La Bātarde [Paperback]

Violette Leduc (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 464 pages
• Publisher: French & European Pubns (October 1, 1964)
• Language: French
• ISBN-10: 0785939601
• ISBN-13: 978-0785939603
• Product Dimensions: 7.4 x 4.9 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,225,077 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Homosexuality, passion, love, desire, but self-absorbed, February 28, 2003

By 

Jeanine - See all my reviews

This review is from: La Bātarde (Paperback)

Despite all of the desire that flows in and out of these pages, La Batarde does not gratify. Leduc refuses to stoop to pander to panting hearts - she simply gives you words of poetry to describe her ugliness, her love affairs, small joys and solitude. And yet, she is not all poetry. She is experimental, and is relentless is driving forth her need to tell you about what a horrible being she is - and yet in the end, you find that you feel not only sympathy but a aching heart when she falls and rises again.
From her childhood trials in provincial France, to her affairs with her classmate Isabelle and her teacher Hermine, to her forced departure to Paris (for being found out with her affairs with the music teacher), to her discovery of Gabriel, to her abortions and black-market activity during World War II, the character that Violette portrays herself is no saint, but in refusing to give herself some pride she emerges as a martyr - of fate (being born with, as she says, an ugly nose). There is no question about her ugliness - even de Beauvoir is reputed to have made fun of her behind her back. Yet this woman must have had charisma, for designers gave her clothign to wear and show off on the streets. A contradiction, this woman was, and this quality of hers is very much shown to the reader in her autobiography.