Cecile is a young, beautiful girl who appears to be very extraverted and has a knack for sensation seeking. She likes to be out in the world, experience new places, meet new people and connect with nature. She is too young to understand her own thoughts and feelings especially because she was never taught to question her thoughts or actions. She has trouble labeling how she feels any time she experiences intense emotion. I could see that her narcissistic father could be to blame for this. He is a man who loves his daughter but does not know how to care for her. He is more concerned with living his life and he simply strings his daughter along with him everywhere. He subjects her to people and environments that are shaping her perspective on love and life.
Cecile loved her life with her dad, afterall, it was quite easy! She didn’t have to do anything she didn’t feel like doing, she was free to make her own decisions, she could drink, smoke and party endlessly. Cecile started to struggle only when order peeked its head in the form of a new potential stepmom – Anna. Cecile wasn’t surprised to see that Anna had problems with the way she was living her life. But because she had never had to defend her actions, she found it incredibly hard to stand up to Anna or even argue with her. An interesting quote from Cecile read: “I realized that carelessness can govern our lives, but it does not provide us with any arguments in its defense”.
Everytime Anna asked Cecile to do something she didn’t want to, she never argued, she simply walked away and thought angry thoughts and came up with vicious ways to make the problem – Anna – go away. She didn’t care that her plans could cause pain to 4 people! Any time she started to feel bad about her actions, Cecile made sure to distract herself by lighting a cigarette or putting on a record until the thoughts were successfully pushed out of her mind.
The tragic ending made this book one of my favorites. The way Cecile and her dad handled Anna’s death was shocking, did they even care at all? Cecile even contemplated that Anna committed suicide because of her and her dad, people who ‘have no need of anybody, living or dead’. She thought that calling it a suicide is romantacizing it. We can clearly see Cecile’s narcissistic tendencies arise, how little she cares for other people and their feelings and how what she wants comes before everything and everyone.
Would you agree that Cecile’s problematic personality is a reflection of her troubled upbringing? Is her dad only to blame? How much of her self centered personality is a result of nature and how much of it is a result of her environment?
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Reflection on Part I Part I of the book follows Jose’s childhood in Black Shack Alley. Some of the important themes of this part are childhood and innocence. Jose and the other children of Shack Alley are constantly up to their own mischief when their parents go to work the fields, despite the punishments they […]
Posted in Blogs, Zobel | Tagged with escapism, naivete, slavery
Of all the books on the reading list, this is the only one I’ve read before. In fact, I studied it in the original language as part of my French A-Level just before I left the UK. And to be honest, I didn’t like it then, and I don’t like it now.
I feel sorry for Cecile, but I just know that I would find her incredibly irritating if I had the misfortune of encountering her in real life. That being said, the book brings such vivid images of an upscale, movie-like experience of the French Riviera that I appreciate it just for that. I also think it’s kind of fun that the book was so controversial upon its release. They just weren’t ready for Cecile’s unladylike-ness or for all the raunchy behaviour going on.
As I mentioned, I don’t really like Cecile. In the book she’s 17, Sagan herself was 18 at the time of publication, I myself was 17 when I read it for the first time, and at the ripe old age of 20 I can make the executive, yet humble, declaration that we girls that age can be messy. Cecile really takes the cake though, with all that palaver over a rather Oedipal obsession with her dad. If I could describe her in two words, they would be: callous disregard. She just doesn’t care. Or doesn’t think. Or both.
She’s clearly not stupid, despite her disinclination toward school. If she didn’t have two braincells to rub together then she wouldn’t have come up with the bizarre plan to invoke jealousy in her dad and Anne. But the very fact that it happened is just weird. On the one hand, I can sympathise with her fear of change, and her satisfaction with her current position in life and with her father. On the other hand it’s just immature to expect everything to stay the same indefinitely, and the lengths she went to in trying to keep everything the same is just ridiculous.
Speaking of ridiculousness, I question all the characters’ thought processes. Even Cyril, who is allegedly a law student goes along with Cecile’s plan? Elsa I understand. The poor girl just wants Raymond back and nobody (myself included) expects any better of her. But Cyril’s haplessness is just disappointing. Anne is a complicated one, though. She’s a certified #girlboss and I reluctantly respect her, but she definitely went too far in trying to control Cecile. Did she though? I don’t know, I haven’t fully made up my mind. On the one hand maybe it’s not too much to ask for her to go back to school, but on the other hand I thought the many comments on her behaviour and her appearance were unproductive and unhelpful.
Despite all the issues I have with the characters and their decisions, I loved reading this book. I loved thinking back to where I was in my life when I read it the first time (17 was a very happy age for me, to an extent like Cecile) and especially recalling certain words and phrases that the original version used. It felt very nostalgic reading the story again; even though it’s only been 3-ish years, it feels like a lifetime ago (immigration and a pandemic will do that to you).
The question I now pose is: Assuming that Cecile’s bubble of naivete would have eventually burst, what do you imagine would have caused it?
Posted in Blogs, Sagan | Tagged with bad decisions, girlboss, immaturity, nostalgia, unlikable characters
Of all the books on the reading list, this is the only one I’ve read before. In fact, I studied it in the original language as part of my French A-Level just before I left the UK. And to be honest, I didn’t like it then, and I don’t like it now.
I feel sorry for Cecile, but I just know that I would find her incredibly irritating if I had the misfortune of encountering her in real life. That being said, the book brings such vivid images of an upscale, movie-like experience of the French Riviera that I appreciate it just for that. I also think it’s kind of fun that the book was so controversial upon its release. They just weren’t ready for Cecile’s unladylike-ness or for all the raunchy behaviour going on.
As I mentioned, I don’t really like Cecile. In the book she’s 17, Sagan herself was 18 at the time of publication, I myself was 17 when I read it for the first time, and at the ripe old age of 20 I can make the executive, yet humble, declaration that we girls that age can be messy. Cecile really takes the cake though, with all that palaver over a rather Oedipal obsession with her dad. If I could describe her in two words, they would be: callous disregard. She just doesn’t care. Or doesn’t think. Or both.
She’s clearly not stupid, despite her disinclination toward school. If she didn’t have two braincells to rub together then she wouldn’t have come up with the bizarre plan to invoke jealousy in her dad and Anne. But the very fact that it happened is just weird. On the one hand, I can sympathise with her fear of change, and her satisfaction with her current position in life and with her father. On the other hand it’s just immature to expect everything to stay the same indefinitely, and the lengths she went to in trying to keep everything the same is just ridiculous.
Speaking of ridiculousness, I question all the characters’ thought processes. Even Cyril, who is allegedly a law student goes along with Cecile’s plan? Elsa I understand. The poor girl just wants Raymond back and nobody (myself included) expects any better of her. But Cyril’s haplessness is just disappointing. Anne is a complicated one, though. She’s a certified #girlboss and I reluctantly respect her, but she definitely went too far in trying to control Cecile. Did she though? I don’t know, I haven’t fully made up my mind. On the one hand maybe it’s not too much to ask for her to go back to school, but on the other hand I thought the many comments on her behaviour and her appearance were unproductive and unhelpful.
Despite all the issues I have with the characters and their decisions, I loved reading this book. I loved thinking back to where I was in my life when I read it the first time (17 was a very happy age for me, to an extent like Cecile) and especially recalling certain words and phrases that the original version used. It felt very nostalgic reading the story again; even though it’s only been 3-ish years, it feels like a lifetime ago (immigration and a pandemic will do that to you).
The question I now pose is: Assuming that Cecile’s bubble of naivete would have eventually burst, what do you imagine would have caused it?
Posted in Blogs, Sagan | Tagged with bad decisions, girlboss, immaturity, nostalgia, unlikable characters
This week, I decided to read Bonjour Tristesse by Francois Sagan. Like another student mentioned in their blog, I felt compelled to read it, as i thought i would likely be able to relate to it. This story follows a 17 year old girl named Cecile who is on summer vacation in the south of France. The novel explores, her relationship with her widowed father, his love interests, as well as her own. I assumed that I would like this story because i too experienced a relationship at 17, furthermore I have divorced parents and had to go through the process of watching them both move on to new people. However, after reading the entire novel I found it not as relatable as i had initially thought it might be. Also, i found that my opinions on each of the characters shifted back and forth quite a bit throughout.
The characters that stood out to me the most over the course of the novel were Cecile, Anne and Cyril. At first, I seriously sympathized with Cecile. Her mother had passed away and the new woman that her father had decided to marry wasn’t exactly ideal in Ceciles eyes. Even though Cecile was used to seeing her father having mistresses, his decision to settle down with one that she did not even like, would be an incredibly hard thing to accept. I think i slowly started to lose sympathy for her though, as she became quite manipulative of almost everyone in her life. Creating an incredibly methodical plan to have Anne removed from her fathers life, was surely not the high road i was hoping she would take. That being said though, I was not fond of Anne either. Although she seemed like the responsible role model that her and her father may have needed, I absolutely hated the way she spoke to Cecile. In my opinion she was way out of line trying to completely shift her life. She tried to end her relationship with Cyril, made multiple comments about her weight and appearance, as well as forcing her study, which she had absolutely no interest in doing. Maybe Anne’s intentions were pure but it just came off as controlling and invasive. Lastly, I think the only character that i had lasting sympathy for, was Cyril. He had true love for Cecile and was sadly roped into her deranged plan to get rid of Anne. Her feelings for him were always wishy washy and i had kind of wished that she would either commit to him, or leave him.
This week, I decided to read Bonjour Tristesse by Francois Sagan. Like another student mentioned in their blog, I felt compelled to read it, as i thought i would likely be able to relate to it. This story follows a 17 year old girl named Cecile who is on summer vacation in the south of France. The novel explores, her relationship with her widowed father, his love interests, as well as her own. I assumed that I would like this story because i too experienced a relationship at 17, furthermore I have divorced parents and had to go through the process of watching them both move on to new people. However, after reading the entire novel I found it not as relatable as i had initially thought it might be. Also, i found that my opinions on each of the characters shifted back and forth quite a bit throughout.
The characters that stood out to me the most over the course of the novel were Cecile, Anne and Cyril. At first, I seriously sympathized with Cecile. Her mother had passed away and the new woman that her father had decided to marry wasn’t exactly ideal in Ceciles eyes. Even though Cecile was used to seeing her father having mistresses, his decision to settle down with one that she did not even like, would be an incredibly hard thing to accept. I think i slowly started to lose sympathy for her though, as she became quite manipulative of almost everyone in her life. Creating an incredibly methodical plan to have Anne removed from her fathers life, was surely not the high road i was hoping she would take. That being said though, I was not fond of Anne either. Although she seemed like the responsible role model that her and her father may have needed, I absolutely hated the way she spoke to Cecile. In my opinion she was way out of line trying to completely shift her life. She tried to end her relationship with Cyril, made multiple comments about her weight and appearance, as well as forcing her study, which she had absolutely no interest in doing. Maybe Anne’s intentions were pure but it just came off as controlling and invasive. Lastly, I think the only character that i had lasting sympathy for, was Cyril. He had true love for Cecile and was sadly roped into her deranged plan to get rid of Anne. Her feelings for him were always wishy washy and i had kind of wished that she would either commit to him, or leave him.
Joseph Zobel’s Black Shack Alley tells a story about life in Martinique from the point of view of a black boy named Jose. Even though the novel stresses his process of personal growth throughout, it generates broader implications of contextual consideration in various aspects in terms of literary analysis. It is vital to consider the […]
Sagan’s “Bonjour Tristesse” is about a 17-year-old girl named Cécile who has family issues. Her relationship with her father significantly affects the type of lifestyle she lives. The narrator is emotionally and psychologically connected to her single father, who serves as the main male figure in her life and is the only source of parental […]
This is a coming-of-age book that deals with the complexity of love and familial problems. If I were to describe Cécile’s character I would use the word fragile. She seems to have no understanding of who she is and what she wants. One moment she is in love with Cyril, the next she views their […]
This week’s reading I found riveting, I truly could not put it down. Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan highlights the dynamic relationship between father and daughter, in this case Cécile and her wealthy father Raymond. The setting takes place on the French Riviera on a summer trip with Cécile, her father and her fathers latest […]
