Bonjour tristesse

by Françoise Sagan, Rainer Moritz (Translator)

Françoise Sagan war erst 19, als sie mit "Bonjour tristesse" die Welt eroberte. Ihr Roman wurde in dutzende Sprachen übersetzt, millionenfach verkauft und verfilmt. Mit großer Treffsicherheit beschreibt sie darin die Befindlichkeiten ihrer jugendlichen Hauptfigur: Cécile ist ein launischer Teenager, scharfsinnig, egoistisch, manipulativ – und dazu verdammt, den Sommer mit ihrem eitlen Vater und seiner jungen, etwas einfältigen Geliebten Elsa in einem Haus an der Côte d'Azur zu verbringen. Zunächst jedoch gelingt es Cécile, die Erwachsenen gegeneinander auszuspielen und den Aufenthalt nach ihrem Geschmack zu gestalten: in herrlicher Leichtigkeit und Freizügigkeit. Bis plötzlich die kluge Anne auftaucht, eine Freundin ihrer verstorbenen Mutter, und die sommerliche Idylle mit erzieherischer Strenge zu zerstören droht. Als der Vater Elsa verlässt und Anne heiraten will, schmiedet Cécile einen Plan – mit tragischen Konsequenzen.

Genres: Classics, Fiction, France, French Literature, Romance, Summer, Coming Of Age

174 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 15, 1954

About the author

Born Françoise Quoirez, Sagan grew up in a French Catholic, bourgeois family. She was an independent thinker and avid reader as a young girl, and upon failing her examinations for continuing at the Sorbonne, she became a writer.

She went to her family's home in the south of France and wrote her first novel, Bonjour Tristesse, at age 18. She submitted it to Editions Juillard in January 1954 and it was published that March. Later that year, She won the Prix des Critiques for Bonjour Tristesse.

She chose "Sagan" as her pen name because she liked the sound of it and also liked the reference to the Prince and Princesse de Sagan, 19th century Parisians, who are said to be the basis of some of Marcel Proust's characters.

She was known for her love of drinking, gambling, and fast driving. Her habit of driving fast was moderated after a serious car accident in 1957 involving her Aston Martin while she was living in Milly, France.

Sagan was twice married and divorced, and subsequently maintained several long-term lesbian relationships. First married in 1958 to Guy Schoeller, a publisher, they divorced in 1960, and she was then married to Robert James Westhoff, an American ceramicist and sculptor, from 1962 to 63. She had one son, Denis, from her second marriage.

She won the Prix de Monaco in 1984 in recognition of all of her work.

Reviews

[Manny · Rating 4 out of 5]

- Hello. I'm Cécile.

- Manny.

- You as bored with this party as I am?

- How bored are you?

- Very.

- I believe I'm enjoying it slightly more than you.

- Were you often this bored when you were my age?

- How old are you?

- Seventeen.

- Um... I'm trying to remember. I think so.

- So what did you do?

- I read a lot.

- Me too. Anything you'd recommend?

- Category?

- Something for a cynical girl who wants to be a famous author?

- You've read Bonjour Tristesse?

- Uh-uh.

- It might inspire you. She published it very young, and it's excellent. And the heroine's first name is the same as yours.

- Any other reasons?

- You don't like your stepmother much, do you?

- You got that one right.

- Well, it has detailed, step-by-step instructions on how to kill her and get away clean.

- Hey! Now I really must read it. Thanks.

- You're welcome.

- Want to come upstairs for a bit?

- You won't be offended if I say no?

- It's okay. I'll find some other middle-aged man to seduce. How about him over there?

- He looks promising. Good luck.

- Okay, well, nice talking. And I'll check out the book.

- I enjoyed meeting you too. Let me know what you think.

- I will. Bye.

- Bye.

[s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all] · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘My love of pleasure seems to be the only consistent side of my character.’

‘They were careless people,’ Nick says at the end of Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, ‘they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together.’ Having Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan described to me by my partner as achieving more successfully what Fitzgerald set out to do in that scene, I knew I had to read it. And I am grateful I have as Bonjour Tristesse is a startling achievement in capturing the carelessness Nick describes but from the interior life of a teenage girl as a portraiture of youthful amorality and yearning for an unbridled existence. ‘I realized that carelessness can govern our lives,’ Cécile, our teenage narrator confesses, ‘but it does not provide us with any arguments in its defense.’ Told as a reflection on the events years down the line, this a tangled web of desires with Cécile pulling the strings in a complex plot to retain her and her widower father’s hedonistic lifestyles. Since ‘all plots tend to move deathward,’ as Don DeLillo would later write, and with the sense of regret in the narration lending a foreboding air, one can deduce they are watching a slow-motion car crash. St in the amorous summer heat along the French Riviera, Bonjour Tristesse is an infectious, psychological coming-of-age tale that will have you eagerly riding along feeling complicit in this web of passion and plotting run amok

‘For what are we looking for if not to please? I do not know if the desire to attract others comes from a superabundance of vitality, possessiveness, or the hidden, unspoken need to be reassured.’

Published when the author was 18 years old—only a year older than her character, Cécile, leading to speculation of autobiographical element—Bonjour Tristesse was an instant and scandalous splash in the French literary world, with accusations of unscrupulousness and moral frivolity in this novel of sexual coming-of-age and disillusionment making it all the more alluring. As the Times reported in 1955 that ‘famed Roman Catholic novelist, François Mauriac, said the book was clearly written by the devil, and that did not harm its sales.’ Born Françoise Quoirez, she adopted the name Sagan in homage to her literary hero Marcel Proust’s Princesse de Sagan, she would go on to write numerous books, though none that ever quite matched the success of Bonjour Tristesse. The title of which is inspired by a Paul Éluard poem which opens the novel.

From the 1958 film adaptation with Jean Seberg, Deborah Kerr, and David Niven

Still, this novel of teenage amorality strapped to a roller coaster of passions and the manipulation of love affairs opened the doors to many novels we have today. During my enthusiastic time reading the novel, I kept declaring that without Sagan we would never have had Sally Rooney. Not that Sagan has a detached style the way Rooney’s can be, quite the opposite really as Cécile’s narration is full of poetic emotional intensity as her moods rise and fall abruptly in response to her situations. In a way there is a kinship with the writing in Osamu Dazai’s Schoolgirl , which also positions the narrator as responding to their social environment.

‘Oh what a tangled web we weave
When first we practice to deceive.’
- Sir Walter Scott

When Anne, a friend of Cécile’s deceased mother, comes to stay along the Riviera with Cécile and father, she quickly pushes aside the father’s young lover Elsa and the two plan to marry. Despite her massive respect for Anne’s intelligence and ability to look down upon even the wealthiest of playboy socialites, Cécile sees the impending marriage as an intrusion into the carefree existence her and her father lead (not to mention a sense of jealousy over her father’s affections) and plots to break them up. She arranges her own lover, Cyril, to playact romance with Elsa to make her father jealous and shake Anna aside in order to continue her life of luxury without rules and pleasure without restraint. ‘I would be influenced, re-oriented, remodelled by Anne,’ she fears and fears the thought of her life changing. She finds herself quite fond of a quote by Oscar Wilde that reads ‘sin is the only note of vivid color that persists in the modern world,’ and aims to embed it in the way she lives her life.

‘I made this attitude my own with far more conviction, I think, than if I had immediately put it into practice. I believed I could base my life on it…I visualized a life of degradation and moral turpitude as my ideal.’

It is a youthful desire, an aspect of the novel Sagan so perfectly leans into with a lot of self-awareness for being a teenager herself at the time or writing. While the critics of the book chastised Cécile for hedonism, her and her father—who she admits is a libertine—likely points to a bit of post-war cultural context and the emphasized valuation of freedom. France had occupation and filled with a spirit of resistance and a yearning to be free. Cécile would have grown up hearing idealized stories of heroism towards liberation, finding empowerment in a struggle against restraints and finding ‘The freedom to choose my own life, to choose myself.’ Of her father she thinks, ‘a break-up would be less painful to him than having to live a well-ordered life,’ and this statement is the heart of her desires to be unshackled from orderly natures of rules and ‘proper upbringing’ in order to retain a wild, amoral freedom that she has built her sense of self around.

‘it was for this I reproached Anne: she prevented me from liking myself. I, who was so naturally meant for happiness and gaiety, had been forced by her into a world of self-criticism and guilty conscience, where, unaccustomed to introspection, I was completely lost. And what did she bring me? I took stock: She wanted my father, she had got him. She would gradually make of us the husband and step-daughter of Anne Larsen; that is to say, she would turn us into two civilized, well-behaved and happy people’

The tragedy at the center of this story is that Cécile does in fact respect and appreciate Anne otherwise and had been excited by her coming. The two often get along, with Anne having played a big part in her upbringing and Cécile vacillates between earnestly wanting to live up to Anne’s expectations and wanting to rend the whole affair asunder. ‘How difficult she made life for us through her dignity and self-respect,’ she fumes.

‘I was not at the age when fidelity is attractive. And of course, I knew little of love: the meetings, the kisses, the weary aftermath.’

There is also an intriguing regard towards love in the book, with Cécile still young and naive as she pursues the older Cyril. French culture has an international association with romance, stemming from the depictions of love from the troubadours, the way poets like Charles Baudelaire emphasized the way art feels emotionally, and the history of French literature depicting feelings as instinctual over logical and love in ways it can exist outside of marriage, and one would not be out of line to refer to this novel as feeling, well, very French as those who had read it before me spoke of it. Love is very central to this story, but Cécile is more of a rambunctious tourist into it than anything else. There is a comedic element to the way Cyril, several years her elder (making it ideal to play act as Elsa’s partner) feeling guilty that he could have ‘had his way with her’ and being proud to tell her he resisted for her sake while Cécile is thinking more along the lines of ‘what the hell man, just take me’. The relationship dives through some interesting corkscrews in this emotional roller coaster of a novel. She even considers how she ‘had given myself to him because I knew that if I had a child, he would be prepared to take the blame,’ which is one of the many signs of her carelessness that she believes anyone but her should clean up her mess.

Sagan’s self-awareness makes this book work so well, with Cécile often shown as naive and arguing bad points Anne dismisses as ‘fashionable’ where even Cécile has to admit she is correct. Not that Cécile will ever repent, which is a major aspect of the novel. And it isn’t that she isn’t intelligent, quite the contrary, though she has no refinement and allows herself to be blown about at the mercy of her passions and flights of fancy. She is also cunning, realizing and finding ‘intense pleasure of analyzing another person, manipulating that person toward my own end.’ Sagan’s capturing of youth and the cruelties one can commit when they react from a place of reactionary emotional discomfort reads quite well and occupying Cécile’s headspace makes it easy to be swept along in the story.

‘ I have known boredom, regret, and occasionally remorse, but never sorrow,’ Cécile tells us but also admits ‘today it envelops me like a silken web, enervating and soft, and sets me apart from everybody else.’ Told somewhere down the line after the events of this story, we know right away that something will go awry and wait with baited breath the whole book to find out exactly what it is. It captures what Fitzgerald was aiming at with Nick’s speech on the carelessness of those with high social standing, retreating back to their lives with others cleaning up the wreckage, and as the novel concludes we see Cécile and her father returning to their reckless ways. Cécile admits ‘I was relieved’ when nothing of the aftermath can held against her and she casts aside Cyril in order to return to her leisurely life of pleasure, much as Nick accuses Tom and Daisy of in Gatsby. However, being told through Cécile we also see that behind the pursuit of pleasure she still does feel pain and regret, with an acknowledgement to herself ‘that poor miserable face was my doing.’ Outwardly she has moved on with nary a scar to show for it, yet at night ‘that summer returns to me with all its memories,’ and we see her haunted by it, though able to snuff those feelings out like one of her cigarettes. Yet still she admits ‘bonjour, tristesse!’ (hello, sadness).

Bonjour Tristesse is a wonderful portrait of youth, which is as brief as the novel at only 130pgs. Lovingly translated by Irene Ash, this book is infectiously written, pulling you through the ups and downs of Cécile’s moods much like the way she weaves her plot to break up love and set herself free. Beautifully constructed, this dark coming-of-age was an absolute delight.

5/5

‘Now I had caught a sudden glimpse of the marvelous mechanisms of human reflexes, and the power that lies in the spoken word. I felt sorry that I had come to it through lies.’

[Tatiana · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is why I don't read books written by teenagers. Banal and melodramatic.

A bored, spoiled 17-year old who has a bit of a crush on her playboy daddy hates her soon-to-be-stepmother. Cue never-ending angst, alcohol, scheming, glam life, underage sex, and boredom, boredom, boredom, and voila! - a bestseller and a classic.

Please, somebody, get her to do some chores so that she doesn't stuff her head with rubbish!

I am tired of such tripe being praised because of "but the author was only 17 when she wrote it!" excuse.

[Vit Babenco · Rating 5 out of 5]

Françoise Sagan is eighteen and all her artless worldview she entrusts to her romantically naive heroine.
Bonjour Tristesse – Sadness Hello… She is seventeen… She has a probing mind… And cleverness tends to increase sadness…

This strange new feeling of mine, obsessing me by its sweet languor, is such that I am reluctant to dignify it with the fine, solemn name of ‘sadness’. It is a feeling so self-indulgent and complete in itself that I am almost ashamed of it, whereas I had always looked upon sadness as being a worthy emotion. Before, I did not know what sadness was, though I knew what it was to be languorous, to have regrets and, more rarely, to feel remorse. Today it is as if I am enfolded in some silken thing, soft and enervating, that sets me apart from others.

Summer by the sea… She, her father and his mistress… No concerns… No worries… Everything is wondrous and beautiful… She dreams to live her life carelessly…
Then the girl learns that the old friend of her late mother comes to stay with them…

She was pleasant yet distant. Everything about her denoted an unwavering will and a serenity that was actually intimidating. Although she was divorced and, in that sense, free, she was not known to have lovers. In any case, we did not move in the same circles: she spent her time with people who were sharp, intelligent and discreet, whereas the people we spent time with were noisy and insatiable – all that my father asked of them was that they be either good-looking or amusing.

A man and two women – is it something like a triangle? The girl watches… She grows anxious… But she has her own boyfriend…

But Cyril was there and he was all I needed to think about. In the evenings we would often go out together to nightclubs in Saint-Tropez, where we would dance to the swooning rhythms of a clarinet, murmuring words of love that I had forgotten by the following morning but that at the time had sounded so sweet.

One fine evening the disposition of forces radically changes… She finds out that all the attention of her father is directed at the newcomer… The daughter is in rage…

‘You take a red-headed girl to the seaside, to sun that she can’t cope with, and when she’s all peeling you abandon her. It’s too easy! And what am I supposed to say to Elsa?’
Anne had turned back towards him wearily. He was smiling at her and wasn’t listening. I could not have been more exasperated.
‘I’m… I’m going to tell her that my father has found another lady to go to bed with and that she should get lost, is that it?’

The girl doesn’t wish to change anything in her carefree existence… And she turns her childish egotism into an instrument of doom…
Even innocence may become an implement of evil.

[Jim Fonseca · Rating 4 out of 5]

A seventeen-year-old girl and her father are stumbling through life after the death of her mother, his wife. The father is a poster child for poor parenting. He brings a series of women into the home and takes his daughter to parties and casinos where she interacts with much older men, dancing, drinking and smoking. (After all, this is France.)



Finally he may settle down and marry one of the women, but the daughter, dreading rules and regulations, bed-time and study hours, spins a web of intrigue around them.

The result? Well, let’s remember the title translates as “Hello Sadness.” (The book is translated from the French.)

As I was reading this very short book (you can read its 127 pages in a sitting) I occasionally thought that it was a bit of stretch to believe that a seventeen-year-old girl could philosophize this deeply about love, life and men, and then I read that the author was nineteen when she wrote this book. Amazing!



Sagan (1935-2004) wrote about 20 novels and led an interesting life. Married twice, she had affairs with men and women. She led the life of a ‘playgirl,’ hanging out with folks like Truman Capote and Ava Gardner. She drove fast cars, liked to gamble, and eventually became addicted to pills and cocaine.

Fans of Proust will be interested to know that the author’s family name was Quoirez but she took the name Sagan from the character ‘Princesse de Sagan’ in Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time. Bonjour Tristesse is by far her best-known work. I also read and enjoyed another of her novels, The Leash.

Top photo of the former Crystal Casino in Nice, demolished after WW II. From thegoodlifefrance.com
The author from harpersbazaar.com

[Revised, picture and shelves added 8/2/23]

[Fabian · Rating 4 out of 5]

The French seventeen year-old girl narrator is at once astute AND childish. The dolce vita of youth and leisure is intoxicating, to partake in or merely read about, and her bohemian experiences and attitudes give the work a refreshing polish. This is somewhat of the opposite of "Catcher in the Rye" since Cecile is experienced, active, cool, while Holden Caulfield. has all the naivete of a newborn, is more of a spectator & is simply, when all is said & done, just duh-hull.

[Megha · Rating 3 out of 5]

Being stuck on the runway for three hours with Bonjour Tristesse in hand is no fun, I tell you.

I read this at a time when I had a lot on my plate. I didn't have enough patience to be concerned about the problems of a bunch of vain people who are wealthier than Scrooge McDuck, who spend their days sun-bathing and surfing and whose evenings are dedicated to drinking and dancing.

Yeah, I agree it is well-written for an 18 year old author. But it is also so superficial. It is natural that the 17 year old narrator acts like a teenager. What is extremely annoying is that all the adults behave like teenagers as well. The average IQ of all the characters in this book is likely to be very low. They simply blame the heat for all their stupidity.

Let's meet these characters:

Cecile: spoiled daughter of a rich dad. Her life sucks right now, because her dad's girlfriend is trying to make her study for an exam and doesn't let her sleep with the pretty boy. Could it be any worse!

Raymond: rich, irresponsible, promiscuous.
Hey, Raymond, you have a daughter to look after, remember?

Elsa: beautiful, fashionable, DUMB.
Occupation: being a mistress to rich men.

Cyril: 25 year old boy that Cecile finds attractive. Considering how he gets involved into Cecile's schemes, probably not too bright.

Anne: cold, calculating, condescending. She decided she wanted Raymond in her life, followed him down to his beach-house, wore a flattering dress one evening and voila! mission accomplished.


**** HERE BE A MAJOR SPOILER. LOOK AWAY. ****

I do have sympathy for Anne's tragic end, but there is this another voice in my head that wants to shout at Anne: What are you, a silly teenager?! A woman her age should know better than to end her life over a short relationship with a frivolous man known to be loose with women. Anne's action is also difficult to digest as there was no indication of love or any real emotion in their relationship. The two barely even spoke.
Damn, this heat. Look where it got her!

****

I spent the rest of the flight reading The Stranger which, like this one, featured French people who spent a lot of time on the beach and cursed the heat. But then there was so much more too. Way better!

[Steven Godin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Françoise Sagan's amoral novel of a schoolgirl's summer romance, scandalised French society at the time, and, in the process, catapulted her into the limelight, at age only eighteen. Not that it really did her any good, being blighted by drink, drugs and unhappy relationships thereafter.

The narrative is told by seventeen-year-old Cécile, holidaying on the Côte d'Azur with her widowed father, a roué who has brought along his young girlfriend. The daughter is exploring her own first sentimental and sensual adventure, a swiftly consummated romance with a handsome law student, when the unexpected arrival of an older woman, a friend of her late mother, disrupts the self-indulgent haze of high summer. First the newcomer takes charge, ordering Cécile to terminate her romance in order to stay indoors and do her homework. Then she and the father fall in love. To prevent their marriage the daughter devises an ill-fated plot in which the pretence of an affair between her boyfriend and the father's dumped girlfriend is intended to provoke jealousy and restore the status quo.

The amorality and sensualism of the characters seem less shocking today, but on the whole the book won me over for two reasons - it's matter-of-fact, existential style that evoked Albert Camus, and the setting - the sun and the sea of the French Riviera, plus of course there's the sex, the gambling, and riding about in fast automobiles. Bonjour Tristesse stands today as a fascinating look at a France that no longer exists. It is an invocation of an era, of a time when young people were beginning to seek freedom from the strict bourgeois society of France after the end of WW2.

Loved the movie as well, probably just as much as the book.

[Celeste Corrêa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Portuguese/ English

Será que, no fundo, todos carregamos memórias de verões que nos mudaram para sempre? Que Cécile restará daquele Verão dos seus dezassete anos?

Os 17 anos de Cécile foram marcados pela liberdade, mas também pelo peso das suas próprias escolhas e sombras que penso nunca se terão dissipado para sempre. Há um tom de melancolia neste livro. O preço da liberdade e a irreversibilidade de certas decisões. Euforia, rebeldia da juventude e a melancolia das consequências deixam um rasto que se prolonga para lá das suas páginas.

Quantos acordamos dizendo: Bom Dia, Tristeza? Todos, penso… É a consciência da maturidade. Há beleza na melancolia do nosso património emocional pessoal e intransmissível. Quem resiste a fazer-lhe uma visita, nem que seja de vez em quando, em dias mais sombrios ou no desânimo das noites sem sono?

Não há adeuses para sempre. Mesmo que todos os anos mudemos de praia. Em qualquer praia, o mar bate na areia.

.........................................................

Do we all, deep down, carry memories of summers that changed us forever? What remains of Cécile from that seventeenth summer? Her seventeenth year was filled with freedom but also with the weight of her own choices—shadows that, I believe, never fully faded. There is a feeling of sadness in this book—the cost of freedom and the fact that some decisions cannot be undone. Excitement, youthful rebellion, and the sadness of consequences leave a mark that stays even after the last page is turned.

How many of us wake up saying: Good Morning, Sadness? That is maturity—the awareness that life brings both joy and regret. There is beauty in the sadness of our personal, unspoken emotional memories. Who can resist revisiting them from time to time, on darker days or sleepless nights?

Goodbyes are never truly final. No matter how many beaches we change, the sea always meets the sand.

[Helga زن زندگی آزادی مرد میهن آبادی · Rating 5 out of 5]

Second time reading this book made me change my 4 star rating to 5.
How our perspective and ideas change and evolve with the passage of time!

Love is the most wonderful thing in the world. What does the price matter? The important thing is not to become embittered and jealous.

Françoise Sagan was only 18 years old when she wrote her first novel, Bonjour Tristesse .The title is taken from Paul Éluard’s poem À peine défigurée.

Love made me live with my eyes wide open, yet with my head in the clouds; I was pleasant and peaceable.

The story is told by 17 year old Cécile and revolves around her complex relationship with Raymond, her Don Juan of a father and Anne, her late mother’s friend.

We had all the makings of a drama: there was a seducer, a vamp and a woman who knew her own mind.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this very much. I read it when I was a teenager - I remember devouring all the bits about love and sex etc - basically being jealous of Cécile - so much happening to her and she is only 17! And now reading it again, aged 53 - I still love it. The psychology rings true and is in fact quite remarkable, as Sagan wrote this - her first book at the age of 18. After failing her exams to continue at the Sorbonne - she took herself off to the family's villa in the south of France and wrote this book there. If you know the story - then these themes are part of Cécile's life too - her soon to be stepmother Anne is adamant that she must study for her entrance exams - to university.

The only point where I felt - as in several other books - I have the same complaint - the ending, the drama of the ending is hyped beyond what is absolutely necessary. It would have been more than enough for Anne, the stepmother to drive off and leave the self-indulgent pair - father and daughter, to their decadent life-style.

What elevates this book, I think, is Cécile's scrupulous self-assessment in relation to the other characters. She knows for example that Anne would be good for her. She has already stated that her father taking her to his parties in Paris and disappearing with an attractive girl for the night - is not the norm. Cécile has also noted the looks when she is with her father, a 17 year-old with a 40 year old and understood that those sly looks means they are perceived as a couple - icky !

This book was written in 1954 - and is remarkably open in its sexually liberated discussions between father and daughter. Cécile is fully aware of her father's sex-life but also knows that the shortness of his attachments are compensated for by his kindness and affection - towards his mistresses. I liked this analysis - I am continually surprised actually that an eighteen year old could write such psychologically complete characters. The difference in myself reading it as a teenager compared with now is quite clear. I know for certain that I was drawn in by the broad strokes of the novel's plot - that I fully understood Cécile's anguish at being locked in her room; her shock and anger when she is banned from seeing Cyril and the lack of support from her father who had previously given her so much freedom. Anne now makes all the decisions concerning Cécile.

As a mature reader, however, I can see all the subtleties. How Cécile is conflicted; she is tortured by her plot against Anne taking off under its own steam, and she trys to reassure herself by asserting that her father is an adult, responsible for his own actions and decisions and yet she knows it is her understanding of his character that allowes her revenge plot to work.

In fact the more I think about this book, the more astonished I am at how the wrench and conflict of emotions is betrayed so clearly in such a simple style and in basically a very simple story.

I think there are some strong anthropological issues being presented here - for example Anne wins Raymond's heart, expunges his mistress Elsa from the villa and enjoys a sexually fulfilling and satisfying relationship with him in front of the seventeen year old AND at the same time bans Cécile from exploring her own sexuality with the attractive, young man from next door. How unfair? There are strong ties and boundaries being displaced and evolved here - the missing mother, sexual freedom for who? disruption of the tie between father and daughter and yet Anne is both right and undeniably wrong.

There are probably only a rare handful of books which could hold my attention as both a teenager and an adult - kudos to this one.

[persephone ☾ · Rating 5 out of 5]

have you ever read a book and liked it so much that you wanted to re-read it almost immediately after finishing it ? well that's exactly what's happening to me right now. ugh i truly believe in 20th century french authors (especially female authors) supremacy 🛐

[Gabrielle (Reading Rampage) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Teenage girls. I hate them.

This short, beautifully written yet incredibly straightforward novel shocked everyone when it was published in France in the 50s. It had been written by a woman still in her teens and spoke frankly and plainly of sex and atheism, the narrator’s voice detached and amoral. Now, it’s no longer shocking – it’s mostly sad, a quick glimpse into the selfish and decadent life of post-war upper class Parisians. The story could be melodramatic, but somehow, Sagan doesn’t allow that easy mistake to happen. It is much more a product of the literature of the era, unaffected and matter of fact. That she wrote it at 18 goes to show that teenage girls have always had a fascination for tragedies, but she had the brain and talent necessary to turn the tale of a disastrous summer vacation into a melancholy story about the discovery of the nature of love and its consequences.

A seventeen year old girl named Cécile, and her widowed father Raymond, go spend the summer in a villa by the sea on the Côté d’Azur. Raymond is a womanizer who has never bothered to hide his lifestyle from Cécile, and he brings along his younger mistress Elsa with them. Cécile meets a young law student named Cyril and begins a budding romance with him. This could have been a perfect summer if Cécile’s late mother’s friend Anne had not decided to join them…

Anne is everything Elsa is not: she is very cerebral, she has a career, she is divorced and independent - she is very "comme il faut", respectable. Cécile at first can’t believe that Anne and her father would be interested in each other, but lo and behold, not only do they get together, but they quickly announce their engagement. Cécile, resentful to find that Anne won’t tolerate her indolent and spoiled lifestyle any longer, hatches a cruel plan to separate her from her father, by manipulating both Elsa and Cyril.

This book does not have a happy ending, and made me think both of Duras and Camus in the resigned attitude of their conclusion. One is tempted to close this book, raise a glass of wine and sadly toast: “C’est la vie!”.

The prose is gorgeous, vivid and quite sensual. If you can tolerate terrible teenage girls, this is absolutely worth a few hours.

[Dolors · Rating 3 out of 5]

“Adieu tristesse,
Bonjour tristesse.
Tu es inscrite dans les lignes du plafond.
Tu es inscrite dans les yeux que j’aime
Tu n’es pas tout à fait la misère,
Car les lèvres les plus pauvres te dénoncent
Par un sourire.
Bonjour tristesse.
Amour des corps aimables.
Puissance de l’amour
Dont l’amabilité surgit
Comme un monstre sans corps.
Tête désappointée.
Tristesse, beau visage.”
Paul Éluard, “À Peine Défigurée”

“Adieu Tristesse
Bonjour Tristesse
Farewell Sadness
Hello Sadness
You are inscribed in the lines on the ceiling
You are inscribed in the eyes that I love
You are not poverty absolutely
Since the poorest of lips denounce you
Ah with a smile
Bonjour Tristesse
Love of kind bodies
Power of love
From which kindness rises
Like a bodiless monster
Unattached head
Sadness beautiful face.”
Paul Éluard, “Barely Disfigured”

As in Paul Éluard’s poem, sadness and foreboding soak this short narrative tingeing it with subtle melancholy disguised in frivolous characters and superficial undertone. The irredeemable burden of selfishness, the strain of a guilty conscience, the disillusionment of unveiled truth, the weight of wrong decisions taken on impulse impregnate the voice of capricious and pampered Cécile, a precocious seventeen year-old girl , who discloses a confession rather than the memories of a summer spent in a paradisiacal villa in the south of France. Céline’s charming and irresponsible father Raymond treats her with the courtesy and tenderness more becoming of a lover than a paternal figure and his refusal of all notions of fidelity and serious commitment defines Cécile’s approach to relationships as passing, rapid, violent and passionate affairs as well as a lifestyle full of free love, lavish luxury, debauchery and hedonistic pleasures.

“Although I didn’t share my father’s aversion to ugliness, which often led us to associate with stupid people, I felt vaguely uncomfortable with anyone devoid of physical charms.” (p.5)

None of her father’s numerous and shallow mistresses has ever threatened to disrupt Céline and Raymond’s unshakable duo until the arrival of Anne, a perspicacious and discerning old friend of Cécile’s deceased mother. Anne’s more traditional, serious and sensible conduct, which represents the conventional idea of love, marriage and responsibility that Céline so much detests, jeopardizes her precious freedom and carefree existence when her father unexpectedly announces his intention of marrying her.
Blinded by her self-interests and unconscious jealousy of Anne for banishing her from being the apple of Raymond’s eye, Cécile starts plotting a plan with Cyril, his young and golden skinned summer lover, to recover her former bourgeoisie and unorthodox life with her father.

“I feared boredom and tranquility more than anything. In order to achieve serenity, my father and I had to have excitement, and this Anne was not prepared to admit.” (p.82)

Bonjour Tristesse was published in 1954, when Françoise Sagan was barely eighteen years old after having failed her foundation-year examinations at the Sorbonne. She replaced her original surname by a nom de plume taken from Proust’s character the Princesse de Sagan and her rebellious coming-of-age novel became both a huge success and a scandal for the underlying skepticism regarding conventional institutions like marriage and family as well as for the subtle hint of a disturbing incestuous nature of father-daughter relationship that impregnates the story.

Sagan soon became representative of the bored and disillusioned young generation whose main focus was a superfluous existence immersed in self-indulgence and decadent pleasure. But both the confessional timbre and the satirical tone of Sagan’s voice reverberating in a controlled, even austere writing style, which doesn’t succumb to lyricism or redundant literary ornaments, shows me otherwise. There is sadness in lonely people trying to fill their artificial relationships with glib gratification. There is sadness in daily conversations revealing the meaninglessness of a life dissipated, with no clear direction. There is sadness in evoking a decisive moment lost in time, when silence became too heavy of a burden to carry and the sound of fear overcame the music of righteousness, creating a dissonant path of no return. There is sadness in shame and remorse. There is sadness in a sense of loss.

Oscar Wilde implied deceit inherently thrives in modern times: “ “Sin is the only note of vivid color that persists in the modern world.” Both Céline and Sagan knew decisions can’t be unmade and that they come with burdensome and sometimes unpardonable consequences. One can be courageous and face past transgressions with integrity or elude guilt and create a groundless existence based on self-deception and forgetfulness while being condemned to never get rid of the unbearable lightness of perennial sadness. Reality might prove to be as complex as human beings are ignorant, but Céline’s preference to tread the second path proved such an anticlimax that I couldn’t get over the irony of choosing sadness to avoid remorse while bearing the ignominy of it all with a distorted smile plastered on Céline's pretty and tanned face.

“A strange melancholy pervades me to which I hesitate to give the grave and beautiful name of sadness.” (p. 3)

[ZaRi · Rating 3 out of 5]

دوران راهنمایی بودم ؛دقیق یادم نیست کلاس دوم ،شاید هم سوم که می رفتم سراغ کتابخانه پدر و برادر هایم. پدرم علیرغم تشویق همیشگی به مطالعه و کتابخوانی چندان خوش نداشت دوران مدرسه شبها تا دیروقت بیدار بمانم و مطالعه کنم.نگران وضعیت درسیم بود.برای همین کتابهایی که قطعشان کوچکتر بود را مخفیانه برمیداشتم و میگذاشتم لای کتاب درسی و به خیال خودم هم که هیچکس نمی فهمد که چه میکنم. «سلام بر غم» جزو کتابهایی بود که قاچاقی خواندمش و اتفاقن خیلی هم چسبید! هر چند تقریبن بیشتر وقتها هنگام مطالعه مچم را میگرفتند. خلاصه اینکه خواندنهای دزدکی آن دوران لذتی عجیب داشت.هنوز با دیدن نام این کتاب آن لذت برایم زنده می شود.

[Ashley (back!) · Rating 4 out of 5]

rtc <3

-

starting this because i have to return it soon!

dedicating this read to my dear friend eva <3

[Blair · Rating 5 out of 5]

This short and sparkling novel was famously published when the author was just 18 years old. While the same length as some short stories, Bonjour Tristesse feels fully-formed and deftly plotted. The narrator, Cécile, is a 17-year-old girl enjoying an extended summer holiday in the south of France with her father. Cécile is pampered, spoilt and somewhat bratty; her father, who she worships, is a louche and charming womaniser. They see themselves as free spirits, although their 'easy' lifestyle is, of course, only enabled by their significant wealth. At the beginning of the book they are staying in a villa along with Daddy's current mistress, Elsa (more than a decade his junior), and doing little other than sunbathing, swimming and socialising. Cécile is also conducting a half-hearted (on her side) romance with a young man, Cyril, who is staying in the same resort. This dreamy equilibrium is disturbed when her father invites a female acquaintance of his own age - Anne, best friend of Cécile's late mother - to join the trip. Anne's presence provokes Cécile's jealousy and uspets the balance of her father's relationship with Elsa, leading our narrator to devise a deadly plan.

The narrative captures the melodrama and insouciance of teenage years so well. I'm tempted to say it's incredible that the author managed this when she was still so young herself, but maybe this is the sort of insight you could only have while still living the experience? In any case, Cécile is an incredibly well-drawn teenager and her characterisation displays a remarkable self-awareness on Sagan's part. I was drawn back into that strange mix of overreacting to the smallest things while at the same time disregarding some of the biggest; Cécile's father's romance with Anne is the end of the world, and Anne's insistence that she should study for exams nothing short of a life-ruining catastrophe, but Cyril's apparent love for her is just a game, one she is not prepared to indulge fully because he likes her too much. Cécile may be selfish and petulant, but her naivety allows for insights the adults sometimes miss. About her father's engagement, for example, 'I had so often seen him happy on account of a woman' - well, indeed! There is also, sometimes, a sense that the novel is written from a future standpoint, that of a mature woman reflecting on her youth. Perhaps this, too, is typical of the character/author's age: when you're 18, the stuff you did when you were 17 seems a million miles away.

With a precocious teenage protagonist, over-privileged rich people swanning around doing whatever they want, and a 26-year-old man 'falling in love' with a girl who isn't even out of school, you'd think I would have absolutely hated this. In fact I thought it was utterly brilliant; I can't find anything critical to say about it at all. I should have read Bonjour Tristesse a long time ago, and I heartily recommend it to anyone who hasn't - it only takes about an hour to get through and it's well worth such a small portion of your time.

[Semjon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Der Titel dieses Klassikers aus dem Jahr 1954 ist etwas verwirrend, denn ich hatte eine kleine Novelle voller Traurigkeit und Schwermut erwartet. Tatsächlich ist diese Geschichte der 17jährigen Cecile, die mit ihrem Vater an der Cote d'Azur den Sommer verbringt, geprägt von Lebensfreude, Genuss und Freizügigkeit. Dies hat mich sehr überrascht, denn ich hatte mich auf ein Buch einer damals 19jährigen Autorin eingestellt, das aus einer jugendlichen Sicht die Probleme des Heranwachsens thematisiert.

Ich fand das Buch ganz hervorragend und kann die Aufregung nachvollziehen, die es seinerzeit in Frankreich ausgelöst haben muss. Wir reden vom Anfang der 50er Jahre, da steckte die deutsche Nachkriegsliteratur noch schwer in der Aufarbeitung der nahen Vergangenheit und das Wunder von Bern war das erste Mal, dass wieder kollektive Freunde herrschen durfte. Und in dieser Zeit schreibt Francoise Sagan eine Geschichte, in dem mit vielen moralischen Wertvorstellung gebrochen wird, insbesondere das freizügige Erleben der eigenen Sexualität bei jungen Frauen und das positive Darstellung der wechselnden Liebschaften des Vaters. Dass das katholische geprägte Frankreich aufschrie, wen wundert es? Unter heutigen Gesichtspunkten wirken die Abenteuer von Vater und Tochter in diesem Sommer eher alltäglich und harmlos, was aber der Qualität des Buchs keinen Abbruch tut.

Raymond, der Vater Ceciles, ist ein agiler 40jähriger, der eine junge Geliebte mit den Urlaub nimmt. Zudem lädt er aber auch eine ältere Freundin der verstorbenen Ehefrau in das Sommerhaus ein. Anne ist eine hübsche Pariserin, eine Dame von Welt, korrekt, strukturiert und besonnen. Die Vernunft in Person. Sie steht im Gegensatz zu den freien Geistern von Raymond und Cecile. Nachdem sich Raymond von seiner jungen Geliebten trennt und beschließt, Anne zu heiraten, bricht für die Cecile eine unbeschwerte Welt zusammen. Anne nimmt die Stellung einer strengen Stiefmutter ein und sie fühlt sich zwischen lockerer Jugend und verantwortungsvollem Erwachsenenleben hin und her gerissen. Hinzu kommt, dass sie die Genüsse der Liebe erstmals in diesem Sommer kennen lernt, als sie sich in den Studenten Cyril verliebt. Dieses Fünfergespann ist der Dreh- und Angelpunkt der Geschichte, die letztlich in einer Tragödie endet, die ganz am Ende die Traurigkeit in Ceciles Leben Einzug halten lässt. Und so ist Bonjour Tristesse auch der letzte Satz des Romans.

Mir hat vor allem dieser leichte und unbeschwerte Schreibstil der Autorin gefallen, so warm und luftig wie ein Passatwind, der über das Mittelmeer zieht. Das Lebensgefühl der jungen Französin wird hervorragend in Worte gefasst. Sehr schön.

[☘Misericordia☘ ⚡ϟ⚡⛈⚡☁ ❇️❤❣ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Un roman particulièrement charmant. Je l'ai lu comme un enfant et je suis sûr que cela m'a fait susceptible au genre romantique.

Q:
My love of pleasure seems to be the only consistent side of my character. Is it because I have not read enough? (c)
Q:
La liberté de penser, et de mal penser et de penser peu, la liberté de choisir moi-même ma vie, de me choisir moi-même. Je ne peux dire ˝d´être moi-même˝, puisque je n´étais rien qu´une pâte modelable, mais celle de refuser les moules. (c)
Q:
A Strange melancholy pervades me to which I hesitate to give the grave and beautiful name of sorrow. The idea of sorrow has always appealed to me but now I am almost ashamed of its complete egoism. I have known boredom, regret, and occasionally remorse, but never sorrow. Today it envelops me like a silken web, enervating and soft, and sets me apart from everybody else. (c)
Q:
I did not find him absurd. I saw he was kind, that he was on the verge of real love. I thought it would be nice for me to be in love with him, too. (c)
Q:
Il arrive un âge où ils ne sont plus séduisants, ni «en forme», comme on dit. Ils ne peuvent plus boire et ils pensent encore aux femmes; seulement ils sont obligés de les payer, d'accepter des quantités de petites compromissions pour échapper à leur solitude. Ils sont bernés, malheureux. C'est ce moment qu'ils choisissent pour devenir sentimentaux et exigeants… J'en ai vu beaucoup devenir ainsi des sortes d'épaves. (c)

[Georgia Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

The beauty of this novel is its simplicity. A croissant compared to hulking meals that take chunks of your life to get through, it is short. Yet, I was left perfectly satisfied.

The setting is summer and the seaside. Could it get any better? Oh, you're just out of school. How is that for a start? You're the pampered daughter of a young widowed dad. He has women fighting over him. And you find a boyfriend who is considerate, intelligent, kind, and good looking. He has a boat. You get to swim every day. You are slim like him and French.

That's the good part. But, events will take a turn. It's all going to be your fault. So, let's borrow from Charles Dickens who wrote: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness . . . . " That about describes (without giving anything away) this coming of age story about messing things up. Written when Francoise Sagan was a teenager herself and had failed the entrance exams to university, it is candid and straight as a number line at school.

Where Dickens is moralistic, Sagan can seem the opposite. Yet, there is wisdom here. It doesn't take long to tell. This is not A Tale of Two Cities. Five characters are all you have to remember. Still, its message is clear. ACTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES! No, not pregnancy this time. Read it and find out for yourself. Have a swim. The water is beautiful.

[benedicta]

someone said this author would have loved Lana Del Rey 🎀

[Kayley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Men spend years reading books and studying philosophy to try and comprehend what Françoise Sagan knew at 18

[Tahani Shihab · Rating 3 out of 5]

“إنني أتردد في أن أخلع، على هذا الشعور المجهول الذي يلاحقني ملله وحلاوته، اسم الحزن الجميل. إنه شعور كامل، أناني، إلى حد أني أكاد أخجل منه، بينما بدا الحزن دائماً لي شريفًا.
لم أكن أعرفه، ولكنني أعرف الملل والأسف، ونادرًا الندم. واليوم، يلتف عليّ شيء كالحرير، مثير وناعم، يفصلني عن الآخرين."

“كانت السعادة دائمًا، بالنسبة إليّ، تعويضًا عن كل شيء”.

[Ana Cristina Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Escrita en 1954 por una joven de 19 años, esta breve novela causó un gran impacto y abrió el camino a unas generaciones de jóvenes que plasmaron su descontento con la sociedad tradicional en el Mayo del 68. Leída hoy en día no es más que una historia agradable y bien contada; todo el escándalo que suscitó en su día nos resulta difícil de entender.

Situada en un verano dorado en la Costa Azul, es un canto al placer y a la libertad, pero al mismo tiempo está presente el remordimiento por no vivir una existencia más ordenada y convencional. Así se expresa el dilema de una generación desgarrada entre las normas de una sociedad conservadora y el deseo de vivir de manera más plena.

La protagonista es Cécile, que a los 17 años es una joven malcriada, ya que su padre viudo no le impone normas de conducta. Ambos viven para la diversión y el placer, en su mansión al lado del mar disfrutan de las fiestas y la bebida. Raymond, el padre, tiene consigo a su última amante, Elsa, a la que Cécile acepta de buen grado. La aparición de Anne, una amiga de su madre, que es una mujer madura, atractiva y con mucha clase, lo cambia todo, ya que Cécile teme que imponga orden y acabe con su tren de vida.

Tal como ella declara:

El amor al placer, a la felicidad, representa el único aspecto coherente de mi carácter.

Solía repetirme a mí misma fórmulas lapidarias, la de Oscar Wilde, entre otras: ‘El pecado es la única nota viva de color que subsiste en el mundo moderno.’.

Creo que lo que impactó en su momento es que tanto la protagonista como la autora eran tan jóvenes.

La novela es muy agradable de leer, está escrita de manera simple y ágil y nos transporta a un entorno placentero y sensual. Las descripciones resaltan este disfrute de la vida en todos los aspectos:

Como no me prestaba atención, me acomodé tranquilamente en un escalón con una taza de café y una naranja e inicié las delicias de la mañana: mordía la naranja y brotaba un zumo azucarado de mi boca. Inmediatamente un sorbo de café negro y ardiente, y de nuevo el frescor del fruto.

Pensé en Cyril, me hubiese gustado que me cogiese en sus brazos, en aquella terraza acribillada por las cigarras y la luna.

Pero la tristeza del título es la culpabilidad que nace de un conflicto no resuelto entre el placer y el deber, algo que en la literatura de nuestros días ya está superado. Cécile vacila continuamente entre las dos visiones de la vida que representan la disciplinada Anne y el hedonismo de su padre:

Mi padre y yo, para estar interiormente tranquilos, necesitábamos la agitación exterior. Y eso Anne era incapaz de admitirlo.

En resumen, creo que es una obra que vale la pena conocer, ya que en su momento fue todo un fenómeno social e influyó en el cambio que se gestaba en los años 50. También hay una película de Otto Preminger del mismo nombre protagonizada por Jean Seberg, David Niven y Deborah Kerr.

Y me quedo con la frase que abre el libro, que es de aquellas para enmarcar:

A ese sentimiento desconocido cuyo tedio, cuya dulzura me obsesionan, dudo en darle el nombre, el hermoso y grave nombre de tristeza.

[Shovelmonkey1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

So what to say about Cecile and her incessant scheming? Apparently a summer on the Med, smoking and drinking on daddy's dollar (or franc) is not enough for well bred young ladies these days. Where swimming, sunbathing and generally being a bright young thing were once enough, Cecile ups the ante and decides that a more diverting way to spend the summer is to plot the downfall of her fathers current relationship and in between times, try to loose her virginity to the likeable but none too bright older man with the boat.A girl with undoubtedly cruel intentions (and probably a battered and dog-eared copy of Les Liasons Dangereuse by Laclos tucked under her mattress). Unfortunately all the drinking, smoking and generally being louche don't actually cancel out a moral conscience and before she knows it her frankly childish meddlings are moving at a pace she can no longer control and she veers between desperate guilt and ambivalence as events unfold. Ultimately the characters offer you very little to love about them - Cecile is naieve and manipulative, Anne is a control freak in a Chanel twin-piece and dear old daddy is an aging play boy with a slightly disturbing penchant for girls much closer to his daughters age than his own.

Francoise Sagan wrote this book at the age of 18 then presumably sat down, lit a cigarette and pouted over how to spend the next 60 years given that she'd already written her great masterpiece which clearly extols her youthful genius.

Youthful or not,it is a great read, and I liked it a lot. It's tightly controlled and well put together; a master class in how to be a moody teen but with the classic teen scent of festering bedroom cancelled out by the faint eau de nil of youthful genius.

[Alexander Carmele · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eskapistisch-verträumt bis zur Schmerzgrenze: die Côte d’Azur als Roman

Inhalt: 4/5 Sterne (eskapistischer Sommerurlaub)
Form: 4/5 Sterne (leicht-locker, fröhlich-larmoyant)
Erzählstimme: 5/5 Sterne (reflektierte Ich-Erzählerin)
Komposition: 3/5 Sterne (hölzern, überzeugend im Abschluss)
Leseerlebnis: 4/5 Sterne (schaurig-verschämte Urlaubsstimmung)

Mit siebzehn Jahre debütierte Françoise Sagan mit Bonjour Tristesse (1954) und gehört zu den meistverkauften Romanen der französischen Literaturgeschichte und schaffte es sogar auf den Index „der verbotenen Bücher“ des Vatikans. Im Zentrum, ähnlich angelegt wie Max Frischs Homo Faber (1957) steht nämlich ein etwas eigenartiger Lebensentwurf von einer siebzehnjährigen Tochter und ihrem vierzigjährigen Vater, nachdem die Mutter früh verstorben ist:

Mein Vater war vierzig Jahre alt und seit fünfzehn Jahren verwitwet; er war jung, voll Lebenskraft, voller Möglichkeiten […] Er war ein leichtlebiger Mensch, geschickt in seinem Beruf, immer begierig nach neuen Erlebnissen und schnell ihrer überdrüssig – und er gefiel den Frauen. Es machte mir keine Schwierigkeiten, ihn von ganzem Herzen zu lieben, denn er war gut, großzügig, fröhlich und voll Zuneigung für mich.

Skandalös wirkte insbesondere das selbstbewusste, fröhliche, eigenwillige Auftreten der Ich-Erzählerin Cécile, die gerade erst durchs Examen gefallen, überhaupt nicht daran denkt, auch nur ansatzweise eine Ernsthaftigkeit zu entwickeln. Das sollen schön andere tun. Als eine Mutterfigur zu ihnen in den Sommerurlaub tritt, besagte Anne Larsen, unternimmt sie alles, eine Heirat zwischen dieser und ihrem Vater zu verhindern, um weiterhin das Leben der Bohème, des Leichtsinns, der Unerwachsenheit zu führen, unbekümmert und frei:

Ich dachte nicht an ihn, als ich den Plan faßte, Anne wieder aus unserem Leben zu verstoßen. Ich wußte, daß er sich trösten würde, wie er sich über alles tröstete. Ein Bruch würde ihm weniger schwerfallen als ein geregeltes Leben; wirklich treffen, wirklich zerrütten konnten ihn nur die Gewohnheit und das ewige Einerlei – genau wie mich. Wir gehörten zur gleichen Rasse, er und ich: zu der schönen, reinen Rasse der Nomaden. – Aber ich dachte nicht immer so, manchmal nannte ich sie auch: die arme, abgestumpfte Rasse der Genußmenschen.

Bonjour Tristesse formuliert den Widerstand gegen soziale Normen und soziale Verpflichtungen, gegen jedwede Form irgendwelchen sozialen Erwartungshorizonten genügen zu müssen – aber diesen Hedonismus bezahlen die Hauptfiguren teuer und hintergründig, nämlich mit einer distanzierten, sich entleerenden Melancholie, die nach und nach in ihnen einzieht und sie von der Welt trennt, in der auf eine Weise geliebt und mit Intensität geredet und interagiert wird, die ihnen fehlt. Der Dandyismus vollendet sich in einem zarten Rückblick der Trauer.

Nur im Morgengrauen, wenn ich in meinem Bett liege und nichts höre als das Geräusch der Autos in den Straßen von Paris, wird mein Gedächtnis mir manchmal zum Verräter: Der Sommer kehrt wieder mit all seinen Erinnerungen. »Anne, Anne!«
Immer wieder sage ich diesen Namen sehr leise und lange Zeit ins Dunkel hinein. Dann steigt etwas in mir auf, das ich mit geschlossenen Augen empfange und bei seinem Namen nenne: Traurigkeit – komm, Traurigkeit.

Auf seine Weise außerordentlich genau konstruiert, das Komplement zu J.D. Salingers Der Fänger im Roggen (1951), eine psychologisch-reflektierende Konsequenz des Sartreschen Existentialismus, der hier, noch konsequenter als Albert Camus in Der Fremde (1942) oder Der Fall (1956) ausspricht, was ihn auszeichnet: die Hoffnung, im Nicht-Dazugehören dazuzugehören, was nicht gelingt und in Melancholie und Verdruss endet. Bei Françoise Sagan in Bonjour Tristesse immerhin bittersüß.

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Details – ab hier Spoilergefahr (zur Erinnerung für mich):
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Inhalt: ●Hauptfiguren: Ich-Erzählerin Cécile (IE), 17 Jahre alt, Tochter von Raymond (R), Halbwaise (seit 15 Jahren), nachdem ihre Mutter verstorben ist, und führt eine Sommerliebe mit Cyril (25 Jahre – CY); Raymond: Vater von Cécile, 40 Jahre alt, hat eine Affäre mit der Sängerin Elsa Mackenbourg (E) (28 Jahre) und verliebt sich in Anne Larsen (A), Mode-Designerin (42 Jahre alt).
● Kurzinhaltsangabe: Cécile und ihr Vater leben ein sorgenloses Leben an der Côte d’Azur. Cécile bandelt mit einem Studenten der Rechtswissenschaften an, Raymond mit der Sängerin Elsa. Beide verfolgen keinerlei ernsthafte Absichten. Es sticht Anne Larson zu ihnen, eine Art Mutterersatz, die das Leben ordnet. Cécile will sich aber nicht einengen lassen und schmiedet ein Komplott gegen sie, als sie Raymond bereits für eine Heirat begeistert hat. Sie lässt Elsa und Cyril eine Affäre vorgaukeln, die Raymond eifersüchtig werden lässt. Es kommt zum Eklat, als Anne Raymond und Elsa im Wald küssen sieht. Überstürzt reist sie ab und kommt bei einem Unfall ums Leben.
● Detaillierte Inhaltsangabe:
Erster Teil: (Sommerurlaub – Anne Larsen reist an – führt ein strengeres Regime ein – Cécile beschließt sie aus ihrem und das Leben ihres Vaters zu vertreiben)
1. C fährt mit ihrem Vater, nach dem sie durch das Examen gefallen ist, in den Sommerurlaub ans Mittelmeer, an die Côte d‘Azur. Er hat seine Geliebte E mit dabei. Es kündigt A an, die nach dem Tod Cs Mutter zeitweise eine Mutterfigur innegehabt hat. Else zieht sich Sonnenbrand zu und schält sich.
2. A kommt an, erschrickt darüber, dass R nicht allein, sondern mit E in den Sommerurlaub gefahren ist. Sie erscheint mit dem Auto, nicht mit dem Zug, wie R und C angenommen haben. E schämt sich für ihre Haut. C räsoniert über das Zusammenleben mit ihrem Vater.
3. A zwingt C fürs Examen zu lernen, nachdem sie bereits einmal durchgefallen ist. C will nicht. Sie will den Sommer mit ihrem Flirt CY verbringen, einen Studenten der Rechtswissenschaft, statt in Bergson zu lesen.
4. Eifersuchtsdrama A versucht E auszustechen, die nichts davon ahnt. Nachmittagsschlafszene. Sie besuchen CYs Mutter. C will nicht, dass CYs Mutter über den Klee gelobt wird, da sie nur ihrer Rolle entsprochen habe (eigenartige Szene).
5. Ausflug nach Cannes, ins Casino. A und R kommen sich näher. E sieht ein, dass sie fünftes Rad am Wagen ist und verschwindet.
6. A und R überlegen zu heiraten. Dieser Plan stürzt C in die Ambivalenz, einerseits mag sie das freie Leben mit dem Vater, andererseits mag sie die Sicherheit und Verlässlichkeit, die A ausstrahlt. A erwischt C und CY in den Fichtennadeln und tadelt sie. Nachdem A sie zwingt, sich von CY fernzuhalten, beschließt C, A aus ihrem Leben und das ihres Vaters zu vertreiben.
Zweiter Teil:
1. C störrisch, verweigert zu essen, wird immer dünner.
2. E zu Besuch, um sich ihre Koffer abzuholen. C intrigiert gegen A und appelliert an E, R wieder zurückzuerobern, sich an A zu rächen. Es gelingt. E soll so tun, als wäre sie mit CY zusammengekommen, um R eifersüchtig zu machen
3. CY will C heiraten, unterbreitet ihr einen Heiratsantrag. C, wankelmütig, malt sich ständig andere Zukünfte aus. A versucht C zu trösten, als sie E und CY fröhlich auf dem Boot sehen und A denkt, C müsse untröstlich sein. A kann nicht wissen, dass das alles inszeniert ist.
4. C simuliert das Lernen, hört heimlich nur Platten, gibt nur vor Kant und Pascal zu lesen. Sie geht mit C heimlich aus und schläft mit ihm. Vor Aufregung vermag sie es nicht, sich eine Zigarette anzuzünden, A hilft ihr.
5. Nachdem herauskommt, dass C über ihr Lernen lügt, erhält sie Hausarrest und wird eingesperrt. Ihr Vater ermahnt ist. C spielt die resignierte, sagt, sie wolle verzichten, wohlwissend, dass das ihren Vater provoziert, der selbst nicht erwachsen werden will.
6. Auf einem gemeinsamen Spaziergang sehen C und R E und CY in den Fichtennadeln liegen. R eifersüchtig auf CY. C dagegen stellt sich ein friedliches Leben mit CY in Paris vor.
7. Sie fahren nach St. Raphael, das Ehepaar Webb zu treffen. C richtet es ein, dass E und CY auch dort erscheinen. C fast im Streit mit Madame Webb.
8. Soziales Umfeld von A und R sehr verschieden, A gesetzt, R dandyhaft, verschrobene Hedonisten. C verabscheut Ruhe, Ernsthaftigkeit und Verantwortungsgefühl.
9. Über den Vater, Charakterisierung, ein Haudegen, Lebemann; A verlangt, dass er seinen leichtsinnigen Lebenswandel aufgibt, erwachsen wird. C hat ein schlechtes Gewissen, den Leichtsinn zu unterstützen.
10. E und R verabreden sich. Sie küssen sich in den Fichtennadeln, A beobachtet das auf einem Spaziergang, völlig entsetzt reist sie ab.
11. R untröstlich, C und R überlegen, wie sie A zurückholen können, schreiben herzerweichende Liebesbriefe, das Telefon klingelt. A ist mit dem Auto verunglückt. Unklar ob Selbstmord oder Unfall. C und R betrinken sich.
12. Beerdigung in Paris, ein Monat Trauer, dann kehrt das alte Leben zurück, und es deutet sich in C eine Art Trauer und Melancholie an.
… schnell erzählte Seifenoper, als es noch keine Seifenopern gab, aber hier mit klarer, sich langsam zusammenziehende Intensität, folgerichtig, reduziert, überzeugend, spannend, und insbesondere durch die Ich-Erzählerin plausibel, die ein Trauma berichtet, nämlich wie sie, um sich keine Zwänge auferlegen zu lassen, an dem Tod von Anne Larsen mitgewirkt hat. Eine Art Tristesse überkommt sie, hier und da, wohlwissend, dass Anne ihr ein stabiles, substanzielles Leben ermöglicht hätte, dass sie aber nicht wollte. Sie wollte frei und ungebunden sein. Der Preis aber lautet: soziale Desintegration. Interessant, spannend, relevant für die Figur, durchweg intensiv erzählt. Ein Gegenstück zu J.D. Salingers Ein Fänger im Roggen, nur noch reflektierter, sentimentaler. Fast antikisch, mit dem Damoklesschwert der Leere, des Verhängnisses über der Hitze des Sommers. Keine 5 Sterne, da es sehr kurz und an manchen Stellen nicht auserzählt wirkt, zu schnell. --> 4 Sterne

Form: Einfache, aber leichte Sprache des Urlaubs, der Sonne, Wiederholungen der Stille, Strand, Licht, Fichtennadelduft, Andeutungen. Sehr gelungene weiche, unanstrengende Erzählart, gelungen, als siebzehnjährige Erzählerin adäquat. Die Lockerheit, die Souveränität zeichnen diesen Stil aus. Aber keine Innovationen, und auch keine Verselbständigung des Sprachmaterials. --> 4 Sterne

Erzählstimme: Im Rückblick reflektierende, sich in Frage stellende, melancholisch-sentimentale, etwas ängstliche Ich-Erzählerin, deren Situation nicht völlig geklärt ist. Wie alt ist sie jetzt? Sie kann sich nicht gut erinnern. Sie verdichtet, deutet an, unterscheidet klar die Zeitebene. Konsequent, in der Perspektivierung nie übergriffig. --> 5 Sterne

Komposition: Die Komposition wirkt flach und etwas arg an den Haaren herbeigezogener Elektra-Komplex – Jungs komplementäres Bild von Ödipus-Komplex. Nur hier spielt der Hedonismus, die Hitze, der Sommer, der Unwille mit herein, zu funktionieren, im Sinne einer verpflichtenden, seelenlosen Arbeitswelt (kein Examen, keine Mutter, sich den Gefühlen hingeben). Selbstvergessenheit in der Jugend, als Jugend, dennoch schematisch und fast gewollt, ein wenig anzüglich, pikaresk, nicht glaubwürdig, in dem Sinne, genau dort, wo die Erzählerin sich psychologisiert. Das Ende jedoch ist gelungen. Es fällt alles zusammen, nur die Mitte des kurzen Buches, also drei Fünftel, wirken etwas läppisch. Besonders die Figuren Elsa und Cyril. --> 3 Sterne

Leseerlebnis: Das Buch besitzt eine irritierende Qualität, die fast unheimlich wirkt. Fast ein Kriminalfall, ein Schuldbewusstsein, aber nur fast, aber eine Trauer, der Widerstand, das Leichte-Überflüssige-Lockere kommt sehr gut durch. Eine Art Limbo, Jenseits, Zeitlosigkeit, enthoben allen Sorgen, gleicht das Buch sehr einem Urlaub. Es irritiert nur selten, am meisten in der Szene mit Cyrils Mutter, wodurch eine gewisse Frontstellung gegen die Mutterfigur schlechthin zu Tage tritt. --> 4 Sterne

[Madeline · Rating 4 out of 5]

"That summer, I was seventeen and perfectly happy. ...My father was forty, and had been a widower for fifteen years. He was young for his age, full of vitality and liveliness. When I left my convent school two years before and came to Paris to live with him, I soon realized that he was living with a woman. But I was slower in accepting the fact that his fancy changed every six months! But gradually his charm, my new easy life, and my own disposition, led me to fall in readily with his ways. He was a frivolous man, clever at business, always curious, quickly bored, and very attractive to women. It was easy for me to love him, for he was kind, generous, gay, and fond of me. I cannot imagine a better or more amusing companion."

This lovely little novel, deceptively slim, made me want to read it while lying on a beach. It's full of rich French people being delightfully and almost stereotypically French at their villa in the Mediterranean, and all the romantic drama and emotional backstabbing that occurs there. The narrator, Cecile, is enjoying her hedonistic lifestyle when her playboy father announces, unexpectedly, that he is getting married. The woman in question is Anne, a family friend who is the opposite of the previous mistresses Cecile's father has had: she's elegant, poised, practical, intelligent, dignified, and forty-two. Cecile recognizes the threat that Anne poses to her carefree life, and decides to destroy the relationship:

"She would gradually turn us into the husband and step-daughter of Anne Larsen, that is to say, she would turn us into two civilized, well-behaved and contented persons. For she would certainly be good to us. How easily - unstable and irresponsible as we were - we would yield to her influence, and be fitted into the attractive framework of her orderly plan of living. She was much too efficient. Already my father was separated from me. I was hurt by his embarrassed face, turning away from me at the table. Tears came to my eyes at the thought of the jokes we used to have together, our gay laughter as we drove home at dawn through the deserted streets of Paris. All that was over. In my turn I would be influenced, readjusted, remodeled by Anne. I would not even mind it, she would handle me with such intelligence, humor, and sweetness. I wouldn't be able to resist her. In six months I should no longer even want to."

In another writer's hands, this story could have gone horribly wrong - Cecile has every opportunity to turn into a spoiled rich brat who can't stand the idea of being forced to behave like an adult with responsibilities, and the way she tries to destroy her father's happiness could be seen as the actions of a borderline-psychotic. The genius of Sagan's book is that she doesn't try to justify Cecile's actions. We see the horrible truth of what Cecile is doing, and so does Cecile. Every few chapters (sometimes every few pages) Cecile will have a moment of clarity, and realize that Anne is a good person and that her father is happy, and she regrets her meddling. But then she goes right back to her destructive plan, because she can't help herself. By letting us see Cecile wrestling with her own conscience, and ultimately being unable to resist her destructive urge, Sagan creates one of the best portrayals of a teenage girl I've ever read.

"Although I did not share my father's intense aversion to ugliness - which often led us to associate with stupid people - I did feel vaguely uncomfortable in the presence of anyone completely devoid of physical charm. Their resignation to the fact that they were unattractive seemed to me somehow indecent. For what are we looking for if not to please? I do not know if the desire to attract others comes from a superabundance of vitality, possessiveness, or the hidden, unspoken need to be reassured."

[Peiman E iran · Rating 3 out of 5]

دوستانِ گرانقدر، داستانِ این رمان در موردِ دختری 17 ساله، شاد و سرخوش به نامِ «سیسیل» است... سیسیل مادرش را از دست داده و با پدرش «ریموند» در پاریس زندگی میکند... ریموند مردی خوش گذران و دخترباز است و بیشتر از آنچه برایِ سیسیل یک پدر باشد، نقشِ یک دوستِ صمیمی را برایِ او بازی میکند.. این پدر و دختر همیشه درحالِ خوشگذرانی و شوخی و خنده هستند... آنها برایِ تعطیلاتِ تابستان به ویلایِ ساحلی خود در اطرافِ پاریس میروند.. در این سفر، دوست دخترِ ریموند یعنی «اِلسا مکنبرگ» نیز همراهِ آنهاست.. اِلسا جوانی جذاب و لوس است که علاوه بر لَوَند بودن، شانسِ خوبی در بُردنِ قمار دارد... در یکی از روزها، سیسیل در ساحل با جوانی قایقران به نام «فیلیپ» آشنا شده و پس از چند روز هر دو عاشقِ یکدیگر میشوند... خلاصه این تعطیلات از هر نظر به بهترین شکل در حالِ سپری شدن است، تا آنکه «آنی لارسن» دوستِ خانوادگی آنها، که دوستِ صمیمیِ مادرِ سیسیل بوده و یک طراحِ لباسِ مشهور است، به جمعِ آنها اضافه میشود.. روزها در تعطیلاتِ شیرینِ تابستانی با رقص و پایکوبی هایِ شبانه و خوشگذرانی های روزانه، سپری میشود... تا آنکه ریموند به یکباره هوس میکند تا بیخیالِ اِلسا شده و با آنی وقت بگذراند.. اِلسا از این موضوع باخبر شده و آنها را ترک میکند.. ریموند پس از ترکِ اِلسا به آنی یا همان «آن»، پیشنهادِ ازدواج میدهد و آنی نیز پیشنهادِ ریموند را قبول میکند... سیسل تصور میکند با ورودِ آنی به زندگیِ آنها، قرار است همه چیز بهتر از پیش شود، ولی تازه سخت گیری هایِ آنی شروع شده و حضورِ وی در زندگیِ آنها، پدر و دختر را از هم دور میکند... آنی زمانی که فیلیپ و سیسیل را در حالِ عشقبازی و هم آغوشی میبیند، سیسیل را از حقِ دوستی و گشتن با فیلیپ محروم میکند... تمامِ این موارد رویِ هم انباشته شده و سبب میشود تا سیسیل تبدیل به دشمنِ آنی شود... او برایِ منصرف شدنِ پدرش از ازدواج با آنی، نقشه ای میریزد... او به فیلیپ و اِلسا پیشنهاد میکند تا آنها نقش دو دلداده را بازی کنند.. با شناختی که از پدرش دارد میداند که ریموند با دیدنِ اِلسا و فیلیپ، حسادتش گُل کرده و دوباره سمتِ اِلسا بازمیگردد و آنی همان زنِ مغرور و زورگویی که پدرش را تصاحب کرده، از زندگیِ آنها بیرون میرود......... عزیزانم، بهتر است خودتان این داستان را خوانده و از سرانجامِ غمناکِ آن اگاه شوید....... به راستی، یک رویدادِ تلخ و عذابِ وجدان، به سادگی میتواند یک انسانِ سرخوش و پُرانرژی را به موجودی غمگین و افسرده تبدیل کند
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دور تا دورم را دیوار و حصاری فرا گرفته است.. یک دیوارِ نامرئی از خاطراتی که نمیتوانم آنها را فراموش کنم
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برایِ زنده ماندن باید همیشه با یک چیزی مست شوی
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اگر نمیتوانی مردم را آنطور که هستند قبول کنی، باید بیخیالِ آنها شوی... سعی نکن در آنها تغییری ایجاد کنی.. چراکه برایِ اینکار دیگر دیر شده است
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امیدوارم این ریویو در جهتِ آشنایی با این کتاب، مفید بوده باشه
«پیروز باشید و ایرانی»

[JimZ · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought Cecile was a self-absorbed spoiled brat.... who more or less was responsible for Anne either getting in a fatal accident or Anne committing suicide. But Cecile apparently didn’t let that bother her too much.

I did not like the character Cecile all that much, but she was honest. She was terribly immature and totally wrapped up in herself, but she was only 17. The author who wrote it apparently had a number of similarities to the character she created.

I thought the book was pretty good. It reminded me of The Stranger by Albert Camus. Among other things, the beach and the blinding heat....were in both books.

Reviews:
• https://www.newyorker.com/books/secon...
• https://litkicks.com/FrancoiseSagan/
• http://faculty.webster.edu/corbetre/p...

The author got in a very bad accident with her Aston-Martin when she was 22, and had to be put on a steady dose of morphine. She became addicted, and she published a diary (Toxique, 1964/5) of her detoxification in a hospital. I read it...actually she didn’t talk a whole lot about that, and 50% of the diary were drawings by her (a number of them were those a nude woman..,I don’t know if she was drawing herself or not). I digress!

She wrote her own obituary (she died at age 69). This is what she wrote, taken from Wikipedia:
• Appeared in 1954 with a slender novel, Bonjour tristesse, which created a scandal worldwide. Her death, after a life and a body of work that were equally pleasant and botched, was a scandal only for herself.

[Labijose · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lo que más me sorprende de esta novela es que su autora la escribiese con tan sólo 18 años, lo que demuestra una madurez narrativa extraordinaria. Por lo demás, ni me gustó ni me dejó de gustar. Reconozco que la protagonista, Cécile, me ha caído bastante mal. A su padre, Raymond, también hay que echarle de comer aparte. ¡Y el final de Anne!, ¡mejor me ahorro el comentario! El ambiente de hedonismo puro y duro se me hizo un pelín repelente. Si la hubiera leído en los años en los que se publicó, seguramente me hubiese impactado, como pasó con “Lolita” en su momento. Pero no ha sido así, y tras su lectura no me decido a ponerle mejor puntuación, porque no me ha dejado ninguna huella.