Résumé
Résumé de La Poupée sanglante
À qui s’adresse-t-il ?
For readers who love candlelit mysteries, haunted old mansions, vampire lore with a scientific edge, and narrators whose confessions are always worth a second look.
De quoi parle ce livre ?
Imagine a quiet Paris street where one lit window can change a life. The Bloody Doll, by Gaston Leroux, the writer behind the Phantom of the Opera, unfolds on the Île Saint-Louis after the First World War. Bénédict Masson, a bookbinder who writes poems and thinks himself too ugly to be loved, watches the watchmaker's daughter from behind his curtains. One moonlit night he sees her kiss a stranger who steps out of a wardrobe. Soon he is drawn into a mansion of rare books and whispered fears.
Dans ce résumé
- 1A poet spies from behind his curtainsFree
- 2The handsome stranger and the night of the blow
- 3Christine's bargain and the library of the Marquis
- 4Four portraits that all show the same man
- 5The Indian doctor, the dancer, and a living ghost
- 6The bundle tied with a black ribbon
- 7Surgery by firelight and a prosector's dangerous idea
- 8A pinprick, a bottle, and a dying woman's story
- 9Ugliness, doubles, and the telling of the tale
Point clé 1 sur 9
A poet spies from behind his curtains
Bénédict Masson keeps a small shop on a sleepy street of the Île Saint-Louis, where he binds fine books and sells postcards. He is about thirty-five and keeps a daily diary. Most of the early chapters are simply his memoirs, and the narrator admits that some people think they were written to make a monster look innocent.
Across the street lives old Norbert, a watchmaker who hides behind green curtains and swears his new escapement will give him perpetual motion. With him live his daughter Christine and his nephew Jacques Cotentin, a brilliant young surgeon who is also her fiancé. Bénédict adores Christine from afar and calls her the Madonna of the island.
One night he climbs to his attic and looks through a skylight. He sees Christine unlock a huge cabinet at the back of her glass-walled studio. A man steps out and she kisses him. Bénédict's heart breaks, and the mystery begins.
That’s 1 of 9 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
- Nothing to pay today · Renews every year
- We email you before you pay
- Cancel online in two clicks
Questions about La Poupée sanglante
What is The Bloody Doll about?
It follows Bénédict Masson, an ugly and lovesick bookbinder on the Île Saint-Louis, who spies on Christine Norbert and her hidden guest, then enters the mansion of a marquis whose wife believes he is an undying vampire.
Who wrote The Bloody Doll and when?
Gaston Leroux wrote it, the French author of The Phantom of the Opera. It belongs to the early twentieth century, in a Paris still living with the changes brought by the First World War.
Is the Marquis de Coulteray really a vampire?
That is the question the novel keeps open. The marquise says yes, Christine calls her mad, and Bénédict finds medical facts that fit both a legend and a scientific crime.
Who are Gabriel and Jacques Cotentin?
Gabriel is the handsome stranger in a Revolution-era cape whom Bénédict sees come out of a wardrobe. Jacques is Christine's cousin and fiancé, a gifted young prosector who works with her father on secret experiments.
Is The Bloody Doll easy to follow?
Yes, because it moves briskly in short chapters, with diary entries, letters and village gossip carrying the story. A lively narrator keeps each mystery clear and each scene vivid.