Vipers’ Tangle (Cyclopedia of Literary Characters)
At a glance:
- Author: François Mauriac
- First Published: 1932
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Psychological realism
- Time of Work: 1930
- Setting: Calèse (an estate), Bordeaux, and Paris
- Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction, Social realism
- Subjects: Family or family life, Memory, France or French people, Love or romance, Marriage, Betrayal, Religion, Paris, 1930’s, Domestic violence
- Locales: Paris, France, Bordeaux, France, Calèse, France
Characters Discussed
Louis (lwee), a dying lawyer who comes to realize that his heart is a knot of vipers. Intelligent, cunning, greedy, unscrupulous, and incapable of love, Louis—as death approaches—writes a letter to be left to his wife. The letter, intended to explain his hatred for her and their children, becomes a diary of his dying days, a record of his life, and functionally an autobiography; ultimately, it becomes a confession of his spiritual journey to Christianity. The document rambles but is always coherent and organized as it records his unhappiness as a miser....
[The entire page is 638 words long]
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