Simply one of the greatest books ever written about young women, sex and going-nowhere love. Just heart-rendingly beautiful. Smart. Precise. Full of deltas and rivers and French colonial heat. The Lover moves me beyond words. I can't even form real sentences about how much I love this book.
— Madeleine
What a shimmering novel about an affair in defiance of the reigning taboos in French colonial society in Vietnam. Duras writes of the self-determination that emerges from a curious mix of power dynamics, lust, discovery, and betrayal. "Either [desire] was there at first glance or else it had never been. It was instant...or it was nothing." And this book, dear reader, is certainly not about nothing
— Kat
Description
A modern classic and international bestseller with more than one million copies in print, The Lover has been celebrated by critics and readers across the globe since its first publication in 1984.
Set in the prewar Indochina of Marguerite Duras's childhood, this is the haunting tale of a tumultuous affair between an adolescent French girl and her Chinese lover. In spare yet luminous prose, Duras evokes life on the margins of Saigon in the waning days of France's colonial empire, and its representation in the passionate relationship between two unforgettable outcasts.
This edition of The Lover includes a new introduction by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Viet Thanh Nguyen that looks back at Duras's iconic work, winner of France’s Prix Goncourt, as it approaches its fortieth anniversary in print.
About the Author
One of France's most important literary figures, MARGUERITE DURAS is best known in the United States for her novel The Lover, and for her brilliant film script Hiroshima, Mon Amour. She is also the author of many other acclaimed novels (The Ravishing of Lol Stein) and screenplays (Détruire, dit-elle). Born in Saigon in 1914 and died in Paris in 1996.
Praise For…
"Powerful, authentic, completely successful . . . perfect." —The New York Times Book Review
“An exquisite jewel of a novel, as multifaceted as a diamond, as seamless and polished as a pearl.” —Boston Herald
“A vivid, lingering novel . . . a brilliant work of art.” —Cleveland Plain Dealer
