, it won the Prix Renaudot—no small feat. This book, dedicated to the mother of a lion cub, is a story of joy. Or even—dare we say it—of the joy. The joy of grasping the ungraspable: «Munier and I understood that we didn’t understand,» the author writes at the end of the book. And for good reason: the animal, as described by Tesson throughout this splendid literary journey and as captured by his photographer friend, is by definition a mystery. The mystery of animal life itself, beyond any moral judgment. A mystery that Aristotle—whose authority Tesson invokes in his writing—had, of course, fully understood:

«Aristotle limited animal destiny to vital functions and formal perfection, outside of any moral consideration. The philosopher’s insight was perfect, superbly balanced, nobly formulated, and utterly effective—Greek, in short!»

This philosophical reflection runs throughout this text, which our magazine’s editorial staff highly recommends. First, because it is expressed in sublime language, where every word and every phrase is chosen with the utmost care. Second, because the admiration for animals that shines through in this piece isn’t just a celebration of cute, cuddly kittens. It’s a sense of wonder at life in its wildest, most amoral, and most visceral form. And finally, you simply must read Tesson’s new book because in it we get to know one animal in particular—the snow leopard—with all its unique characteristics.

«She was there, and the world faded away. She embodied the Physis Greek, natura in Latin, of which Heidegger gave this religious definition: «that which emerges of its own accord and thus appears.»

When the writer-adventurer hides out in a cave with his companions—the photographer Munier, his friend Marie, and the metaphysician Léo-Pol Jacquot—to give themselves a chance to see the animal appear, we are presented with a brief moral guide. A repertoire of virtues so foreign to our way of life, which is influenced by an urbanized society detached from the beauty of the world: prudence and hope are the two most prominent in the novel. Through these two totems of true ecology—namely, anthropological ecology—Tesson invites us to wait. The waiting for a «face-to-face encounter between our admiration and [the panther’s] indifference,’ or the waiting for something else entirely. And this waiting itself is beautiful—whether or not the object of our waiting—and thus of our love—appears.