Almost every
afternoon in summer, Marguerite Duras and Yann Andréa would drive from
Trouville to the Hôtel de la Marine in Quillebeuf, usually via
Pont-Audemer, a round trip of slightly under eighty miles. This is just what
the two unnamed characters in Emily L.
do, at a time when, Duras’s biographer Laure Adler says, the couple were
drinking six or eight litres of wine a day without eating. It’s hardly surprising
that the narrator is terrified of the masses of Koreans she sees around her on
the café terrace: sounds like a dose of the DTs.
The narrator and her
friend seem to be at a negative turning point in their relationship, but that’s
not the focal point of interest here: it’s the much-travelled English Captain
and his wife (later known as Emily L.) who are the principal subjects here, he
with his strong Pilsner beers, and his alcoholic wife with her double bourbons.
An early few sentences about them sets the tone:
‘Perched on their stools
almost motionless, heads leaning forwards, dangling, they were […] a little
ridiculous. You could have called them plants, something like that, of no
definite state, a sort of vegetable, human plants, no sooner born than already
dying, no sooner living than already dead.’ (My translation.)
Emily L.’s history
comes in instalments, but to sum up: she comes from a wealthy family, and after
the death of her parents she inherited a boat and property. She has been many
places in the boat with her husband the Captain (a nickname the patronne gives him), but their relationship seems to have run aground, they
seem to be in terminal Despair Street.
Probably once beautiful,
Emily L. wrote nineteen poems in her youth which were (unknown to her) published
by her father, and (also unknown to her) they’ve been translated into a few
European languages, she quite a celebrity if only she knew it, but the Captain has
always seen her poems as a rival and steers the pair into safe Malaysian waters
where Emily L. remains anonymous. Emily L. has already dismissed these poems as
juvenilia, but the turning point in her poetry came when she was writing a poem
following the still-birth of her child, an unfinished poem that the Captain
burned in jealous hatred, and which Emily L. searched all over for. She never
wrote anything after that.
She only learns of
the existence of the booklet from the warden of their house, who looks after it
when they are (almost always) away on mindless cruises. He loves Emily L., she
loves him, but their relationship will never see day. Perfection, perhaps. Emily L. was Marguerite
Duras’s favourite character, and there’s more than a little Duras in her.
My Marguerite Duras posts:
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Marguerite Duras: La Pute de la côte normande
Marguerite Duras: L'Homme assis dans le couloir
Marguerite Duras: Agatha
Marguerite Duras: Emily L.
Marguerite Duras: Les Yeux bleus cheveux noirs
Marguerite Duras: L'Amant | The Lover
Marguerite Duras: Le Ravissement de Lol V. Stein
Marguerite Duras: L'Amante anglaise
Laure Adler: Marguerite Duras
Marguerite Duras: Cimetière du Montparnasse
Marguerite Duras: Un barrage contre le Pacifique
Marguerite Duras: L'Après-midi de Monsieur Andesmas
Marguerite Duras: Les Petits Chevaux de Tarquinia
Marguerite Duras: Le Marin de Gibraltar | The Sailor from Gibraltar
Marguerite Duras: La Douleur | The War: A Memoir
Yann Andréa: Cet amour-là
Marguerite Duras and Xavière Gauthier: Les Parleuses
Marguerite Duras: Savannah Bay
Marguerite Duras: Détruire, dit-elle | Destroy, She Said
Marguerite Duras: L'Amour
Marguerite Duras: Dix heures et demie du soir en été
Marguerite Duras: Le Square | The Square
Marguerite Duras: Les Impudents
Marguerite Duras: Le Shaga
Marguerite Duras: Oui, peut-être
Marguerite Duras: Des journées entières dans les arbres
Marguerite Duras: Suzanna Andler
Marguerite Duras: Le Vice-Consul | The Vice Consul
Marguerite Duras: Moderato cantabile
Marguerite Duras: La Vie matérielle
Marguerite Duras: La Vie tranquille
Marguerite Duras: La Pluie d'été
My Marguerite Duras posts:
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Marguerite Duras: La Pute de la côte normande
Marguerite Duras: L'Homme assis dans le couloir
Marguerite Duras: Agatha
Marguerite Duras: Emily L.
Marguerite Duras: Les Yeux bleus cheveux noirs
Marguerite Duras: L'Amant | The Lover
Marguerite Duras: Le Ravissement de Lol V. Stein
Marguerite Duras: L'Amante anglaise
Laure Adler: Marguerite Duras
Marguerite Duras: Cimetière du Montparnasse
Marguerite Duras: Un barrage contre le Pacifique
Marguerite Duras: L'Après-midi de Monsieur Andesmas
Marguerite Duras: Les Petits Chevaux de Tarquinia
Marguerite Duras: Le Marin de Gibraltar | The Sailor from Gibraltar
Marguerite Duras: La Douleur | The War: A Memoir
Yann Andréa: Cet amour-là
Marguerite Duras and Xavière Gauthier: Les Parleuses
Marguerite Duras: Savannah Bay
Marguerite Duras: Détruire, dit-elle | Destroy, She Said
Marguerite Duras: L'Amour
Marguerite Duras: Dix heures et demie du soir en été
Marguerite Duras: Le Square | The Square
Marguerite Duras: Les Impudents
Marguerite Duras: Le Shaga
Marguerite Duras: Oui, peut-être
Marguerite Duras: Des journées entières dans les arbres
Marguerite Duras: Suzanna Andler
Marguerite Duras: Le Vice-Consul | The Vice Consul
Marguerite Duras: Moderato cantabile
Marguerite Duras: La Vie matérielle
Marguerite Duras: La Vie tranquille
Marguerite Duras: La Pluie d'été
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