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The Lover

Marguerite Duras,

Maxine Hong Kingston (Introduction),

Barbara Bray (Translator)

Start date: April 1, 2020

Finish date: April 30, 2020

Discussion: Current Group Reads

Why we're reading this: April 2020 Short Story/Novella
[close] April 2020 Short Story/Novella

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What Members Thought

Mar 03, 2008 Laura rated it really liked it

Shelves: 1001-books-you-must-read-before-you, read-2009, novellas, book-and-movie, french-literature, bookcrossing, fiction-20th-century

Dans L'Amant, Marguerite Duras reprend sur le ton de la confidence les images et les thèmes qui hantent toute son ouvre. Ses lecteurs vont pouvoir ensuite descendre ce grand fleuve aux lenteurs asiatiques et suivre la romancière dans tous les méandres du delta, dans la moiteur des rizières, dans les secrets ombreux où elle a développé l'incantation répétitive et obsédante de ses livres, de ses films, de son théâtre.

A movie was made based on this book: The Lover (1992), directed by Jean-Jacques A ...more

8 likes · Like · see review

Apr 23, 2020 Kelly_Hunsaker_reads ... rated it really liked it

Shelves: 1001-books, historical-fiction, asian, read-in-2020, 60-before-60, european, biographical-fiction, mental-health

Marguerite Duras' novella The Lover is the semi-autobiographical story of her childhood, growing up in Vietnam. Her parents were teachers, and her father died young. The mother stays in Vietnam with the children, where they live lives in poverty and struggle with her mental illness. She is remote, and inattentive to the children. To make things worse for Ms. Duras, her older brother steals everything they have to support his drug habit. At age 15, the girl becomes a lover to an older Chinese man ...more

5 likes · Like · see review

Dec 05, 2016 Nadine in NY Jones rated it really liked it

Shelves: saw-the-movie-b4-i-read-the-book, translation, literary-schmiterary, 1001-books

3.5 stars, rounded up to 4

My mother says, This one will never be satisfied with anything. I think I’m beginning to see my life. I think I can already say, I have a vague desire to die. From now on I treat that word and my life as inseparable.

This book won't be for everyone.

This is the book I've been looking for all my life.

I've found it now, what will I read for the next forty years? I'm sure I'll find something.

This has been on my TBR since back when I first discovered the Jane March / Ton ...more

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Sep 06, 2010 Liz rated it really liked it

Shelves: 1001

Great book.

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Oct 27, 2013 Norrin2 rated it liked it

Lovely, lyrical and haunting. Also depressing, meandering and at 117 pages too long. It seemed to me that the author of this obviously autobiographical work was so determined that we not get to know the protagonist that she sometimes switched from first person narration to third for no reason that I could see other than to maintain distance from the reader.

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