The Necklace and other Stories

Resumen del libro

In a lively, sparkling, and sharp-edged (Arthur Goldhammer) new translation, Guy de Maupassant's most beloved works are reintroduced to twenty-first-century readers.
A Parisian civil servant turned protégé of Flaubert, Guy de Maupassant is considered not only one of the greatest short story writers in all of French literature but also a pioneer of psychological realism and modernism who helped define the form. Credited with influencing the likes of Chekhov, Maugham, Babel, and O. Henry, Maupassant had, at the time of his death at the age of forty-two, written six novels and some three hundred short stories. Yet in English, Maupassant has, curiously, remained unappreciated by modern readers due to outdated translations that render his prose in an archaic, literal style.

In this bold new translation, Sandra Smith the celebrated translator of Irene Nemirovsky's Suite Francaise brings us twenty-eight of Maupassant's essential stories and two novellas in lyrical yet accessible language that brings Maupassant into vibrant English. In addition to her sparkling translation, Smith also imposes a structure that captures the full range of Maupassant's work. Dividing the collection into three sections that reflect his predominant themes nineteenth-century French society, the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 71, and the supernatural Smith creates "an arrangement suggesting a culture of relation, of structure, of completion" (Richard Howard).

Biografía del autor

Autor del celebérrimo cuento El Horla , Guy de Maupassant (1850-1893) es uno de los autores franceses más brillantes del siglo xix. Entre 1870 y 1880 trabajó como escribiente en varios ministerios. Después, orientado por Flaubert, se dedicó enteramente a la literatura. Entre sus novelas más destacadas cabe citar, además de Bel Ami, Una vida, Mont-Oriol y Fuerte como la muerte.