From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia The Lover (1984 novel)
The Lover (1984 novel)
The Lover tine romance between a pubescent girl from a financially
strapped French family and an older, wealthy Chinese
man.
In 1929, a 15 year old nameless girl is traveling by fer-
ry across the Mekong Delta, returning from a holiday at
her family home in the town of Sa Đéc, to her boarding
school in Saigon. She attracts the attention of a 27 year
old son of a Chinese business magnate, a young man of
wealth and heir to a fortune. He strikes up a conversation
with the girl; she accepts a ride back to town in his chauf-
feured limousine.
Compelled by the circumstances of her upbringing,
this girl, the daughter of a bankrupt, manic depressive
widow, is newly awakened to the impending and all-too-
real task of making her way alone in the world. Thus, she
becomes his lover, until he bows to the disapproval of his
First edition cover of L’amant father and breaks off the affair.
Author(s) Marguerite Duras For her lover, there is no question of the depth and
sincerity of his love, but it isn’t until much later that the
Original title L’Amant girl acknowledges to herself her true feelings.
Translator Barbara Bray
Country France Published versions
Language French There are two published versions of The Lover: one writ-
ten in the form of an autobiography, without any super-
Genre(s) Nouveau Roman
imposed temporal structures, as the young girl narrates
Publisher Editions de Minuit in first-person; the other, called The North China Lover and
released in conjunction with the film version of the work,
Publication date 1984
is in film script form, in the third person, with written di-
Published in 1986 alogue and without internal monologue. This second ver-
English sion also contains more humor than the original.
Media type hardback Barbara Bray’s English translation won the Scott
Moncrieff Prize and PEN/Book-of-the-Month Club Trans-
Pages 148 pages
lation Prize in 1986.
ISBN 2707306959
OCLC Number 11625220 Real-life connections
Dewey Decimal 843/.912 19 Duras never revealed the real name of her Chinese lover,
but later admitted to being the girl when the film The
LC Classification PQ2607.U8245 A626 1984
Lover was being made. The last thing she heard of him
was that he immigrated to the United States after the
The Lover (French: L’Amant) is an autobiographical novel
Chinese Revolution. He had already died when the movie
by Marguerite Duras, published in 1984 by Les Éditions
was produced.
de Minuit. It has been translated to 43 languages and was
Duras was only 15½ at the time of her love affair,
awarded the 1984 Prix Goncourt. It was adapted to film in
which is also the age of the heroine in the novel. [1]
1992 as The Lover.
In the movie the heroine tells her lover that she is 17.
He tells her that he is 32.
Plot summary
Set against the backdrop of French colonial Vietnam, The
Lover reveals the intimacies and intricacies of a clandes-
1
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia The Lover (1984 novel)
References External links
[1] The Lover: Duras, Politics, and Lust • (French) L’Amant at the Editions de Minuit homepage
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Categories:
• 1984 novels
• Novels by Marguerite Duras
• Novels about ephebophilia
• Autobiographical novels
• Novels adapted into films
• Novels set in Vietnam
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