Vezivanja

by Emmanuelle Pagano

"L'amour plus des copeaux de bois, du produit pour les vitres, une clochette, du shampoing, des oiseaux, des écharpes, des appareils photos, des ponts, des cordes, un vélo, des instruments de musique, une canne à pêche, des brosses à cheveux, des fusils de chasse, des livres, des gélules, du carton, des lampes, des agates, des élastiques, une malle, des fruits, des lentilles de contact, des échantillons, des bateaux, des pansements, de la peinture, des arbres, des agendas, un mouchoir en tissu, du liquide vaisselle, des box, du scotch, des ballons, du savon, des soldes, une mouillette, des connexions internet, des marées, des archives, des paquets cadeaux, une pince à épiler, du mica, des mains courantes, des trams, un faon, des maquettes, un vaporisateur d'eau, des cours de médecine, des montres, des coussins brodés, des plumes, des clés, un chat, du sel, des écorces, des poupées, une émeraude, des avions, un foulard, des fleurs, des manèges, des téléphones, des crayons de couleurs, des boîtes aux lettres, une fève, des tatouages, des télés, des cartes, des miroirs, un kit de couture, des mathématiques, des chaussures, des poissons, des valises, des jeux de société, un éboulis de pierre, des bouchons auriculaires, des carnets, des bocaux en verre, des calendriers, des pantins, une table de mixage, des grains de sable, du yoga, des poids en laiton, des éclairages automatiques, un aspirateur, des trains, des fagots, des éoliennes, des insectes, et une pelote de fil."

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, France, Romance, French Literature, Literary Fiction, Contemporary

149 pages, Hardcover

First published October 3, 2013

About the author

Emmanuelle Pagano, alias Emmanuelle Salasc, née le 15 septembre 1969, dans l'Aveyron, est une écrivaine française.

Emmanuelle Pagano was born in Aveyron in September 1969. She lives today in Ardèche, with three children, born in April 1991, September 1995 and May 2003. She graduated in Fine Arts, and has done university researches in the field of esthetics in the cinema as well as the multimedia.

Reviews

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Trysting by Emmanuelle Pagano, translated by Jennifer Higgins and Sophie Lewis, was a quick read for Women in Translation month. Fragmented vignettes of love and loss, all the tiny things we notice or accept of our partners and lovers, from body hair to aging. I expected a bit more from a book titled "trysting" but nothing really sordid or questionable here. (Dang!)

[Marie-Therese · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a genuinely lovely thing this little book is! Free of an overarching plot or continuing characters, each section is essentially a story in miniature, an introduction to fresh perspectives, snapshots of individual lives. Pagano casts her net wide and we watch as people of all sexes, orientations, and ages meet, meld, and part. There is great sweetness here but also bitter anger and the deep pain of loss. Pagano has a remarkable eye for the particular and an ear for what makes an individual human voice unique and worth listening to.

Highly recommended.

[Jess · Rating 3 out of 5]

‘Anything I didn’t give him, I didn’t keep. Anything I didn’t give him is lost.’

Boldy experimental, yet elegant and authentic, Pagano’s exceptional attention to detail delivers intimate vignettes of love, loss and everything in between.

The nature of the style is certainly fragmented, and for me, I didn’t entirely feel that the snippets cohered overall; whilst each reflects, refracts and distorts earlier instalments, the overall effect is piecemeal and somewhat repetitive. In many cases, I found myself yearning for more, for context.

Ultimately, Trysting reads like a database of writing prompts. But that should not in anyway bely its greatest achievement: it describes the indescribable.

[Ends of the Word · Rating 5 out of 5]

What is Love? It is a question which poets and philosophers have long enjoyed grappling with, but whose answer remains as elusive as ever. Even if we were to consider just one type of Love - that between lovers, between partners - its manifestations are incredibly varied. Every couple has its own love story.

Emmanuelle Pagano's "Trysting" was originally published in French as "Nouons-nous". It is now available in an English translation by Jennifer Higgins and Sophie Lewis, issued by independent publishers And Other Stories. Trysting is an exploration of romantic and erotic love presented in a series of poetic vignettes in which different narrators describe aspects of their relationship. Very few of the entries exceed one page, most consist of a short paragraph, some are just one-line aphorisms. The protagonists are ordinary people from all walks of life. Only once are we allowed to guess the identity of the narrator - and that turns out to be a historical figure, explorer Lady Franklin. Frankly, this exception jars - one of the most delightful aspects of Trysting is that the couples who people it could be us, or the spouses who live down the road.

This book is as hard to define as love itself. Is it a novel? A short story collection? An anthology of prose poetry? Flash fiction? Perhaps it could be considered a "mockumentary" or fictional "vox pop". Yet, despite the variety of the lifestories and feelings evoked (happiness, loss, parting, pleasure, desire, indecision, peace, comfort, pain) there is little attempt to differentiate the narrative style. It is as if the protagonists of the book whispered their secrets to the author and entrusted her to weave them into one poetic garland, rendered in the writer's own unmistakable voice.

This is a special book which, whilst recognising and describing the heartache relationships can cause, bravely celebrates the gloriously ordinary joys of Love.

https://endsoftheword.blogspot.com/20...

[Caroline · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this. The book consists of items from packed little one-sentence statements to two-page vignettes that convey a spacious range of observations and experiences of love. The snippets are from the viewpoints of all kinds and ages of people in dozens and dozens of relationships, at all stages of the process: first sight, first meeting, deepening relationship, long-time comradeship, disastrous break-ups, death of a spouse. I really recommend it. I’m not usually one for books about love--but the art is compelling here.

I think I liked one of the very first pieces the best (the book proceeds roughly from youth to old age, but not of the same lovers). An adolescent couple gets disrupted by her father, and the revenge taken by the boy is so ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream’-like that it seems to float on air--ingenious and artistic. One would love to actually see it.

An example of the very short pieces:

He was leaning against the wall, his shadow rippling over the edge of the pavement. I stepped on it.

A little longer:

Since our son was born, she’s had a line of hair stretching from her pubic bone to her navel, sharp and black like an upside down exclamation mark. I lie alongside her top to tail to read this bravo and answer its call the right way up.

Or, for my reading friends:

I was at my desk in the study room at the library, absorbed in my reading, nicely cradled in the cone of light from my lamp and in the studious silence, in my bubble as they say. His shadow moved over me. He was doing the thing I hate, which I’ve never let anyone do before: he was reading over my shoulder. I don’t know why, but that time it didn’t bother me. I didn’t look at him. After a very brief interval of hesitation and surprise, I started to read again, and so did he, standing there behind me, having shown the delicacy to step back just enough to give me the light I needed and without ever muddying the silence, that silence libraries have, composed of litle papery noises, of chairs creaking slightly and muffled steps. His hands settled on either side of mine, which were holding my book; his down-stretched arms were like protective barriers around my space, my jealously guarded reading space, our space from now on. And without needing to see each other, our eyes moved at the same pace, paused in the same places, made the same breaks for commas, and finished sentences in perfect time. I could feel, as I turned a page, that he had read to the end of it. We were reading at the same rhythm, and since then we have taken care to maintain that rhythm, even when things aren’t great between us. We still read together, and if we lose each other over a few lines, we wait.

Lovely. Many kudos to translators Jennifer Higgins and Sophie Lewis; their choices are pitch perfect.

[jeremy · Rating 3 out of 5]

she inspects herself in the mirror from every angle, seeking imperfections. she doesn't find any, and leaves the bathroom feeling pleased and beautiful, but the mirror can't reflect something that lies just beneath the skin, something that is there, inside her, that prevents us from loving each other, that she will never see.

emmanuelle pagano's trysting (nouons-nous) is composed of a few hundred brief vignettes – some but a single sentence, others as lengthy as a page or two. capturing the marvel and mundanity of romantic relationships, both in fervor and treachery, promise and peril, the french author offers a catalogue of moments, memories, joys, betrayals, idiosyncrasies, attractions, lusts, secrets, revelations, longings, arguments, confessions, regrets, hopes, tendernesses, lies, first kisses, and the like.

we are getting old. i like the signs of aging on him, the wrinkles and folds, the emergence of moles and liver spots. i wonder if these marks appear all of a sudden or little by little. i look out for the signs of these blossomings. time is pollinating his skin with flowers, with speckles, with stars.

though revealing, authentic, and imaginative (as well as beautifully crafted), trysting becomes a little tiresome if read in too few sittings, as the voyeurism gets a bit exhausting. nonetheless, pagano's book offers some compelling glimpses into the (imaginary) lives of others, arousing envy and inducing anguish in equal measure. love is so often a mess and trysting puts on a diverse showing of the very best and worst of it all.

with her, i had that seesaw feeling of being almost happy, on the verge of a new beginning, and the certainty that always came too: this won't last.

*translated from the french by jennifer higgins and sophie lewis

[Robin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book of brief but piercing glances into relationships between people. Husbands and wives, lovers, strangers; attracted, besotted, betrayed, bewildered.

Some of them seem like excellent openings to entire novels, and I like to imagine what would come next:

"He chose me, so I must be rare. Perhaps even precious. He says: No, it was you who chose me."

"We have never wept at the same time."

"If all the men I've loved were able to cross-check the facts, if they knew each other, say, and if they were to get together and discuss me, they'd be scared stiff. I hope they never meet."

"He has a way of handling things that instantly tells me the kind of mood he's in, particularly the way he closes the door when he's going out or coming in. This morning's door wasn't a bad one."

And then there are others that, if anything was added, it would be superfluous:

"She had the dirty habit of putting her hands on the windowpanes when she was looking outside, even when I'd just cleaned them, as though seeing through windows was something done with your fingers. She had little hands. She probably still has them, those little hands, glove size seven, but I can't see them to check. I know she must, as I don't imagine she's changed size, but I can't be sure because she left me. I'm not sure when it was. I don't know how long ago it must be. The marks of her palms and fingertips are still on the windows, clearly visible when I put my mouth up close and exhale, when I bring them out with my breath. I'm worried that they'll disappear. They're still there, so it can't be long since she left. But the windows are getting grubby and they need cleaning. My friends say I should pull myself together and stop letting things go. It's about time to do a bit of housework, they say, give the windows a wipe, what with all the rain we had last year and the pollen in spring, and the pollution of the city. No, it can't be a year already. Her handprints are still there. None of my friends can explain that, none of them can tell me why her little hands are still on the windows despite all the dust, despite the months and months that have allegedly passed. I know it isn't long since she left. They're tricking me with all that stuff about rain and pollen and pollution. I breathe on the glass and see her there, hands pressed against it, looking out, and just to be sure, when I'm alone, I fix her prints to the window with hairspray."

[Readerwhy]

Fragmentteja rakkaudesta ja rakastamisesta.

Iältään, taustoiltaan, seksuaalisuuksiltaan erilaisten henkilöiden yhteentulemisia, yhdessäolemisia, eroja, arkisia tilanteita - kaikki tarkalla resoluutiolla kuvattuja. Liioiteltua lienisi väittää, että Trysting on Paganon versio Barthesin teoksesta A Lover’s discourse, mutta jokin ohut yhteinen peilinsiru niiden välillä lukiessani kulki.

Pagano tavoittaa rakkaussuhteiden pienet detaljit, niiden sisällä olevan valtavan.

”Illness has made her so thin that making love has become painful. Painful for us both. I wish she could be blooming again, bursting with health, big, full of life. But she’s dying and I hurt her. But she’s dying and she hurts me.”

*

”He wasn’t very good at using his mobile. He left me messages by accident, which were usually just the sound of him walking. I listened to them right to the end.”

*

”I found out that he was writing down everything about us, and storing our outings, our presents and journeys, not in a diary but in the form of archives, with tickets and boarding passes as evidence. His cellar was lined with shelves stuffed with files, all categorised by periods of time and by names. Girls’ names. Mine only took up half a shelf.”

*

”We went away for a romantic weekend. We hardly knew each other but already he wanted to sign my name on the postcards he wrote to his friends, his family, even his beloved old mum.”

[Lidija · Rating 4 out of 5]

Uvijek iznova podsjećam samu sebe da svatko ima svoju priču, kako god klišejizirano zvučalo. Priču dugačku, bogatu detaljima ili samo priču-detalj. Jednu rečenicu koja ga određuje - u tom trenutku ili (za)uvijek. Ljubavnu, prijateljsku, usputnu, ali ipak priču.
Emmanuelle Pagano neke od njih ovdje je zapisala. Priče od stranice ili dvije ili priče od rečenice ili dvije. Ili jednog odjeljka. Sjajno, zanimljivo, pomno odabrano.
Zanima me koje bih ja odabrala kad bih pokušala zapisati tuđe (ili svoje) priče?

[Kat at Book Thingo]

Doesn't understand the romance genre. Not for me.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/201...

[Jo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Recueil de plusieurs histoires d'amour indépendantes les unes des autres, Nouons-nous est un récit incontestablement humain et profondément touchant. Emmanuelle Pagano nous livre ici, par tranches de quelques paragraphes ou quelques lignes à peine, les épanchements romantiques et mélancoliques d'une foultitude de protagonistes différents. Si ce récit a permis à l'amoureux des mots que je suis d'être ravi grâce aux descriptions qu'il contient, je me suis, malgré moi, senti assez loin de toutes les émotions qu'évoquaient les héros.

En effet, la plupart du temps, ne nous connaissons absolument rien de la personne dans laquelle on se glisse, même pas son genre. C'est une expérience plutôt inédite de mon côté et, bien qu'elle s'avère être divertissante et intrigante, ce principe est à double-tranchant étant donné qu'il ne nous aide pas à nous identifier aux personnages et à leurs sentiments. Sans connaître leurs motivations, leur passé ou leurs désirs, difficile de vraiment vibrer au même rythme qu'eux. Emmanuelle Pagano opte pour un style éphémère et très court, très saccadé, qui plaira certainement aux amateurs du genre mais qui m'a, finalement, laissé de marbre et ne m'a permis de me rapprocher des protagonistes qui peuplent ce roman comme je l'aurais souhaité.

Cependant, comme précisément précédemment, Nouons-nous est une déclaration d'amour à l'amour et aux mots. C'est un véritable hommage à toutes les émotions qui nous traversent, nous asphyxient et nous enroulent lorsque l'autre nous épanoui ou nous renverse. À travers ces récits d'amours naissantes, vacillantes, étouffantes, exaltantes ou finissantes, l'auteure nous permet d'être noyés (de la meilleure façon possible) par un torrent de poésie, de tendresse et de nostalgie. Elle revient sur toutes les conceptions possibles et imaginables du sentiment amoureux qui reste, pourtant, si impossible à saisir.

À tâtons, alors qu'on essaye de distinguer qui est qui et qui ressent quoi, l'auteure dépeint une humanité profonde et réaliste. La maladie, la mort, la jalousie, la tromperie, le bonheur, la peur, la désillusion ou encore la liberté sous autant de thèmes abordés par Emmanuelle Pagano tout en étant tous noués au même sentiment, liés à la même racine : l'amour. Cet amour qui construit et illumine, cet amour qui dévaste et bouleverse. Chaque homme, chaque femme, chaque geste, chaque odeur est décortiqué et analysé. Les âmes et les cœurs sont ouverts et, ainsi béants, ils dépeignent, avec délicatesse et grâce, toutes les facettes que porte en lui le sentiment romantique. Malgré mon manque d'attachement pour les personnages, j'ai trouvé cette palette d'émotions extrêmement bien transcrite et absolument convaincantes.

Nouons-nous est un beau récit sur toutes les joies et les peines que nous évoque l'autre, ses retrouvailles et sa perte. Je le recommande même si je me suis senti loin des personnages principaux, il est très court et est doté de belles philosophies à découvrir sans plus tarder.

[Lorri Steinbacher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Non-traditional fiction translated from the French. Each vignette--some a mere sentence long, none over a page or two--deals with love and the ways we experience and express it. You are sure to recognize yourself somewhere in its pages. The reviewers compare the tone to Marguerite Duras and this comparison is apt.

Recommended for fans of Duras or Leanne Shapton, French fiction, and non-traditional storytelling.

[Nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting assortment of vignettes/flash fiction on love, relationships, and sex, all told in the first person. They weren't bad but I did have difficulties finishing the book because at some point I just lost interest in moving forward (I think because there just isn't enough connective tissue or context holding the pieces together). But this feels more like a case of "it's not you, it's me" b/c it's definitely intentional, and if you like that sort of thing, you should enjoy this.

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short prose pieces that serve as tiny dispatches from relationships that are fractured and fragmenting. Sometimes at the beginning of an affair, sometime at the end of a log romance. There are no characters per se, just nameless men and women falling in and out of love with other nameless men and women. Ultimately I found myself wanting more context for the doomed relationships.

[Jeremy Gavins · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just my kind of book. I have a huge memory problem which means that if I read a couple of chapters of a book and leave it for more than a day I forget what I have read. Therefore nowadays I can either read a book from cover to cover in one go or read short story type of books.

Written in short pieces which I can read then leave and come back to. Love and leave stories. Well written.

[Krayfish1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic. A collection of stories ranging from one sentence to two pages about relationships. Includes what initially attracted a person, small details that makes them fond, the aftermath of breakups. Some stories are about people who become controlling -- there are a lot of sad stories, broken up with a few joyful ones. The minutiae of the details included are delightful.

[Katrina B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

are they snippets? drabbles? some of these read beautifully - extracted and distilled and sweet like honey in gin. others read like the quick fire answers to a writing prompt, or the writing prompt itself. if the former, effective albeit forgettable; as the latter, a nice well to return to and drink from on occasion. a short quick read, both romantic and relateable to the end.

[Leeza · Rating 3 out of 5]

interesting! kind of an expanded prose poem, with individual paragraphs up to a page that each explore human relationships, connection, sex, love etc with a shifting you/I/him/her. some lovely and interesting sections, particularly when it veers more to the strange and uncanny, but felt a bit too ephemeral to make a lasting impression

[June · Rating 2 out of 5]

i’m allergic to this writing. literally. i don’t know if it was lost in translation or what, but no. and i was totally deceived by “a seductive blend of Maggie Nelson and Marguerite Duras”. idk about that.

this might read well if you owned it and read a single vignette a day for like a year?

[Kirsty · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favourites of 2016, in the category 'Best Hard-To-Describe Book Written as Tiny Vignettes About Love': http://www.kirstylogan.com/best-books...

[Helen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful writing !

[Katy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lijepo, jako i emotivno.

[Claire Steele · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this, in much the same way as I love oysters. It's not like a regular meal, but it feels real and authentic and in small quantities the best food on earth.

[Amanda Sloan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this!

[Marta Ivanović · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Između njega i mene više se ništa ne događa. U iščekivanju sam. Dok čekam, radim inventuru. Pitam se ostaje li još mnogo toga od nas na zalihama dana.”

[Sushil Goswami · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75 /5.
Unlike anything I've ever read before.
Vignettes, ranging from fleeting ephemeral to mulled over, marinated thoughts.

[Tina · Rating 3 out of 5]

“Nitko ne vidi sve što ja vidim kad je gledam”.

[Marla · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars

[Noémie · Rating 3 out of 5]

À lire en une traite ou deux max. Sinon on perd le rythme et la concentration de ces moments d’amour suspendus.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Polyphonic love in a flash.

Vignettes, ranging in length from a few words to a few pages, on love in all its forms. Here we have meetings, couplings, leavings, many of which are sensuously described.

Emmanuelle Pagano's kaleidoscopic view of love is enthralling. Each vignette is convincingly distinct. Recommended dose: sip, don't gulp.

Translated by Jennifer Higgins and Sophie Lewis.