Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Guy de Maupassant's Tales of Suicide - A Collection of Short Stories
    Guy de Maupassant's Tales of Suicide - A Collection of Short Stories
    Guy de Maupassant's Tales of Suicide - A Collection of Short Stories
    Ebook107 pages1 hour

    Guy de Maupassant's Tales of Suicide - A Collection of Short Stories

    By Guy de Maupassant

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    These early works by Guy de Maupassant were originally published in the 1880's. As a collection of short stories, this represents Maupassant's tales of suicide, and includes 'A Stroll', 'Found on a Drowned Man', 'The Child', 'The Magic Couch', 'Yvette Samoris', and many other titles. Guy de Maupassant was born in 1850 at the Château de Miromesnil, near Dieppe, France. He came from a prosperous family, but when Maupassant was eleven, his mother risked social disgrace by trying to secure a legal separation from her husband. After the split, Maupassant lived with his mother till he was thirteen, and inherited her love of classical literature. In 1880, Maupassant published his first - and, according to many, his best - short story, entitled 'Boule de Suif' ('Ball of Fat'). It was an instant success. He went on to be extremely prolific during the 1880s, working methodically to produce up to four volumes of short fiction every year. Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900's and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRead Books Ltd.
    Release dateMar 31, 2016
    ISBN9781473360310
    Guy de Maupassant's Tales of Suicide - A Collection of Short Stories
    Author

    Guy de Maupassant

    Guy de Maupassant was a French writer and poet considered to be one of the pioneers of the modern short story whose best-known works include "Boule de Suif," "Mother Sauvage," and "The Necklace." De Maupassant was heavily influenced by his mother, a divorcée who raised her sons on her own, and whose own love of the written word inspired his passion for writing. While studying poetry in Rouen, de Maupassant made the acquaintance of Gustave Flaubert, who became a supporter and life-long influence for the author. De Maupassant died in 1893 after being committed to an asylum in Paris.

    Read more from Guy De Maupassant

    Related to Guy de Maupassant's Tales of Suicide - A Collection of Short Stories

    Related ebooks

    Short Stories For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    Related categories

    Reviews for Guy de Maupassant's Tales of Suicide - A Collection of Short Stories

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Guy de Maupassant's Tales of Suicide - A Collection of Short Stories - Guy de Maupassant

      Guy de Maupassant’s

      Tales of Suicide

      -

      A Collection of

      Short Stories

      Copyright © 2016 Read Books Ltd.

      This book is copyright and may not be

      reproduced or copied in any way without

      the express permission of the publisher in writing

      British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

      A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

      Contents

      Guy De Maupassant

      A Stroll

      A Widow

      Found on a Drowned Man

      Madame Baptiste

      Old Amable

      PART I

      PART II

      PART III

      Suicides

      The Child

      The Magic Couch

      The Model

      Yvette Samoris

      Guy De Maupassant

      Henri-René-Albert-Guy de Maupassant was born in 1850 at the Château de Miromesnil, near Dieppe, France. He came from a prosperous family, but when Maupassant was eleven, his mother risked social disgrace by trying to secure a legal separation from her husband. After the split, Maupassant lived with his mother till he was thirteen, and inherited her love of classical literature, especially Shakespeare. Upon entering high school, he met the great author Gustave Flaubert, and despite being something of an unruly student proved himself as a good scholar, delighting in poetry and theatre.

      Not long after he graduated from college in 1870, the Franco-Prussian War broke out, and Maupassant enlisted voluntarily. Afterwards, he moved to Paris, where he spent ten years as a clerk in the Navy Department, and began to write fiction under the guidance of Flaubert. At Flaubert’s home he met a number of distinguished authors, including Émile Zola and Ivan Turgenev. In 1878, Maupassant became a contributing editor of several major newspapers, including Le Figaro, Gil Blas, Le Gaulois and l’Écho de Paris, writing fiction in his spare time.

      In 1880, Maupassant published his first – and, according to many, his best – short story, entitled ‘Boule de Suif’ (‘Ball of Fat’). It was an instant success. He went on to be extremely prolific during the 1880s, working methodically to produce up to four volumes of short fiction every year. In 1883 and 1885 respectively, Maupassant published Une Vie (A Woman’s Life) and Bel-Ami, both of which rank among his best-known works. In 1887, by then a very famous and very wealthy literary figure, he published what is widely regarded as his finest novel, Pierre et Jean.

      As well as being a well-known opponent of the construction of the Eiffel Tower, Maupassant was a solitary, withdrawn man with an aversion to public life. In his later years, as a result of the syphilis he had contracted earlier in life, he developed a powerful fear of death and became deeply paranoid. In early 1892, Maupassant tried to commit suicide by cutting his throat, and was committed to a private asylum in Paris. He died here some eighteen months later, aged 42. He penned his own epitaph: I have coveted everything and taken pleasure in nothing. Some years later, in his autobiography, Friedrich Nietzsche called Maupassant one of the stronger race, a genuine Latin to whom I am particularly attached.

      A Stroll

      When Old Man Leras, bookkeeper for Messieurs Labuze and Company, left the store, he stood for a minute bewildered at the glory of the setting sun. He had worked all day in the yellow light of a small jet of gas, far in the back of the store, on a narrow court, as deep as a well. The little room where he had been spending his days for forty years was so dark that even in the middle of summer one could hardly see without gaslight from eleven until three.

      It was always damp and cold, and from this hole on which his window opened came the musty odor of a sewer.

      For forty years Monsieur Leras had been arriving every morning in this prison at eight o’clock, and he would remain there until seven at night, bending over his books, writing with the industry of a good clerk.

      He was now making three thousand francs a year, having started at fifteen hundred. He had remained a bachelor, as his means did not allow him the luxury of a wife, and as he had never enjoyed anything, he desired nothing. From time to time, however, tired of this continuous and monotonous work, he formed a platonic wish: Gad! If I only had an income of fifteen thousand francs, I would take life easy.

      He had never taken life easy, as he had never had anything but his monthly salary. His life had been uneventful, without emotions, without hopes. The faculty of dreaming with which every one is blessed had never developed in the mediocrity of his ambitions.

      When he was twenty-one he entered the employ of Messieurs Labuze and Company. And he had never left them.

      In 1856 he had lost his father and then his mother in 1859. Since then the only incident in his life was when he moved, in 1868, because his landlord had tried to raise his rent.

      Every day his alarm clock, with a frightful noise of rattling chains, made him spring out of bed at 6 o’clock precisely.

      Twice, however, this piece of mechanism had been out of order—once in 1866 and again in 1874; he had never been able to find out the reason why. He would dress, make his bed, sweep his room, dust his chair and the top of his bureau. All this took him an hour and a half.

      Then he would go out, buy a roll at the Lahure Bakery, in which he had seen eleven different owners without the name ever changing, and he would eat this roll on the way to the office.

      His entire existence had been spent in the narrow, dark office, which was still decorated with the same wall paper. He had entered there as a young man, as assistant to Monsieur Brument, and with the desire to replace him.

      He had taken his place and wished for nothing more.

      The whole harvest of memories which other men reap in their span of years, the unexpected events, sweet or tragic loves, adventurous journeys, all the occurrences of a free existence, all these things had remained unknown to him.

      Days, weeks, months, seasons, years, all were alike to him. He got up every day at the same hour, started out, arrived at the office, ate luncheon, went away, had dinner and went to bed without ever interrupting the regular monotony of similar actions, deeds and thoughts.

      Formerly he used to look at his blond mustache and wavy hair in the little round mirror left by his predecessor. Now, every evening before leaving, he would look at his white mustache and bald head in the same mirror. Forty years had rolled by, long and rapid, dreary as a day of sadness and as similar as the hours of a sleepless night. Forty years of which nothing remained, not even a memory, not even a misfortune, since the death of his parents. Nothing.

      That day Monsieur Leras stood by the door, dazzled at the brilliancy of the setting sun; and instead of returning home he decided to take a little stroll before dinner, a thing which happened to him four or five times a year.

      He reached the boulevards, where people were streaming along under the green trees. It was a spring evening, one of those first warm and pleasant evenings which fill the heart with the joy of life.

      Monsieur Leras went along with his mincing old man’s step; he was going along with joy in his heart, at peace with the world. He reached the Champs-Elysees, and he continued to walk, enlivened by the sight of the young people trotting along.

      The whole sky was aflame; the Arc de Triomphe stood out against the brilliant background of the horizon, like a giant surrounded by fire. As he approached the immense monument, the old

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1