Dear Departed by Marguerite Yourcenar

Dear Departed by Marguerite Yourcenar

First published in French in 1974 under the title 'Souvenirs Pieux', DEAR DEPARTED is the first volume of a trilogy by Marguerite Yourcenar, one of the most celebrated French writers of the century, devoted to her own origins and background. Yourcenar describes the events surrounding her birth in 1903, then takes us back through the centuries to meet her mother's forebears: soldiers, essayists, idealists, heroines, even ambassadors. Throughout, the history of the family serves as a window on the history of a rapidly-changing Europe.Using memoirs, letters and momentos, Yourcenar richly evokes both the larger events on the European stage and the rhythms and textures of everyday existence. Though rarely visible, Yourcenar is everywhere present, her perceptions rendered in her unmistakable voice. The book is a tour-de-force of historical and literary imagination.

Recalls Proust's fidelity to our actual thinking about the past * SUNDAY TELEGRAPH *
Rich and entertaining * GUARDIAN *
Yourcenar's precision is hot; it is animated by real blood, real loss and real love * INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY *
Slider and his creator are real discoveries* DAILY MAIL *

Marguerite Yourcenar, the first woman elected to the Academie Française, was the author of plays, poems, short stories and novels, most notably the best-seller MEMOIRS OF HADRIAN. She died in 1987.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9781860493546
ISBN 10	1860493548
Title	Dear Departed
Author	Marguerite Yourcenar
Series	Virago Modern Classics
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Little, Brown Book Group
Year published	1997-10-02
Number of pages	368
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.