| Les Filles du feu | |
|---|---|
Title page from 1856 edition of Les Filles du feu |
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| Author(s) | Gérard de Nerval |
| Country | France |
| Language | French |
| Genre(s) | Short story collection |
| Publication date | 1854 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| ISBN | NA |
Les Filles du feu (English: Girls of Fire) is a collection of short stories published by the French poet Gérard de Nerval during January 1854, a year before his death. During 1853, Nerval had suffered three nervous breakdowns and spent five months in an asylum, and he saw Les Filles du feu as an opportunity to show the public, his friends, and his father that he was sane.[1]
However, all of the short stories in Les Filles du feu had been published previously: "Angélique" in Les Faux Saulniers (1850), "Sylvie" in La Revue des Deux Mondes (1853), and "Emilie," "Jemmy," "Isis," and "Octavie" in multiple reviews.
Contents |
Sylvie is a semi-autobiographical tale of a man who is haunted by the memory of three women in his life, all who seem to blend together. The story opens with the narrator at the theatre, where he is enamored an actress named Aurélie. He is suddenly reminded of a memory from childhood, and he experiences a flashback. First, he remembers a festival where he danced with a local girl named Sylvie but was entranced by Adrienne, a young noble (whose resemblance to Aurélie is what brings on the flashback). Adrienne ultimately becomes a nun.
As Adrienne is unobtainable, he returns to Sylvie several years later and spends many days with her. As they pass by a monastery, the narrator mentions Adrienne, much to Sylvie's dismay. He returns to Paris.
The narrator returns, and Sylvie and he spend a day socializing at an elderly relative's home. However, nothing results from this, and the narrator leaves again.
Finally, Sylvie marries someone else, and the narrator pursues Aurélie, the actress, more aggressively. They become friendly, and the narrator asks her if she ever spent time in a convent, associating her with Adrienne. Ultimately, Aurélie ends her relationship with the narrator, and the narrator returns one final time to Sylvie, now a mother. When he asks about Adrienne, Sylvie reveals that she has been dead many years.
Octavie is the story of a narrator who journeys to Italia. While he is there, he meets a young English woman and makes a rendez-vous with her. Meanwhile, he visits the home of a local woman, who reminds him of an actress he once knew.
Isis is an essay about the goddess of love and her many forms over the years.
Corilla is a short play.
Emilie is the final story of the collection. It is the story of Desrochers, a French lieutenant serving near Bitche in Lorraine near the German border, defending it against the threat of Prussian attacks some time after 1815. He is wounded in the face, and while he is being healed in Metz, he meets and befriends Emilie, a young woman from Haguenau (Alsace), and her aunt. The two become enamored of each other and decide to marry in her home town. The night before the civil ceremony, they stop at Bitche. Desrochers tells some fellow soldiers about how he "killed the first and only man I ever struck in hand-to-hand fighting" during a Prussian attempt on the fort of Bitche. The next day Desrochers, his wife, and her brother Wilhelm leave. At an inn, Wilhelm argues with Desrochers' acquantances about his father's death by a French soldier at the same fort in Bitche. The soldiers are surprised at how similar Wilhelm's story is to Desrochers'. The next day, Wilhelm asks Desrochers to give him a tour of the fort, and when they get to the spot where Wilhelm's father was killed, Wilhelm accuses Desrochers and challenges him to a duel. Emilie sends a priest to intervene, but Desrochers realizes that he and his wife can never be happy, as he was her father's killer. Desrochers re-enlists and is killed on the front line; Emilie retires to a convent.