book review: Les Belles Images by Simone de Beauvoir

"'I tell you what, we'll talk about it tomorrow. But if you know any unhappy people, we'll try to do something for them. You can treat sick people, give poor ones money - there are masses of things you can do.'
'Are there really? For everybody?'
'Dear me, I should cry all day long if there were people whose unhappiness couldn't be cured at all.'"

The idea of choosing this book as a holiday read was that by the time I got to Paris I was reading about Parisians. The problem was by the time I had got to the [point when I pitched up on a campsite in the Parisian suburbs the characters of this book had quite put me off heading for the Champs Elysees.

They are meant to of course as Simone de Beauvoir portrays the vacuous world of the rich in Paris. in a way that leaves you despairing of their lack of connection with the real world. They search for happiness and fulfilment among the top class restaurants and their weekends away in the country but don't know how to respond when someone brings real pain and horror into their lives.

So they protect the bubble by running away from the news, banning their children from reading newspapers and keeping the conversation to safe naval gazing subjects of conversation.

At the heart of the story is Laurence who we are told has had a nervous breakdown five years previously and then slowly heads towards another. What sparks her off is her daughter mentioning that she is unhappy and upset by the suffering in the world. Despite the best efforts to stop her from reading newspapers the influence of a more worldly friend is difficult to stop and so the seed of unhappiness is planted in the apartment leaving the ambitious architect father and the fragile mother to cope with the consequences.

At the same time a parallel story displaying the vanity and shallowness of the older generation is running with XXX's mother being dumped by a rich aged boyfriend because the 56 year-old fancies getting involved with a 19 year-old. The mother screams at her daughter that a woman without a man is nothing and highlights that even someone who is apparently successful believes that society cannot view her in those terms unless she has a rich man on her arm.

The world this book refers to is sadly still probably there and certainly the world of the vacuous rich is one that you can certainly imagine still being like this. What keeps you reading isn't any sympathy for the characters but a sense of fascination that something so natural and innocent, the idea that not everyone is happy, can cause such distress. It proves, if it needed underlining, that regardless of your wealth and success you cannot cocoon yourself from reality.

There are also some messages here about the position of women in society, with the mother showing a desperation to be with a man in order to be accepted by society and the attitude towards Laurence as one verging on the patronising and bullying by some of the men in her life.

Not the most enjoyable read but then it was never designed to be and although it's looking a bit old in some respects the world she took the scalpel to is still there and still deserves to get this sort of literary examination.

book of books - The Blood of Others

The idea behind the timing of reading this book was that it was a sort of companion piece to Iron in the Soul by Jean-Paul Sartre. The prompt was the suggested further reading at the end of the book. The problem was that the library did not have a copy so eBay became the supply route and that took time and in the end this bookby Simone de Beauvoir was not read quite when intended.

That is a shame because this would work well with the Sartre Roads to Freedom trilogy. The same topics are covered and you get a reinforced sense that far from the second world war being the only major thing to happen to the French in the 1930s there was also political unrest that spawned some of the future leadership of the resistance movement.

Plot summary
The book evolves around the relationship of Jean and Helene. There are a series of flashbacks from a point where for reasons unknown Helene is dying that outline how Jean left home and became a communist before rejecting that political line and becoming a trade union leader before finally post invasion becoming part of the resistance. His relationships with his parents go full circle as well with his father initially disliking him for the communism but then becoming proud of his resistance activities. Helene is a young girl trapped in a boring relationship with Paul, a work colleague of Jean's, and stuck in a dull job. She meets Jean and falls for his independence and sense of clear direction and identity. They become lovers and even plan to marry but when war is in the offing she gets him a desk job back in Paris and he hates her for it and they split up. She eventually comes back to him to ask her to help get a Jewish friend across the border and she starts working for the resistance. In a mission she is fatally wounded and she dies in his arms and Jean, who by now is responsible for hostages dying each time he carries out a bombing or sabotage really does have the blood of others on his hands.

Is it well written?
It starts a little bit clumsy with it not quite clear what is going one and it is only after a little while that you start to understand the time device being used to build up the story from the past to the point of the present. The characters are strong and the small cast makes it feel intimate. But the crucial but here is te exetensialist style that is consitent and is on display in both Jean and Helene. In the end no one can force you to make a decision you don;t feel you want to make or feel honest about and it is the dilemma of having to make a choice that will have a fatal impact on others that is the dilemma that Jean faces that is at the heart of the book, It does gently but firmly grip you and make you want to see it through to some sort of conclusion, which as a measure of the success of the writing is a fairly strong one.

Should it be read?
For those who want to build up a picture of the state in France prior to the war and immediately afterwards then this deserves to be read. The scenes of the retreating army leaving them exposed to the enemy and the Jewish baby being taken away are powerful and not connected with any philosophical style. It is also one route into this prolific but legendarty feminist writer. This seems like a good starting point and she has a real knack of imagining the male motivation and point of view making it a strong book from a characterisation point of view. Overall it deserves to get a look in but the fear is that the start is so liable to leav you confused and lukewarm that you might fail to continue with a book that has some valuable things to say.

Summary
An independent man learns painfully that he cannot make decisions or live a life that is solitary and unconnected with the world around him.

Version read - Penguin paperback

The Blood of Others - post V

The book ends with Jean not only for spilling the blood of others but also once again treated differently from those around him. He is also left without Helene who dies in his arms after being injured in a mission that Jean feels he could have stopped her from carrying out. Again there is a real sense here of the no win situation the resistance were in because for every Nazi they killed the retribution against their countrymen was severe.

At the risk of pre-empting a review it is safe to say that would be a great companion piece to the Jean-Paul Sartre's Road to Freedom trilogy with the same themes and the same feelings covered.

Bullet points between pages 220 – 240

* Helene is shaken out of her plodding routine by her Jewish friend Yvonne who has to go into hiding because the Germans are rounding up the Jews and deporting them back to the concentration camps

* Helene witnesses a woman being torn apart from her baby with the soldiers assuring her that they will soon be reunited and the woman cries her name “Ruth” as the truck carries her away

* After those two incidents Helene goes to call on Jean to try and get Yvonne away into the free zone and asks if she can work for him and although reluctant he accepts because it is not his place to decide other people’s decisions

* He wants to go in her place but the committee has decreed that he is too important to the organisation and cannot risk his life – something that again separates him from the workingmen and women around him making him feel bourgeois

* Helene must have been wounded and she lays dying and does so finally in his arms and all the time Laurent, one of the resistance fighters keeps asking Jean if he will agree to laying a bomb, something that will be paid for with the death of hostages the German’s will shoot in reprisals

* Jean has already faced the wrath of his mother who told him to turn himself over to the authorities and face the consequences of his actions rather than let other people die but that along with his guilt for Helene and his friends is the guilt he is carrying

A review will follow shortly…

The Blood of Others - post IV

Because it is the weekend and a lot has been going on today with school fairs and working in the house all I am aiming to do is read the remaining 40 pages of The Blood of Others in two readings.

By now the uncertainty of the start has long been forgotten and the way de Beauvoir weaves the past and the present has actually become familiar and you start to appreciate the way she is building the story to its climax. The other point that has to be made for her is a wonderful ability to put herself into the heads of both strong male and female characters and the way she describes Jean’s thinking is incredibly perceptive.

Bullet points between pages 200 – 220

* Helene splits from Denise and her family and heads back into Paris after hitching a lift with the Germans who are taking supplies and villagers back into the capital, which is deserted and feels like a Sunday afternoon, but a particularly strange one

* Then there is a skip ion time and Helene is working for a German and even considering going to Berlin but at the moment when she has to commit she backs out because she is ashamed to be collaborating

* Then the story moves to Jean who meets his old friend Marcel who has escaped from the prisoner of war camp and is bemused to find his friend running a resistance movement that involves ‘terrorism’ as he describes it but at the same time he thoroughly approves

Last pages tomorrow…

The Blood of Others - post III

The narrative shifts between the past and the present with the story always getting closer to converging with Helene dying of a wound gained in some mission that she carried out for the French resistance. Along with Sartre’s Iron in the Soul this provides a great insight into what it must have felt like to be running away from the German invasion and there is a poignant moment when Helene and Denise watch the French soldiers, officers and then tanks and guns head through the village leaving them alone and then the German troops stroll in.

Bullet points between pages 110 - 200

* Jean and Helene’s relationship develops but she is frustrated that he continues to see Madeline and starts to wonder why he has no real need of her living an independent life that he believes makes him some how less bourgeoisie and more working class

* Madeline announces that she is going to go and fight in the Spanish Civil War so she drops out of the picture for several months and the focus stays on Jean and Helene and Denise and Marcel their friends

* Marcel is driving Denise insane with his attitude to life refusing to be touched for days on end and wasting his talent as an artist because he cannot believe in what he is doing and despite the comments of Jean and Helene he cannot seem to change his ways

* Denise puts her energy into a book that Jean too honestly appraises as being second-rate upsetting her but in the meantime he has agreed to marry Helene and they are all set for the happy event

* But war does break out and Jean is called up and because of her fears for his safety Helene pulls some strings and gets him sent back to Paris to a safe job in the rear, which makes Jean furious and he breaks off the engagement and manages to get back to the front

* Time skips and Jean has been injured, Helene and Denise are leaving Paris to take refuge in the country and Marcel has probably been taken prisoner because Germans surrounded his division

* Then the characters are different and Helene is dying and Jean is struggling with his feelings about it all although at this stage you do not know why she has been hurt and why Jean feels so responsible for it happening

More over the weekend…

The Blood of Others - post II

This book has improved over the last few chapters as the characters become more defined and a clear story emerges. You don’t naturally fall for them as they are slightly difficult as people to understand but despite that it is worth sticking with.

Bullet points between pages 42 – 110

* Along with Jean, the 20 year-old who rejects everything his family has provided for him so he can be truly free and able to claim his true position another character Helene emerges who is someone looking for love and is stuck in a relationship with Paul who works with Jean

* Paul doesn’t inspire her and she falls in love with Jean although he tells her he is not interested and is involved in a relationship with someone else who he has a casual sexual relationship with

* Helene keeps dreaming of jean even though he does his best not to encourage her and the effect on her relationship means she finally splits with Paul and as a result naively thinks that Jean will accept her

* She goes round to talk to him and after he rejects her again she throws herself into the arms of an old friend who takes her virginity and leaves her with a pregnancy to worry about and she ends up having the abortion at Jean’s flat because that is the only place she can go outside the family home

* As a result Jean feels so guilty that he allows her in and although he continues to sleep with Madeline the woman he has a causal sexual affair with Helene becomes his lover and their relationship starts to develop but the year is 1937 and you know what is round the corner

More tomorrow…

The Blood of Others - post I

In a way it would have made a lot more sense to have read this straight after the Jean-Paul Sartre Roads to Freedom trilogy but because of the variants of eBay bidding and post office delivery that was not possible. The reason why it makes such a good companion piece to the Sartre is because not only does it have much of the same existentialist style and it is set in France but also there is the backdrop of the war looming.

Just as in the Age of Reason, Mathieu the lead character has a moment when he has to decide if he will join the communist party this book starts with the very same internal debate going on in the characters wondering how to make something of their lives.

Bullet points from pages 7 – 42

* The story seems to start with a question being asked of a group of people about a decision having to be made that you sense could be quite a life and death one for those involved

* Then the narrative seems to swing back to an earlier time when a well to do man Jeans decides to embrace communism and reject the luxuries of his life and after completing a two year apprenticeship in his father type setting firm he announces that he will take nothing more from him

* He finds work at the bottom rung of the typesetting trade and starts to ingratiate himself with his fellow workers and convinces his artistic friend Jacques that he is doing something worthwhile enough for his friend to sign up to the party as well

* Then a character named Helene is introduced who works in a chocolate shop but dreams of escape and finds her boyfriend Paul too boring to inspire much and when she demands that he takes her along to a meal with a friend it turns out he is meeting Jean who by this time has rejected communism and is concentrating on traditional non-political trade unionism

Hopefully the action will pick up a bit tomorrow…