The Penguin Book of French Short Stories. Volume 1 From Marguerite De Navarre to Marcel Proust by Patrick McGuinness

£12.99
Available
Product Ref. (e.g. ISBN, SKU)
9780241462003
Published:
25 Jan 2024
Format:
Paperback
Number of pages:
512 pages
Dimensions:
198x129x23mm
Weight:
0.352kgs
This first volume celebrates the rich tradition of the French short story. Spanning four centuries, it brims with decadent tales, 'bloody tales' and fairy tales, detective stories and war stories, the experimental and the existential. These are stories about the self and the other, the fantastic and the realist, the country and the city, the nation and the colony, told in an eclectic array of voices and styles.

'Beautiful and deep ... a sumptuous treat for any book lover' The Independent

'Food for short story lovers everywhere' Irish Times

*A major celebration of the French short story and Spectator Book of the Year*

The short story has a rich tradition in French literature. This feast of an anthology celebrates its most famous practitioners, as well as newly translated writers ready for rediscovery. The first volume spans four hundred years, taking the reader from the sixteenth century to the 'golden age' of the fin de siècle. Its pages are populated by lovers, phantoms, cardinals, labourers, enchanted statues, gentleman burglars, retired bureaucrats, panthers and parrots, in a cacophony of styles and voices. From the affairs of Madame de Lafayette to the polemic realism of Victor Hugo, the supernatural mystery of Guy de Maupassant to the dark sensuality of Rachilde, this is the place to start for lovers of French literature, new and old.

Edited and with an introduction by Patrick McGuinness, academic, writer and translator.

About the Author: Patrick McGuinness is Professor of French and Comparative Literature at the University of Oxford, and a Fellow of St Anne's College. Born in Tunisia and raised in Belgium, he is a poet, novelist and translator. His novel The Last Hundred Days was longlisted for the 2011 Man Booker Prize and shortlisted for the 2011 Costa First Novel Award, and his second novel, Throw me to the Wolves, won the 2020 Encore Award. His other books include three collections of poems, The Canals of Mars (2004), Jilted City (2010), Blood Feather (2023) and a memoir, Other People's Countries (2015), which won the Duff Cooper Prize. He was made a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres in 2011, and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

More Information
Number of pages 512

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