L'école des femmes suivi de Robert et de Geneviève

by André Gide

Le roman est présenté comme le journal intime d'Éveline X, envoyé à un éditeur (supposément André Gide) par sa fille, Geneviève, après la mort de sa mère des suites d'une épidémie lors de la Première Guerre mondiale où Éveline s'est enrôlée comme infirmière. Il est composé de deux parties distinctes et d'un épilogue. Dans la première partie, Éveline, jeune femme naïve et idéaliste, raconte son admiration et son amour pour Robert, depuis leur rencontre jusqu'aux premières années de leur mariage qui se fait malgré l'hostilité première de son père visàvis de Robert. Éveline reprend son journal après une interruption de vingt ans dans une deuxième partie, où la femme mûre, mère de deux enfants et épouse malheureuse confie qu'elle n'a désormais plus d'illusions sur Robert, dont elle comprend enfin la médiocrité et l'opportunisme. Les deux romans suivants prolongent et élargissent ce procédé, en proposant des points de vue différents qui contrastent avec celui d'Éveline. Dans Robert (1930), André Gide donnera la parole au mari, qui propose une réfutation du point de vue d'Éveline. Il rapporte sa version des faits et la justification de ses excès de perfectionnisme qu'Éveline lui reproche. Dans Geneviève (1936), c'est leur fille qui prend la parole. Elle porte un regard désabusé sur le ménage de ses parents, rêvant d'un monde d'indépendance et d'émancipation des femmes, elle prend parti pour sa mère et critique les moeurs de son père.

Genres: France, Fiction, French Literature, Classics

256 pages, Mass Market Paperback

Published May 8, 1973

About the author

Diaries and novels, such as The Immoralist (1902) and Lafcadio's Adventures (1914), of noted French writer André Gide examine alienation and the drive for individuality in an often disapproving society; he won the Nobel Prize of 1947 for literature.

André Paul Guillaume Gide authored books. From beginnings in the symbolist movement, career of Gide ranged to anticolonialism between the two World Wars.

Known for his fiction as well as his autobiographical works, Gide exposes the conflict and eventual reconciliation to public view between the two sides of his personality; a straight-laced education and a narrow social moralism split apart these sides. One can see work of Gide as an investigation of freedom and empowerment in the face of moralistic and puritan constraints, and it gravitates around his continuous effort to achieve intellectual honesty. His self-exploratory texts reflect his search of full self, even to the point of owning sexual nature without betraying values at the same time. After his voyage of 1936 to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the same ethos informs his political activity, as his repudiation of Communism suggests.

Chinese 安德烈·纪德

Reviews

[Northernsaw-whetowl · Rating 5 out of 5]

This review contains spoilers, although with Gide's writing style, I don't believe my summary takes away from the novel.

Andrè Gíde, an author forgotten by time and because his writing all too often contained controversial themes. The School For Wives begins with a letter from the daughter of the main character, a letter that informs us that her mother is dead, but she believes that her diaries will help young women today.

Then we’re thrown into Eveline’s world, through her own writing. Eveline tells us how much she wants to marry Robert, tells us about well-spoken, intelligent Robert. He cares for grammar, for art, and she loves him. From the very first entry, we know it will all go wrong.

Eveline does marry him, and she exalts in her chance to give up everything and serve him (this is the 1920s, after all). She comes off as a strong character, intelligent and compassionate. Eveline reads people well, except for Robert. It takes her twenty years, a time period where she puts down her journal and vows not to write again, to hate him.

By then, she has two children. She recognizes Robert’s well-spoken manner that captured her heart when they first met as a fake attempt to sound intelligent. Robert doesn’t help people because he is king; he helps people so that they owe him. Everyone seems blind to this, and Eveline is alone. She realizes that her son is just like his father, and she hates him for it even as she loves him.

It takes her longer to realize her daughter, Genevieve, the writer of the letter at the beginning, sees it the exact same way. Eveline considers leaving Robert; she tells him she will. Finally, she escapes to work in a hospital, despite how Robert forbids her from doing it. Eveline worked with patients who lay dying from contagious diseases for five months, then she caught the disease and died.

Eveline is a strong woman. She wants to be perfect; she wants to leave Robert. At the end, the hospital and her death grants her freedom. She leaves behind Genevieve, who insists any man in her life will be her partner, not her master, and that she may never marry at all.

I recommend this book to anyone looking for a meaningful, short story. It’s an easy read, and a beautiful example of the strength and perseverance of women.

[Emel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the distinct contrasts between each section of the book: Young naive Éveline, so in love with the idea of being in love and blindly throwing herself into the role of subservient wife, then turn the page on a 20 year gap and the mature Éveline is perfect in her contempt for her pompous husband and the life she set herself up with. The secondary relationships are so poignant - her Father, once her ally and against the marriage, comes to respect Robert just when Éveline needs him to support her leaving him. Robert's friend, who she disliked on sight, becomes not only the man she most respects, but the object of her unrequited love AND the husband of her best friend! Then, more time passes and her daughter is able to fill in the gaps while offering a wonderful feminist attitude, completely in contrast to Éveline at her age. For a book that is (a) so old and (b) a translation, I half expected it to be too much like hard work but actually enjoyed every bit of it. (Except Robert. But I don't think anyone is supposed to enjoy Robert)

[Clara Hllb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dommage qu’il ait fallu attendre la dernière partie pour que l’histoire devienne intéressante.

[Rion Myriam · Rating 3 out of 5]

7 octobre 1894, ainsi débute "L'école des femmes". Mis dans ce contexte de fin de XIXe siècle, nous comprenons mieux les propos qui vont suivre et qui abordent de manière avant-gardiste les rapports homme-femme. Ainsi le titre prend tout son sens.

[Marta Di · Rating 5 out of 5]

Straordinaria prova di introspezione psicologica al femminile (salvo la piccola parentesi di Robert che ha l'unico scopo di accendere i riflettori sulle parole femminili) da parte di un grande maestro, Gide.
Bellissimo documento sull'emancipazione femminile

[PATRICE PRIVAT · Rating 4 out of 5]

De merveille en merveille je vais avec Gide. Magnifique surplomb sur la vie des coeurs.

[Melinda Griffith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written from 3 points of View, this book is from 1929, yet broaches subjects that I think most girls/women wish were more candidly discussed.

[Andras Horvath · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even with the three chapters together, it feels incomplete, but maybe its intentionally mysterious. The first chapter is very light with the interesting notion of falling out of love because the character of the husband was only wishful thinking on the side of the wife. The second chapter was only there to provide more details, at the same time, indirectly confirming the hypocrisy of the husband. I enjoyed the third chapter the most: the story of the daughter was by far the best written part of the book.

[Narimene · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bon, ce livre était une grande surprise.
You know when you read a book and you feel like you made a thrilling discovery and you couldnt be happier? Well this is it.
I wont be able to convey how much this book was interesting. For starters, it talks about (and defends in a way) homosexuality. I mean, THIS BOOK WAS WRITTEN IN 1927. Maybe some of you knew it was talked about at the time but i didnt. That drove me to research the (nobel-prize winning) author, whom i previously had an idea on , and his biography was really intriguing, i invite everyone who's interested to read about him.
Another crutial part about this book is that, andré gide fiercely defended women and talked about the case in a way that is so mindblowingly modern. I admire his audacity, especially in such a conservative close-minded society that he obviously criticised whenever he could find a chance. I have read male authors who write about women rights, and this is the one i connected with the most.
I am so sorry that this writer (this book in particular) is not widely known (although andré gide has his respectable reputation in french lit) and not credited enough. I really, from the bottom of my heart invite you to read him. A good snack for the mind.

[Z · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve been trying to touch up on my French so I read this entire thing without translating it, still confused halfway through but I still loved the book with all my heart

[Epicure of Literature · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is very interesting to follow the thought of eveline, robert and genevive. Each has their own argument for their thought, belief, feeling and action.I enjoy Eveline's inner conflict between her obedience to her husband and her desire for freedom and rebellion. I also found that Genevive's ideas on feminism quite provocative. LGBT issue is also astonishing. I also quite sympathetic with Robert's confession. Well, this book is really well written.


I do love Voltaire's Quatrain cited by Gisele.Here is the quotation in indonesia edition
"Begitulah adanya manusia
Selalu melenceng dalam berusaha
Di pagi hari membuat rencana
Dan sepanjang hari hal-hal tak berguna."
HOW TRUE!!

[Oktay Yagiz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Une hiperbole des emotions: «Alors il se passa quelque chose d'extraordinaire : je le vis brusquement prendre sa tête dans ses mains et éclater en sanglots. Il ne pouvait plus être question de feinte ; c'étaient de vrais sanglots qui lui secouaient tout le corps, de vraies larmes que je voyais mouiller ses doigts et couler sur ses joues, tandis qu'il répétait vingt fois d'une voix démente :
- Ma femme ne m'aime plus ! Ma femme ne m'aime plus !»

[Barbara Lock · Rating 4 out of 5]

Why has time forgotten about André Gíde? Perhaps we are out of practice reading narrative with embedded philosophy, nuance, intellectual content, subtle satire, secret stories. In these sequentially published first person narrative accounts (wife; husband; daughter), we are exposed to themes which were, at the time, highly controversial, most significantly the idea of women existing outside of their relationship to a husband. I appreciated the craft and the content.

[vahumbug · Rating 5 out of 5]

man this book was so good like the end of a relationship full of hate and resentment and how the world is terrible and false you get the story for 3 different perspectives this is my favorite book by him by far
dark

[thuys]

Ở một đẳng cấp mà trong Gide thấy cả các chị Thúy Vân Thúy Kiều với Huy Cận Xuân Diệu với các thứ các thứ tuy không phải lối dịch thuật ưa thích nhưng để tên tác giả với dịch giả vai kề vai hầu như cùng kích cỡ cũng là hợp lý lắm thay.

[Bahar Filiz · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book is GREAT.

[Tugrul · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not as bright as "Isabelle" by the same author. It portrays the inner workings of a woman's mind, by observing the diary of the lady within two different period of time in her life.

[Risma · Rating 4 out of 5]

i will read this book

[gbkMnkii · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked Eveline part, but the rest of the book...hmm, just simply wasn't well written.

[Jennifer · Rating 2 out of 5]

J'aurais surtout pris la dernière partie qui était fort intéressante et surtout audacieuse pour l'époque. Les autres parties m'ont plutôt ennuyée malgré le revirement de la fin.