Week 9: The Lover by Marguerite Duras

Hey everyone! This week, I decided to read The Lover by Marguerite Duras. There’s only three more books left to read this semester it’s going by so fast! So we have another uncomfortable read this week, yay. As a few of my classmates mentioned, this book is definitely disturbing and unsettling. I feel like this generation is a lot more conscious about age gaps in relationships, and this book definitely hits all those spots.

This novel is Marguerite Duras’s semi-autobiography, which takes place in 1920s colonial French Indochina. It focuses on a young French girl from a low-income family who starts a relationship with a wealthy Chinese-Vietnamese man who is literally over twice her age?? Marguerite begins the story by reminiscing about her relationship with the Chinese man. Here, we understand how the two became drawn to each other despite their extreme differences in origin and class, eventually leading to their families’ and society’s disapproval. However, they manage to spend time together by sneaking around Indochina.

A big part of this novel is the social class, age difference, sexual relations, and power dynamic between the two couples. I wanted to touch on the power dynamic between the most. Firstly, I found it kinda strange the characters didn’t have names. They referred to the Chinese-Vietnamese man as “Chinaman”, and the French girl isn’t given a specific name. I feel like giving the man the name “Chinaman” somewhat highlights how Duras adds a sense of mystery surrounding his character and underscores the power dynamics inherent in their relationship since this nickname is defined more by his ethnicity and social status than by his individual identity. I also feel like their anonymous names contribute to the novel’s sense of detachment and universality.

Continuing on with the power dynamic, to me, it’s obvious that the man took advantage of such a young girl, given that most of their connections were sexual, and in exchange, the girl gets the money. If this doesn’t sound illegal and extremely disturbing, I don’t know what it is. This makes Agostino fantasizing about his mother seem like nothing. It definitely pained me to read how she’s pleasuring Chinaman in exchange for some money; it shows how far she’d go just to earn some money for her family, no matter the circumstances. I know some countries still encourage this custom of having their daughters marry off or be in relations with wealthy men for money. Still, personally, I don’t think I could ever accept having my child doing such a thing even if we were dirt poor.

ALSO the fact that her family doesn’t even appreciate or genuinely love her adds more salt to the wound. Her family life is depicted as troubled and dysfunctional. This poor 15 year old girl does all this for her family but doesn’t even get the bare minimum back. Her mother is emotionally and physically distant, isolating this poor girl from basic love, security and stability. Her brothers are no help either since they’re the same as their mother, absent and providing no support she needs. The lack of love she received from her family kind of suggests how her feelings towards the Chinaman are largely influenced by her desires to escape her troubled family life and her longing for the intimacy she never got.

This novel delves into themes of love, desire, power dynamics, colonialism, isolation, and identity. It challenges conventional notions of love by depicting a passionate relationship that is fraught with societal taboos and power imbalances. It shows how love can be complex and multidimensional and how the power imbalance influences the dynamics of relationships.

Discussion Question: How did you feel reading this novel, knowing the age gap between the Chinaman and the girl? Do you think the girl’s family dynamics affected her sense of self and her relationships with others?