GUY DE MAUPASSANT

(1850-1893)

French novelist. He was born in the Château Miromesniel near Torvile sur Arques in Normandy in 1850, and died in Paris in 1893.

He started writing at the age of thirty under the personal, literary influence of Gustave Flaubert and he managed to live luxuriously thanks to his works.

He was an excellent narrator and his natural talents established him as one of the main followers of the naturalistic movement.

In his stories one can notice an extraordinary power of observation, magisterial descriptions of characters and settings, as well as a very personal and strong style.

Of his works we can mention the now very famous story “Ball of Fat” (1880) that appeared in a collection of stories titled The Evenings of Medan; and of his novels: A Woman’s Life (1883), Pierre and Jean (1883), Bel Ami (1885), Strong as Death (1889), The History of Our Heart (1890); as well as of his story books: The Maison Tellier (1881), Contes de la Bécasse (1883), The Randoli Sisters (1884), The Horla (1887) and The Hand (1889).

In 1892, he was admitted to an asylum after he tried to commit suicide. He died the next year while suffering from a very serious mental illness caused by a venereal disease (with no cure at the time) which had tormented him for the last decade of his life.

 ***

AUTOSCOPY

Last Thursday… Was it last Thursday? I can’t remember… Well, the thing is that something unbelievable happened to me. I returned home late after wandering, as I usually do, through the streets of Paris. I felt that the morning was particularly dark so I felt inspired to write a story that I decided to just name “The Night.” With all the ideas jammed inside my imagination I quickly went upstairs to my study to write, but when I got to the second floor I had a strange feeling in my stomach. I took out my gun, which I always carry on my evening walks, and without making a sound stepped into my studio. As the wicked, stale light of the moon crept through the windows, I could see a silhouette sitting on the heavy reading couch. I thought for an instant that it was my servant, François, but his build was much bigger and, anyway, François knew he had no permission to come in. Then I suspected that it could be my literary mentor Gustave Flaubert. He was one of the few who didn’t need permission to come in the door. However, I remembered he was dead and he believed, as I did, in complete annihilation. Gustave would never contradict himself!

So who was the intruder? I approached with caution, gun in hand, and with a quick movement I turned the chair around.

Although the light was very dim, it still allowed me to recognize the face of the man I pointed my gun at. The sudden horror I felt when I saw his face made me pull the trigger three times, but my gun wasn’t loaded. My efficient François had cleaned it and forgotten to load it up again. I stepped back with a gasp. That broad shouldered Viking with a big moustache and black eyes was me, Guy de Maupassant, sitting on the couch!

The apparition was not disturbed. He smiled, pointed at the desk with his finger and said, “I have already started to write ‘The Night’. You can read the draft and see what you think of it.” His tone was so natural it was most  offensive.

Whatever way I had thought the plot of my story that Thursday … Or was it Wednesday? The terror that had immobilized me vanished before my curiosity.

I took the handful of written sheets of paper (it was my own handwriting!). I started to read and noticed that he had already figured out some of the story’s sections that I hadn’t yet. I turned to the reading chair in surprise but my twin was not there anymore.

I couldn’t sleep the rest of the night and, early the next morning, I went to see my family physician. I told him in detail and without shame what had happened, but the doctor seemed to think it was something normal.

“The drugs that you are forced to take due to your disease,” he said, “can be causing you an ‘autoscopy’ and even though it is a strange illness, it….”

“What in the world is an autoscopy?” I interrupted.

“It is a harmless change of perception. It is only a hallucination produced by a chemical imbalance of the brain; don’t worry about it,” said the sage.

I left the doctor’s office more at ease but not yet convinced. A hallucination did not explain the text on the desk; however, I was aware that my old illness, (a not very strange ailment of Venus) sooner or later would lift me up to the summits of madness.

I walked along Paris boulevards and felt happy when I saw, at the Rouen Café, my old colleague Emile Zola, who invited me to sit at his table. There we remember our literary mischief and soon three controversial ladies joined us: his nanny, Madame Bovary Flaubert and my Mademoiselle Fifi. Between drinks, laughs and tobacco I told him briefly what was happening to me.

“Remember,” he said, “we must jump to the stars using the springboard of exact observation. Write about it!”

Emile left and I started scribbling on the table at the Café a story that later on the intruder would call “The Horla”.

Days passed and I kept bumping into my double around the house. I ordered the servants to move to a small cottage outside the mansion. Now more than ever I needed to be “alone”; I didn’t want anyone to hear me arguing with the other.

Our encounters were becoming more and more frequent and it was unbearable to live that way with my own self.

If I thought about writing, he had already done it. If I wanted to move a piece of furniture, it was already were I wanted it to be. If I wanted to take a bath, he was using it. And if that was not enough, he spent all the wretched day criticizing my work. The only place where I didn’t find him was in my bed, maybe that is why I decided to spend more time there. . .

Since the intruder didn’t let me carry out any of my everyday activities in peace, I worked on the garden and repaired the house’s old furniture. Meanwhile, locked in my studio, he wrote my stories without rest.

Sick and tired of his intrusion I decided to take refuge in my boat, the “Bel Ami.”

I did not mention my decision to any of the servants; I didn’t even think about it very hard, I was so afraid the meddler would anticipate it.

So one day at daybreak I sneaked out of bed and headed towards the Seine where the Bel Ami was docked. I went on board with great excitement and searched the deck three times from bow to stern as I inspected the sails, the rudder, the masts, the ropes, the anchor, the fresh water and supplies. I was ready to set sail and felt liberated.

I mapped out the route; I was going to sail through the Seine as far as the English Channel; from there I would pass through the Calais Crossing and I would guide my ship as far as the Northern Sea: the Normandy waters of my childhood and youth.

Leaning on the starboard rail, I waved to the Bougival’s boatmen who, standing on the pier, lifted their jugs filled with rum and invited me as always to listen to tales of the sea in exchange for hot and dirty stories, which I knew made them laugh.

I was thinking I could join them for a few minutes when I recognized far away the silhouette of the loyal François who was walking towards the pier. I cut the rope that held the main sail with my blade, but I knew I was not going to sail on time. So I hurried down the stairs to my bunk intending to hide like a little boy. I came in haste, locked the hatch behind me and started looking for a place to hide; it was then that I discovered the intruder, that wretched parasite, sleeping in my bed. I approached him slowly so as not to wake him and, determined to erase the hallucination, Islashed his throat.

Now I’m sure all this started on a Thursday; my reasoning is much clearer—but on the other hand I’m not really sure who I am.

I just woke up. Someone is going out the door. I’m in a hospital room. A bandage is wrapped around my neck and my left hand is holding this story.

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