Claudine Married by Colette

Regular readers of this blog might remember that I recently read Claudine in Paris by Colette, and although I didn’t much take to Claudine, I continued the series with Claudine Married.

Claudine isn’t any more likeable in this story. After a whirlwind courtship with her much older uncle by marriage, Claudine and Renaud married, then spent several years travelling and living out of suitcases. Back in Paris, Claudine fell in lust with the wife of a friend, Rezi, and supported by Renaud, started an affair with her. Claudine then, hypocritically in my opinion, had a major hissy fit when she discovered that Renaud and Rezi were also having an affair.

There was a particularly nasty little scene at the beginning of the story when Claudine and Renaud visited her old school at Montigny on their honeymoon, where Renaud gave young schoolgirls sweets in exchange for kisses, then watched them sleep. Claudine’s recognition and acceptance of Renaud’s attraction to very young girls, as well as her own sexual attraction to them made me uncomfortable. Perhaps things were different back then, but in my opinion, that still doesn’t make them right.

Not much more to say about this one, really. The only thing I preferred about Claudine in this story was that she ‘owned’ her emotions and behaviour more than she did in Claudine in Paris, possibly because she was slightly older and more mature this time around.

If you’re wondering why I read these books when I clearly didn’t enjoy them, it was because I was on holidays with a very limited supply of reading material. I could have re-read something else, I suppose, but I hadn’t enjoyed any of the other books I’d taken with me enough for that either.

I’ll probably give Colette a miss in future.

Claudine in Paris by Colette

Claudine in Paris is the first book I’ve read by Colette. Since reading this I’ve also read Claudine Married, the next book in the series of four, but have not yet reviewed this. By rights, I should have started with Claudine at School, but have not yet found a copy of this book.

I might have liked Claudine better had I started at the beginning of the series, but I found her character to be cruel and contradictory. She was frank, but well-aware of the effect she produced at all times, which made the occasions when she demonstrated naivety to seem false. Her conversation and behaviour was often salacious and sensationalist, and sometimes nasty, just for effect.

The story began with seventeen-year old Claudine recovering from an illness that had left her thin and tired. She was mourning her long hair that had fallen in ringlets to her waist, as it had been cut off during her illness, leaving her with a boyish crop of curls.

When Claudine’s father suddenly decided to move to Paris, Claudine was devastated at leaving her beloved home and village school at Montigny, which seemed to have been be a hotbed of lesbian affairs, including one between the headmistress and a teacher. Claudine happily left Luce behind, a fellow schoolgirl who she had teased, taunted and abused for years.

In Paris, the self-obsessed Claudine met her effeminate cousin Marcel and manipulated him into sharing the details of his love affair with another boy. When Claudine met Marcel’s father, her much older and widowed Uncle Renaud, she fell in love with him and he with her and her boyish crop of curls, or was it just lust? I don’t know and don’t care, these two deserved each other.

Eventually Luce also came to Paris and became the mistress of an elderly, unattractive man who she called ‘uncle’. I can’t imagine why this shocked Claudine, yet it did.

I also disliked Claudine’s maid Melie, who felt sorry for Claudine’s cat Fanchette when she went on heat and provided the cat with a ‘husband’. Claudine arranged for the resulting kittens to be put down.

Although I disliked Claudine’s character and the predatory sexual behaviour in the story, she had a distinct voice and I liked that she pushed boundaries. I also liked the writing, especially when Claudine talked about her beloved Montigny.

I preferred Claudine Married even though the story was more scandalous still, because it seemed to me that in Claudine Married, Claudine ‘owned’ her bad behaviour instead of faking wide-eyed ingenuity. Review of this to follow.

Claudine in Paris was book nine of my second Classics Club challenge to read 50 classics before my challenge end date of September 08, 2028.