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In Mantel’s version of events, he is bisexual, but I do not know whether this is true of the real Desmoulins or not. This is a magnificent achievement, gripping and engrossing, and a strident demonstration of how historical fiction can compliment the academic. So I kept at it, and little by little it began to grip me, until, having reached the end, I felt an immense sense of loss and had immediately to go back and re-immerse myself; and then, having reached the end for a second time, could still hardly bear to say goodbye. Anne-Madeleine was repeating the De profundis in a monotone: "From the morning watch even until night: let Israel hope in the Lord.
Aunt Eulalie stood up, and the book slipped out of her fingers, slithered down her skirt, fell and opened itself on the floor. I found myself struggling with a slow crawl through the social history of what should have read as very hard. We choose our own recommendations: fiction, non-fiction, memoirs, poetry, nature writing; in fact anything other than children's books, and not necessarily newly-published.Afterwards the child, who had learned to measure out sparingly his stronger emotions, wondered if he ought to be sorry.
He made her think of his mother, sometimes; he had those sea-colored eyes that seemed to trap and hold the light. François had stood before the priest and done his duty; but once he met her body between the sheets, he felt again the original, visceral passion. He was the rising star of the local barrister's association and one of the district's most coveted bachelors. To be sure," he said, "it would be a pity to let your clever little boy come to nothing for the want of a little cash. She also gets away with switching tenses and generally leaving the reader to work out what's happening by herself.The laborer, exhausted, swayed against the wall, marking the plaster with a long rust-colored streak. Here, though, her approach is more diffuse as she follows her triad: volatile and vulnerable Camille Desmoulins, bold and fleshy Danton with his charisma and his grubby morals, and the troubled intellectual fervour of Maximilien Robespierre. In 1767--when Armand was able to walk, and Anne-Clothilde was the baby of the household--Jean-Nicolas said to his wife:"Camille ought to go away to school, you know.
Eulalie said, "You'll be all right with Grandmother for a few days, till your mother's feeling better. Mantel suggests that they forced the two of them into sexual relations so that Eléonore would become pregnant and Robespierre would marry her. I found it difficult that sometimes they were referred to as their christian names and then others as their surnames but when you get to around page 300 you have learnt that Desmoulins is also Camille, Robespierre is also Max and Georges/Georges-Jaques is also Danton. Her use of the p-word is a measure of the kind of disdain she feels emanating from the academic historians, who seem to think there are only two kinds of history, the 'sceptical and rational' or the 'imaginative and erratic'.It was not the custom to heat the place, unless ice formed on the holy water in the chapel font; so in winter it was usual to go out early to harvest some icicles and drop them in, and hope that the principal would stretch a point. This was another buddy read with my friend Jemidar, who shares my fan girl enthusiasm for Hilary Mantel's writing. He was drawn by her myopic green eyes, wide-open eyes that could soften or sharpen like the eyes of a cat. Being very interested in history, particularly the French Revolution (in which the novel is set), the book turned out to be the perfect choice for me, as Mantle's ability to seamlessly interweave fact with fiction proved to be excellent.
He had a strong sympathy with the poor, which made him very popular, at first in his hometown of Arras and, later, as a deputy to the Estates General and the National Assembly at Versailles and Paris. She flirts with several men while she is married to Desmoulins, but we never know for certain if she is unfaithful to her husband. What a bummer when you pick a big long novel and it turns out to be the pain in the arse this one did - not so bad that I could apply the 100 page rule but not so good that I actually wanted to pick the thing up and read the words in it.
Jean-Nicolas contacted Cateau-Cambrésis in a belligerent mood to ask why his son had developed a stutter. It was to be Louis-le-Grand, the best school in the country, where the sons of the aristocracy were educated--a school that looked out for talent, too, and where a boy with no fortune might get on. Appassionante romanzo storico che, attraverso soprattutto i personaggi di Danton, Desmoulins e Robespierre, apre a una visione come "in presa diretta" degli anni e delle passioni della rivoluzione francese. From the very beginning, Danton has a strong desire for money, unlike Desmoulins, who is content to be a struggling young lawyer until the events of the Revolution overtake him.