about 20 June 2020

The summer solstice sucks for anyone who thinks going to bed at night is the only good part of every day.

something about "Bel-Ami" by Guy de Maupassant

Bel-Ami, by Guy de Maupassant, is a great read. It is about a young man, Georges, a merciless social climber in Paris circa 1885 (the year of the book's publication). Early in the book, Georges sets his sights on Madeleine, the crafty wife of his supervisor, Forestier. Forestier grows deathly ill, and Georges comes to support Madeleine in the final hours before her husband's death. Moments after Forestier dies, Georges asks Madeleine to join him out on the balcony; there, he makes his move.

"I want you to listen to what I'm going to say and try to understand me. Above all, don't be angry if I talk about such things at a moment like this, but I shall be leaving the day after tomorrow, and when you come back to Paris, it may perhaps be too late. So here goes. As you know, I'm only a poor devil with no money at all who's still making his way. But I've got determination, I think some intelligence, and I've made a start—a good start. With a successful man, you know what you're getting; with someone just beginning, you never know where he'll finish up. That may be a bad thing or it may be a good thing. Anyway, I told you one day in your home that my dearest dream would have been to marry a wife like you. And I want to say that again now. Don't try to answer me. Let me go on. I'm not making you a proposal. That would be an odious thing to do at this time and place. I'm only anxious that you shouldn't fail to know that a word from you can make me a happy man, that you can make me either your friend, your brother if you like, or else even your husband, as you will—that my heart and whole body are all yours. I don't want you to answer me now; I don't want to talk about it any more, here. When we meet again in Paris, you'll let me know what you've decided. Until then, not a word. You agree?"

He had spoken without looking at her, as if he were scattering the words in the darkness in front of him. And she seemed not to have heard him as she, too, stood motionless, staring vaguely ahead at the vast landscape under the pale light of the moon.

For many minutes they remained side by side, elbow to elbow, thinking in silence. Then she murmured: "It's a little cold," and, turning round, went back to the bed. He followed her.

As he came near, he recognized that Forestier really was beginning to smell and he moved his chair away because he would not have been unable to stand the stench for long.

That scene made an impression on me. Georges is motivated by a ravenous hunger for status, but his relationships with powerful women are complicated by his feeling of real affection toward them. That affection is never better expressed in Bel-Ami than in this scene. But the timing is obviously horrific and undermines the connection the reader wants to feel with Georges.


Note: Georges does not experience change or get redeemed. That adds to the book's novelty.

"Selected Short Stories" by Guy De Maupassant

I do not remember how or when I added the French writer, Guy De Maupassant, to my reading list, but I am thankful for the suggestion. The short stories in this collection are flirtatious and efficiently satisfying. Maupassant captured very human episodes that are water-ringed by vague taboos and unseemliness. This collection, translated with an introduction by Roger Colet, was published by Penguin Books in 1971.

From Maupassant's masterpiece, "Boule De Suif":

The others ordered wine, except for Cornudet, who demanded beer. He had his own special way of opening the bottle, giving the liquid a good head, and examining it, first tilting the glass and then holding it up between the lamp and his eyes to appreciate the colour. When he drank, his great beard, which was the colour of his favorite beverage, seemed to quiver with emotion, and he squinted so as not to lose sight of his mug; he looked as if he were performing the one function for which he had been born. It was as though he were establishing in his mind a connexion, or even an affinity, between the two ruling passions of his life—Pale Ale and Revolution—and he certainly never drank the one without thinking of the other.

I enjoyed every word of these 30 stories, but "Boule De Suif" is easily my favorite. 

Maupassant, a French writer and protégé of Gustave Flaubert, is considered a member of the naturalist school and wrote much of his work in the 1870s and 1880s. He wrote, according to Wikipedia, hundreds of short stories, six novels, three travel books, and one volume of verse.