Jun
2
11:00pm
Rachel Careau with Kathleen Antonioli, Chéri and The End of Chéri
By Porter Square Books
Porter Square Books is thrilled to welcome Rachel Careau, the first woman to translate Collette's tragicomic masterpiece in over 85 years, for a virtual event. Kathleen Antonioli will join her in conversation. This event will be free and open to all, hosted via Crowdcast.
An exquisite new translation of Colette’s tragicomic masterpiece, a pair of novels exploring the relationship between an aging courtesan and a much younger man.
Chéri and its sequel, The End of Chéri, mark Colette’s finest achievements in their brilliant, subtle, and frank investigations of love and power. Set in the Parisian demimonde in the last days of the Belle Époque, Chéri tells the story of Léa, a courtesan at the end of a successful career, and her lover, the beautiful but emotionally opaque Chéri. Chéri will soon enter into an arranged marriage, ending their six-year affair, which—they will each realize too late—has been the one real love of their lives.
The End of Chéri picks up their story in the aftermath of the First World War. Chéri, now a decorated soldier, has returned from the trenches to a changed world. Emotionally estranged from his independent and unfaithful wife, a psychically wounded Chéri begins an inexorable descent—one that leads him back to a stunning encounter with Léa.
As the acclaimed writer and translator Lydia Davis puts it in an illuminating foreword, Rachel Careau’s “brilliantly ingenious, close new translation” reveals Chéri and The End of Chéri as “the strangest of love stories.” Colette skillfully portrays her characters’ shifting inner lives and desires amid a clear-eyed depiction of interpersonal power dynamics. Careau’s lean, attentive translation restores to these classic novels their taut, remarkably modern style—the essence of Colette’s genius.
Colette (1873–1954) wrote numerous works, including Gigi, The Vagabond, and the five Claudine novels. She was the first woman elected president of the Académie Goncourt.
Rachel Careau is the recipient of a 2019 National Endowment for the Arts literature translation fellowship. Her writing and translations have appeared recently in BOMB, Harper’s Magazine, Literary Hub, Plume, and Two Lines. She lives in Hudson, New York.
Kathleen Antonioliis an associate professor of French in the Department of Modern Languages at Kansas State University. Antonioli has published several articles on Colette and contributed to the French-language Colette dictionary (Dictionnaire Colette) project.
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