Reviews with content warning for Pedophilia - Der Liebhaber

i wouldn’t know how to rate this book. the writing is breathtaking and i love the way duras narrates her family dynamics. the least interesting thing about it is the older lover!

Content Warnings

odpeppiatt's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

"We said nothing about all this outside, one of the first things we'd learned was to keep quiet about the ruling principle of our life, poverty. And then about everything else. Our first confidants, though the word seems excessive, are our lovers, the people we meet away from our various homes, first in the streets of Saigon and then on ocean liners and trains, and then all over the place." (60)

"I've never written, though I thought I wrote, never loved, though I thought I loved, never done anything but wait outside the closed door." (25)

the reason for my high rating is primarily bc of the voice. it's really hard to be conversational and poignant at the same time, but duras really nailed it I thought. she did this really weird thing with punctuation, using it in this intentionally incorrect (unless punctuation was different in France? in the '80s? doubt it but maybe) way, really unique & unlike anything I've seen (not that I've really been out here "seeing it all"), that made you have to read it with a certain rhythm, probably the way she wanted it to sound. it intensifies the inner monologue, suggests that the narrator isn't as blasé as she presents herself. like this: "I looked at her to try to find out, find out who she was, Marie-Claude Carpenter. Why she was there rather than somewhere else, why she was from so far away too, from Boston, why she was rich, why no one knew anything about her, not anything, no one, why these seemingly compulsory parties. and why, why, in her eyes, deep down in the depths of sight, that particle of death? Marie-Claude Carpenter. Why did all her dresses have something indefinable in common that made them look as if they didn't quite belong to her....." (66) a lot of the sentences are fragments, things like that, just ~musical~ as they say. but it sounds good like that, it's more like how people talk, reminisce. this book would definitely sound really good read aloud. her experience as a screenwriter is obvious (in a good way).

I read this to ring in Valentine's Day (based solely on the title)....... needless to say it was very UNceremonious..... between this and Anaïs nin, I have digested more unstigmatized pedophilia than I ever wanted to in my life. I just needed more acknowledgement that it's fucked up. and I get that that's maybe the point and the reader's reaction is enough commentary and whatever Duchamp said about the spectators making the art and whatnot, but what if the reader doesn't react "correctly"? it goes back to the whole fucking licorice pizza debate (there were real-life people Ginj/OS/I talked to who didn't consider the age gap the whole time they were watching the movie--ginj and I still thought the you were supposed to feel weird, OS disagreed). but regardless, I needed my uncomfy-ness to be validated more because I have a hard time trusting my own opinions as it is (**not that I didn't trust my vindication of my opinion here)

my other qualm is just that I wanted to know more about pretty much all of the characters, especially the younger brother. I felt like she reflected on a lot of big life moments

like her father and both of her brothers dying

without actually disclosing the moments themselves.

ok that's all my takeaways I think......

**had to bring it down a quarter of a star bc I don't know that I really loved reading it, even though I appreciate it.........

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sleepylit's review against another edition

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dark reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Overall, I enjoyed the story being told, but the way it was written became a bit confusing to me. There were also points that I felt were not needed in relation to the bigger picture of the relationship between the girl and the man. The details about her mother and brothers were not important to understand the relationship, but I do concur it was needed to be able to assess the economic differences.

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