8 h 36 minAudiobook12 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if the life you dream of leaves no room for the life you actually live?
At seventeen, Jeanne leaves her convent school eager for love and happiness. A Norman baron's daughter, she returns to a world of fields, cliffs and sea. When the handsome Julien de Lamare arrives, his charm seems to promise the future she imagines. Marriage brings those hopes into the daily life of a household.
In A Woman's Life, Guy de Maupassant follows Jeanne from girlhood to old age with clear eyes and plain sympathy. Love, money, religion and motherhood shape her days, while ordinary disappointments wear at her dreams. The gap between what she expects and what she finds gives this quiet story its force.
What you’ll discover
- A heart full of hope Meet Jeanne as she steps beyond the convent, ready to welcome a bright future.
- Beauty beyond the household Travel from Normandy's fields and sea to the rough mountains of a Corsican honeymoon.
- The distance between dreams Watch romantic expectations meet the small demands and disappointments of married life.
- A woman's narrow world Explore the limits surrounding Jeanne as she moves from daughter to wife and mother.
- Sympathy without softened edges Discover Maupassant's direct prose, where ordinary scenes carry the weight of a whole life.
Who will love it
For readers who love realistic fiction, intimate character studies and the French novel of the nineteenth century. It also rewards anyone curious about Maupassant beyond his short tales, with a story of love, money, religion and motherhood.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A girl leaves the convent full of dreams
- A handsome neighbor arrives and wins her
- A honeymoon in Corsica shows the first cracks
- Home again, and a husband shows his nature
- Betrayals at Les Peuplets break her trust
- A son becomes the center of her world
- Illusion and reality shape every choice
- A woman's place in her world has narrow walls
- Plain scenes and the sea carry the story
Who’s who
- JeanneA warm, dreamy young Norman noblewoman who leaves the convent hoping for love and happiness, and meets the real world one day at a time.
- Julien de LamareA handsome, poor viscount who courts Jeanne with charm and marries her, then shows himself to be stingy, cold and selfish.
- Baron Simon-Jacques Le Perthuis des VaudsJeanne's kind, generous father, full of enthusiasm and book learning, who loves his daughter and the estate of Les Peuplets.
- Baroness AdélaïdeJeanne's gentle, sentimental mother, in frail health, who lives on memories and quiet feelings and adores her daughter.
- RosalieA young servant raised alongside Jeanne, loyal and sturdy, whose life stays bound up with Jeanne's in ways neither expects.
- Abbé PicotThe easygoing village priest, fond of good food and kind to his flock, who brings a mild, human face to the church.
- PaulJeanne's son, born in her married years, who becomes the object of all her love and hope.
- Gilberte de FourvilleA neighboring noblewoman who becomes Jeanne's friend, and whose life becomes entangled with the household.
Formats and delivery
- eBook
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- Large-print eBook
- The same book in bigger, clearer type, from the first page.
- Audiobook
- 8 h 36 min, complete, read by Lucas Linden.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas in about 12 minutes, to read or to hear.
- Paperback
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print paperback
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print hardcover
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
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Une vie
by Guy de Maupassant · 1883
Jeanne leaves her convent full of dreams, as marriage, money and custom shape her hopes for love in Normandy.
Medium level5–10 hours to read25 languages
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In short
A Woman's Life is the first novel of Guy de Maupassant, published in France in 1883 under the title Une vie, which simply means A Life. Maupassant was then known for brilliant short stories.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A girl leaves the convent full of dreams
The story opens as Jeanne finishes packing her trunk, ready to leave the convent where she has spent her girlhood. She is seventeen, healthy, warm hearted and eager. For years she has been shut away from the world, and she imagines that life outside will be a long series of joys. She has made plans for how happy she will be, and she cannot picture anything else.
It is raining on the morning she is meant to go home, but her father, Baron Simon-Jacques Le Perthuis des Vauds, and the family set out by carriage anyway for Les Peuplets, the country house near the Normandy coast where Jeanne will live. A young maid named Rosalie, who is nearly Jeanne's age and was raised beside her, goes along.
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What is A Woman's Life by Guy de Maupassant about?
It follows Jeanne, a Norman noblewoman, from her release from convent school through marriage, motherhood and middle age. It shows how her romantic hopes meet the hard facts of a husband's coldness, family money and the passing of time.
When was A Woman's Life written and is it a true story?
Maupassant published it in 1883 as Une vie, his first novel. It is fiction, though set in a real Normandy and drawn from the customs and attitudes of nineteenth century French provincial life.
Who is Jeanne in A Woman's Life?
Jeanne is the central character, a warm and idealistic young woman from a Norman baron's family. She leaves the convent at seventeen hoping for love, and the novel follows her through the decades that follow.
The author
Guy de Maupassant
1850–1893 · French novelist and story writer
Guy de Maupassant was a French writer born in Normandy in 1850. He wrote short stories and novels, including A Woman’s Life (1883), Bel-Ami (1885), The Horla (1887), and Pierre and Jean (1888). He lived in France, worked as a government clerk in Paris, and died in Paris in 1893.
More by Guy de Maupassant
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