A PARISIAN AFFAIR AND OTHER STORIES

Set in the nouveau riche Paris of society women prostitutes and playboys; in the Normandy countryside; and on the French Riviera where Maupassant had lived the thirty-four short stories in this volume are among the most darkly humorous and brilliant in French literature. They focus on the complexity of close relationships: between lovers as in the poignant fantasy A Parisian Affair or the touchingly ironical The Jewels; between siblings as in At Sea; and between former partners as in Encounter. They reveal two sides of human nature: its grace and generosity and also as in Boule de Suif its greed and hypocrisy. Piquant and varied Maupassant’s stories lay humanity bare with deft wit and devastating honesty.