Modern Classics Frontenac Mystery

Mauriac, François

Literature & Fiction

Penguin Classic

Modern Classics Knot Of Vipers

Classics

The Frontenac Mystery (Twentieth Century Classics)

Contemporary

Penguin Books, Ltd.

In a country house deep in the Bordeaux vineyards an old man - a prosperous lawyer risen to wealth from the peasantry - writes a curse on his grasping wife, children and grandchildren, plotting their disinheritance as the consummate pleasure of a life built on avarice.

20th Century Knot Of Vipers

A portrait of a sensitive, intelligent woman who refuses to be vanquished by the tragedies in her life

Therese (Twentieth-Century Classics)

Literary

Penguin Classics

From the moment she walks from court having been charged with attempting to poison her husband, to her banishment, escape to Paris, and final years of solitude and waiting, the life of Thérèse Desqueyroux is passionate and tortured. The victim of a hostile fate, Thérèse, as Mauriac said of her ‘belongs to that class of human beings … for whom night can end only when life itself ends. All that is asked of them is that they should not resign themselves to night’s darkness.’ Thérèse’s moving and powerful story affirms the vitality of the human spirit, making her an unforgettable heroine.

Modern Classics Therese

Nobel-prize winner François Mauriac's masterpiece is Thérèse Desqueyroux, the story of a complex woman trapped by provincial life. First published in 1927, this astonishing and daring novel has echoes of Madame Bovary and has recently been made into a ravishing film starring Amélie actress Audrey Tautou. 
Thérèse Desqueyroux walks free from court, acquitted of trying to poison her husband. Everyone knew she'd tried to do it, but family honour was more important than the truth. As she travels home to the gloomy forests of Argelouse, Thérèse looks back over the marriage that brought her nothing but stifling darkness, and wonders, has she really escaped punishment or is it only just about to begin?
François Mauriac was born in Bordeaux in 1885. He left his university studies to devote himself to writing, and published a collection of poems, Les Mains jointes (Clasped Hands), in 1909. He married in 1913 and the following year was mobilized to serve in the First World War with the Auxilliary Medical Squad in Thessalonica. Mauriac's major literary breakthrough came in 1922 with a novel called Le Baiser au lepreux (A Kiss for the Leper). His most famous work, Thérèse Desqueroux, appeared in 1927 and has been made into a film twice: first in 1962, with Emmanuelle Riva in the lead role, and more recently in 2012, in a version starring Audrey Tautou. In 1933 Mauriac was elected a Member of the French Academy and in 1952 he received the Nobel Prize for Literature. He died in Paris in 1970.
'A great novel ... the brilliance of its structure and the elegance of its prose never fail to take my breath away' - Beryl Bainbridge

Thérèse Desqueyroux (Penguin Modern Classics) [ Language:English ]

Format Paperback Subject Literary Collections Publisher Farrar Straus Giroux

Questions of Precedence

Farrar. Straus and Giroux

In one of Mauriac's lesser known novels, he introduces the reader to The Frontenacs, small landed gentry of the Bordeaux region on France. This story explores the special, even sacramental, character of the family bond.

The Frontenacs: A Novel

Format Paperback Subject French Fiction Crimes Fiction Publisher Farrar Straus and Giroux

The Mask of Innocence: A Novel

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