Reviews for The Diary of a Chambermaid

The average rating for The Diary of a Chambermaid based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2019-12-22 00:00:00 David Kennedy Mirbeau's chambermaid, Celestine R., is an extravagant creation who lodges in the imagination as you plunge into his ironic and always subversive critique of French life in 1900. A worldly tease, she's a vulnerable, manipulative, defiant and highly sexed star in his "theatre of deceit." Though somewhat of a bigot, Celestine remains likeable - an achievement in itself - while being unaware of the bitter twist that grips her final situation. This is a dark social comedy. Mirbeau's own life, which got off to a bad start with his being raped by Jesuit priests as a teen, made him see the world as a torture garden where "passions, greed, religion, social institutions were monstrous flowers." He was an anarchist who defied conventions : his contempt for authority defined him as a journalist, novelist and playwright. (He became very rich). With Zola, he attacked anti-semitism (the Dreyfus case), and was appalled by the behavior of human beings. An acute observer of all classes, he delivers unsparing criticism of people he saw and knew or knew about. I would call this Diary a "bloody" satire. Bloody because there's a savage murder that goes unpunished. Celestine believes she knows the killer--. Filmmakers Renoir and Bunuel did their own versions of "Chambermaid" that only vaguely follow the book. They both found his ending unacceptable (or the censors did). But Mirbeau's finale makes the novel a "classic" of modernity. It foreshadows the ambiguity of Pinter and the transgressions of Genet. The saucy Celestine is stationed with a cold, childless married couple in Normandy when she starts her diary and then, veering away from a chronological story, Mirbeau has her remembering past scenes (and abuses) with other households. This structure shattered the literary "realistic" formula of the day. Some memories focus on vice, like overhearing a madame describe a brothel scene where she watches two hunchbacks having sex. "You should see them! Nothing's more exciting." Some are hilarious: while traveling a grand madame refuses to open a jewel case because her dildo is there, carefully packed. Others are troubling: another madame encourages Celestine to take care of her grandson, 19, who is dying of TB. Mirbeau avoids all descriptions of sex, but soon Celestine and the sickly youth are entwined. After a session, "from his mouth...a flow of blood hit my face." Months later she wonders if she contracted the disease. How does she stop the torment of desire? Easily: "with my own caresses." Within the Norman house is a gardener-coachman named Joseph, a dark, virile, ugly man (and raging anti-semite) who beguiles Celestine. Drawn to him, she trembles in his presence. "I will not, I cannot, love this man. No, no, it is not possible. And yet it is possible, and it is true." I deplore Identity Politics and Identity Art. In this mostly forgotten novel, Mirbeau's first-person diary of a chambermaid seems unique; he is psychologically convincing throughout. His characters tolerate depravity "as a cherry tree bears cherries." There is not a whisper of sentiment here for anyone. Written in sedate prose, you will not find an overwrought word or soft interlude. Mirbeau destroys our illusions about people we know. Shall I mention the monsieur with a shoe fetish found dead with one of Celestine's shoes clamped in his mouth?

Review # 2 was written on 2019-07-28 00:00:00 Michael Crabtree Diary of a chambermaid is a good novel but it does not seem to be an indispensable novel in the ouvre of octave mirbeau. Let's be honest. No one writes in their diary with such polished narration and well choreographed scenes. For the most part mirbeau is an effective chronicler and cynical commentator of his times but the diary device is a lavish contrivance. He does however provide a compelling female narrator who writes awfully long and intricate observations about her employers, exposing the dirty underbelly of their high class lifestyles. For its time it might have sparked outage and shock and awe. Today it is simply amusing in its scandalous or simply exaggerated depictions. It is a somewhat tame mirbeau novel with enough weird, unexplainable touches of macabre wit to meet with my stamp of approval.