REGIS JAUFFRET
Translated by Vineet LalISBN: 9780956808202
ISBN Kindle: 9780956808257 (£6.17)
ISBN Epub: 9780956808288 (£6.17)
21.5cm x 14.5cm
222 pagesPrice: £11.99
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“Dear Charlotte,
You died on a sudden whim from a long illness. Suicide gushed through your brain like an oil spill and you hanged yourself. You had been living in Paris for fourteen years but on 7 June 2007 you took the train to Marseille. As if humans had the memory of an elephant and sometimes returned to dig their grave near the place where, in the past, they’d forced their way out of their mother’s womb to set foot in life.”
Lacrimosa unfolds through a moving exchange of letters between the narrator and his young lover, Charlotte, who has just committed suicide. Their poignant dialogue makes this epistolary novel a truly cathartic experience.
Born in Marseille in 1955, Régis Jauffret is a mind-blowing author whose books are often described as acerbic and written with a scalpel, stripping life to the bone.
“Lacrimosa is marked by Jauffret’s own direct involvement in both the real-life events and the narrative, an internal exploration deepened by his own experience.”
Russell Williams, TLS
“If you follow my advice, I promise: while reading Lacrimosa, you will both endure enjoyment and suffering. Lacrimosa is just made of what life is made of.”
Olivier Barrot, Vice Versa, France 24
“Régis Jauffret has perhaps written his most accomplished novel, a work of devastating and devastated beauty: an ode to a dead lover.”
Magazine Littéraire
“Lacrimosa works like a literary boxing match, a heartbreaking masterpiece where emotion is never far from the absurd.”
Express
“A savage epistolary dialogue made for a great novel.”
Nouvel Observateur
“A merciless tale in which honesty explodes from every page, sometimes to the point of provocation.”
Figaro
“Tragic and caustic.”
Télérama
