La Bâtarde by Violette Leduc w. foreword by Simone de Beauvoir [FIRST PAPERBACK EDITION] 1967 • Dell

La Bâtarde by Violette Leduc with a foreword by Simone de Beauvoir

FIRST U.S. PAPERBACK EDITION [1966] DELL BOOKS 

Third Dell printing / 1967.

Vintage mass market paperback in very good condition.

Clean, tight and seemingly unread copy.  Cover shows a few worn edges. 

Reads beautifully!

ABOUT THE BOOK

An obsessive and revealing self-portrait of a remarkable woman humiliated by the circumstances of her birth and by her physical appearance, La Batarde relates Violette Leduc's long search for her own identity through a series of agonizing and passionate love affairs with both men and women.

When first published, La Batarde earned Violette Leduc comparisons to Jean Genet for the frank depiction of her sexual escapades and immoral behavior. A confession that contains portraits of several famous French authors, this book is more than just a scintillating memoir. Like that of Henry Miller, Leduc's brilliant writing style and attention to language transform this autobiography into a work of art.

Violette Leduc was born the illegitimate daughter of a servant girl and was encouraged to write by Maurice Sachs and Simone de Beauvoir. Her first novel, L'Asphyxie (In the Prison of Her Skin), was published by Camus for Gallimard and earned her praise from Jean-Paul Sartre, Jean Cocteau, and Jean Genet. She went on to write eight more books, including Ravages, L'Affamee, and La Folie en tete (Mad in Pursuit), the second part of her literary autobiography.