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Anaïs Nin - Im Meer der Lügen
Début des années 30. Anaïs Nin vit en banlieue parisienne et lutte contre l’angoisse de sa vie d’épouse de banquier. Plusieurs fois déracinée, elle a grandi entre deux continents, trois langues, et peine à trouver sa place dans une société qui relègue les femmes à des seconds rôles. Elle veut être écrivain, et s’est inventé, depuis l'enfance, une échappatoire : son journal. Il est sa drogue, son compagnon, son double, celui qui lui permet d’explorer la complexité de ses sentiments et de percevoir la sensualité qui couve en elle. C’est alors qu’elle rencontre Henry Miller, une révélation qui s’avère la première étape vers de grands bouleversements.
Kindle Edition
First published August 26, 2020
61 people are currently reading
3156 people want to read
About the author
Léonie Bischoff
11 books45 followersAfter a high school diploma in Visual Arts in Geneva , Léonie Bischoff left Switzerland to study in Brussels , at the École Supérieure des Arts Saint-Luc, where she obtained a degree in comics. She then moved to Paris where she published, in 2009, her first graphic story in the collection Phantasmes at Manolosanctis. With the same publisher, she participated the following year in the collective album 13m28, before publishing her first solo comic, Princess Suplex. Leonie Bischoff then returned to Brussels where she wrote and drew the graphic novel Hoodoo Darlin coming out in 2013 at Casterman. It is the first album that she signs with her full name, rather than her pseudonym "Léonie", used for her previous publications. She then worked with screenwriter Olivier Bocquet on the comic book adaptation of Camilla Läckberg's eponymous novels , La Princesse des glaces and Le Prédicateur. These albums were released in 2014 and 2015 by Casterman .
Léonie Bischoff lives and works in 2020 in Brussels and she is part of Atelier Mille with 7 other authors and cartoonists, including Thomas Gilbert , Nicolas Pitz , Jérémie Royer .
In 2020, she delivers Anaïs Nin, sur la mer des mensonges. The book is one of the five finalists for the 2021 Critics' Grand Prize, is in the selection for the Golden Fauve at the 2021 Angoulême Festival 4 and obtains the Fauve Audience Prize. The book is also selected for the 2021 Artémisia Prize for female comics.
Léonie Bischoff lives and works in 2020 in Brussels and she is part of Atelier Mille with 7 other authors and cartoonists, including Thomas Gilbert , Nicolas Pitz , Jérémie Royer .
In 2020, she delivers Anaïs Nin, sur la mer des mensonges. The book is one of the five finalists for the 2021 Critics' Grand Prize, is in the selection for the Golden Fauve at the 2021 Angoulême Festival 4 and obtains the Fauve Audience Prize. The book is also selected for the 2021 Artémisia Prize for female comics.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 647 reviews
October 18, 2022
Every man I have let read my writings has tried to change them. Writing like a man doesn't interest me. I want to write like a woman. I have to swim far from the shore to find the words...under a sea of lies.
Even if I wasn’t overly enthralled when reading Anaïs Nin’s A Spy in the House of Love and Little Birds in my early twenties, I cannot deny I was strongly fascinated by her and the idea of extensive diary writing. Nonetheless I could never bring myself to effectively read one of the five volumes of her diaries that I managed to collect over the years, nor Henry and June that I purchased after watching the film adaptation in my student days (book purchases and cinema visits were both rare events and because of that I guess more memorable). But good grief, I vividly recall how I was blown away by that film – at loss for words watching the sensual scenes with Anaïs Nin and June Miller dancing together. For weeks I was in a strange, hazy mood, infatuated with Uma Thurman.
This graphic novel inspired by the life of Anaïs Nin and written and designed by the Swiss illustrator and author Léonie Bischoff in many respects reminded me of that film experience years ago. Bischoff mostly focusses on the sources of Anaïs Nin’s creativity: why did she want to write, why did she want to be an artist? I do like to believe in the possibility of life-changing encounters and experiencing the shock of awakening – as apparently Nin did too.
Visually stunning, blending reality with dream scenes, often beautifully tuning in to the metaphor of the sea with a colour palette of green and blues hues, the graphics of this book are alluringly graceful and flowing and accord excellently with the fluidity and ambiguity of Nin’s personality the way Bischoff imagines and presents it.
The title is well-chosen. Anaïs Nin swims in a sea of lies, even keeping two versions of her famous diary to feign authenticity and candidness letting her husband Hugo read one version, while jotting down her various sexual adventures with others in another. Her libertine life blooms on lies, lies, and more lies.
Despite the manifold qualities of this graphic novel, it didn’t win me over entirely, which for sure is my bad and not the graphic novel’s. I was disappointed that again the very same period in the life of Anaïs Nin gets the lion’s share of the attention (apart from a few flashbacks to her childhood and youth in London and New York, Bischoff covers mostly the period 1928-1934, when Nin is living in a suburb of Paris and having an affair with Henry Miller). For me the film Henry & June covered that period so splendidly I wasn’t looking for another interpretation of it but rather wished to hear more on what followed next in her life (her friendships with Gore Vidal and Edmund Wilson; her life as a bigamist) even if Bischoff’s playful and tender Henry Miller was a breath of fresh air compared to the rather uninspiring, pale Miller in the film.
Apart from the diary and the significance of it for Nin – a companion, a lover, a voice also visualised by Bischoff - the graphic novel doesn’t touch on Anaïs Nin’s writing, concentrating on the phase creating the writer instead: how Nin frees herself erotically and morally from the conventional path that was in front of her as a woman in a subservient role as a wife and mother in order to become an artist, a writer – a process of liberation that episodically takes on a quite radical form because in her quite privileged situation her freedom is mostly defined in sexual terms, having sex with about every man she seems to find interesting next to her husband, whether for real or in imagination in her diary (Henry Miller her cousin, her dance teacher, her two psychotherapists (among them Otto Rank), her father) and eventually, seeing no place for children in her life, her decision for an abortion when she is five months pregnant (a part of the book definitely not for the squeamish).
Entertaining, elegant and intriguing, this graphic novel might appeal to fans of Nin as well as to readers not (yet) familiar with her work or person.
A taster:
(*** 1/2 )
Even if I wasn’t overly enthralled when reading Anaïs Nin’s A Spy in the House of Love and Little Birds in my early twenties, I cannot deny I was strongly fascinated by her and the idea of extensive diary writing. Nonetheless I could never bring myself to effectively read one of the five volumes of her diaries that I managed to collect over the years, nor Henry and June that I purchased after watching the film adaptation in my student days (book purchases and cinema visits were both rare events and because of that I guess more memorable). But good grief, I vividly recall how I was blown away by that film – at loss for words watching the sensual scenes with Anaïs Nin and June Miller dancing together. For weeks I was in a strange, hazy mood, infatuated with Uma Thurman.
This graphic novel inspired by the life of Anaïs Nin and written and designed by the Swiss illustrator and author Léonie Bischoff in many respects reminded me of that film experience years ago. Bischoff mostly focusses on the sources of Anaïs Nin’s creativity: why did she want to write, why did she want to be an artist? I do like to believe in the possibility of life-changing encounters and experiencing the shock of awakening – as apparently Nin did too.
Visually stunning, blending reality with dream scenes, often beautifully tuning in to the metaphor of the sea with a colour palette of green and blues hues, the graphics of this book are alluringly graceful and flowing and accord excellently with the fluidity and ambiguity of Nin’s personality the way Bischoff imagines and presents it.
The title is well-chosen. Anaïs Nin swims in a sea of lies, even keeping two versions of her famous diary to feign authenticity and candidness letting her husband Hugo read one version, while jotting down her various sexual adventures with others in another. Her libertine life blooms on lies, lies, and more lies.
Despite the manifold qualities of this graphic novel, it didn’t win me over entirely, which for sure is my bad and not the graphic novel’s. I was disappointed that again the very same period in the life of Anaïs Nin gets the lion’s share of the attention (apart from a few flashbacks to her childhood and youth in London and New York, Bischoff covers mostly the period 1928-1934, when Nin is living in a suburb of Paris and having an affair with Henry Miller). For me the film Henry & June covered that period so splendidly I wasn’t looking for another interpretation of it but rather wished to hear more on what followed next in her life (her friendships with Gore Vidal and Edmund Wilson; her life as a bigamist) even if Bischoff’s playful and tender Henry Miller was a breath of fresh air compared to the rather uninspiring, pale Miller in the film.
Apart from the diary and the significance of it for Nin – a companion, a lover, a voice also visualised by Bischoff - the graphic novel doesn’t touch on Anaïs Nin’s writing, concentrating on the phase creating the writer instead: how Nin frees herself erotically and morally from the conventional path that was in front of her as a woman in a subservient role as a wife and mother in order to become an artist, a writer – a process of liberation that episodically takes on a quite radical form because in her quite privileged situation her freedom is mostly defined in sexual terms, having sex with about every man she seems to find interesting next to her husband, whether for real or in imagination in her diary (Henry Miller her cousin, her dance teacher, her two psychotherapists (among them Otto Rank), her father) and eventually, seeing no place for children in her life, her decision for an abortion when she is five months pregnant (a part of the book definitely not for the squeamish).
Entertaining, elegant and intriguing, this graphic novel might appeal to fans of Nin as well as to readers not (yet) familiar with her work or person.
A taster:
(*** 1/2 )
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April 15, 2025
‘I will always conjure the mystical and the mysterious to express what I feel.‘
The life, lies, longings and love affairs of Anaïs Nin come pouring from the page in breathtaking artwork in Léonie Bischoff’s biographical graphic novel Anaïs Nin: A Sea of Lies. Drawing from her diaries, Bischoff chronicles key moments from the early 1930s in the artistic awakening of the writer who would shock and captivate the literary world with her bold, erotic works and honest depictions of her interior life. Through colorful artwork that adapts to further portray the way Nin felt she was composed of many different women all at once, Bischoff threads the events into an emotionally charged journey of self-discovery, desires, problematic affairs and more in an engaging union of biography and highly expressive visual arts.
‘For beauty. For love. For creation. I will never write like a man. I will write like a woman. I will express the inexpressible. Intuitions. Quivering. I will make of my life a masterpiece and invent a language to tell it. I will believe in my magic.’
First of all, shoutout to libraries. I have a regular patron who has been researching Anaïs Nin and we got to chatting about her book Henry and June because of the film of the same name while I was sifting through our statewide loan program to track down the entirety of Nin’s published works. Imagine my excitement to discover this existed and I practically shouted across the library “I found the coolest thing for you!” when the patron came in the next day. So of course I had to read it to, despite not really having much prior knowledge of Nin beyond knowing her erotica fame and that she had numerous affairs such as with Henry Miller and psychoanalyst Otto Rank. I’m glad I did, even if just for the art which is absolutely gorgeous:
Each page is dazzling, done in what appears to be colored pencil, capturing a lot of expressions in the more basic frames of line-art face designs and also overwhelming you with beauty in the more detailed frames that seem to be bursting with color and life. Okay though, nobody would say Henry Miller was a great beauty or anything but Bischoff totally does him dirty and I think that is hilarious. Anyways. The narrative often dips into surrealism, which is in keeping with Nin’s own fiction, and the art reaches to match. It is delightful:
Nin is a complex figure, and one should be aware that this graphic novel does get into a lot of sexuality, manipulation and includes the incestuous affair Nin had with her own father (there are prominent visual nods to the surrealist imagery in her novel House of Incest, which is primarily about Henry and June but does contain veiled allusions to her father). We watch Nin go from a rather reserved sexuality—feeling restricted by her husband’s career in banking instead of art—to embracing her sexual desires and harnessing her affairs for artistic purposes. Most notable is her relationship with Miller, which begins over the pair working on each other’s writing following Nin’s work on D. H. Lawrence: An Unprofessional Study.
Henry, Anaïs, and June
‘I am a mirror for the desires of men,’ Nin considers, ‘and the roles that I play for them ignite the fires of their creativity.’ As her desires fuel her works, she finds it also inspires her lovers, though her financial support of Miller and desires for his wife do cause some emotional turmoil. As she begins to seek sexual inspiration with many around her, she increasingly finds herself as multiple people living in one being and navigating a ‘sea of lies.’ According to Nin’s biographer, Deidre Bair, Nin once said ‘I tell so many lies I have to write them down and keep them in the lie box so I can keep them straight.’ The key here, which we see all throughout the graphic novel, is that writing was, for her, a way to expand life, to live multiple lives, to live life more deeply in the linguistic investigations into events. Nin finds that men feel threatened by her writing, snapping once at Miller ‘You don’t understand that there can be other truths. Every man who reads my writing tries to “fix” it.’ For better or for worse, this graphic novel centers her journey to embrace her voice and her truth, not for others but for herself.
This was an interesting read, and often rather uncomfortable, especially not having much knowledge on Nin’s life prior to the reading. While I’m sure much is embellished or distorted to fit—its like a biopic where its still kind of fiction even if it isn’t?—Bischoff blends it all into a forward progressing story that pulls a lot of emotion and introspection along with it. This is a scandalous story, but it is so wonderfully told and presented in outstanding artwork.
4/5
The life, lies, longings and love affairs of Anaïs Nin come pouring from the page in breathtaking artwork in Léonie Bischoff’s biographical graphic novel Anaïs Nin: A Sea of Lies. Drawing from her diaries, Bischoff chronicles key moments from the early 1930s in the artistic awakening of the writer who would shock and captivate the literary world with her bold, erotic works and honest depictions of her interior life. Through colorful artwork that adapts to further portray the way Nin felt she was composed of many different women all at once, Bischoff threads the events into an emotionally charged journey of self-discovery, desires, problematic affairs and more in an engaging union of biography and highly expressive visual arts.
‘For beauty. For love. For creation. I will never write like a man. I will write like a woman. I will express the inexpressible. Intuitions. Quivering. I will make of my life a masterpiece and invent a language to tell it. I will believe in my magic.’
First of all, shoutout to libraries. I have a regular patron who has been researching Anaïs Nin and we got to chatting about her book Henry and June because of the film of the same name while I was sifting through our statewide loan program to track down the entirety of Nin’s published works. Imagine my excitement to discover this existed and I practically shouted across the library “I found the coolest thing for you!” when the patron came in the next day. So of course I had to read it to, despite not really having much prior knowledge of Nin beyond knowing her erotica fame and that she had numerous affairs such as with Henry Miller and psychoanalyst Otto Rank. I’m glad I did, even if just for the art which is absolutely gorgeous:
Each page is dazzling, done in what appears to be colored pencil, capturing a lot of expressions in the more basic frames of line-art face designs and also overwhelming you with beauty in the more detailed frames that seem to be bursting with color and life. Okay though, nobody would say Henry Miller was a great beauty or anything but Bischoff totally does him dirty and I think that is hilarious. Anyways. The narrative often dips into surrealism, which is in keeping with Nin’s own fiction, and the art reaches to match. It is delightful:
Nin is a complex figure, and one should be aware that this graphic novel does get into a lot of sexuality, manipulation and includes the incestuous affair Nin had with her own father (there are prominent visual nods to the surrealist imagery in her novel House of Incest, which is primarily about Henry and June but does contain veiled allusions to her father). We watch Nin go from a rather reserved sexuality—feeling restricted by her husband’s career in banking instead of art—to embracing her sexual desires and harnessing her affairs for artistic purposes. Most notable is her relationship with Miller, which begins over the pair working on each other’s writing following Nin’s work on D. H. Lawrence: An Unprofessional Study.
Henry, Anaïs, and June
‘I am a mirror for the desires of men,’ Nin considers, ‘and the roles that I play for them ignite the fires of their creativity.’ As her desires fuel her works, she finds it also inspires her lovers, though her financial support of Miller and desires for his wife do cause some emotional turmoil. As she begins to seek sexual inspiration with many around her, she increasingly finds herself as multiple people living in one being and navigating a ‘sea of lies.’ According to Nin’s biographer, Deidre Bair, Nin once said ‘I tell so many lies I have to write them down and keep them in the lie box so I can keep them straight.’ The key here, which we see all throughout the graphic novel, is that writing was, for her, a way to expand life, to live multiple lives, to live life more deeply in the linguistic investigations into events. Nin finds that men feel threatened by her writing, snapping once at Miller ‘You don’t understand that there can be other truths. Every man who reads my writing tries to “fix” it.’ For better or for worse, this graphic novel centers her journey to embrace her voice and her truth, not for others but for herself.
This was an interesting read, and often rather uncomfortable, especially not having much knowledge on Nin’s life prior to the reading. While I’m sure much is embellished or distorted to fit—its like a biopic where its still kind of fiction even if it isn’t?—Bischoff blends it all into a forward progressing story that pulls a lot of emotion and introspection along with it. This is a scandalous story, but it is so wonderfully told and presented in outstanding artwork.
4/5
April 15, 2021
Absolument sublime. Je ne savais rien de la vie de Anaïs Nin et c’était une belle manière d’apprendre à la connaître. Le coup de crayon de la dessinatrice et ses couleurs sont tout simplement merveilleux.
February 17, 2023
QUELLE HONTE ! Très décevant. Le dessin n'est pas du tout mon style donc je passerai là dessus. Mais ce qui me dérange le plus c'est ce que quoi la bd se concentre. Pour une fois qu'une bd sur une poetesse est publiée on ne mentionne que sa vie sexuelle. Ne la résumant finalement qu'à cela : son sexe.
De plus toute la partie sur son père est extrêmement romantisée et surtout banalisée et fausse !!!!!!!!!! Anaïs Nin a écrit très tôt un livre pour dénoncer l'inceste de son père "la maison de l'inceste" parce qu'elle ne supportait pas qu'il vive tranquillement sa vie bourgeoise et tranquille et en toute impunité (pour reprendre ses propres mots dans des interviews) . Alors qu'ici Anaïs Nin donné l'impression d'aimer cela...et vraiment je trouve cela choquant. Tout le focus de cette bd est choquant surtout venant d'une autrice (c'est une femme qui a écrit cette bd). Anaïs Nin était tellement plus que cela. Son art était tellement époustouflant sans pareil et ne respectant aucune règle. Bref il y aurait eu temps de choses à dire a écrire sur cette femme extraordinaire qui n'a pas vécu a travers les hommes a l'inverse de tout ce que la bd prétend...CE QUI M'AGACE le plus c'est de lire tous les commentaires de personnes qui ont découvert Anaïs Nin grâce à cette bd et qui maintenant lient Anaïs Nin a l'anais Nin de cette histoire. C'est �� se demander si l'autrice s'est renseigné sur le sujet. Si elle aime seulement ou respecté Anaïs Nin. Bref si vous vous intéressez a Anaïs Nin NE LISEZ PAS cette bd. Lisez ses romans, ses journaux intimes et surtout ses poèmes. Regardez ses interviews ou des documentaires. La vous apercevrez un bout d'Anaïs Nin. Loin de cette caricature soumise au bon vouloir des hommes et nymphomane.
De plus toute la partie sur son père est extrêmement romantisée et surtout banalisée et fausse !!!!!!!!!! Anaïs Nin a écrit très tôt un livre pour dénoncer l'inceste de son père "la maison de l'inceste" parce qu'elle ne supportait pas qu'il vive tranquillement sa vie bourgeoise et tranquille et en toute impunité (pour reprendre ses propres mots dans des interviews) . Alors qu'ici Anaïs Nin donné l'impression d'aimer cela...et vraiment je trouve cela choquant. Tout le focus de cette bd est choquant surtout venant d'une autrice (c'est une femme qui a écrit cette bd). Anaïs Nin était tellement plus que cela. Son art était tellement époustouflant sans pareil et ne respectant aucune règle. Bref il y aurait eu temps de choses à dire a écrire sur cette femme extraordinaire qui n'a pas vécu a travers les hommes a l'inverse de tout ce que la bd prétend...CE QUI M'AGACE le plus c'est de lire tous les commentaires de personnes qui ont découvert Anaïs Nin grâce à cette bd et qui maintenant lient Anaïs Nin a l'anais Nin de cette histoire. C'est �� se demander si l'autrice s'est renseigné sur le sujet. Si elle aime seulement ou respecté Anaïs Nin. Bref si vous vous intéressez a Anaïs Nin NE LISEZ PAS cette bd. Lisez ses romans, ses journaux intimes et surtout ses poèmes. Regardez ses interviews ou des documentaires. La vous apercevrez un bout d'Anaïs Nin. Loin de cette caricature soumise au bon vouloir des hommes et nymphomane.
December 19, 2020
Un ravissement de bout en bout. Le fond, la forme, tout est d’une beauté et d’une intelligence incomparables.
Si bel hommage à cette écrivaine insondable et magnétique.
A lire et à offrir sans réserve!
Si bel hommage à cette écrivaine insondable et magnétique.
A lire et à offrir sans réserve!
August 16, 2021
Si tuviera que definir con un adjetivo este fascinante cómic sobre la vida de Anaïs Nin elegiría “hipnótico”. Porque hipnótica es la mezcla entre los hechos que suceden y la percepción de los mismos que tiene la propia protagonista: entre la realidad, la ensoñación y las ganas de convertir cualquier evento cotidiano en literatura. Porque hipnótica es la vida de una mujer al filo de la navaja, en constante huida hacia adelante, en tenaz lucha por una libertad que le permitiese escapar de las normas más estrechas de la sociedad. Porque hipnótico es el dibujo que sirve de vehículo para contar su historia y que se entreteje en entramados de colores inverosímiles que plasman en papel un universo inabarcable, cambiante, tormentoso y adelantado a su tiempo.
‘Anaïs Nin: en un mar de mentiras’ se centra en los años centrales de la vida de esta genial intelectual sin la que es imposible entender el proceso de liberación de la mujer a lo largo del siglo XX, el ambiente cultural de Europa y Estados Unidos de antes y después de la Segunda Guerra Mundial, o el proceso mediante el cual se puso sobre la mesa el deseo y la sexualidad femenina. Como esta novela gráfica se centra en estos años centrales de su vida se puede permitir profundizar mucho en los eventos, los idilios y el proceso de producción de Nin en esta época. Y lo hace sin pudor, pero también sin interés en remover lo morboso: la historia está contada desde una perspectiva que intenta recoger la esencia de la mujer que Anaïs Nin estaba aprendiendo a ser y que marcaría a tanta gente de su entorno primero y a tantas generaciones de lectoras después.
Solo había escuchado grandes elogios a este libro y creo que se los merece todos. Creo que tanto narrativa como plásticamente es redondo. Usa algunos recursos estilísticos que yo no había visto hasta ahora, y se aleja de la linealidad y la condescendencia con el personaje que de vez en cuando tienen las biografías ilustradas. Me parece una manera magnífica de acercarse a esta fascinante mujer y al nacimiento de sus archiconocidos diarios.
‘Anaïs Nin: en un mar de mentiras’ se centra en los años centrales de la vida de esta genial intelectual sin la que es imposible entender el proceso de liberación de la mujer a lo largo del siglo XX, el ambiente cultural de Europa y Estados Unidos de antes y después de la Segunda Guerra Mundial, o el proceso mediante el cual se puso sobre la mesa el deseo y la sexualidad femenina. Como esta novela gráfica se centra en estos años centrales de su vida se puede permitir profundizar mucho en los eventos, los idilios y el proceso de producción de Nin en esta época. Y lo hace sin pudor, pero también sin interés en remover lo morboso: la historia está contada desde una perspectiva que intenta recoger la esencia de la mujer que Anaïs Nin estaba aprendiendo a ser y que marcaría a tanta gente de su entorno primero y a tantas generaciones de lectoras después.
Solo había escuchado grandes elogios a este libro y creo que se los merece todos. Creo que tanto narrativa como plásticamente es redondo. Usa algunos recursos estilísticos que yo no había visto hasta ahora, y se aleja de la linealidad y la condescendencia con el personaje que de vez en cuando tienen las biografías ilustradas. Me parece una manera magnífica de acercarse a esta fascinante mujer y al nacimiento de sus archiconocidos diarios.
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January 8, 2021I don't know how to rate this book. In terms of art and how it serves the storytelling, it's probably the most freaking beautiful graphic novel I've read. I have many conflicted feelings about how the trauma and extremely toxic / non consensual relationships were portrayed. I don't know.
April 21, 2021
10/10 sur le côté artistique, l’ouvrage est magnifique!
En voyant la cote du livre et ses nombreux prix/nominations je suis clairement dans la minorité, mais il faut dire je ne savais pas dans quoi je m’embarquais en choisissant ce livre et que je m’attendais à une lecture légère et douce (j’aurais dû lire le résumé avant)
C’est difficile de juger l’histoire sachant que c’est inspiré de la vie d’Anaïs Nin... Mais de dépeindre de la pédophilie et de l’inceste aussi légèrement que ça, d’avoir autant de personnages/humains qui manquent d’éthique professionnelle et ce sur un style artistique aussi coloré, détaillé et captivant... c’est intense...
Vivement le pouvoir de la sensualité et de la sexualité chez la femme, mais j’en tire plus de dégoût qu’autre chose en ayant terminé ce roman graphique! Encore plus troublant de savoir que c’est vraiment arrivé...
Je trouve juste dommage qu’il n’y ait pas de TW au début du livre, car ce n’est pas une lecture facile et cela pourrait être très difficile pour certaines personnes.
En voyant la cote du livre et ses nombreux prix/nominations je suis clairement dans la minorité, mais il faut dire je ne savais pas dans quoi je m’embarquais en choisissant ce livre et que je m’attendais à une lecture légère et douce (j’aurais dû lire le résumé avant)
C’est difficile de juger l’histoire sachant que c’est inspiré de la vie d’Anaïs Nin... Mais de dépeindre de la pédophilie et de l’inceste aussi légèrement que ça, d’avoir autant de personnages/humains qui manquent d’éthique professionnelle et ce sur un style artistique aussi coloré, détaillé et captivant... c’est intense...
Vivement le pouvoir de la sensualité et de la sexualité chez la femme, mais j’en tire plus de dégoût qu’autre chose en ayant terminé ce roman graphique! Encore plus troublant de savoir que c’est vraiment arrivé...
Je trouve juste dommage qu’il n’y ait pas de TW au début du livre, car ce n’est pas une lecture facile et cela pourrait être très difficile pour certaines personnes.
November 22, 2020
Cet album tient essentiellement sa beauté des dessins de Léonie Bischoff mis au service d’une autrice qui m’a été dans l’ensemble antipathique. Je n’ai jamais lu Anaïs Nin, il faudra que j’y remédie car j’ai culpabilisé de ressentir autant d’émotions négatives à son égard - un adjectif me vient avant de la définir comme une femme libre : égoïste, et je ne pense pas que l’un aille forcément avec l’autre. J’aurais aimé avoir plus d’empathie pour elle... Difficile de transmettre sa complexité, je suppose, à travers quelques pages si bien illustrées soient-elles.
March 31, 2024
Anaïs Again
Review of the Fantagraphics hardcover edition (2023) translated by Jenna Allen from the French language original Anaïs Nin - Sur la mer des mensonges (2020), a graphic novel adaptation of Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love": The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin, 1931-1932 (1986) and Incest: From "A Journal of Love": The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin, 1932-1934 (1992).
I read the French language original back in 2021 and reviewed it (in English) as On the Sea of Lies. This was a re-read which confirmed my initial impression that the art work in both its design and detail is exquisite and its methods of telling the story are well chosen.
I'm not going to repeat the earlier review here, but am including the related extra links posted in 2021 below.
Trivia and Links
The Fantagraphics website for the English language book does not provide any preview pages, but you can view the first 5 pages of the original French language graphic novel at the publisher Casterman's official page for the book here.
Author/artist Léonie Bischoff is interviewed about the original French language edition Anaïs Nin: sur la mer des mensonges at a YouTube video here (the video is in French, but you can autogenerate subtitle translation in various languages, including English).
Author/artist Léonie Bischoff discusses her interest in Anaïs Nin and demonstrates her drawing with a head portrait at a YouTube video here (the video is in French, but you can autogenerate subtitle translation in various languages, including English).
Review of the Fantagraphics hardcover edition (2023) translated by Jenna Allen from the French language original Anaïs Nin - Sur la mer des mensonges (2020), a graphic novel adaptation of Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love": The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin, 1931-1932 (1986) and Incest: From "A Journal of Love": The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin, 1932-1934 (1992).
I read the French language original back in 2021 and reviewed it (in English) as On the Sea of Lies. This was a re-read which confirmed my initial impression that the art work in both its design and detail is exquisite and its methods of telling the story are well chosen.
I'm not going to repeat the earlier review here, but am including the related extra links posted in 2021 below.
Trivia and Links
The Fantagraphics website for the English language book does not provide any preview pages, but you can view the first 5 pages of the original French language graphic novel at the publisher Casterman's official page for the book here.
Author/artist Léonie Bischoff is interviewed about the original French language edition Anaïs Nin: sur la mer des mensonges at a YouTube video here (the video is in French, but you can autogenerate subtitle translation in various languages, including English).
Author/artist Léonie Bischoff discusses her interest in Anaïs Nin and demonstrates her drawing with a head portrait at a YouTube video here (the video is in French, but you can autogenerate subtitle translation in various languages, including English).
September 26, 2020
Le dessin est très beau, l'histoire est bien écrite et j'ai clairement détesté le personnage et sa vision des choses. Je ressens un profond dégoût à la fin de cette lecture.
Read
October 25, 2025#Tabus/ConfissõesI
No íntimo magoa-me estar a revelar-me, e aos meus diários. Sinto-me nua numa multidão. É uma tortura. Quando falo, sinto que minto imperceptivelmente a fim de me tapar. Envergo trajos. Detesto expor-me verdadeiramente. As mentiras assemelham-se a um trajo, pequenas mentiras, principalmente desvios, porque eu tenho medo de não ser compreendida, e tenho medo da dor. E então aquilo que não conto derramo no diário.
Anaïs Nin, em Incesto
Angela Anaïs Juana Antolina Rosa Edelmira Nin y Culmell
Quando soube que a Devir tinha traduzido Anaïs Nin - Sur la mer des mensonges fiquei estática. A compra foi mais do que impulsiva, a leitura foi lenta e contemplativa e o resultado da experiência não podia ter sido melhor. Aliás, foi tão bom que me levou, em simultâneo, a ler os dois diários (Henry e June; Incesto) que inspiraram Léonie a criar esta biografia gráfica. E, mais uma vez, a experiência, inesperada, não podia ter sido mais prazerosa (Anaïs ficaria duplamente orgulhosa, imagino).
Não sou isenta: tenho em Anaïs uma escritora e uma mulher inspiradora. Mas Léonie também não se pode esquivar ao cunho de admiradora, e isso fica bem evidente nesta obra.
Síntese delicada de uma vida em busca de completude, esta novela gráfica percorre destemidamente os 3-5 anos mais exploratórios da vida de Anaïs Nin (1931/34), do seu casamento e aqueles em que desbrava caminho como escritora, em que desenvolve a sua escrita criativa e aprofunda a diarística, começa a explorar a psicanálise e trava conhecimento com Henry Miller, June Mansfield, René Allendy, Otto Rank ou Antonin Artaud.
Recuperando sempre excertos dos diários como âncora biográfica, Anaïs Nin - no mar de mentiras permanece fiel ao discurso sincero, apaixonado e livre de uma mulher que recusou toda a vida cumprir com padrões normativos. Figuras máximas da sua história, os diários de Anaïs não só alimentam a narrativa e os diálogos desta obra gráfica, como se fazem protagonistas da maravilhosa história que foi a sua vida.
É o meu reconforto, o meu espelho, a minha droga...
Ali, exploro o meu carácter e o dos outros. Analiso, ouso dizer!
Dou sentido às coisas. Tenho tantas facetas em mim, tantos fragmentos contraditórios... o diário parece-se comigo.
A finesse do traço da ilustradora e a poesia de Anaïs, coordenados sem ponta de censura, resultam numa obra sensível, emotiva, feminina e delicada que nos devolve a voz de uma escritora de sensações e emoções. Não consigo imaginar melhor forma de trazer de novo à vida uma mulher assim livre de preconceitos e limites.
Eu vivo, Henry...
Eu vivo mesmo dupla ou triplamente, porque quando escrevo revivo tudo ainda com mais intensidade
Do diário à ficção, da ficção ao diário, a escrita é aquilo que me mantém viva.
No íntimo magoa-me estar a revelar-me, e aos meus diários. Sinto-me nua numa multidão. É uma tortura. Quando falo, sinto que minto imperceptivelmente a fim de me tapar. Envergo trajos. Detesto expor-me verdadeiramente. As mentiras assemelham-se a um trajo, pequenas mentiras, principalmente desvios, porque eu tenho medo de não ser compreendida, e tenho medo da dor. E então aquilo que não conto derramo no diário.
Anaïs Nin, em Incesto
Angela Anaïs Juana Antolina Rosa Edelmira Nin y Culmell
Quando soube que a Devir tinha traduzido Anaïs Nin - Sur la mer des mensonges fiquei estática. A compra foi mais do que impulsiva, a leitura foi lenta e contemplativa e o resultado da experiência não podia ter sido melhor. Aliás, foi tão bom que me levou, em simultâneo, a ler os dois diários (Henry e June; Incesto) que inspiraram Léonie a criar esta biografia gráfica. E, mais uma vez, a experiência, inesperada, não podia ter sido mais prazerosa (Anaïs ficaria duplamente orgulhosa, imagino).
Não sou isenta: tenho em Anaïs uma escritora e uma mulher inspiradora. Mas Léonie também não se pode esquivar ao cunho de admiradora, e isso fica bem evidente nesta obra.
Síntese delicada de uma vida em busca de completude, esta novela gráfica percorre destemidamente os 3-5 anos mais exploratórios da vida de Anaïs Nin (1931/34), do seu casamento e aqueles em que desbrava caminho como escritora, em que desenvolve a sua escrita criativa e aprofunda a diarística, começa a explorar a psicanálise e trava conhecimento com Henry Miller, June Mansfield, René Allendy, Otto Rank ou Antonin Artaud.
Recuperando sempre excertos dos diários como âncora biográfica, Anaïs Nin - no mar de mentiras permanece fiel ao discurso sincero, apaixonado e livre de uma mulher que recusou toda a vida cumprir com padrões normativos. Figuras máximas da sua história, os diários de Anaïs não só alimentam a narrativa e os diálogos desta obra gráfica, como se fazem protagonistas da maravilhosa história que foi a sua vida.
É o meu reconforto, o meu espelho, a minha droga...
Ali, exploro o meu carácter e o dos outros. Analiso, ouso dizer!
Dou sentido às coisas. Tenho tantas facetas em mim, tantos fragmentos contraditórios... o diário parece-se comigo.
A finesse do traço da ilustradora e a poesia de Anaïs, coordenados sem ponta de censura, resultam numa obra sensível, emotiva, feminina e delicada que nos devolve a voz de uma escritora de sensações e emoções. Não consigo imaginar melhor forma de trazer de novo à vida uma mulher assim livre de preconceitos e limites.
Eu vivo, Henry...
Eu vivo mesmo dupla ou triplamente, porque quando escrevo revivo tudo ainda com mais intensidade
Do diário à ficção, da ficção ao diário, a escrita é aquilo que me mantém viva.
March 16, 2022
Je ne connaissais pas du tout Anaïs Nin mais j'ai eu envie d'avoir un aperçu d'elle après en avoir entendu tant de bien, j'ai emprunté cette BD et je dois dire que j'ai trouvé celle ci magnifique et pleine de poésie.
Néanmoins je garde un gout amère, sale, après avoir découvert la vie de Anaïs Nin. J'entend tout le monde parler d'elle comme d'une Icone et c'est peut être la qu'a été mon problème.
Au delà de sa sensualité hypnotisante qu'on ressent superbement tout au long de la BD, ce que j'ai vu aussi c'est la romantisation de l'inceste, des "psychanalystes" incompétents, des troubles psy ignorés et non traités, des violences physiques (au sein de son mariage) et de la pédopornographie sur lesquels elle et son entourage ferment les yeux, au profit de l'image de la femme libre et du cliché de l'artiste torturée.
Je pense que je lirais au moins l'un de ces livres pour découvrir sa plume mais c'est sur que j'ai été décontenancé par vision idolâtrée d'Anaïs Nin.
Néanmoins je garde un gout amère, sale, après avoir découvert la vie de Anaïs Nin. J'entend tout le monde parler d'elle comme d'une Icone et c'est peut être la qu'a été mon problème.
Au delà de sa sensualité hypnotisante qu'on ressent superbement tout au long de la BD, ce que j'ai vu aussi c'est la romantisation de l'inceste, des "psychanalystes" incompétents, des troubles psy ignorés et non traités, des violences physiques (au sein de son mariage) et de la pédopornographie sur lesquels elle et son entourage ferment les yeux, au profit de l'image de la femme libre et du cliché de l'artiste torturée.
Je pense que je lirais au moins l'un de ces livres pour découvrir sa plume mais c'est sur que j'ai été décontenancé par vision idolâtrée d'Anaïs Nin.
January 23, 2021
I have rarely read such a beautiful and inspiring graphic work. I fell in love with Bischoff's pencil at the same time as the story of Nin. A single desire, to discover everything about their works.
May 3, 2021
"Acercarse a Anaïs Nin es como adentrarse en una hoguera en la que sabes que vas a arder pero de la que no te quieres alejar.
Nin fue bailarina y escritora. Se la conoce sobretodo por sus diarios en los que la sexualidad y el erotismo no son un tabú, sino todo lo contrario. Se la considera una de las precursoras de la novela erótica femenina aunque más que novelas lo que Nin escribió fue su vida. Se rodeó de figuras importantes como Henry Miller y Otto Rank, de los cuáles fue amiga y amante pero no sólo se relacionó con hombres, también conoció la sexualidad a través de mujeres como June Miller.
La vida de Anaïs fue cuanto menos fascinante y en esta novela gráfica firmada por Léonie Bischoff, ganadora del premio del público en el pasado festival de Angoulême, se cuenta parte de su historia a principio de la década de los años 30. Con una mágnifica ilustración Bischoff nos acerca a ese mundo de pasiones desenfrenadas pero también a ese debate interno que provocaba la moralidad de la época en una persona que parecía no pertenecer a ella.
No es necesario conocer a Anaïs antes de leer esta novela gráfica, primera publicación del reciente estrenado sello Garbuix books, pero lo que sí es seguro es que después de hacerlo necesitareis más sobre ella porque cómo bien transmite Bischoff, una vez conoces a Anaïs no vas a querer perderla jamás." Sara Collado
Nin fue bailarina y escritora. Se la conoce sobretodo por sus diarios en los que la sexualidad y el erotismo no son un tabú, sino todo lo contrario. Se la considera una de las precursoras de la novela erótica femenina aunque más que novelas lo que Nin escribió fue su vida. Se rodeó de figuras importantes como Henry Miller y Otto Rank, de los cuáles fue amiga y amante pero no sólo se relacionó con hombres, también conoció la sexualidad a través de mujeres como June Miller.
La vida de Anaïs fue cuanto menos fascinante y en esta novela gráfica firmada por Léonie Bischoff, ganadora del premio del público en el pasado festival de Angoulême, se cuenta parte de su historia a principio de la década de los años 30. Con una mágnifica ilustración Bischoff nos acerca a ese mundo de pasiones desenfrenadas pero también a ese debate interno que provocaba la moralidad de la época en una persona que parecía no pertenecer a ella.
No es necesario conocer a Anaïs antes de leer esta novela gráfica, primera publicación del reciente estrenado sello Garbuix books, pero lo que sí es seguro es que después de hacerlo necesitareis más sobre ella porque cómo bien transmite Bischoff, una vez conoces a Anaïs no vas a querer perderla jamás." Sara Collado
September 13, 2025
My wonderful friend Olivier gave me a copy of this gorgeous graphic novel for my birthday! He’s lovely and obviously knows me very well. Merci, merci!
I have long been fascinated with Nin’s work, both her fiction and her more autobiographical work. She was a deeply complex person, extremely talented, headstrong and intelligent. She could also be terribly selfish, manipulative, and cruel. And as the title implies, she was also a liar. She is someone I admire, but lucidly: a great artist, she was, but a good person, she was not.
Of course, a lot of attention is given to her relationship with Henry Miller, which she wrote about extensively. I understand why Bischoff would make it an important part of her narrative, but I do admit that I was hoping to learn something new. The real focus, however, is Nin’s journey towards making herself the woman and artist she has always wanted to be, by liberating herself from the social trappings and expectations that were forced on women at the time. She rejected a lot of them for the sake of her art, and while I wish the book would have devoted more space to her writing, I understand that exploring her inner world, and how she came to write, makes for a richer tale than simply parroting her words.
The artwork in this graphic novel is absolutely stunning, the metaphor of the sea being a felt presence through the gorgeous watery color palette and the fluid line work.
A wonderful homage to a great writer, and quite a feast for the eyes! It made me feel like re-reading her short stories!
I have long been fascinated with Nin’s work, both her fiction and her more autobiographical work. She was a deeply complex person, extremely talented, headstrong and intelligent. She could also be terribly selfish, manipulative, and cruel. And as the title implies, she was also a liar. She is someone I admire, but lucidly: a great artist, she was, but a good person, she was not.
Of course, a lot of attention is given to her relationship with Henry Miller, which she wrote about extensively. I understand why Bischoff would make it an important part of her narrative, but I do admit that I was hoping to learn something new. The real focus, however, is Nin’s journey towards making herself the woman and artist she has always wanted to be, by liberating herself from the social trappings and expectations that were forced on women at the time. She rejected a lot of them for the sake of her art, and while I wish the book would have devoted more space to her writing, I understand that exploring her inner world, and how she came to write, makes for a richer tale than simply parroting her words.
The artwork in this graphic novel is absolutely stunning, the metaphor of the sea being a felt presence through the gorgeous watery color palette and the fluid line work.
A wonderful homage to a great writer, and quite a feast for the eyes! It made me feel like re-reading her short stories!
October 8, 2021
On the Sea of Lies
Review of the Casterman original French language paperback edition (2020) of a graphic novel adaptation of Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love": The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin, 1931-1932 (1986) and Incest: From "A Journal of Love": The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin, 1932-1934 (1992)
Although my French is very basic, it is good enough for reading books on subjects about which I already have a large amount of previous knowledge, such as Julien Teyssandier's travel/music non-fiction Arvo Pärt (2017) and Philippe Girard's graphic novel Leonard Cohen. Sur un fil (2021). It was while I was browsing the webpages of Girard's Belgian/French publisher Casterman that I noticed Bischoff's graphic novel and that it had won the 2021 Audience Award at the Angoulême International Comics Festival.
In the case of Anaïs Nin, I didn't have that much familiarity. I only knew her from the Philip Kaufman film Henry and June (1990) and from having the 1989 Harcourt paperback edition of its source book (which I suspect that I didn't actually finish reading at the time, as it seemed too tedious). I now re-read the book in parallel with the graphic novel.
Regardless of one's belief in the truthfulness of Nin's diary (I'm particularly doubtful about the paternal incest parts (yech!), and suspect some Freudian fantasy fulfillment about the father who was mostly absent from her life), there is no doubting the beauty of Bischoff's art work which explores Nin's life and her adventurous sexual world. The real and/or imagined lovers range from the husband Hugo Guiler, writer Henry Miller and his wife June Miller, her father Joaquín Nin, her cousin Eduardo, her dance teacher Francisco Miralles Arnau and two psychoanalysts: René Félix Allendy and Otto Rank.
The beauty and variety of the art pages for the love scenes are particularly well done and range from flowers and butterflies themes for passionate encounters to a black background and "black light" neon lines to heighten the darkness in the "incest" scene. The graphic novel concludes with the celebratory air of the first publication of Henry Miller's notorious Tropic of Cancer (1934), which was funded by Nin. There is a cameo appearance by Lawrence Durrell at the end as well.
This is an outstanding graphic novel by Léonie Bischoff and it will be interesting to see what her future works will be. There are further diaries by Nin, but I suspect that Sur la mer des mensonges has already covered the most dramatic part of her life quite thoroughly.
Trivia and Links
You can view the first 5 pages of the graphic novel at the publisher Casterman's official page for the book here.
Author/artist Léonie Bischoff is interviewed about Anaïs Nin: sur la mer des mensonges at a YouTube video here (video is in French, but you can autogenerate subtitle translation in various languages, including English).
Author/artist Léonie Bischoff discusses her interest in Anaïs Nin and demonstrates her drawing with a head portrait at a YouTube video here (video is in French, but you can autogenerate subtitle translation in various languages, including English).
Review of the Casterman original French language paperback edition (2020) of a graphic novel adaptation of Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love": The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin, 1931-1932 (1986) and Incest: From "A Journal of Love": The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin, 1932-1934 (1992)
In the early 1930s, Anaïs Nin lives in the Parisian suburbs and struggles with the anguish of her life as a banker's wife. Several times uprooted, she grew up between two continents, in three languages, and struggles to find her place in a society which relegates women to supporting roles. She wants to be a writer, and since childhood has invented a loophole: her diary. It is her drug, her companion, her double, the one who allows her to explore the complexity of her feelings and to perceive the sensuality that simmers within her. It was then that she met Henry Miller, a revelation that proved to be the first step towards a great upheaval. - translation of the French language synopsis.
Although my French is very basic, it is good enough for reading books on subjects about which I already have a large amount of previous knowledge, such as Julien Teyssandier's travel/music non-fiction Arvo Pärt (2017) and Philippe Girard's graphic novel Leonard Cohen. Sur un fil (2021). It was while I was browsing the webpages of Girard's Belgian/French publisher Casterman that I noticed Bischoff's graphic novel and that it had won the 2021 Audience Award at the Angoulême International Comics Festival.
In the case of Anaïs Nin, I didn't have that much familiarity. I only knew her from the Philip Kaufman film Henry and June (1990) and from having the 1989 Harcourt paperback edition of its source book (which I suspect that I didn't actually finish reading at the time, as it seemed too tedious). I now re-read the book in parallel with the graphic novel.
Regardless of one's belief in the truthfulness of Nin's diary (I'm particularly doubtful about the paternal incest parts (yech!), and suspect some Freudian fantasy fulfillment about the father who was mostly absent from her life), there is no doubting the beauty of Bischoff's art work which explores Nin's life and her adventurous sexual world. The real and/or imagined lovers range from the husband Hugo Guiler, writer Henry Miller and his wife June Miller, her father Joaquín Nin, her cousin Eduardo, her dance teacher Francisco Miralles Arnau and two psychoanalysts: René Félix Allendy and Otto Rank.
The beauty and variety of the art pages for the love scenes are particularly well done and range from flowers and butterflies themes for passionate encounters to a black background and "black light" neon lines to heighten the darkness in the "incest" scene. The graphic novel concludes with the celebratory air of the first publication of Henry Miller's notorious Tropic of Cancer (1934), which was funded by Nin. There is a cameo appearance by Lawrence Durrell at the end as well.
This is an outstanding graphic novel by Léonie Bischoff and it will be interesting to see what her future works will be. There are further diaries by Nin, but I suspect that Sur la mer des mensonges has already covered the most dramatic part of her life quite thoroughly.
Trivia and Links
You can view the first 5 pages of the graphic novel at the publisher Casterman's official page for the book here.
Author/artist Léonie Bischoff is interviewed about Anaïs Nin: sur la mer des mensonges at a YouTube video here (video is in French, but you can autogenerate subtitle translation in various languages, including English).
Author/artist Léonie Bischoff discusses her interest in Anaïs Nin and demonstrates her drawing with a head portrait at a YouTube video here (video is in French, but you can autogenerate subtitle translation in various languages, including English).
April 4, 2021
Alors, je n'étais pas très motivé à lire ceci car je connaissais déjà en gros la vie d'Anaïs Nin donc cela n'avait pas grand intérêt au départ. Cependant, une amie et collègue me l'a prêté et m'a dit que ça valait le coup, juste pour les illustrations. Et donc, je dois reconnaître qu'elle avait raison. Les illustrations sont magnifiques et juste pour cela, il mérite d'être lu. Je vais donc jeter un oeil aux prochaines publications de Léonie Bischoff. Feuilleter une oeuvre d'art au temps de la fermeture des musées fut très agréable.
October 16, 2020
Wow, quelle beauté ce roman graphique !
J'ai été complétement happée, mais les 30 dernières pages m'ont mise mal à l'aise tellement la vie d'Anaïs Nin va dans tous les sens (pour le dire avec un euphémisme et ne pas spoiler).
Le pire c'est la psychanalyse wtf haha.
J'ai été complétement happée, mais les 30 dernières pages m'ont mise mal à l'aise tellement la vie d'Anaïs Nin va dans tous les sens (pour le dire avec un euphémisme et ne pas spoiler).
Le pire c'est la psychanalyse wtf haha.
May 12, 2022
I disegni sono bellissimi.
Solo quest'anno ho letto la Nin, per la prima volta. Il suo Il delta di Venere è stato piuttosto divertende, ma non sapevo niente dell'autrice.
Ritengo che questo volume le renda giustizia: la Nin è un personaggio complicato, incastrato tra la vita borghese e quella d'artista, tra le aspettative della società per una donna del suo rango e la voglia di libertà.
Solo quest'anno ho letto la Nin, per la prima volta. Il suo Il delta di Venere è stato piuttosto divertende, ma non sapevo niente dell'autrice.
Ritengo che questo volume le renda giustizia: la Nin è un personaggio complicato, incastrato tra la vita borghese e quella d'artista, tra le aspettative della società per una donna del suo rango e la voglia di libertà.
Read
February 9, 2025Ma-gni-fique ! J'ai absolument adoré le trait, l'univers graphique, les ambiances. Les couleurs, la composition des planches, la retranscription des émotions et d'une intériorité impalpable. Un travail incroyable !
J'ai lu cette BD sans connaître Anaïs Nin (jamais lue), si ce n'est de réputation sur sa quête de liberté et de stabilité mentale. Je ne me prononcerai donc pas sur la véracité historique ou non du récit.
Ceci étant dit, j'ai trouvé la personnage complexe, très intéressante, avant-gardiste, intriguante. Elle n'a pas toujours eu ma sympathie mais elle est là pour bousculer. Et c'est un pari réussi !
J'ai lu cette BD sans connaître Anaïs Nin (jamais lue), si ce n'est de réputation sur sa quête de liberté et de stabilité mentale. Je ne me prononcerai donc pas sur la véracité historique ou non du récit.
Ceci étant dit, j'ai trouvé la personnage complexe, très intéressante, avant-gardiste, intriguante. Elle n'a pas toujours eu ma sympathie mais elle est là pour bousculer. Et c'est un pari réussi !
January 21, 2022
18/20
Cette BD biographique nous fait découvrir la femme derrière l’écrivaine. Anaïs Nin est un personnage particulier, très libre pour son époque, et toujours en quête de perfection artistique. Les dessins sont incroyables, et en font un ouvrage extraordinaire, à lire absolument.
Ma chronique : https://littleprettybooks.com/2022/01...
Cette BD biographique nous fait découvrir la femme derrière l’écrivaine. Anaïs Nin est un personnage particulier, très libre pour son époque, et toujours en quête de perfection artistique. Les dessins sont incroyables, et en font un ouvrage extraordinaire, à lire absolument.
Ma chronique : https://littleprettybooks.com/2022/01...
August 4, 2021
Beautifully drawn biography of Anaïs Nin, the erotic French-American writer who is most famous for her journals relating, among other things, her many intimate relations. Left me wondering if her husband knew about half of them. One of her lovers was Henry Miller. Their relation was portrayed in the movie Henry and June starring Uma Thurman.
I don't know what to think of Anaïs: was she liberated and a feminist, or rather a egoistic narcissist? Anyway, this spiked my interest in reading one of her works.
Léonie Bischoff uses a poetic, almost dreamlike sort of tone, which it's reflected in the gorgeous colour pencil drawings. Outstanding, one of the best graphic novels I've ever come across.
I don't know what to think of Anaïs: was she liberated and a feminist, or rather a egoistic narcissist? Anyway, this spiked my interest in reading one of her works.
Léonie Bischoff uses a poetic, almost dreamlike sort of tone, which it's reflected in the gorgeous colour pencil drawings. Outstanding, one of the best graphic novels I've ever come across.
April 26, 2021
Voici une œuvre biographique très réussie. La vie d'Anaïs Nin, présentée en bande dessinée, la première femme à avoir écrit de la littérature érotique. Un magnifique coup de crayon tout en douceur, tons pastels sur fond blanc, épuré, très agréable à l'œil, qui met en valeur la poésie du personnage. Je ne connaissais pas vraiment la vie et le parcours de cette femme, j'ai adoré la façon dont Léonie Bischoff nous la présente. Sans vulgarité ni jamais trop cru. Mais quand même pour adulte, on s'entend, certaines images sont assez explicites.
December 29, 2021
Questa lettura è stata intensa, senza pause: non c’è stata la possibilità effettiva di staccare gli occhi dalle pagine.
Le tavole illustrate sono ipnotiche, meravigliose nel vero senso della parola.
Il racconto propone situazioni che mi hanno turbata e che si sono scontrate con la mia morale; ciononostante, l’ho trovato molto vero, seppur “nel mare delle menzogne”.
Le tavole illustrate sono ipnotiche, meravigliose nel vero senso della parola.
Il racconto propone situazioni che mi hanno turbata e che si sono scontrate con la mia morale; ciononostante, l’ho trovato molto vero, seppur “nel mare delle menzogne”.
January 5, 2021
Des dessins à couper le souffle et une partie de la vie d'Anaïs Nin intéressante à découvrir mais je suis un peu restée sur ma faim. Et certains passages mettent très mal à l'aise. Un tw inceste aurait été nécessaire je trouve...
November 24, 2024
TW: viol, inceste, avortement
January 7, 2022
un 4,5/5.
J’ai forcément entendu parler d’Anaïs Nin et je connaissais vaguement son histoire mais je n’ai jamais rien lu d’elle, ni d’Henry Miller, d’ailleurs ! Mais j’ai été particulièrement attirée par le graphisme de cet album : j’ai trouvé le crayonné et les couleurs douces magnifiques, c’est ciselé, fin, léger et en même temps ample et foisonnant malgré une apparente simplicité. D’ailleurs, on peut retrouver cette dualité sur la couverture et elle est aussi très représentative du personnage star. Anaïs Nin est une femme complexe, parfois étrange, libre et moderne, féministe avant l’heure et à la vie peu commune. Son charme semble indéniable vu le nombre de personnes qui l’ont aimée malgré tous ses mensonges et qui lui sont restés fidèles. L’album n’est pas une biographie car l’auteure ne raconte pas la vie entière d’Anaïs : ce serait plutôt ce que j’appelle un pan de vie, quelques années décrites avec quelques flashbacks pour éclaircir certains détails, et l’ensemble se focalise plus sur les sentiments et ressentis des personnages plutôt que sur les faits, rendant ainsi tous ces protagonistes attachants, sympathiques et humains. J’ai pris beaucoup de plaisir à cette lecture qui m’a permis d’en savoir un peu plus sur Anaïs Nin (une mini biographie avec des dates-clés et des évènements marquants de sa vie aurait été bienvenue en fin d’album) et cela m’a donné l’envie de découvrir ses œuvres.
J’ai forcément entendu parler d’Anaïs Nin et je connaissais vaguement son histoire mais je n’ai jamais rien lu d’elle, ni d’Henry Miller, d’ailleurs ! Mais j’ai été particulièrement attirée par le graphisme de cet album : j’ai trouvé le crayonné et les couleurs douces magnifiques, c’est ciselé, fin, léger et en même temps ample et foisonnant malgré une apparente simplicité. D’ailleurs, on peut retrouver cette dualité sur la couverture et elle est aussi très représentative du personnage star. Anaïs Nin est une femme complexe, parfois étrange, libre et moderne, féministe avant l’heure et à la vie peu commune. Son charme semble indéniable vu le nombre de personnes qui l’ont aimée malgré tous ses mensonges et qui lui sont restés fidèles. L’album n’est pas une biographie car l’auteure ne raconte pas la vie entière d’Anaïs : ce serait plutôt ce que j’appelle un pan de vie, quelques années décrites avec quelques flashbacks pour éclaircir certains détails, et l’ensemble se focalise plus sur les sentiments et ressentis des personnages plutôt que sur les faits, rendant ainsi tous ces protagonistes attachants, sympathiques et humains. J’ai pris beaucoup de plaisir à cette lecture qui m’a permis d’en savoir un peu plus sur Anaïs Nin (une mini biographie avec des dates-clés et des évènements marquants de sa vie aurait été bienvenue en fin d’album) et cela m’a donné l’envie de découvrir ses œuvres.
April 2, 2023
Ça m'a ému d'une manière que je comprends pas forcément, la vie de cette femme a eu l'air si complexe et folle, pleine de questionnements et d'incompréhensions. Je veux juste la connaître et en savoir plus sur sa vie, ses pensées alors que j'ai du mal à l'apprécier pleinement à cause de certains de ses actes et de la façon dont elle vit par rapport aux autres. À côté de ça le monde est difficile pour elle et avec elle et je veux comprendre à quel point ça a influencé sa façon d'être.
J'ai adoré les dessins en plus, ils sont absolument magnifiques, les moments importants pour Anaïs Nin sont tellement mis en avant visuellement. C'est bien en contraste avec la simplicité des dessins le reste du temps et ça donne encore plus de force et d'émotions aux dessins plus complexes.
Je vais m'intéresser à elle et à ses écrits ✨
J'ai adoré les dessins en plus, ils sont absolument magnifiques, les moments importants pour Anaïs Nin sont tellement mis en avant visuellement. C'est bien en contraste avec la simplicité des dessins le reste du temps et ça donne encore plus de force et d'émotions aux dessins plus complexes.
Je vais m'intéresser à elle et à ses écrits ✨
May 22, 2024
Beautiful drawings, ugly subject matter. This book throws at you - and to some degree romanticises - the deeply problematic sexual encounters and affairs as well as the serious mental problems that supposedly shaped Anaïs Nin's life and writings. I don't know anything about the real Anaïs Nin, but if she was anything like the fictional one portrayed in this graphic novel, I'd find her pitiful and absolutely unlikeable.
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