![]() ![]() Nono likes to roll dice with the young sailors who frequent his establishment. Madame Lysiane is married to the owner of the brothel, whose name is Nono. She is the madame of the Brest brothel, La Feria Robert, Querelle’s brother, is her lover. The only female character in the book is Madame Lysiane. There is this persistent theme running throughout the novel of the two brothers, Querelle and Robert, being so much alike that the love they have for each other is self-love, and the two brothers are, in fact, one and the same person. He has a look-alike brother, Robert, who is a gigolo in the local brothel in Brest called La Feria. His being a sailor and moving around from place to place makes him able to escape detection for the murders and thefts he commits. His good looks make him a sort of magnet for almost anyone who sees him. Georges Querelle is a young, muscular, good-looking French sailor, in the French seaport town of Brest where the action of the novel takes place. It was controversial for the 1940s (thus the anonymous publication), involving, as it does, homosexuality, murder, romantic obsession and prostitution. Querelle (also known as Querelle de Brest) was written in 1945 and published anonymously in 1947. “ The notion of murder often brings to mind the notion of sailors and the sea.” This is the opening sentence of the novel Querelle by French author Jean Genet (1910-1986). ![]() ![]() ![]() Querelle ~ A Capsule Book Review by Allen Kopp ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |