Novel
The Devil in Love
Le Diable amoureux
Jacques Cazotte · 1772
Opening lines
J'étais à vingt-cinq ans capitaine aux gardes du roi de Naples: nous vivions beaucoup entre camarades, et comme de jeunes gens, c'est-à-dire des femmes, du jeu, tant que la bourse pouvait y suffire; et nous philosophions dans nos quartiers quand nous n'avions plus d'autre ressource.
At twenty-five I was a captain in the guards of the King of Naples: we spent much of our time together as comrades, and lived as young men do, that is, for women and gambling, as long as our purses could stand it; and we philosophised in our quarters when we had no other resource left.
Translation by Erostrate
Text quoted from gutenberg.org
Synopsis
Alvare, a young Spanish captain in the guards of the King of Naples, lets a friend initiate him into the cabala and, in the ruins of Portici, summons the devil. An enormous camel's head appears and asks him what he wants. At his command, the apparition turns into a dog, then a page, then a young woman, Biondetta, with whom Alvare falls in love without managing to find out who she really is.
Context
The tale appeared in 1772 under the fictitious address of Naples, in reality from Le Jay in Paris, with the subtitle of Spanish novella and six deliberately naive figures, which mocked the mania for illustrating books. Pierre-Georges Castex saw in it the initiator of the modern fantastic tale, which leaves the reader uncertain of the reality of events. A ballet was drawn from it as early as 1840, revived in 1848 in Saint Petersburg by Marius Petipa under the title Satanella.
Who it is for
A short narrative, in an eighteenth-century language that presents no difficulty, which can be read in one sitting.
Prizes and reception
Its question “Che vuoi ?”, put by the apparition, gave Jacques Lacan an image for his theory of desire.
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