The Captive by Colette
Translated by Antonia White
I always enjoy taking part in Women in Translation month during August; I read a lot of translated literature anyway, and likewise a lot of women authors, so in some ways it’s a bit of a case of the month being what I already do. However, I haven’t managed to get on to so many titles this year because of “War and Peace”; but having picked up a lovely edition of Colette’s “The Captive” on my recent travels, I decided this would be an ideal re-read, particularly as she’s a Virago author too (and translated by another Virago author!).
I first read Colette in the early 1980s, and this was one of the titles I had, so it’s been over 35 years since I read this particular book (gulp!). I’ve returned to certain of her works over and over again (particularly “Break of Day”) but I’m pretty sure I’ve never re-read “The Captive” so I was very eager to see what I made of it after all this time.
Published in 1913, “The Captive” is narrated by Colette’s alter ego, Renée Néré, who featured in a number of the author’s works, most notably “The Vagabond”. In the latter story she was a music hall artist, travelling the country, living out of a trunk and performing wherever fate took her. In “The Captive”, Néré has retired from music hall after receiving a legacy and is frankly at a loose end. We first encounter her living in a hotel in Nice and basically wasting her time hanging around with Jean and May, a pair of young lovers with a destructive relationship, and the rather entertaining Masseau, an opium addict who serves as light relief! Renée is alternately bored and amused with her companions and often seems to wish she could be on her own, communing with nature and relishing her solitude.
However, Renée is not as straightforward as she seems, and despite her age still has her attractions. Inevitably, Jean is drawn to the older, more experienced woman and despite her attempts to escape him by running off to Geneva, they begin an affair which is characterised from the start by a simple physical connection rather than anything deeper. However, this relationship is nothing if not complex and we follow its twists and turns until it reaches a perhaps unexpected conclusion…
A simple sounding tale, perhaps, but in the hands of an author like Colette it’s anything but. Renée herself is a complex mix, attempting to resist the allure of the younger man yet unable to; despite her avowed independence, she craves love, and also to be reassured that she’s still attractive. As for Jean, for much of the book he’s unreadable and it’s only towards the end of the story that we see a little more of his personality emerge. All the nuances and complexities of an affair between man and woman are laid bare here: the little lies and compromises, the obsession and the disillusionment, the arguments and the bliss. In many ways Renée is trying to keep herself detached during the affair; she tries to convince herself that it’s simply a physical thing between them, but the longer the relationship goes on, the harder it is to really believe that. The title has been translated before as “The Shackle”, perhaps to indicate that love is such a thing and that Renée has been captured by the emotion. However, I believe the literal translation of the original French “L’Entrave” is ‘obstacle’, and Renée certainly encounters one in her quest for freedom.
You pretend to love me; this means that all day long I must bear the burden of your anxiety, your watch-dog vigilance, your suspicion. Tonight I am not off the chain, but it has slipped from your hand and trails behind me so that I do not feel the pull of it.
There are elements of the story which might sit uncomfortably with modern readers: the casual violence between Jean and May; the constant smoking; and the fact that a woman is considered past it at the ripe old age of 36… (heavens!) This latter is particularly striking, as modern attitudes would consider 36 to be in the prime of life; but Renée/Colette makes constant reference to her increasing age, the need to keep up certain barriers between the lovers, a certain heaviness of age – most odd! Much of the plot is concerned with the power balance within the relationship, which shifts as the story develops, and a to modern eyes the sacrifices Renée makes might be unacceptable; although I would wager that things have not changed as much as we might think they have… And it’s worth remembering that she is in a position of having basically no occupation: she misses the music hall (and a visit to her old colleague Brague makes that pain even worse), has no need to make a living and is at a loose end, so ripe for an emotional intrigue. There is a hint at one point that she is attempting a career as a writer, but this is never stated outright, and Renée seems very much a woman at a transitional period of her life.
The story itself is fascinating and involving; and I felt it very much reflected Colette’s view at the time, as she was a woman who certainly needed love. Yet there are other elements creeping in, those which became more prominent in her later books: her profound love of nature is evident, as well as her wonderful powers of observation and her ability to capture a place or person in a few lines. As I read I really felt as if I was *in* the South of France, or Paris, or Geneva, so vivid are the pictures she paints.
I’m never sure how widely known Colette is nowadays; in my feminist youth, she was someone we turned to readily as a pioneering woman who carved out her own life and lived it on her own terms, while writing wonderful books along the way. Returning to her writing with this book I felt, as I always do, not only what wonderful prose she wrote but what a wonderfully adventurous life she must have had. I loved my re-read of “The Captive” and if you haven’t read anything by the marvellous Colette I would strongly urge you to – a remarkable woman and a remarkable writer.
MarinaSofia
Aug 23, 2017 @ 07:37:09
Great choice for WIT – you can never go wrong with Colette. I loved Claudine when I was a child and just grew up alongside her and with Colette’s other works, relishing the sensuous prose and the ‘naughty’ themes (bless my parents’ innocence, they thought I was just eager to improve my French). Men often appear as shackles, even though some of them are charming, in her work and zI wonder how much of a part her experience with Willy played in this.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 09:13:11
You can’t – I don’t think she’s ever disappointed me, and I love the idea of you growing up reading the Claudine books! I suspect you may be right about Willy – 13 years in that kind of marriage when you’re a young girl has to have some kind of damaging effect.
Jonathan
Aug 23, 2017 @ 09:46:28
My first Colette was ‘The Pure and Impure’ which I read at the end of last year. It probably wasn’t the best one to start with; ‘The Captive’ may be a good one for me to try especially as I seem to like books written around that period.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 10:38:03
Probably not the best place to start with her, no. I would suggest maybe reading The Vagabond first then this one, as they both feature the same protagonist and both signalled her setting off on her own (literally in her flight from her marriage to Willy, and creatively in her writing career). Wonderful books!
Jonathan
Aug 23, 2017 @ 10:50:41
Thanks. I’ve added both to my GoodReads list and I notice that ‘The Vagabond’ is available from my library.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 10:55:55
🙂 Always a bonus!
heavenali
Aug 23, 2017 @ 09:49:34
Brilliant choice for witmonth, I am reading my third book for witmonth having one still to review. Shockingly I have only read one Collette book.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 10:36:19
You’re doing well! I loved this read and I highly recommend more Colette!!
Jane @ Beyond Eden Rock
Aug 23, 2017 @ 10:13:58
I remember reading this in the eighties too, and loving it. Back then the library seemed to have all her books on the shelves but these days I don’t see anything of hers.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 10:35:58
No, I suspect she’s not as mainstream as she was at that time. All my lovely original Penguin editions from the time used to be prominently on the bookshelves in all the shops. I wish she was more widely read.
Andy Kelley
Aug 23, 2017 @ 12:07:05
Fantastic post, as always, and your insights are spot on. Thanks for taking the time to include the photos. Your monst ardent American fan!
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 13:13:34
Thank you – most kind!
gina in alabama
Aug 23, 2017 @ 13:47:07
i recently listened to Henry James’ The Ambassadors and kept having the most peristent echoes/flashbacks to Colette’s Cheri. I am going to revisit Cheri soon. The affair between Chad and Marie Vionnet just resonated with echoes of Cheri and Lea. I read Cheri and The End of Cheri in the 80s and am sure that the intervening years would now add depth and shadow. I read Ambassadors then too for the first time and my, how much I missed, or was just to young to perceive.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 13:51:09
I certainly think I get much more out of my re-reads nowadays, being older and a much more seasoned and weathered reader! In a perfect setting I would love to just re-read the whole of Colette’s work from end to end!
Dark Puss
Aug 26, 2017 @ 17:15:12
Do re-read them! When I was much younger (and green) the only two books of Colette that I didn’t adore were Cheri and The Last of Cheri. I re-read them after a gap of thirty years recently and certainly benefited from my “real world” experiences. This time I understood much better what she was writing about.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 26, 2017 @ 18:47:34
:)) I wish I had infinite reading time! But yes, I do get so much more out of them being a more seasoned reader!
JacquiWine
Aug 23, 2017 @ 15:24:03
A typically perceptive review of what sounds like an excellent choice for WIT Month. Like you, I sometimes wonder about the reception of certain elements of Colette’s work in today’s day and age. But then again, perhaps these things are best viewed in the context of what was considered de rigueur at the time. I still have a couple of her novellas in my tbr – possibilities for next year’s WIT month perhaps?
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 15:55:22
Thanks Jacqui! Yes, like most older books there are elements that we would not accept today. As you suggest, I personally don’t have an issue as I can see them in the context they came from – we can’t expect views to be the same a century later. She’s ideal reading for WIT in my opinion – which ones do you have left?
JacquiWine
Aug 24, 2017 @ 08:03:44
Gigi and The Cat – plus another novella, the name of which escapes me right now. I would have to check.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 24, 2017 @ 09:32:50
Oooh, lovely! Actually, I seem to remember The Cat is a little dark and wonderful – why wait till next year? :))))
Dark Puss
Aug 26, 2017 @ 17:12:12
The Cat is one of her outstanding works, the true nature of unwavering and unsentimentalised, love is revealed within it.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 26, 2017 @ 18:48:24
I do recall it as being a standout of hers.
BookerTalk
Aug 23, 2017 @ 15:47:34
I was hoping to get this from the library today – who can resist the Midi in 1930s – but sadly came away empty handed. Nothing by Colette on the shelves at all….Pout
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 15:53:42
It’s very annoying – I just searched my local library catalogue and the few titles they have seem to stuck away in reserve stock. So depressing.
BookerTalk
Aug 25, 2017 @ 19:11:41
At least they have some even if only in reserve, our library system offered zero
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 25, 2017 @ 21:38:29
True – disappointing yours has none!
Lady Fancifull
Aug 23, 2017 @ 16:19:12
Ah, the wonderful Colette!
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 23, 2017 @ 17:28:23
She was rather magnificent, wasn’t she?
Dark Puss
Aug 26, 2017 @ 17:09:58
Totally magnificent – unparalleled writing skills in my opinion (within her particular area of course). I fail to understand why she is not as popular as many other writers of her era.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 26, 2017 @ 18:48:55
It’s bizarre, isn’t it? For her earthy love of nature if nothing else she should be read and loved.
Caroline
Aug 24, 2017 @ 15:10:25
I love her but I don’t think I’ve read this because I’m not sure about the original title. She’s an author one can easily reread and find new meaning, treasures.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 24, 2017 @ 18:53:54
Definitely – I always discover new riches on re-reading Colette! 🙂
madamebibilophile
Aug 27, 2017 @ 20:03:25
I’ve also read Colette for WIT month, and this sounds really wonderful. She’s so readable and has so much to say – I’ll be on the look out for a copy of this!
kaggsysbookishramblings
Aug 28, 2017 @ 11:30:13
She’s marvellous isn’t she? Can’t get enough of her.
Kat
Sep 03, 2017 @ 22:31:34
I do love Colette, especially The Vagabond, and wish I liked this one better, since it’s a sequel. And, by the way, at a bookstore in Omaha a group is reading The Vagabond! Isn’t that great?
I have the translation of The Captive by Antonia White, albeit with the title The Shackle. Yes, the violence is hard to take in this one: I think of it as a predecessor of 50 Shades of Grey. And since Renee didn’t show any kind of masochism with Big Noodle, I wonder what’s happening. Still, it’s Colette!
kaggsysbookishramblings
Sep 04, 2017 @ 13:51:21
From memory (and we’re talking a long time ago) I think I liked The Vagabond better too. Time for a re-read, perhaps, to be sure! And as for the violence, I guess it’s a product of its time – I somehow imagine that Colette herself would give as good as she got…
buriedinprint
Sep 08, 2017 @ 15:14:16
Having recently perused the ‘net for photos of Nice in the 1950s (for a Mavis Gallant story), I was struck by your find of the area so many years earlier. It looks very different obviously! I wish I more often took the time to put the ‘net to work for such projects to enhance reading nowadays, but then the books are calling and attention is pulled here and there, so the pictures often go undiscovered. But, then, look how lovely it is to have that photo of Colette to help you visualise her alter ego too. The visuals are quite lovely, really.
kaggsysbookishramblings
Sep 08, 2017 @ 15:49:47
:))) Colette always looks stunning, whatever her age. And sometimes a post just seems to call for illustration!