Joan Smith
In the End, She Preferred Sartre
Beloved Chicago Man: Letters to Nelson Algren 1947-64
By Simone de Beauvoir
Gollancz 575pp £25
It started with ardour and ended in bitterness, this affair which Simone de Beauvoir described as ‘the only truly passionate love in my life’. Documented in more than three hundred letters, her affair with the American writer Nelson Algren introduced her to the physical pleasure she had never found with Jean-Paul Sartre – and threatened to destabilise her carefully constructed writer’s life in Paris. Perhaps that is why, many years later, she repudiated the affair, insisting to a friend that ‘you have to make it clear that I lied in all those letters. Everything was a lie.’
Everything? When they met in February 1947, while de Beauvoir was on a lecture tour of America, they quickly plunged into an affair. Three months later, back in France, de Beauvoir was already addressing Algren in her almost daily letters as ‘my dearest husband’ and describing herself as his ‘wife
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
Richard Flanagan's Question 7 is this year's winner of the @BGPrize.
In her review from our June issue, @rosalyster delves into Tasmania, nuclear physics, romance and Chekhov.
Rosa Lyster - Kiss of Death
Rosa Lyster: Kiss of Death - Question 7 by Richard Flanagan
literaryreview.co.uk
‘At times, Orbital feels almost like a long poem.’
@sam3reynolds on Samantha Harvey’s Orbital, the winner of this year’s @TheBookerPrizes
Sam Reynolds - Islands in the Sky
Sam Reynolds: Islands in the Sky - Orbital by Samantha Harvey
literaryreview.co.uk
Nick Harkaway, John le Carré's son, has gone back to the 1960s with a new novel featuring his father's anti-hero, George Smiley.
But is this the missing link in le Carré’s oeuvre, asks @ddguttenplan, or is there something awry?
D D Guttenplan - Smiley Redux
D D Guttenplan: Smiley Redux - Karla’s Choice by Nick Harkaway
literaryreview.co.uk