"" (; ) is a French expression attributed to King Louis XV, or in the form "" (; ) to Madame de Pompadour, his favourite.Mould 2011 p. 43.OUP-Lexico 2020. It is generally regarded as a nihilistic expression of indifference to whatever happens after one is gone.Nishitani 1990 p. 132. Its meaning was translated in 1898 by E. Cobham Brewer in the forms "When I am dead the deluge may come for aught I care", and "Ruin, if you like, when we are dead and gone".Brewer 1898 p. 342.

One account says that Louis XV's downcast expression while he was posing for the artist Maurice Quentin de La Tour inspired Madame de Pompadour to say: Another account states that the Madame used the expression to laugh off ministerial objections to her extravagances. The phrase is also often seen as foretelling the French Revolution and the corresponding ruin brought to France.Farlex Inc. Staff 2015.

The phrase is believed to date from after the 1757 Battle of Rossbach, which was disastrous for the French.

Alternate interpretations Biographer Michel Antoine thought that the remark "Après moi, le déluge" was actually a prediction that the upcoming passing of Halley's Comet in 1759 would cause a literal flood, similar to the Genesis flood having been blamed on it as well.Antoine 1989 pp. 740f.

Literary and other uses

Literature prior to 19th century

An expression carrying a similar meaning, "Εμοῦ θανόντος γαῖα μιχθήτω πυρί", meaning "After my death, let the world burn!", can be found in The Twelve Caesars. An anonymous character proclaims it, implying that this expression is already a common proverb.

A phrase of similar meaning to the title phrase is attributed to the Arabic poet Abu Firas al-Hamdani who died in 968 AD; the phrase translates as, "If I die of thirst, may it never rain again". The phrase in the original text is "إذا مِتُّ ظمآنًا فلا نزلَ القطرُ".

Literature in and after the 19th century

Karl Marx used the phrase in Das Kapital (1867) stating, " is the watchword of every capitalist and of every capitalist nation."Das Kapital, Vol. 1, Part III, Chapter Ten, Section 5. "In every stockjobbing swindle every one knows that some time or other the crash must come, but every one hopes that it may fall on the head of his neighbour, after he himself has caught the shower of gold and placed it in safety. Après moi le déluge! [After me, the flood is the watchword of every capitalist and of every capitalist nation. Hence Capital is reckless of the health or length of life of the labourer, unless under compulsion from society."]

Fyodor Dostoevsky applies the phrase in his writings to describe the selfishness and apathy of certain corrupting values. He used it in The Idiot, (serialised beginning in 1868) as an epigraph for an article written by one of the characters of the novel. During the trial of Dimitri Fyodorovich Karamazov in The Brothers Karamazov (serialised beginning in 1879), the prosecution uses the expression to describe the attitude of the defendant's reprobate father and to lament the deterioration of Russian values more generally.

Literature in the 20th century Arthur Moeller van den Bruck was fond of using the phrase, as in:The liberal has flourished at all periods. The nobody is always eager to imagine himself a somebody. The man who is a misfit in his own society is always a liberal out of amour propre. The disinterestedness of the conservative cherishes the sacredness of a cause that shall not die with him; the liberal says: Après moi, le déluge. Conservatism is rooted in the strength of man; liberalism battens on his weakness. The liberal's conjuring trick consists in turning others' weakness to his own account, living at other men's expense, and concealing his art with patter about ideals. This is the accusation against him. He has always been a source of gravest danger.Moeller van den Bruck, Arthur. (1934). Das Dritte Reich, Translated by E. 0. Lorimer. Introduction by M. A. Hamilton. London: George Allen & Unwin LTD. Full text online. (Original work published 1923), p.90-91

D. H. Lawrence used the phrase in "Whitman" (1923), calling it "the soul's last shout and shriek, on the confines of death".Studies in Classic American Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), p. 155. In other of his writings of the 1920s, Lawrence uses the expression a number of times, calling it "the tacit utterance of every man", in his "crisis" of unbearable "loneliness ... surrounded by nullity"."The Crown", IV (1925) in Reflections on the Death of a Porcupine and Other Essays (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 280. But "you mustn't expect it to wait for your convenience," he warns the dissolute "younger generation";"Latter-Day sinners" from Pansies (1928) in Poems, Volume 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), p. 461. "the real deluge lies just ahead of us"."The Memoires of Duc de Lauzun", Version 1 (1926) in Introductions and Reviews (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 91.

Kurt Vonnegut uses "" in his novel Player Piano (1952), when the main character Paul talks to Doctor Pond.

Jack Kerouac's last essay, titled "After Me, the Deluge", was published in the Los Angeles Times on 26 October 1969, five days after his death. It is a somewhat bitter reconsideration of the so-called Beat Generation, which he was credited with inspiring.

In popular culture

Singer-songwriter Regina Spektor included "" in the chorus of her song "Après Moi" from her 2006 album Begin to Hope, a song later covered by Peter Gabriel in his album Scratch My Back.

See also Flood myth Let them eat cake No. 617 Squadron RAF

References

Notes

Sources

A further relevant field may be .

Further reading