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Zusatztext “Slyly intelligent! engaging! hyper-observant of human nature with all its glories! foibles! and fragile pretense! Maupassant’s stories are as relevant today as when they were first written.” —Elizabeth Berg Informationen zum Autor Guy de Maupassant (1850--1893), after serving in the Franco-Prussian War, became a close friend of Flaubert and his circle. He wrote hundreds of short stories as well as novels and verse. In his later years, he suffered from mental illness, and he died in an asylum. Joachim Neugroschel ’s translations include definitive renderings of Kafka, Mann, Racine, Molière, Bataille, and many others; his most recent book is No Star Too Beautiful: An Anthology of Yiddish Stories from 1832 to the Present . He has been awarded the French-American Foundation Translation Prize, the Goethe House/PEN Translation Prize (twice), and Guggenheim and NEA grants. He lives in Belle Harbor, New York. Adam Gopnik is the author of Paris to the Moon (available from Random House Trade Paperbacks). Klappentext Includes The Necklace! Butterball! The Tellier House! On the Water! Mademoiselle Fifi! The Mask! The Inn! A Day in the Country! The Hand! The Jewels! The Model! The Entity (The Horla) These stories—poignant scrutinies of social pretension! wicked tales of lust and love! and harrowing examinations of terror and madness—display the full genius of Guy de Maupassant in an enthralling new translation by Joachim Neugroschel. They reveal Maupassant's remarkable range! his technical perfection! his sexual realism! and his ability to create whole worlds and sum up intricate universes of feeling in a few pages The Necklace She was one of those pretty and charming girls who, as if through some blunder of fate, are born into a family of pen pushers. She had no dowry, no prospects, no possibility of becoming known, appreciated, loved, of finding a wealthy and distinguished husband. And so she settled for a petty clerk in the Ministry of Education. Unable to adorn herself, she remained simple, but as miserable as if she’d come down in the world. For women have no caste or breed; their beauty, their grace, and their charm serve them in lieu of birth and family background. Their native finesse, their instinct for elegance, their versatile minds are their sole hierarchy, making shopgirls the equals of the grandest ladies. She suffered endlessly, feeling that she was meant for all delicacies and all luxuries. She suffered from the poverty of her apartment, the dinginess of the walls, the shabbiness of the chairs, the ugliness of the fabrics. All these things, which wouldn’t have even been noticed by any other woman of her station, tortured her and infuriated her. The sight of the Breton girl who did her humble housework aroused woeful regrets in her and desperate dreams. She fantasized about hushed antechambers with Oriental hangings, illuminated by high, bronze torchères, and with a pair of tall footmen wearing knee breeches and napping in spacious easy chairs because of the air made heavy by the heater. She fantasized about large drawing rooms lined with ancient silk, about fine furniture carrying priceless knickknacks, about small, fragrant, dainty parlors meant for five o’clock chats with the most intimate friends, well-known and sought-after men whose attention was envied and desired by all women. Whenever she sat down for supper at the circular table covered with the same tablecloth for three days, she faced her husband, who, removing the lid from the tureen, ecstatically declared: “Ah! A good stew! I don’t know of anything better!” But she fantasized about elegant dinners, about shiny silverware, about tapestries filling the walls with ancient figures and exotic birds in the midst of a magic forest; she fantasized about exquisite courses served in wondrous vessels, about gallantries...
