The Officers' Ward (novel)

The Officers' Ward
Author	Marc Dugain
Original title	La chambre des officiers
Country	France
Language	French
Genre	War novel
Published	1998 by JC Lattès
Published in English	1999
Pages	172 p.
ISBN	978-2-7096-1903-5
OCLC	40167608
Dewey Decimal	840
LC Class	PQ2664.U3479

The Officers' Ward (French, La chambre des officiers), is a novel by Marc Dugain, published in 1998 (1999 in English). It is supposedly based on the experiences of one of the author's own ancestors during World War I.[1]

Synopsis

Adrien Fournier, a handsome lieutenant in the Engineers, is the narrator and main protagonist.[2] Adrien is wounded on a simple reconnaissance mission on the first day of French involvement in the Great War. He is hit by a stray shell, which kills his fellow officers and his horse, and destroys the centre of Adrien's face. Devastated and permanently disfigured, he spends the rest of the war in a hospital, in a maxillofacial unit, with a small group of others who have similar injuries—including a woman, Marguerite, who has been wounded while nursing at the Western Front. Adrien's palate and jaw are gradually reconstructed by pioneering plastic surgeons.

The novel follows the experiences of the group in the aftermath of the war and their subsequent lives, right up to World War II and beyond.

Reception

The novel won eighteen literary prizes[3] and was made into a film in 2001, directed by François Dupeyron and starring Eric Caravaca as the central character.

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References

Marc Dugain (2000). The Officers' Ward. Phoenix House. ISBN 978-1-86159-176-0.
Dominique Coutant-Defer; Alexandre Randal; lePetitLittéraire.fr (16 December 2014). La Chambre des officiers de Marc Dugain (Analyse de l'oeuvre): Comprendre la littérature avec lePetitLittéraire.fr. Primento. ISBN 978-2-8062-1951-0.
Anna Branach-Kallas; Piotr Sadkowski (19 July 2018). Comparing Grief in French, British and Canadian Great War Fiction (1977-2014). BRILL. pp. 14–. ISBN 978-90-04-36478-3.

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[1] Marc Dugain (2000). The Officers' Ward. Phoenix House. ISBN 978-1-86159-176-0.

[2] Dominique Coutant-Defer; Alexandre Randal; lePetitLittéraire.fr (16 December 2014). La Chambre des officiers de Marc Dugain (Analyse de l'oeuvre): Comprendre la littérature avec lePetitLittéraire.fr. Primento. ISBN 978-2-8062-1951-0.

[3] Anna Branach-Kallas; Piotr Sadkowski (19 July 2018). Comparing Grief in French, British and Canadian Great War Fiction (1977-2014). BRILL. pp. 14–. ISBN 978-90-04-36478-3.