In the Absence of Men -

Philippe Besson

Carroll & Graf Publishers

2003

180 páginas

6h 0m

ISBN-10: 0786711612

Like Michael Cunningham's homage to Virginia Woolf in The Hours and Jean Rhys's to Charlotte Bronte in The Wide Sargasso Sea, Philippe Besson's extravagantly praised first novel pays tribute to Marcel Proust. It also dares to introduce an asthmatic middle-aged Proust into its masterfully manipulated plot and invents a series of deeply felt letters written by him to the novel's young protagonist, Vincent de l'Etoile. In the summer of 1916, the emotionally precocious Vincent, who is the same age as the century, awakens to the possibilities of both erotic and platonic love. In the course of one week-at literary salons, at the Ritz, in cork-lined rooms-Vincent launches an intense friendship with the celebrated Proust, while at his parents' house in Paris he embarks on a sensual journey with Arthur Vales, the soldier son of a family servant, on leave from the front. Unknowingly, Vincent is also beginning a passage into a manhood that will be haunted by the secret he uncovers behind the love he bears for a doomed French infantryman and a famous middle-aged Jewish writer.

Resenhas (1)

3.5 (Bom)

Poesia triste em forma de texto

A estrutura do texto é diferente de tudo o que eu já li – afinal, foi meu primeiro contato com literatura francesa. O livro é exaustivamente melancólico e, por mais curto que seja, achei longo. Serve para refletir; no amor, nas oportunidades, nas relações, nas posições e na vida. É um livro bom.