Quartier nègre
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Quartier nègre is a French language novel by Georges Simenon first published in 1935.
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Summary
Joseph Dupuche and his young wife, recently married in France, disembark in Cristobal and go to Panama where Dupuche learns that the S.A.M.E., the firm that hired him as a senior engineer, is bankrupt and that the letter of credit he presented to the bank is no longer valid. Without money, without a job, they will get to know more or less shady compatriots, whom Dupuche, with his sense of social hierarchy, will soon despise. However, thanks to them, Germaine finds a job as a cashier in a big hotel in the city, where she can only stay alone.
Separated from her, Dupuche is reduced to living in the Negro district, always looking for a job. This estrangement leads to misunderstanding between the two spouses: Germaine maintains an honorable standard of living, while Dupuche vegetates and indulges himself among the blacks. The disunity is accentuated when Dupuche settles on the other side of the canal, in Colon, with a young Negress, Véronique. To survive, he accepts to work as a laborer at the port, but is gradually rejected by the French community because he indulges in alcohol (the "chicha") and especially because he lives with a black woman. The whole society, to which he belonged, does not interest him anymore, especially since his wife, courted by the son of his bosses, wants a divorce. In spite of certain attempts of friends who would like to save the couple by bringing them back to France, Dupuche accepts. Only the birth of his son Véronique will manage to give him back a feeling of joy that he will savor in the "solitude of his spirit", more and more stupefied by drink.
Ten years later, Dupuche dies of acute hematuria, leaving six children. At his funeral in Panama City, those who had been around him, friends and enemies, relatives and strangers, are gathered.
Special aspects of the novel
The slow dissolution of a young couple as a result of a forced estrangement that places each of the spouses in a situation that ends up opposing them, rejecting one of them in a society that is itself rejected by the clan to which the other belongs.
Work description
Space and Time
Space
The cities of the Panama Canal: Cristobal, Panama, Colon.
Time
Contemporary era.
Characters
Main character
Joseph Dupuche. Engineer at the Société Anonyme des Mines de l'Équateur (S.A.M.E.). Married. In his thirties.
Other characters
- Germaine, wife of Dupuche, a little younger than her husband
- Véronique, young black girl, 15 or 16 years old.
See also
