- O nosso amor não é um amor vulgar, meu Armando. Amas-me como se eu nunca tivesse pertencido a outro homem; e tremo que depois, arrependendo-te do teu amor e arrojando-me ao rosto como um crime do meu passado, me obrigues a lançar-me de novo na existência a que me foste buscar. Agora que saboreei uma vida nova, morreria se voltasse à outra, não o esqueças. Diz.-me que nunca me deixarás.

Margarida Gautier e Armando Duval vivem um amor lindo e idílico, mas que é assombrado pela profissão de Margarida. Eu acho que eles sabiam que nunca seriam felizes nem ficariam juntos, mas tive pena que o seu amor fosse interrompido por terceiros e por julgamentos da sociedade. Se terceiros não se tivessem interposto entre eles, penso que Armando conseguiria ignorar o passado de Margarida e esta conseguiria ultrapassar a doença que a acabou por vitimar. Gostei deste livro do Duminhas.

Agora que estou quase a morrer, apesar do que me dizem os médicos, porque tenho muitos, o que prova que a doença aumenta, quase lamento ter dado ouvidos a teu pai; se eu soubesse que não tirava senão um ano ao teu futuro, não teria resistido ao desejo de passar esse contigo, e ao menos morria com a mão de um amigo nas minhas. É verdade que se vivêssemos juntos esse ano, eu não morreria tão cedo.

"One of the greatest love stories of all time..."

It's not a love story. It's the romanticized story of a very dysfunctional and disturbing relationship between unstable Marguerite and deeply idiotic and vicious Armand.

Armand is by far one of the most infuriating narrators I've ever had the misfortune to read about. He never loves Marguerite : throughout the book, he's obsessed with the idea of owning her, which is completely different. He "falls in love" with her seconds after seeing her for the first time, although she does not display any likable quality beside being beautiful. On the contrary, she's even quite vain, cruel, and, at dinner, vulgar and childish (throws the piano partition across the room because she can't get it right). I did pity Marguerite at the end, but only because she was dying young, alone and in pain; for the entirety of the book, she does nothing but show an unstable, unlikable and shallow personality.

Armand is just as bad, though: that very first night, he proclaims his eternal love to her, although he has JUST met her and doesn't actually know anything about her or her personality. Therefore, his easy tears and words of love hold literally no value - love builds over time, not overnight, and it is precisely his immaturity that actually drove them to their doom.

Later on, the fact that he was unable to guess that Marguerite had sacrificed herself by meeting with his father in secret while it was so, so, blatantly obvious was maddening. He's an idiot... and a mean one at that.

The way he treated her after she left him is where it went downhill for me. Instead of seeking an explanation, instead of communicating or being forgiving (again: he should have known why she did what she did, it was OBVIOUS), he turned so completely psycho on her I could not believe it. How can you claim to love someone so much yet take so much pleasure in trying to destroy them? He picked the one woman he knew would hurt her the most; slept with her out of sheer viciousness and arranged it all so Marguerite would know.

The pleasure he took in causing her pain in public, in humiliating her, in savoring each instant he saw her weaken or leave a party because she could not bear to see them together, disgusted me and I was so angry that he kept saying that deep down, he still loved her. No, asshole. You don't and you never have: that is not how you treat someone you love.

Prudence was the only character who ever made sense in the entire book, the only one who understood the maddening shortcomings of their characters, their motivations, and the depth (or lack thereof) of their bond. Her monologues were incredibly accurate and always fascinating to read - too bad nobody ever bothered to actually listen to her.

The entire "love" story was nothing short of abusive. The only redeeming quality of the book lies in the exceptionally beautiful way it is written. Dumas' writing is godly and it reads like poetry. It's engaging, gripping, beautiful. I thoroughly enjoyed every sentence. The French language is, in this book, at its finest.

“When she had gone, I was frightened at the solitude in which she left me.”

3

After seeing Moulin Rouge twice on Broadway, I decided to pick up this read that was recommended to me, and I had a great time noticing the different elements of this story that inspired the film and show.

While the story felt repetitive in its back-and-forth romance that could have been edited down, it is still a stunning, heartbreaking story that I’m glad I picked up.

Superbă carte. Superbă!

I’ve decided to make it a goal to read one classic a month in 2023, and I’m glad I decided to really dig into ‘The Lady of the Camellias’! A book that you absolutely should get lost in the minutiae of. If I showed you my weathered and beaten copy from being in my backpack for so many weeks you wouldn’t believe the number of tabs and highlights throughout the pages. Not a romance novel.. but not not a romance novel..? I truly think we can classify this classic as a study of romantic behavior.

P.S. It’s hard to really rate classics IMO, so I’m rating this one purely on how much I enjoyed it and how much I connected to the characters!

A SHORT PREVIEW:
At its core, ‘The Lady of the Camellias’ (TLOTC) is the story of an all too self-aware but vapid Parisian courtesan being loved by a man who alternates between wanting to possess her and obsessing over her. We’re thrown into the world of beautiful people with too much money and masochistic tendencies finding out what attraction really means beyond the ennui of daily life.

THOUGHTS:
-tWhen it comes to the classics, I think everyone is going to pick out the parts that are the most meaningful to them and what makes these tales truly ‘classic’. However, there are some ideas and elements that particularly stuck out to me as good life lessons and studies in human behavior.
-tThe first lesson that I picked up from TLOTC – pay attention to how people treat others in life and then posthumously. Very early into the book, it was probably the first time I’ve really seen a book of old talk about it. Everyone now kind of throws shade and put’s things out there as soon as they notice it… but there is an elegance to Alexandre Dumas’s 19th-century version of calling people out for what is essentially ‘busybodying’.
-tPeople that we think are one thing in life, that the world has placed in one very limited box, are often far more complex. No one is ‘just’ an electrician, a teacher, or even a courtesan. They have a whole world going on inside that’d maybe good, interesting, noble etc. that we know nothing about. It’s always been far too easy to label people in polite society as one-dimensional without ever knowing what really makes them – them. In the case of Margeurite, she had more nobility in her actions than probably most realized, but that was often overlooked because of what she was.

CHARACTER BUILDING:
-tMarguerite Gautier: Made out to initially be such a vapid creature of whimsical wants and a peculiar affection for camellias.. I found that there was so much more to her motivations beyond that vain mask. Her character is perhaps the first time I’ve read a woman’s character be so openly critical of the way men interact with women they want to possess. She also speaks with far more intelligence than I think we’re led to believe a courtesan normally would?
-tArmand: Really, he is probably one of the silliest MMC’s I’ve ever read about. So many of his motivations just seem like what we would call today ‘simping’ lol I can find no better way to describe it. (Most certainly not my kind of man.. I’m more of a Rhysand from ACOTAR, Mr.Darcy, Thor from the first two movies kind of gal!!)
-tAlexandre Dumas: Sometimes I forgot that he wrote this novel while also included himself in the tale. His character throughout presents an interesting study in the role we see ourselves playing in the lives of others? He cast himself as a fairy godmother/angel of mercy type which I find interesting. Obviously we don’t know how much of this story is true..

HISTORICAL NOTES:
The woman in the novel Marguerite is based on a real-life figure: Marie Duplessis, who was a courtesan in Paris in the 19th century. This work inspired operas and movies alike, many of which are famous today! La Traviata by Verde (which means ‘The Fallen Woman’ in Italian), the musical Moulin Rouge! and many other movies.

FAVORITE QUOTE(s):
There really are SO many that I think it’s best if I limit it to 3 of my favorites and then have you read it!

De lo que se entera uno al investigar sólo un poco acerca de la lectura que se emprende. Resulta que la famosísima Dama de las Camelias existió en la persona de Marie Dupleiss, joven cortesana de París que vivió de 1824 a 1847 y quien fuera amante del propio Alejandro Dumas, hijo y del prodigioso pianista y compositor Franz Lizst, entre otros. Esto por lo que toca a la Dama y por lo que respecta a la obra, ésta es un trasunto de la vida de Marie y es sabido que sirvió de inspiración para la célebre ópera de Giuseppe Verdi llamada La Traviata y que también se han hecho películas y obras de teatro basadas en esta novela. Estos conocimientos básicos le agregaron interés a mi lectura por si acaso algo hiciera falta a esta obra aclamada a través de los años por la crítica y por el público.

La prosa del autor es cristalina, ágil y elegante y sirve para contar la historia de esta dama, retratando el ambiente parisino de las cortesanas, las francachelas, el dispendio para satisfacer vanidades, la vida galante de la aristocracia y las triquiñuelas de aquellas mujeres llamadas mantenidas que a veces nos hacen reír. Dumas demuestra un profundo conocimiento de estos juegos galantes y afectivos; de la satisfacción de las vanidades por los caballeros que mantenían a jóvenes cortesanas y de los caprichos y ventajas que ellas debían tomar.

La historia es una novela de romance cuya trama no nos da tregua alguna. Está estructurada de manera muy sencilla ya que abarca un breve lapso de tiempo y va avanzando de manera cronológica a través de algunas descripciones, así como de las constantes reflexiones interiores del protagonista, muchas de las cuales nos ponen a pensar, y sobre todo sus diálogos amenos y certeros que conllevan cierta profundidad. Estos diálogos son desarrollados por los protagonistas que son dos personajes inolvidables de la literatura universal: Marguerite Gautier y Armand Duval.

La relación entre Marguerite y Armand nos muestra palpablemente aspectos como la frivolidad, la encrucijada moral, el egoísmo, la renuncia, la ilusión, la satisfacción de la vanidad y otros atributos humanos que rodean a una pasión desarrollada en torno a una mujer tan bella como falta de virtud, Marguerite, a la que se le contempla a través de una lejanía inaccesible y pecaminosa y de repente se planta frente a Armand como una especie de aparición redimida. La extrema susceptibilidad de Armand Duval se enfrenta con la frivolidad y el interés pecuniario de una mujer acostumbrada a los amores mercenarios.

La trama se desarrolla en París por el año 1847, un año antes de iniciar la Segunda República Francesa bajo Napoleón III, entonces París no era todavía la ciudad que conocemos ahora y cuya transformación arquitectónica se inició hacia 1852. Sin embargo siendo entonces algo más que una ciudad medieval, París tenía ya su encanto, el cual se nos describe y sirve de ambientación para este célebre relato del hijo de Alejandro Dumas.

Una novela muy bien lograda que ha superado mis expectativas y en donde Dumas retrata muy vivamente el amor propio herido profundamente y lo contrasta con la renuncia y la abnegación. El final adquiere un tono vibrante y emotivo pleno de sentimientos arrebatados y exaltados.

Άλλο ένα από τα κλασικά μυθιστορήματα που ασχολούνται με τον έρωτα, μία ιστορία αγάπης με την οποία μεγάλωσαν γενιές και γενιές. Μία ιστορία για τον απόλυτο έρωτα που φυσικά το κύριο χαρακτηριστικό του είναι η θυσία. Η κυρία με τις καμέλιες είναι μία διάσημη πόρνη του Παρισιού, με δεκάδες πλούσιους εραστές και ακόμα περισσότερους θαυμαστές. Αυτός που την ερωτεύεται παράφορα και που τη θέλει για πολλά πράγματα περισσότερα από το σώμα της καλείται να θυσιάσει όλα αυτά που συνδέονται με τον τρόπο που οι άντρες βλέπουν μία ερωτική σχέση μόνο και μόνο για να έχει την κύρια θέση στην καρδιά της, παραβλέποντας το γεγονός ότι πρέπει να τη μοιράζεται. Και εκείνη όμως από την πλευρά της για τον έρωτα της θα πρέπει να θυσιάσει την άνετη και ενδιαφέρουσα ζωή της στους κοσμικούς κύκλους του Παρισιού. Θυσία και από τους δύο, λοιπόν, αλλά τα πράγματα ποτέ δεν είναι τόσο απλά, με το κοινωνικό περίγυρο αλλά και την ίδια τη μοίρα να τοποθετούν ένα σωρό εμπόδια, την ώρα από αυτά που νιώθουν κάνουν την αποδοχή αυτών των θυσιών κάτι πολύ δύσκολο.

Ένας ύμνος στην αγάπη, λοιπόν, στην ομορφιά του πραγματικού έρωτα, στη χαρά που φέρνει αλλά και στη λύπη που προκαλεί. Στον έρωτα που ξεπερνά τις κοινωνικές συμβάσεις, ακόμα και την κοινή λογική, τον σχεδόν μαζοχιστικό έρωτα που μας κάνει να εκτιμάμε τα βάσανα και να πέφτουμε χαμηλά μα που στο τέλος μας σπρώχνει στο να γινόμαστε καλύτεροι ... τουλάχιστον όσο κρατάει. Αυτά σε ένα βιβλίο όπου ο συγγραφέας σκύβει με συμπάθεια πάνω από αυτή τη γυναίκα που η μοίρα την έσπρωξε στον αγοραίο έρωτα, δίνοντας μας μία εικόνα για αυτές τις γυναίκες εντελώς διαφορετική από την κοινή αντίληψη που τις θέλει ανίκανες να νιώσουν υψηλά αισθήματα, κάτι που από ότι γνωρίζω προκάλεσε αρκετές αντιδράσεις στην εποχή που γράφτηκε. Ένα βιβλίο εξαιρετικό, που αν και στο ξεκίνημα του δεν κατάφερε να με κερδίσει, καθώς προχωρούσαν οι σελίδες, όμως, μου άρεσε όλο και περισσότερο και στο τέλος το άφησα βαθύτατα συγκινημένος.

What a book!. Truly I enjoyed every single part. It's a timeless classic you should read. I knew the story I saw Moulin Rouge! countless times but yet it was so different. It's funny at the beginning I thought I will love Armand more and I judged her since she was...well you know what she was but more book progress I more disliked Armand and started not only to love her but to admire her. Marguerite is strong and independent twice stronger character than Armand. Overall beautiful writing style steady and not pathetic. I like it.
------------------------------------------------
Kakva knjiga! Baš sam uživala. Vanvremenki klasik koji bi trebalo da pročitate. Priča mi jeste bila poznata zbog "Mulan ruća" međutim u isto vreme bila je potpuno drugačije. ironično je, na početku sam bila sigurna da ći Armanda više voleti. Nju sam odmah osudila jer je..pa bila je to što jeste. Međutim kako je knjiga odmicala njega sam počela da ne volim a njoj da se divim. Ona je zaista jak lik koji ne zavisi od bilo kog muškarca dva puta jača od njega. Generalno prelepo napisana knjiga, stil veoma dobar nema patetike. Dopala mi se.

Flower For Flower
‏Flower For Flower



( یوهان سباستین باخ را پلی می‌کند... )

“عیسی مرحم انسان‌های زخم‌خورده و دردمند بود.
لویی فردینان سلین پزشک فقرا.

سِلا محضردار دهاتی‌های کاستیل وآدمکشان اکسترامادورا بود.

مالاپارته همدم تهیدست و تیره روز ترین مردم ناپال.
سیمون دوبوار مدافع زنان.
امیل زولا اسم یک فاحشه را برای رمانش انتخاب کرد .



{«حضرت عیسی...»}


حضرت عیسی به گمراهان راه‌هایی را نشان می‌داد که آدمی را از مسیر بدی به خوبی می‌رساند.
و به آنها می‌فهماند که چنین کاری بسیار دشوار است.
اما ممکن است...

شاید تا به حال اسم “مریم‌مجدلیه” به گوش‌هایتان خورده‌باشد،زن تن فروش و بسیار زیبایی که یک روز مردم شهر به دنبال او می‌افتند تا او را سنگسار کنند،
این زن فرار می‌کند فرار می‌کند تا اینکه به عیسی مسیح می‌رسد حضرت عیسی جریان را از او وهم از مردم می‌پرسد و مرد می‌گویند بخاطر گناهانی که انجام داده باید سنگسار شود...
حضرت مسیح می‌گوید بله سنگسار شود اما ...
اما اولین سنگ را کسی بزن که گناهی نکرده باشد.
« انجیل‌یوحنا_باب هشتم_آیات ۱/۱۱»
و این زن یکی از یاران حضرت عیسی میشود و حتی حضرت عیسی درمورد این زن می‌گوید:
تو بخشیده خواهی شد،زیرا بیش از دیگران با دوست داشتن انس گرفته ای.



Flower For Flower
‏Flower For Flower




الکساندر دوما فرزند‌ نا مشروعی‌که در ۲۴ سالگی اولین رمان خود یعنی این شاهکار ادبی را می‌نویسد‌...

شاهکاری که روایت مادام کاملیاست زن جوان و دافی‌روستایی که در کوچه خیابان های شانز‌لیزه
در عین تسلیم شدن به فساد و هرزگی روحش با طراوت و دست نخورده بود.زنی عاشق،فداکار،درست.
تکرار میکنم الکساندر دوما در ۲۴ سالگی این شاهکار ادبی را می‌نویسد.


{جرات‌نوشتن این رمان...}


«خاطره»
در سال ۱۳۹۹ یک دختر جنده در کوچه‌ی ما زندگی می‌کند...چند روز قبل به من سلام داد،از ترس اینکه مبادا کسی مرا با او دیده باشد فرار کردم...»
و الکساندر دوما تقریبا در سن من اما در قرن 9
در مورد زنی روسپی نوشت و از او دفاع کرد که حتی بعد از مرگ این زنان هم مردم نمی‌خواهند جسد این زنان را در گورستان های خود ببینند.
زنانی که روزی مثل خورشید میدرخشند و عاقبت در خاموشی،درخشش خود را از دست می‌دهند.




براستی چه کسی حق قضاوت در مورد دیگران را به ما داده؟




Flower For Flower
‏Flower For Flower

The oxford world's classics edition of this novel said in the opening introduction that 'this has never been a novel for which persons of taste and discernment have been able to confess outright enthusiasm.'

As much I dislike oxford for that very pretentious and frank statement; I can't fully disagree.

Now, I'm definitely not a person of good 'taste' and 'discernment' or whatever that may mean. All I know is that when I read stuff like this: "Am I not your slave, your dog? Do with me what you will. Take me, I am yours."

Then I want to barf. It's certainly not my type of romance. It's a rather plain story with an overbearing excess of sentiment and sweetness. It also has insta-love which I cannot stand.

The story follows a young man named Armand and the courtesan, Marguerite Gautier, whom he falls madly in love with. Of course complications abound in their relationship which makes it difficult for them to be together. For Armand, it's to do with the fact that he wants her to be his lover, not merely his mistress, which would have been considerably bad for his image since she's essentially a high-class prostitute, but Armand doesn't care about that because his madly obsessed and infatuated with her. For Marguerite, it's the fact she's can't simply give up her extravagant life for Armand, who is not all that rich. She spends money so outlandishly that's she in debt even though she gets huge amounts of money from her other lovers.

I would think that if someone said that they can't love you because you don't have enough money to spend on them then you would know it's time to simply move on. But it doesn't convince the love-sick hero for he's just too enamoured by her. And for what reason? I seriously have no clue. There's nothing interesting about her. She comes off as quite selfish. And it's not like Armand doesn't realise that she spends money recklessly. He says so himself, "She was one of those women who never consider the countless amusements of which their life is made can be a serious financial drain." Armand also notes that she had 'men spend more on flowers than would be needed to enable a whole family to live without care.'

Maybe, I am misinterpreting the story. I know this story was intended to make you sympathetic to courtesans, but I only came out thinking how these courtesans need to better handle their finances and maybe lay out a budget plan along the way.