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Absence
A masterful debut that dramatizes the role of the unconscious in artistic creation and the power of unconditional love, in a split narrative alternating between two points of view: that of a painter drawn to depict an unknown female figure who keeps on appearing under his brush, and that an anonymous woman addressing letters to an absent loved one. In deeply felt and moving images, Lucie Paye forges an intrigue that tells of redemption and the lies which destroy lives, all the while directing her reader, and her characters, with a deftness reminiscent of the Master of Suspense in Rear Window.
- GenresFictionLiterature
150 pages, Paperback
First published March 5, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
July 10, 2022
Absence is award-winning translator Natasha Lehrer's rendition of Lucie Paye's 2020 debut novel Les coeurs inquiets.
It is the 21st book from the wonderful publisher Les Fugitives, who specialise in Francophone literature. My reviews of all of their books can be found on my dedicated shelf.
This novel, with a focus on painting and its drip-feed narrative structure fits these tenets well. It is told in two alternating sections:
The He (“Lui” in the French) section is narrated by a painter of landscapes, who was discovered in a Mauritian hotel by a Parisian gallerist and persuaded to move to Paris, where he staged a successful exhibition. He is now preparing for his second exhibition but as he starts to paint, and against his conscious will, he finds a figure of a mysterious and elusive woman appearing in his pictures:
The painting frothed under his brushstrokes. The sea its mottled green hues rippling in the wind, a thick deposit swirling in the currents. Under his pressure, the cliff opened onto an image: a garden. He beat a path through, blind and sighted all at once. The grain of the canvas, thick paint squeezed from the tubes, turning into bark, stem, grass, leaf, moss. In the centre of the garden stood a figure. There had never been one in his landscapes before. At first he thought it was a play of the light, the afterimage of a ray of sunshine through the trees, but then it began to take shape: a woman was walking towards him. The shadows of the vegetation swathed her now in a dappled cloak. Her face, framed by long hair, was half-hidden by the curve of a palm frond. Her hand was raised to push it aside, but the movement, suspended in mid-air, masked her eyes. He guessed at her mouth. He followed the line of her lips. Impatience made him clumsy. He knew that this was only the beginning. The moment would come when these lips would open to whisper their secret to him. He knew her eyes would, in due course, emerge from the shadows. Then, perhaps, he might find what he was looking for.
The She (“Elle”) sections comprise a letter by a woman to her long-lost love:
When I'm dreaming, when I'm awake, alone, in company, on a terrace, in a garden, I never stop seeing you. There before me, fleetingly alive, before reality is restored and steals you away again. I have fought to find you with every fibre of my being. Hope has kept me alive. A thousand mornings I have woken up convinced today would be the day. A thousand times my heart has leapt, thinking I had caught a glimpse of you. A thousand times I have gone to bed, wanting to believe that tomorrow would be the day I would see you again. I have embalmed the tiniest detail of every memory I have of you. I do sometimes lose heart. I worry I won't recognise you: your forehead, your nose, your mouth. Your lovely forehead, snub nose, rosebud mouth, pretty chin... Mon tout amour. But your eyes - no, they won't have changed. Your eyes - I'd recognise them anywhere.
Other key figures include the gallerist, the painter’s lover Ariande, and an elderly friend of his father, and the connections between the stories and characters are gradually revealed. To say more would circumvent the novel’s purpose as Paye follows a technique modelled on that of Hitchcock in Rear Window (including a clear nod where He becomes obsessed with a neighbour that he spies on with binoculars):
From: https://www.critikmanie.com/amp/entre... which also comments on the choice of pronouns.
Other key motifs, explicitly referenced and important to the characters as well as the novelist's intent, include Paul Valéry’s poem The Graveyard by the Sea (in two translations, one by David Pollard and another by C. Day Lewis), The Arnolfini Portrait by Jan van Eyck and Plath’s The Bell Jar.
An impressive novel, moving, psychologically intense and full of insight into the nature of artistic creation - another great book from one of our finest publishers.
It is the 21st book from the wonderful publisher Les Fugitives, who specialise in Francophone literature. My reviews of all of their books can be found on my dedicated shelf.
The central tenets of our list include, but are not limited to:
- Women’s voices,
- A focus on short works, which we believe make for an ideal introduction to an author’s oeuvre,
- The exploration of trans-genre and non-linear narratives, following in the footsteps of the Modernists,
- A particular affinity for narratives concerned with cinema, the visual arts and music.
This novel, with a focus on painting and its drip-feed narrative structure fits these tenets well. It is told in two alternating sections:
The He (“Lui” in the French) section is narrated by a painter of landscapes, who was discovered in a Mauritian hotel by a Parisian gallerist and persuaded to move to Paris, where he staged a successful exhibition. He is now preparing for his second exhibition but as he starts to paint, and against his conscious will, he finds a figure of a mysterious and elusive woman appearing in his pictures:
The painting frothed under his brushstrokes. The sea its mottled green hues rippling in the wind, a thick deposit swirling in the currents. Under his pressure, the cliff opened onto an image: a garden. He beat a path through, blind and sighted all at once. The grain of the canvas, thick paint squeezed from the tubes, turning into bark, stem, grass, leaf, moss. In the centre of the garden stood a figure. There had never been one in his landscapes before. At first he thought it was a play of the light, the afterimage of a ray of sunshine through the trees, but then it began to take shape: a woman was walking towards him. The shadows of the vegetation swathed her now in a dappled cloak. Her face, framed by long hair, was half-hidden by the curve of a palm frond. Her hand was raised to push it aside, but the movement, suspended in mid-air, masked her eyes. He guessed at her mouth. He followed the line of her lips. Impatience made him clumsy. He knew that this was only the beginning. The moment would come when these lips would open to whisper their secret to him. He knew her eyes would, in due course, emerge from the shadows. Then, perhaps, he might find what he was looking for.
The She (“Elle”) sections comprise a letter by a woman to her long-lost love:
When I'm dreaming, when I'm awake, alone, in company, on a terrace, in a garden, I never stop seeing you. There before me, fleetingly alive, before reality is restored and steals you away again. I have fought to find you with every fibre of my being. Hope has kept me alive. A thousand mornings I have woken up convinced today would be the day. A thousand times my heart has leapt, thinking I had caught a glimpse of you. A thousand times I have gone to bed, wanting to believe that tomorrow would be the day I would see you again. I have embalmed the tiniest detail of every memory I have of you. I do sometimes lose heart. I worry I won't recognise you: your forehead, your nose, your mouth. Your lovely forehead, snub nose, rosebud mouth, pretty chin... Mon tout amour. But your eyes - no, they won't have changed. Your eyes - I'd recognise them anywhere.
Other key figures include the gallerist, the painter’s lover Ariande, and an elderly friend of his father, and the connections between the stories and characters are gradually revealed. To say more would circumvent the novel’s purpose as Paye follows a technique modelled on that of Hitchcock in Rear Window (including a clear nod where He becomes obsessed with a neighbour that he spies on with binoculars):
Dans ce roman, je joue à faire de la « direction de lecteur », guidant son regard/sa lecture, ouvrant puis fermant des hypothèses, un peu comme Hitchcock disait avoir fait de la « direction de spectateurs » à propos de son film Fenêtre sur cour.
From: https://www.critikmanie.com/amp/entre... which also comments on the choice of pronouns.
Other key motifs, explicitly referenced and important to the characters as well as the novelist's intent, include Paul Valéry’s poem The Graveyard by the Sea (in two translations, one by David Pollard and another by C. Day Lewis), The Arnolfini Portrait by Jan van Eyck and Plath’s The Bell Jar.
An impressive novel, moving, psychologically intense and full of insight into the nature of artistic creation - another great book from one of our finest publishers.
November 3, 2023
“The painting frothed under his brushstrokes.”
With this beguiling opening line, I was gripped by this sparse narrative as if I had tipped straight into a swirling painting myself. The story begins to bloom out of two disparate threads - a painter obsessively creating his newest series of paintings for an exhibit all focused around a mysterious woman who only exists in his art, and an anonymous woman writing letters to an absent loved one. As the story progresses, the absences felt in these two life paradoxically begin to fill them.
The writing is gorgeous, as if brushstrokes were translated into text, and I found the experience of reading this novel like standing up close to a painting’s individual daubs of texture and color and slowly backing away until the picture crystallized in the mind. It left me with a feeling of gentle yearning that persisted long after turning the final page. Lucie Paye possesses the gift of crafting a story with perfect economy, leaving me wanting more yet with the delicate touch of someone who knows how much fuller it is to invite the reader to build the full picture through the gaps in the narrative. Another instance of absence, filling.
With this beguiling opening line, I was gripped by this sparse narrative as if I had tipped straight into a swirling painting myself. The story begins to bloom out of two disparate threads - a painter obsessively creating his newest series of paintings for an exhibit all focused around a mysterious woman who only exists in his art, and an anonymous woman writing letters to an absent loved one. As the story progresses, the absences felt in these two life paradoxically begin to fill them.
The writing is gorgeous, as if brushstrokes were translated into text, and I found the experience of reading this novel like standing up close to a painting’s individual daubs of texture and color and slowly backing away until the picture crystallized in the mind. It left me with a feeling of gentle yearning that persisted long after turning the final page. Lucie Paye possesses the gift of crafting a story with perfect economy, leaving me wanting more yet with the delicate touch of someone who knows how much fuller it is to invite the reader to build the full picture through the gaps in the narrative. Another instance of absence, filling.
October 5, 2022
Book 9 of 12 for the year goal - an alluring presentation but personally it went overboard on the cliched sickly pale artist stereotype trying to be real in this dark world etc etc etc
Some of the letters from “she” had some fabulous sections of painfully realistic pleading, of desperation and instance. But they were irregular and unexpected.
The ending was unexpected but welcome, if unfinished.
Odd but enjoyable in some ways if repetitive and overplayed in others.
Some of the letters from “she” had some fabulous sections of painfully realistic pleading, of desperation and instance. But they were irregular and unexpected.
The ending was unexpected but welcome, if unfinished.
Odd but enjoyable in some ways if repetitive and overplayed in others.
January 31, 2025
hmm. just a whole bunch of meh. ending feels incredibly rushed (which is not great as that’s the entire climax/reveal) the entire surprise/mystery of the book doesn’t feel good or interesting at all? it’s literally being spoon fed to the reader, the only person shocked by the ending should be the lead protagonist (who isn’t even rly one that is particularly likeable?) feels very undercooked, short jagged writing style also felt a pain to read and every character either just feel cliche or meh.
July 23, 2021
It’s a 5 stars for me (although not a fav), I read it in one sitting and enjoyed every bit of it.
The book, about a painter finding its way through life with his art, is a real piece of art itself. The writing mechanism are reflected in the character’s paintings, and leaving us here to wonder where we are going, maybe we know maybe we don’t, we want to find out, and maybe we will.
The book, about a painter finding its way through life with his art, is a real piece of art itself. The writing mechanism are reflected in the character’s paintings, and leaving us here to wonder where we are going, maybe we know maybe we don’t, we want to find out, and maybe we will.
June 28, 2022
This novella describes what being consumed by art is. The main character is so enraptured in a old wound that love is a concept that he has been numbed to. This is a beautiful story. It made me feel something. Extra brownie points for mentioning Paris and London key areas whilst I am travelling in Paris and London.
September 26, 2022
A wonderful, glorious, gorgeous book. So beautifully written and seamlessly translated from French by Natasha Lehrer. A deliciously slow burn with a built in, achingly sad tension as an artist struggles to find his mojo and a woman writes to a long-lost son. It might occasionally verge on the over-ideal and syrupy but overall it's a superb read.
May 1, 2024
A beautiful book that is especially strong when discussing the challenge of creating art. Please be aware that, despite this being compared to Rear Window and Hitchcock's works, this is not a thriller. There is mystery, yes, but it is a gentle unfolding. The main character watches his neighbours from his window, yes, but never sees anything particularly shocking.
October 9, 2022
Very French, beautifully written, a quick read which I wish I'd made more of an effort with when I started it. Interesting structure which resolves itself well and ends up making perfect sense. Enjoyed.
June 13, 2020
Un roman bien construit. Il n'y figure pas beaucoup d'action, mais j'ai senti une grande émotion à lire cette plume poétique.
September 14, 2022
Saisie par le style d'écriture de Lucie Paye mais je reste légèrement sur ma fin en ce qui concerne le récit, trop court peut-être
October 11, 2022
weak ending
April 9, 2023
Read this in one sitting - don’t think I’ve done that with anything since I was a teenager! Loved it
February 3, 2023
I was captivated by my this novel from the first page and read it in a single sit .
December 24, 2022
i want to ask lucie paye a million questions and even then it wouldn’t be enough
this book was so wonderful, so elegantly crafted, so well thought out. it had a plot and it executed it so well
this book was so wonderful, so elegantly crafted, so well thought out. it had a plot and it executed it so well
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews