13 h 52 minAudiobook8 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 people closest to you are no more genuine than the false coins passing through a schoolboy’s hands?
In Paris before the First World War, Bernard Profitendieu finds a letter that calls his parentage into question. He leaves home, determined to trust his own judgment. His close friend Olivier Molinier longs for recognition and a life in writing, but admiration can make it hard to see people clearly.
Around them, families hide painful truths, schoolboys pass false coins, and writers seek influence. Olivier’s uncle Edouard keeps a journal and works on a novel called The Counterfeiters. His rival, Comte Robert de Passavant, offers glamour and fashionable opinions. André Gide brings their lives together to ask where sincerity ends and performance begins.
What you’ll discover
- A boy’s uncertain freedom Follow Bernard as he leaves home and tests his own sense of what is true.
- The hunger for admiration Meet Olivier, whose gifts and shyness sit beside a deep wish to be noticed.
- False coins, borrowed selves Explore the gap between what people are and the parts they choose to play.
- A novel within a novel Watch Edouard wrestle with writing as his own book takes shape inside Gide’s story.
- Lives beyond a straight line Enter a web of families, friendships, and secrets rather than follow a single hero.
Who will love it
For readers who love novels about ideas, young people growing up, and writers at work, with tangled family lives and questions about what makes a person genuine.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A schoolboy leaves home and finds a writer
- Two families hide what they cannot say
- A rival writer offers Olivier a glamorous life
- The boys of a boarding school pass false coins
- What the book says about sincerity and the false
- A novel about writing a novel
Who’s who
- Bernard ProfitendieuA clever schoolboy who leaves his family home and tries to live by his own judgment and his own sense of what is true.
- Olivier MolinierBernard's close friend, a shy and gifted boy who longs to be noticed and admired, and who is drawn toward writing.
- EdouardOlivier's uncle, a novelist who keeps a journal and is trying to write a novel called The Counterfeiters.
- Comte Robert de PassavantA rich and fashionable writer who charms younger people and wants to be admired as an artist.
- Vincent MolinierOlivier's older brother, a young doctor who is ambitious and entangled in a troubled relationship.
- Laura DouviersA young married woman in a painful position, who finds more kindness from friends than from the people closest to her.
- Georges MolinierOlivier's younger brother, a restless schoolboy who likes dares and secrets.
- BorisA small, sensitive boy at the boarding school, easily led and easily hurt by the stronger boys.
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- Audiobook
- 13 h 52 min, complete, read by Lucas Linden.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas in about 8 minutes, to read or to hear.
- Paperback
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
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- Large print paperback
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print hardcover
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I contraffattori
by André Gide · 1925
A schoolboy leaves home in Paris to live by his own judgment, as false coins and borrowed ideas test what is genuine.
Medium level10–20 hours to read25 languages
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In short
The Counterfeiters is a novel by the French writer André Gide, published in 1925 under the French title Les Faux-monnayeurs. Gide had written many short narratives he called tales or sotie, a kind of comic satire.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A schoolboy leaves home and finds a writer
The story opens with Bernard Profitendieu, a clever schoolboy in Paris who is about to sit his final school examinations. At home he finds a letter that shows him that the man he calls his father may not be his real father. Bernard does not weep or argue. He decides to leave the house that night, and he does so without any plan except to live by his own judgment.
His closest friend is Olivier Molinier, a sensitive boy who is also close to finishing school. Bernard goes to Olivier for help, and through Olivier he is drawn into a wider circle. Olivier has an uncle, the novelist Edouard, who has just come back to Paris. Edouard is older, quiet and watchful, and he writes down what he sees in a private journal.
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What is The Counterfeiters about?
It follows schoolboys, young men, parents and writers in Paris before the First World War. Its subject is the gap between what people are and what they pretend to be, shown through families, a school and a novelist at work.
Who is Edouard in The Counterfeiters?
Edouard is a novelist who keeps a journal and is trying to write a novel called The Counterfeiters. He is Olivier's uncle, and through his journal we see both the other characters and his own doubts.
What does the title The Counterfeiters mean?
It points to false coins, but also to false people, opinions and feelings. Gide uses counterfeiting as a symbol for anything made to look genuine that has no real value behind it.
The author
André Gide
1869–1951 · French novelist
André Gide was a French author born in Paris in 1869. He lived in France and died in Paris in 1951. He wrote novels, essays, plays, and journals. His books include The Vatican Cellars, published in 1914, and The Counterfeiters, published in 1925. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1947.
More by André Gide
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