Like Death

November 7, 2016
In this slim novel, Maupassant takes as his subject a long affair and its slow burn of love and jealousy. Feted artist Olivier Bertin, “the chosen painter of Parisiennes,” enjoyed a career of enduring success; “Fortune led him to the threshold of old age, petting and caressing him all the way.” The painter’s affair with Anne de Guilleroy, wife of a “Norman Squire,” begins when he first sees her dressed in mourning, and he takes her as his muse, inviting her to sit for a painting. The novel charts the early euphoric stage of their love, when “he went to bed early, still vibrating with happiness,” through the long plateau of amitié amoureuse. However, as Anna and her daughter enter a party one night, the painter observes that Anna is “like a flower in full bloom” while her 18-year-old daughter, Annette, is “just blossoming.” Olivier becomes torn between his affection for the two, and his love becomes complicated, “feeling for the mother his revived passion and covering the daughter with an obscure tenderness.” Anna, aware of her lover’s increasing ambivalence, becomes tormented and sickened with jealousy of her daughter as well as becoming aware of her own aging, while Annette remains blissfully innocent and oblivious to the amorous drama. Though the novel has its quaint charms, its Freudian love triangle often feels heavy-handed and its characters flat. The novel builds to a dramatic yet predictable climax, lacking the freshness of Maupassant’s best work.

Starred review from November 15, 2016
The psychoemotional precision of Maupassant in an elegant new translation by celebrated translator Howard.Olivier Bertin is the most sought-after portraitist in Paris. Exalted not just for his talent and refined technique, but also the ease with which he blends with Parisian society, he is handsome and charming, but, though he never lacks for admirers, he has never loved--until he's thunderstruck by the sight of a lovely young woman in mourning clothes at a party and contrives to paint her portrait and, with luck, seduce her. Soon Anne, the comtesse de Guilleroy, a canny, resourceful woman, married with a young daughter, comes to sit for him. After minimal resistance or moral questioning, Anne accepts that she returns the painter's affections and bears no remorse as they embark on a passionate affair that, though Anne remains married to the oblivious count, lasts for many years and settles into the comfort, habit, and thoughtless affection of a contented marriage. Now a young woman herself, Anne's daughter, Annette, returns to Paris from her childhood spent at her grandmother's estate in Eure, and, though Anne is pleased to have her home, she is increasingly haunted by her dissipating youth and distressed by comparisons of their beauty: judgments which generally favor the younger woman. Olivier, also realizing the consequences of passing years--on his body and prevailing artistic tastes--feels a surge of renewed passion for his mistress on Annette's return, seeing in her daughter all he admired in Anne when their love was still new. It's here that Maupassant best depicts, with meticulous care and nuance, the neuroses and internal struggles of these lovers as they grapple for control over their emotions and the unstoppable onrush of time. A finely shaded portrait of desire, will, and the complex entanglements of love, set against cutting social commentary from a realist master.

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