w/e lecture: Fanfan by Alexandre Jardin

Questions of marriage preoccupy all of us, at one point of our lives or another. I for one was forced to face them head on back in my undergrad, when during a French course I had to write a quick essay on getting married or searching for pleasure. Recently, a monologue about marriage came to my attention and I hurry to share it with you, primarily for the pleasure of the female readers of this blog, recently tortured by a long list of articles on politics and MEP 2014 elections (results I, II, III, UKIP, Toronto, TestVote).

This book (Amazon .com, .ca) was published sometime in the 90s (‘93 if I remember correctly). A movie starring Sophie Marceau was also made shortly after the book was published. You can find a book resume by Claudia Sardi and another one by Melanie.

Or consider the resume on the English edition backcover (hint: it’s about love and feelings and fighting against what the author calls “passion” but it’s really “lust”).

Alexandre Crusoe possesses both an improbable ancestry (Robinson) and an impressive idealism. Although a priapic pioneer from an early age, he is only nineteen when he swears eternal love for the constant, catholic Laure de Chantebise, stoically accepting both her noble family and her matrimonial ambitions. Not for him the amatory wanderings of his ‘exorbitantly beautiful’ mother and his eccentric scriptwriter father. They, in their son’s opinion, have successfully shown that sexuality is the enemy of serenity, concupiscence the foe of committment.

And then Alexandre meets Fanfan. She is ‘the woman I had been dreaming of ever since I was thirteen’. She fills him with images that would alarm his local curate – and she presents him with the perfect challenge. He will not stoop to sexual betrayal of Laure. Instead he will seduce Fanfan without succumbing to physical desires, lay unremitting siege to her feelings, embark on a love affair that will be an infinite, platonic prelude.

Fanfan has other ideas. So does Laure. Alexandre’s father has a very good idea that will encourage his son’s fantasies (and it will make a good film). And Alexandre himself, marooned on the island of his emotions, fending off the ocean of reality, finds himself embarking on a most extraordinary and singular adventure.

Funny, sad, beautiful and lyrical, Fanfan is a delightful modern fable, an agonised, ecstatic rite of passage – and a highly original story addressing the eternal problem of eternal love.

Without further ado, let’s take a look at the monologue presented toward the end of the book.

First, the French version: page 227, where we see yet another adolescence takedown, page 228: “la vie de couple c’est la seule veritable aventure de notre temps” and finally, page 229: “Il est interdit de jouer avec le coeur d’une femme”.

I have to tell you, any conversation or monologue about love (l'amour) and the emptiness of life sounds so much better in French. Unfortunately, I need to keep the rest of the article, containing certain personal musings and the English version, encrypted and available only to supporters of this site. The password is RvLPPcupct-like.

Show encrypted text

If this is not enough for you, try Emma Hansson’s essay comparing lovers prototypes, from Madame Bovary to Alexandre Jardin’s characters, or a list of love novels.

Sources / More info: imdb-fanfan, magnet, wiki-en, wiki-fr, Fanfan @ Amazon.com, Fanfan @ Amazon.ca

zamo, marriage, casatorie, fanfan, reading, book, lit, literature, fiction, novel, monologue, love, feelings (Tags)