Betty (Simenon novel)
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"A psychopathic woman pours out her life story to the widow who nurses her through her latest drinking binge." --Harcourt blurb, 1975 |
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Betty (1961) is a 'roman dur' by Georges Simenon, the story of an unfaithful wife, who is caught in the act, flees her home and ends in the arms of another man, causing the death of the woman who saved her.
The novel was adapted into the film Betty (1992) directed by Claude Chabrol.
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Summary
When Betty, dead drunk, fails one night at the "Le Trou" (English: "The Hole"), Mario's bar-restaurant, brought there by a customer who picked her up in a bar near the Champs-Élysées, she has just been driven from her home, where she lived, in the house of her in-laws, with her husband and her two children. She had to renounce all rights to them, in return for an annuity which will be paid to her. Such is the result of her misconduct which had become scandalous.
Picked up by Mario's friend, Laure, who lodges her in the hotel where she lives, Betty will experience, for the duration of a few days, a whole new environment: the “twisted” clientele who frequents the bar-restaurant. of Mario, the calm assurance of the latter, a good fellow who impresses the young woman, the effective dedication of Laure to whom Betty reveals, in bits and pieces, her past life.
Originally from a provincial family, she was traumatized to have seen, as a child in the countryside, her uncle "mating" (as in animal husbandry) a young servant. She subsequently feels what is to be dirty as "some sort of mystical protest" and behave like a whore, even after her marriage to Guy whom she married because he is straight and orderly and he embodies the other aspect of her personality. A muddled and troubled soul, having only received affection from her father (from whom the war separated her at a very young age), she continually lies to herself. To escape reality, she drinks, which makes one of her lovers, who is a psychiatrist, remark that she will end up in the asylum or in the morgue. In her complicated contact with Laure, also undermined by alcohol, Betty pulls herself together with a last jump. A ray of hope: Mario. A sudden rapprochement precipitates them one towards the other and causes the departure of Laure. By committing suicide, Laure fulfills Betty's destiny in her place. "It was one or the other" ...
Production
Simenon wrote this novel in Échandens, in Switzerland, between 5 and 12 October 1960.
Characters
- Élisabeth Étamble, née Fayet, alias Betty
- Laure Lavancher, widow of a professor of medicine from Lyon, 48 years old, mistress of Mario
- Mario, owner of the bar `` Le Trou
- Guy Étamble, husband of Betty, polytechnician, engineer at the Union des Mines, 35 years old
- Madame Étamble, stepmother of Betty, widow of General Étamble
- Schwartz, medical student, psychoanalyzes Betty
Film adaptation
The novel was adapted in 1992 into the film Betty directed by Claude Chabrol, with Stéphane Audran and Marie Trintignant in the main roles.
See also
