Querube Barber - outside reading

A different kind of novel

Moderato Cantabile is a novel written by Marguerite Duras and compiled in a book called Four Novels. Marguerite Duras is a French playwright, novelist and filmmaker who is well recognized as a literary figure in France. In music, moderato cantabile means moderately and melodiously. In the story, these terms are a source of contention between a piano teacher and the son of the main character. This novel was first published in 1958. Before writing Moderato Cantabile, Duras used realism as her writing style. But with this new novel, she switched to existentialism.
The novel is narrated by a narrator who just presents the facts. It is up to the reader to interpret what is been narrated. At times, the reader does not know who is talking. Other times, the reader does not know where the action is taking place.
This novel is about a woman called Anne Desbaresdes, her son, mentioned throughout the novel as “the child”, and a man named Chauvin. Anne is a wealthy woman from the upper class who is not satisfied with her marriage and is bored with her empty life. She keeps herself busy by taking her son to piano lessons, walking by the seashore and along the Boulevard de la Mer and by going to a café where she drinks lots of wine with Chauvin, a middle-class worker.

Anne has a strange relationship with her son. While reading the novel, at times you think that Anne loves her son; but other times, you wonder if she has second thoughts about why she brought him into this world. For instance, in talking with Chauvin Anne says sometimes she thinks she has invented her son.

At the beginning of the novel, the child is taking piano lessons. It is apparent that he doesn’t want to take the lessons, and he tells his mother so. But his mother insists on him learning to play the piano. The child’s teacher, Mademoiselle Giraud, gets frustrated and impatient with the child because he is very stubborn and doesn’t want to learn the notes or the songs. Mademoiselle Giraud is very critical of the way Ann Desbaresdes raises her son. On one occasion, she tells Ann, that the way Ann brings up her son “is absolutely appalling.” Mademoiselle Giraud makes these comments in front of the child.

One day while the child is taking piano lessons, a murder takes place in a café near the apartment where the child takes the lessons. A woman was murdered by her lover. Anne spends many hours in the same café trying to find out why, how and by whom was the woman murdered. She attempts to make sense of the event. This is where she meets Chauvin. Anne Desbaresdes and Chauvin developed some kind of sexual relationship. The relationship is not a physical relationship, but rather through the exchange of words and thoughts or fantasies.

To me, the novel is a critique of the division of classes in the French society and the lack of affection of wealthy husbands towards their wives. This lack of involvement between husbands and wives leaves the women wondering and getting involved with extramarital affairs.