André Deutsch Ltd Lost Profile 失去的側影 莎崗經典作品

“Truman Capote called this novel "swift" and "graceful." Those words bring a racehorse to my mind. No excess flesh. Lean with muscle. Something to be admired. Capote nailed it. Swift and graceful is what you get from start to finish with Sagan.” — Georgia Scott, Goodreads

 

A beautiful hardback copy of Lost Profile by French author Françoise Sagan whose first novel Bonjour Tristesse, written in three weeks when she was 18 years old, scandalised French society with a tale of bourgeois affairs in the French Riviera. As ever with Sagan, Lost Profile explores power, money, love and the immorality of relationships in Parisian high society.

 

At the start of the novel, Josée Ash is a young French woman married to a rich American guy named Henry. Their relationship is turning toxic. Not long into the novel, their marriage becomes seriously abusive. Josée is trapped in her marriage with the pathologically jealous husband. The brutality realistic description of love that turns bitter. It is always chilling when love dies, no matter the circumstances. 

 

But then the American millionaire Julius A. Cram, whom they had met casually at a dinner party, intervenes. The subtly crafted plot is largely concerned with the young Josée's financial sponsorship by the unrelated yet paternal Julius A. Cram and plays speculation on his true motives for such attentions. Just why a middle-aged, successful businessman invests so much time and money in a care-free, attractive young divorcee is not always down to the obvious reasons; or is it?

 

Josée is in many ways a typical Sagan heroine : upper-middle class, attractive but not super-young, entangled with several men, going about in Le Tout Paris yet secretly bored and disgusted by the social posturing and superficiality of that milieu. We couldn't help but notice cracks in its cool, self-assured exterior. She has almost no will of her own, only wilfulness – her agency consists of merely indulging her urges and whims. All the action is left to others – men, or women defeminized to the point of automatons. And of all of this, still – no discernible awareness.

 

Interesting perspectives on classes and people, and an ideal read in the June sun if you enjoy reading about how that layer of society lived in 1974: lots of dinners and evening entertainments, jet-setting back and forth across the pond, cigarettes and bouquets and tearooms. Published in 1976 by André Deutsch, an iconic publisher, Lost Profile in Sagan's 'couldn't-be-anything-but-French' way.

 

Features

• Edition : -
• Binding : Hardcover
• ISBN : 9780233967066
• Publication Date : 1976/1/1

 

Materials & Care

• Imported