Dangerous Liaisons (Wordsworth Classics) - Softcover

De Laclos, Pierre Choderlos

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1840227311 ISBN 13: 9781840227314

Verlag: Wordsworth Editions Ltd, 2014

Inhaltsangabe

In this famous story of seduction, two highly intelligent but amoral French aristocrats plot the downfall of a respectable young married woman and a fifteen year old girl who has only just emerged from the convent. The letters these two conspirators exchange are remarkably frank in describing how they manage to achieve their ends and, at the same time, reveal nuances of character which make it impossible to dismiss either of them as simply evil. Those written by their victims are equally revelatory in a quite different and subtle way, while the manner in which Laclos handles the epistolary form in order to ensure that his two protagonists are finally defeated, not by outside forces, but the fissures in their own relationship, is a triumph of narrative skill., This novel poses shrewd questions about the relation between love and sex, and suggests that, in certain sections of eighteenth century French high society, idleness, boredom and wealth had created individuals whose misfortunes it would be hard to regret when, only seven years after Dangerous Liaisons was published, the Revolution broke out. Blurb by David Ellis

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Biografía del autor

Pierre de Laclos was a French soldier, who wrote just one novel, Les Liaisons Dangereuses (Dangerous Liaisons), in 1782. Considered scandalous in its day, it remained consistently popular and was the subject of a well-known film adaptation in 1988

Reseña del editor

Les Liaisons dangereuses better known as Dangerous Liaisons is a French epistolary novel by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos, first published in four volumes by Durand Neveu from March 23, 1782. It is the story of the Marquise de Merteuil and the Vicomte de Valmont, two rivals (and ex-lovers) who use sex as a weapon to humiliate and degrade others, all the while enjoying their cruel games. It has been claimed to depict the decadence of the French aristocracy shortly before the French Revolution, thereby exposing the perversions of the so-called Ancien Regime. However, it has also been described as a vague, amoral story. As an epistolary novel, the book is composed entirely of letters written by the various characters to each other. In particular, the letters between Valmont and the Marquise drive the plot, with those of other characters serving as illustrations to give the story its depth.

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Wordsworth Editions Ltd
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1840227311
• ISBN 13: 9781840227314
• Einband: Libro de bolsillo
• Sprache: Englisch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 400