THE LOVER
My only article on Mme. Marguerite Duras, "La Duras" as named by some critics, was published while I was both an engineering and a law/political science student at two different universities in Barranquilla, as well, as an advanced French student at Alliance Française, and just having attained my Université de Paris IV-Sorbonne Diploma in French Studies. My article was entitled "Marguerite D. as a Detective" (Margarita D. como Detective; in Spanish), was a discussion on the article by the same title appeared in L'Express on July 26, 1985, a magazine that we used to read in our advanced French conversation class, as well as Paris Match and Le Nouvel Observateur, but which I read at the old library at the Alliance Française with the supervision of librarians and friends Andrée Gallée and George Huyon.
The full article can be retrieved and read from the following link:
http://www.lexpress.fr/actualite/societe/fait-divers/marguerite-d-comme-detective_794971.html
But my interest in Mme. Duras started at the reading time that I myself called "the two marguerites", where the other Marguerite was Marguerite Yourcenar with her Memoires d'Adrien.
In principle, my reading of The Lover gave me a sense of a profound recall by the writer of a real personal experience as a young man, as my own memories suggest that love was quite visual, sensual, and vivid.
But the story of the lover is a unique one. It combines a beautiful Vietnamese country time in the Asian landscape, and provides a scenery for love without constraints between a 15 and half year old French adolescent and a 50 year old Chinese businessman from Cholen in Indochina, whose family comes from the Nord of China, in Fou-Chouen, and whose physical description does not convey manhood physical power; yet one that is aroused after his seduction by the French girl, a student at a city's French Lycée. A forbidden story in which Mme. Duras recounts the story of a passionate love, in which first sight attraction spans a series of encounters in the steamy Vietnamese city of Saigon. The story provides an insight in the uninhibited girl who seduces the businessman and entices him into a world of passion prior to his traditional marriage to a Chinese woman. The romance is disturbed by the girl's family financial crisis, one that recalls many Latin American novels, where a lack of harmony with her brother and the search for personal independence drives the girl deeper in the unexpected relationship.
Losing her virginity at such a short age was apparently not a great concern for the girl. The mix of pleasure and pain is repeated and enjoyed in many occasions in a private garçonnière, where love steams passion in hot downtown Saigon. The pleasure and pain is something that could be a flatter for a man in many instances, but in a scenario where pleasure was to be the ultimate goal, it seems as if the threshold is reached, yet the affair continues. However, once married to a Chinese woman, the wealthy Chinese businessman abruptly ends his relationship with the girl. A relationship that has given him fear for his abuse, a relationship he did not want in principle, but one that takes the core time of his thoughts. The story ends with a bitter farewell for both, who still desire each other. Yet a final call at the end of the novel suggests that the relationship was true and integral love more than just pure physical passion.
The style through which Mme. Duras combines a narrative in the first person and then in the third person, referring to the girl provides an interesting narrative perspective beyond her simple and melodious style. At times, she unties the literary time from the chronological time, as many Latin American writers do, including Cortázar and García Márquez. Events such as the girl's younger and older brother's and mother's death and various others also bring great sentiment to the story, and give an additional dramatic and even tragic dimension.
After rereading the book in French and watching the movie by the same title, I came to the conclusion that Mme. Duras is unique in her style and content handling, and daring to write such a story is an unexpected challenge full of intrigue, for a woman writer of great success. In the United States, I could encounter Toni Morrison to be the closest writer with whom I would work in a comparative study of narrative styles, yet it would be difficult to come to a conclusion that they were similar or alike in any fashion.
Mme. Duras is also the author of over 50 books, including novels, theater, and récits among other genres. Other novels include: L'Amante Anglaise (1967); Agatha (1981);. L'Amant (1984); La Douleur (1985); l'Amant de la Chine du Nord (1991). Her theater works include a series (Théatre I, II, III), where critics could highlight La Bête dans la jungle; and her dialogs and récits, Hiroshima mon Amour (1960) and L'Homme Atlantique (1981), several of which were converted into film scripts and made movies. Certainly, Marguerite Duras has a special place in the European literature of the 20th century for her unique style and the nature and treatment of her narrative.
