Marguerite Duras

Marguerite Donnadieu (4 April 1914 – 3 March 1996), known as Marguerite Duras (French: [maʁɡ(ə)ʁit dyʁas]), was a French novelist, playwright, screenwriter, essayist, and experimental filmmaker. Her script for the film Hiroshima mon amour (1959) earned her a nomination for Best Original Screenplay at the Academy Awards.

Marguerite Duras
BornMarguerite Donnadieu
(1914-04-04)4 April 1914
Saigon, Cochinchina, French Indochina (now Vietnam)
Died3 March 1996(1996-03-03) (aged 81)
Paris, France
Occupation
NationalityFrench
Period1943–1995
Spouses
  • Robert Antelme
  • Dionys Mascolo
  • Yann Andréa

Early life and education

Duras was born Marguerite Donnadieu on April 4, 1914, in Gia-Dinh[1] (near to Saigon), Cochinchina, French Indochina (now Vietnam); she was the only daughter of two teachers who had responded to a campaign by the French government encouraging French people to settle in the colony.[2]

Duras's father fell ill soon after their arrival and returned to France, where he died. After his death, her mother remained in Indochina with her three children. The family lived in relative poverty after her mother made a bad investment in an isolated property and area of rice farmland in Cambodia.[2] See, e.g. Un Barrage contre le Pacifique.

At 17, Duras went to France, her parents' native country, where she began studying for a degree in mathematics. She soon abandoned this to concentrate on political science, then law.[2] After completing her studies in 1941, she worked for the French government in the Ministry of the Colonies;[2] in the 1930s she also changed her name to Marguerite Duras. In 1939, she married the writer Robert Antelme.[2]

During World War II, from 1942 to 1944, Duras worked for the Vichy government in an office that allocated paper quotas to publishers and in the process operated a de facto book-censorship system. She also became an active member of the PCF (the French Communist Party)[2] and a member of the French Resistance as a part of a small group that also included François Mitterrand, who later became President of France and remained a lifelong friend of Duras.[2] Her husband, Antelme, was deported to Buchenwald in 1944[3] for his involvement in the Resistance, and barely survived the experience (weighing on his release, according to Duras, just 38 kg, or 84 pounds). She nursed him back to health, but they divorced once he recovered.

Career

Duras was the author of many novels, plays, films, interviews, essays, and works of short fiction, including her best-selling, highly fictionalized autobiographical work L'Amant (1984), translated into English as The Lover, which describes her youthful affair with a Chinese man. It won the Prix Goncourt in 1984.[4] The story of her adolescence also appears in three other books: The Sea Wall, Eden Cinema and The North China Lover. A film version of The Lover, produced by Claude Berri and directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud, was released to great success in 1992. Duras's novel The Sea Wall was first adapted into the 1958 film This Angry Age by René Clément, and again in 2008 by Cambodian director Rithy Panh as The Sea Wall.

Other major works include Moderato Cantabile (1958), which was the basis of the 1960 film Seven Days... Seven Nights; Le Ravissement de Lol V. Stein (1964); and her play India Song, which Duras herself later directed as a film in 1975. She was also the screenwriter of the 1959 French film Hiroshima mon amour, which was directed by Alain Resnais.[5] Duras's early novels were fairly conventional in form, and were criticized for their "romanticism" by fellow writer Raymond Queneau; however, with Moderato Cantabile, she became more experimental, paring down her texts to give ever-increasing importance to what was not said. She was associated with the nouveau roman French literary movement, although she did not belong definitively to any one group. She was noted for her command of dialogue.[6]

In 1971, Duras signed the Manifesto of the 343, which publicly announced she had an abortion.[7]

Many of her works, such as Le Ravissement de Lol V. Stein and L'Homme assis dans le couloir (1980), deal with human sexuality.[8]

Towards the end of her life, Duras published a short, 54-page autobiographical book as a goodbye to her readers and family. The very last entry was written on August 1, 1995 and read ""I think it is all over. That my life is finished. I am no longer anything. I have become an appalling sight. I am falling apart. Come quickly. I no longer have a mouth, no longer a face".[9] Duras died at her home in Paris on March 3, 1996, aged 81.[10]

Personal Life

While married to Robert Antelme, Duras acted on her belief that fidelity was absurd. She created a menage a trois when she started an affair with Dionys Mascolo, who fathered one of her sons.[11]

During the final two decades of Duras’ life, she experienced various health issues. Starting in 1980 she was hospitalized for the first time from a combination of alcohol and tranquilizers.[12] She was also undergoing various detoxification procedures to help her recover from her alcohol addiction. After being hospitalized in October of 1988 she fell into a coma that lasted until June of 1989.[13]

Paralleling her health issues in the 1980s, Duras began having a relationship with a homosexual actor named Yann Andréa.[14] Yann Andréa would help Duras through her various health issues. Duras would later detail these interactions and companionship in her final book Yann Andréas Steiner.[15]

Sadly, Duras’ health would continue to decline into the 1990s, resulting in her death on March 3, 1996.[16]

Bibliography
  • Les Impudents, Plon, 1943
  • La Vie tranquille, Gallimard, 1944
  • Un barrage contre le Pacifique, Gallimard, 1950
  • Le Marin de Gibraltar, Gallimard, 1952
  • Les petits chevaux de Tarquinia, Gallimard, 1953
    • translated by Peter DuBerg as The Little Horses of Tarquinia, 1960
  • Des journées entières dans les arbres, "Le Boa", "Madame Dodin", "Les Chantiers", Gallimard, 1954
    • translated by Anita Barrows as Whole Days in the Trees, 1984
  • Le Square, Gallimard, 1955 (tr. The Square, 1959)
  • Moderato Cantabile, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1958
  • Les Viaducs de la Seine et Oise, Gallimard, 1959
  • Dix heures et demie du soir en été, Paris, 1960
    • translated by Anne Borchardt as Ten-Thirty on a Summer Night, London, 1961
  • Hiroshima mon amour, Gallimard, 1960
    • translated by Barbara Wright & Richard Seaver as Hiroshima mon amour, 1961
  • "Les deux ghettos", in: France-Observateur, 9 November 1961, p. 8–10
  • L'après-midi de M. Andesmas, Gallimard, 1960
    • translated by Anne Borchardt and Barbara Bray as The Afternoon of Mr. Andesmas, 1964
  • Le Ravissement de Lol V. Stein, Gallimard, 1964
    • translated by Richard Seaver as The Ravishing of Lol Stein, 1964
  • Théâtre I: les Eaux et Forêts-le Square-La Musica, Gallimard, 1965 (tr. The Rivers and the Forests, 1964; The Square; La Musica, 1965)
  • Le Vice-Consul, Gallimard, 1965
    • translated by Eileen Ellenborgener as The Vice-Consul, 1968
  • L'Amante Anglaise (fr), Gallimard, 1967
    • translated by Barbara Bray as L'Amante Anglaise, 1968
  • Théâtre II: Suzanna Andler-Des journées entières dans les arbres-Yes, peut-être-Le Shaga-Un homme est venu me voir, Gallimard, 1968
  • Détruire, dit-elle, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1969
    • translated by Barbara Bray as Destroy, She Said
  • Abahn Sabana David, Gallimard, 1970
  • L'Amour, Gallimard, 1971
    • translated by Kazim Ali and Libby Murphy as L'Amour
  • Ah! Ernesto, Hatlin Quist, 1971
  • India Song, Gallimard, 1973
    • translated by Barbara Bray as India Song, 1976
  • Nathalie Granger, suivi de "La Femme du Gange", Gallimard, 1973
  • Le Camion, suivi de "Entretien avec Michelle Porte", Les Éditions de Minuit, 1977
  • L'Eden Cinéma, Mercure de France, 1977
    • translated by Barbara Bray as Eden Cinema, 1992
  • Le Navire Night, suivi de Cesarée, les Mains négatives, Aurélia Steiner, Mercure de France, 1979
    • translated by Susan Dwyer as The Ship "Night"
  • Vera Baxter ou les Plages de l'Atlantique, Albatros, 1980
  • L'Homme assis dans le couloir, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1980
    • translated by Barbara Bray as The Man Sitting in the Corridor, 1991
  • L'Été 80, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1980
  • Les Yeux verts, Cahiers du cinéma, n.312–313, June 1980 and a new edition, 1987
    • translated by Carol Barko as Green Eyes, 1990
  • Agatha, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1981 (tr. Agatha)
  • Outside, Albin Michel, 1981
  • L'Homme atlantique, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1982
    • translated by Alberto Manguel as The Atlantic Man, 1993
  • Savannah Bay, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1982, 2ème edition augmentée, 1983 (tr. Savannah Bay, 1992)
  • La Maladie de la mort, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1982
    • translated by Barbara Bray as The Malady of Death, 1986
  • Théâtre III: -La Bête dans la jungle, d'après H. James, adaptation de J. Lord et M. Duras, -Les Papiers d'Aspern, d'après H. James, adaptation de M. Duras et R. Antelme, -La Danse de mort, d'après A. Strindberg, adaptation de M. Duras, Gallimard, 1984
  • L'Amant, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1984. Awarded the 1984 Prix Goncourt
    • translated by Barbara Bray as The Lover
  • La Douleur, POL, 1985
    • translated by Barbara Bray as The War
  • La Musica deuxième, Gallimard, 1985
  • Les Yeux bleus Cheveux noirs, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1986
    • translated by Barbara Bray as Blue Eyes, Black Hair, 1987
  • La Pute de la côte normande, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1986
    • translated by Alberto Manguel as The Slut of the Normandy Coast, 1993
  • La Vie matérielle, POL, 1987
    • translated by Barbara Bray as Practicalities, 1990
  • Emily L., Les Éditions de Minuit, 1987
    • translated by Barbara Bray as Emily L.
  • La Pluie d'été, POL, 1990
    • translated by Barbara Bray as Summer Rain
  • L'Amant de la Chine du Nord, Gallimard, 1991
    • translated by Leigh Hafrey as The North China Lover, 1992
  • Yann Andréa Steiner, Gallimard, 1992
    • translated by Barbara Bray as Yann Andrea Steiner, 1993
  • Agatha, Savannah Bay, The Post-Apollo Press, 1992 (tr. Howard Limoli)
  • Écrire, Gallimard, 1993
    • translated by Mark Polizzotti as Writing, 2011
  • C'est tout, POL, 1995
    • translated by Richard Howard as No More, 2000[17]

Filmography

Director

Actor
  • India Song (1975) - (voice)
  • The Lorry (1977) - Elle
  • Baxter, Vera Baxter (1977) - Narrator (voice, uncredited)
  • Le navire Night (1979) - (voice)
  • Aurélia Steiner (Vancouver) (1979) - Narrator (voice)
  • Agatha et les lectures illimitées (1981) - (voice)
  • Les enfants (1985) - Narration (voice, uncredited) (final film role)

References
  1. "Bnf: Notice de personne: Duras, Marguerite ((1914-1996)" (in French). Retrieved 18 September 2018.
  2. Riding, Alan. "Marguerite Duras, 81, Author Who Explored Love and Sex". New York Times. Retrieved 14 April 2017.
  3. "Transport parti de Compiègne le 17 août 1944 (I.265.)" (in French). Retrieved 31 July 2018.
  4. "Le Palmarès". Académie Goncourt.
  5. "The Criterion Collection – Hiroshima Mon Amour". The Criterion Collection.
  6. "Marguerite Duras". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. 2012. Retrieved 4 April 2012.
  7. "manifeste des 343". 23 April 2001. Archived from the original on 23 April 2001. Retrieved 28 May 2019.
  8. Alex Hughes, "Erotic Writing" in Hughes and Keith Reader, Encyclopedia of contemporary French culture, (pp. 187–88). London, Routledge, 1998, ISBN 0415131863
  9. Riding, Alan (4 March 1996). "Marguerite Duras, 81, Author Who Explored Love and Sex". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  10. Coward, David (4 March 1996). "Passion into Prose: Obituary: Marguerite Duras". The Guardian. p. 12.
  11. Vircondelet, Alain (15 March 1996). "OVERSTEPPING BOUNDARIES: A LIFE OF MARGUERITE DURAS". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 15 April 2020.
  12. Vircondelet, Alain (15 March 1996). "OVERSTEPPING BOUNDARIES: A LIFE OF MARGUERITE DURAS". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 15 April 2020.
  13. "Duras, Marguerite (1914–1996)". Retrieved 15 April 2020.
  14. Vircondelet, Alain (15 March 1996). "OVERSTEPPING BOUNDARIES: A LIFE OF MARGUERITE DURAS". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 15 April 2020.
  15. "Duras, Marguerite (1914–1996)". Retrieved 15 April 2020.
  16. "Duras, Marguerite (1914–1996)". Retrieved 15 April 2020.
  17. No More at Seven Stories Press.
  18. AlloCine, Le Camion, retrieved 17 June 2019

Further reading
  • Montalbán, Manuel Vázquez; Glasauer, Willi (1988). Scenes from World Literature and Portraits of Greatest Authors. Barcelona: Círculo de Lectores..
  • Glassman, Deborah N. (1991). Marguerite Duras: Fascinating Vision and Narrative Cure. Rutherford, New Jersey; London: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press; Associated University Presses. ISBN 0838633374 – via Google Books.
  • Hill, Leslie (10 July 1993). Marguerite Duras: Apocalyptic Desires. London, New York City: Routledge. ISBN 0415050480 – via Google Books.
  • Schuster, Marilyn R. (1993). [arguerite Duras Revisited. New York City: Twayne. ISBN 0805782982. ISBN 9780805782981.
  • Vircondelet, Alain (1994). Duras: A Biography. Normal, Illinois: Dalkey Archive Press. ISBN 1564780651. ISBN 9781564780652.
  • Adler, Laure. (1998), Marguerite Duras: A Life, Trans. Anne-Marie Glasheen, London: Orion Books.
  • Crowley, Martin (2000). Duras, Writing, and the Ethical. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0198160135. ISBN 9780198160137.
  • Harvey, Robert; Alazet, Bernard; Volat, Hélène (2009). Les Écrits de Marguerite Duras: Bibliographie des oeuvres et de la critique, 1940–2006. Paris: IMEC. p. 530.
  • Selous, Trista (1988), The Other Woman: Feminism and Feminity in the Work of Marguerite Duras, New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 9780300042870.
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