Advanced French Studies: novels and short stories Mme Stadnicki
La Dernière Classe (The Last Class) Alponse Daudet 1873 It's the region of Alsace, in the north-east of France, close to Germany. It's 1870, and the Germans (Prussians) have invaded France. This was the Franco-Prussian War, which France lost, the first of three big wars in which Germany invaded France. All the battles of the Franco-Prussian War were fought on French soil, and none on German. The invaders have occupied most of the towns and villages and carry on maneuvers, order people around, etc. In most places the occupying forces have made laws that from now on only German will be taught in schools. No more French classes. The story is about a young French boy, Franz, who took learning French for granted and skipped class a lot, along with all his friends; the villagers, who never bothered to learn much about their language, since they took it for granted; and the schoolmaster, M Hamel, who when it's finally too late, shows them the importance of language to a culture, to the identity of a community.
Kiffe Kiffe Demain (Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow) Faïza Guène 2004 This is a startlingly sassy coming-of-age tale that realistically imagines the time when a girl feels she's on the outside, looking in. In the case of Doria, Guène's 15-year-old narrator, it is all too true. A child of Moroccan immigrants in France, the bellicose Doria is a cynical Muslim teenager in a Parisian suburb. Abandoned by her father, she and her mother inhabit a small flat in a concrete project far from the glamour, culture, and good schools in Paris. Doria is taunted for being different; her goodwill wardrobe, her family's poverty, and her poor learning skills all seem to point to the same mektoub, or destiny: a future without hope. Out of this clash of cultures, Doria struggles to find her place and escape the malaise she feels about her life. In the end, she fashions something new taking the Arabic phrase for "same old, same old" (kif-kif), mixing in the French verb kiffer (to really like something), and coining a brand-new motto for herself: "kiffe kiffe tomorrow," a kind of rallying cry that fuels her belief in a future and a home she can love, and turns her despair to hope. Packed with astute social observation, Kiffe Kiffe Demain is rich in trenchant humor, with a cast of unforgettable characters and a narrator with a sharp and powerfully authentic voice.
Pierre et Jean Guy de Maupassant 1887 Pierre et Jean marked a turning-point in the development of French fiction, situated as it is between traditional social realism and the psychological novel. It is recognized as a classic study of filial jealousy, triggered by one of the two brothers of its title finding himself the sole inheritor of the fortune of his mother’s former lover.” Pierre et Jean is set in Le Havre in the 1880s and is notable for its evocation of the Normandy coastline captured by the Impressionists. But Maupassant’s achievement is to have woven from this simple plot in a maritime context a brilliantly crafted exploration of the complexities at the heart of family life.
Le Racisme Expliqué à Ma Fille (Racism Explained to My Daughter) Tahar Ben Jelloun 1977 When Tahar Ben Jelloun took his ten-year-old daughter to a street protest against anti-immigration laws in Paris, she asked question after question: "What is racism? What is an immigrant? What is discrimination?" The author's intent was to explain, with this book, the modern "trauma" that racism is to children and to help adults answer their children's questions on racism. The author says, though, that children are more likely to understand that one isn't born racist, but becomes it. Adults are not likely to change their ideas.
Un Sac de Billes (A Bag of Marbles) Joseph Joffo 1973 Joffo’s memoirs were published and written in a novel fashion and tell the account of Joffo as a young boy during the Holocaust. When Joseph Joffo was ten years old, his father gave him and his brother 5,000 francs each and instructions to flee Nazi-occupied Paris and, by foot, train and bus, join their brothers Henri and Albert in Menton on the Mediterranean coast, where they'd be safe. This book tells of this journey. Joffo and his twelve-year-old brother, Maurice, travel all around France by themselves. They are attempting to escape from the grasp of Hitler and his S.S. men as they infiltrate France. They travel through northern France to the de-militarized zone in the South. The boys then spend four blissfully safe months in Menton with their brothers, Henri and Albert, before having to leave the town for Nice where their parents are waiting .Joffo returns to Paris shortly after its liberation is announced in an over-crowded train. Maurice does also, although in his typical style he also takes enough cheese to make a very large profit on! They are both re-united with their family in the coiffeur - although sadly not their father who perished in a concentration camp before the end of the war.
Moderato Cantabile Marguerite Duras 1970 Perhaps the most admired of all Marguerite Duras's novels, Moderato Cantabile is almost a twentieth-century Madame Bovary in its picture of the dissatisfied wife of a rich provincial industrialist, who forms an attachment to one of her husband's workmen. This is not the normal chronicle of adultery but a carefully woven tapestry of emotion. A haunting, oblique love story, it perfectly demonstrates the Duras technique of associating human emotion with locales and landscapes, and of describing longing, loneliness and love through references to weather, temperature, the color of the sky and the sound of the sea.
Une Si Longue Lettre (So Long a Letter) Mariama Bâ 1998 Une si longue lettre is a semi-autobiographical novel by the Senegalese writer Mariama Bâ. Its theme is the condition of women in Western African society. Une si longue lettre, Mariama Bâ's first novel, is literally written as a long letter. As the novel begins, Ramatoulaye Fall is beginning a letter to her lifelong friend Aissatou Bâ. The occasion for writing is Ramatoulaye's recent widowhood. As she gives her friend the details of her husband's death, she recounts the major events in their lives. Ramatoulaye's husband, Moudou Fall, died suddenly of a heart attack. Following the strictures of her Muslim faith, Ramatoulaye must remain in seclusion for a period of forty days. Aissatou, to whom the letter is written, emigrated to the United States and pursued a feminist, monogamist relationship.
Carmen Prosper Mérimée 1846 Carmen is the original novella that inspired the classic opera by Bizet. The unforgettable story of Carmen, a flirtatious, charismatic, and amoral gypsy who bewitches and emotionally enslaves Don José, a desperate man, into a tragic obsession, has captivated generations with its passion and sensual intensity.
Descriptions from Barnes and Nobel and Wikepedia.
Advanced French Studies: films Below is a list of possible films to be shown this semester that are thematically linked to the readings.
Le Grand Voyage NR Driving his traditional Muslim father (Mohamed Majd) across Europe en route to Mecca, thoroughly modern college 2004 student Reda (Nicolas Cazale) finds little to say to the old man. But along the way, as the gap between father and son begins to narrow, the two discover that ultimately it's the journey -- not the destination -- that matters. For his fresh take on the road trip formula, director Ismael Ferroukhi earned a BAFTA nomination.
L'Auberge Espagnole R When a Frenchman signs on to become an exchange student and learn Spanish so he can land a coveted job, he heads 2002 to Barcelona and moves in with a host of other young Europeans who help him discover how to enjoy life.
La Rafle NR This gripping drama based on a true story follows the fate of three carefree Parisian boys and their families as Nazi 2010 officials and corrupt French collaborators arrest them -- along with thousands of other French Jews -- in 1942. Shipped to a holding facility until they can be sent to concentration camps, the lads encounter a weary Jewish doctor (Jean Reno) and a kindly Christian nurse (Mélanie Laurent). Roselyne Bosch directs.
Carmen PG In 19th-century Seville, tempestuous gypsy Carmen (Julia Migenes-Johnson) seduces army corporal Don José (Placido 1984 Domingo). The corporal forsakes his military career, his fiancée and even his ailing mother to win the beauty's heart - - but she shuns his advances in favor of a bullfighter (Ruggero Raimondi). Domingo is in fine form in this film version of the opera classic shot on location in Spain.
C.R.A.Z.Y NR There are five boys in the Beaulieu family -- Christian, Raymond, Antoine, Zachary and Yvan. But Zac (played by Emile 2005 Vallee and Marc-Andre Grondin) is the only one who's gay. That's why growing up in Montreal alongside his heterosexual brothers and his strict, emotionally distant
Incendies R When their mother's will implores them to deliver letters to the father they thought was dead and a brother they 2010 never knew about, twins Jeanne (Mélissa Désormeaux-Poulin) and Simon (Maxim Gaudette) journey to the Middle East and attempt to reconstruct their family's hidden history. Adapted from a Wajdi Mouawad play, director Denis Villeneuve's Oscar-nominated drama flashes back to intense scenes set during the Lebanese civil war in the 1970s. Caché R Winner of the Cannes Best Director Award, Michael Haneke's psychological thriller centers on wealthy French 2005 couple Georges (Daniel Auteuil) and Anne (Juliette Binoche), who begin receiving threatening videotapes and phone calls that threaten to ruin their relationship. Georges realizes who the perpetrator is but refuses to tell Anne. Yet childhood flashbacks reveal the mystery, a story that illuminates France's damaged relations with Algeria.
La Gloire de Mon Père G Based on the best-selling memoirs of French novelist and filmmaker Marcel Pagnol, this humorous and captivating 1990 recollection of a young boy's life in turn-of-the-century southern France focuses on his memorable summer holidays. Mystified by nature, Marcel turns to his father for an education on the ways of the wild. But his father comes up short in Marcel's eyes when Uncle Jules, an experienced woodsman, proves to be far more knowledgeable.
Moderato Cantabile NR A wealthy and bored woman (Jean Moreau) is witness of a murder in affection and meets another witness (Jean-Paul 1960 Belmondo). She asks him about the history of the victim and falls in love with him.
Hiroshima, Mon Amour NR In director Alain Resnais's poetic adaptation of Margueurite Duras's acclaimed book, a French actress (Emmanuelle 1959 Riva) in Japan meets a Japanese architect (Eiji Okada) with whom she has an affair. Their relationship consists of conversations about the bombing at Hiroshima. They discuss the horrors that he and his family endured and her perception of the cataclysm back home in occupied France. Duras's screenplay earned an Oscar nod.
Descriptions from imdb.com and Netflix