Flaubert of his plans for his first novel. Was it perhaps the prospect of his own mortality that made him start A Life ? And was it the prospect of his first-born that made him end the novel as he did? 'In the midst of life we are in death,' and vice versa ; or as Norbert de Varenne, the nihilistic poet in Maupassant's second novel Bel-Ami , puts it: 'to live is to die': 'Life is a hill. For as long as we're climbing, we have our eyes on the summit and we feel happy; but as soon as we arrive at the top, we suddenly see the way down and the end, which is death. It's slow going on the way up, but fast on the way down.' 7 In A Life the ascent is brief the descent protracted and unflinchingly, compellingly, told.
7 Romans , ed. Louis Forestier (Paris, 1987), 299.
NOTE ON THE TRANSLATION
This translation is based on the text of Une vie edited by Louis Forestier in the Pléiade edition of the Romans (Paris, 1987). First published in 1883, Une vie was published in a revised edition by Ollendorff in 1893. Forestier follows the latter text in the belief that Maupassant himself made the corrections to his 1883 text; Antonia Fonyi (GF-Flammarion, 1993) argues that Maupassant was too ill by this time to do so, and that even when he was well, he was not much given to the revision of his previously published work. While Fonyi's arguments have some force, the matter remains uncertain; and it has seemed best to follow what is still regarded as the standard edition. The variants between the 1883 and 1893 editions are in any case not of major consequence.
Une vie was first published in English (in an anonymous translation) by Henry Vizetelly in 1888 as no. 8 in his series of 'Boulevard Novels', and bore the title A Woman's Life . A subsequent (bowdlerized) translation, by Henry Blanchamp, preferred A Woman's Soul (London, 1907), but thereafter A Woman's Life was thought to be the appropriate title by Bree Narran (London, 1920) and Antonia White (London, 1949). Katharine Vivian's translation for the Folio Society in 1981 retains the French title. To date there have been thirteen translations of the novel into English, of which only one (by Marjorie Laurie in the 1920s) has been entitled A Life .
The most widely available translation of Une vie has been the version by H. N. P. Sloman in Penguin Classics (1965), who retains the unsatisfactory title of A Woman's Life . Sloman's practice of running Maupassant's short paragraphs together has not been followed in the present translation on the ground that Maupassant's practice in this respect is an intentional stylistic device and one which he owed in large measure to Flaubert.
In the preparation of this translation I am once more deeply indebted both to my wife Vivienne for her encouragement and patient reading of the typescript and to I. P. Foote for his painstaking and invariably well-judged advice on how inaccuracy, infelicity, and anachronism might be avoided.
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
In English
Maupassant in Translation
Novels
Bel-Ami , trans. Douglas Parmée (Harmondsworth, 1975).
Pierre et Jean , trans. Leonard Tancock (Harmondsworth, 1979).
Short Stories
A Day in the Country and Other Stories , trans. and ed. David Coward (Oxford, 1990).
Mademoiselle Fifi and Other Stories , trans. and ed. David Coward (Oxford, 1993).
A Parisian Bourgeois' Sundays and Other Stories , trans. Marlo Johnston (London and Chester Springs, Pa., 1997).
Biographies
Francis Steegmuller, Maupassant. A Lion in the Path (New York, 1949; repr. London, 1950; 1972).
Paul Ignotus, The Paradox of Maupassant (London, 1966).
Michael Lerner, Maupassant (London, 1975).
Roger L. Williams, The Horror of Life (London, 1980); pp. 21772 provide a judicious and well-informed account of Maupassant's medical history.
Critical Studies
Edward D. Sullivan, Maupassant the Novelist (Princeton and Oxford, 1954).
Maupassant: The Short Stories (London, 1962).
Richard B. Grant, 'Imagery as a Means of Psychological
7 Romans , ed. Louis Forestier (Paris, 1987), 299.
NOTE ON THE TRANSLATION
This translation is based on the text of Une vie edited by Louis Forestier in the Pléiade edition of the Romans (Paris, 1987). First published in 1883, Une vie was published in a revised edition by Ollendorff in 1893. Forestier follows the latter text in the belief that Maupassant himself made the corrections to his 1883 text; Antonia Fonyi (GF-Flammarion, 1993) argues that Maupassant was too ill by this time to do so, and that even when he was well, he was not much given to the revision of his previously published work. While Fonyi's arguments have some force, the matter remains uncertain; and it has seemed best to follow what is still regarded as the standard edition. The variants between the 1883 and 1893 editions are in any case not of major consequence.
Une vie was first published in English (in an anonymous translation) by Henry Vizetelly in 1888 as no. 8 in his series of 'Boulevard Novels', and bore the title A Woman's Life . A subsequent (bowdlerized) translation, by Henry Blanchamp, preferred A Woman's Soul (London, 1907), but thereafter A Woman's Life was thought to be the appropriate title by Bree Narran (London, 1920) and Antonia White (London, 1949). Katharine Vivian's translation for the Folio Society in 1981 retains the French title. To date there have been thirteen translations of the novel into English, of which only one (by Marjorie Laurie in the 1920s) has been entitled A Life .
The most widely available translation of Une vie has been the version by H. N. P. Sloman in Penguin Classics (1965), who retains the unsatisfactory title of A Woman's Life . Sloman's practice of running Maupassant's short paragraphs together has not been followed in the present translation on the ground that Maupassant's practice in this respect is an intentional stylistic device and one which he owed in large measure to Flaubert.
In the preparation of this translation I am once more deeply indebted both to my wife Vivienne for her encouragement and patient reading of the typescript and to I. P. Foote for his painstaking and invariably well-judged advice on how inaccuracy, infelicity, and anachronism might be avoided.
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
In English
Maupassant in Translation
Novels
Bel-Ami , trans. Douglas Parmée (Harmondsworth, 1975).
Pierre et Jean , trans. Leonard Tancock (Harmondsworth, 1979).
Short Stories
A Day in the Country and Other Stories , trans. and ed. David Coward (Oxford, 1990).
Mademoiselle Fifi and Other Stories , trans. and ed. David Coward (Oxford, 1993).
A Parisian Bourgeois' Sundays and Other Stories , trans. Marlo Johnston (London and Chester Springs, Pa., 1997).
Biographies
Francis Steegmuller, Maupassant. A Lion in the Path (New York, 1949; repr. London, 1950; 1972).
Paul Ignotus, The Paradox of Maupassant (London, 1966).
Michael Lerner, Maupassant (London, 1975).
Roger L. Williams, The Horror of Life (London, 1980); pp. 21772 provide a judicious and well-informed account of Maupassant's medical history.
Critical Studies
Edward D. Sullivan, Maupassant the Novelist (Princeton and Oxford, 1954).
Maupassant: The Short Stories (London, 1962).
Richard B. Grant, 'Imagery as a Means of Psychological
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