Le Bal
  • Published: 1 November 2007
  • ISBN: 9780099493976
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 112
  • RRP: $29.99

Le Bal

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Two lost masterpieces of French literature gathered together in one volume for the first time.

From the author of the bestselling Suite Française.

Le Bal is a sharp, brittle story of a girl who sets out to ruin the mother she hates. The Kampfs have risen swiftly up the ranks of 1930s Parisian society. Painfully aware of her working-class roots, and desperate to win acceptance, Madame Kampf decides to throw a huge ball to announce her arrival to society. Her daughter Antoinette, who has just turned fourteen, dreams of attending, but Madame Kampf is resolved not to present her daughter to potential admirers. In a fury of adolescent rage and despair, Antoinette exacts a swift and horrible revenge...

Snow in Autumn pays homage to Némirovsky's beloved Chekhov and chronicles the life of a devoted servant following her masters as they flee Revolutionary Moscow and emigrate to a life of hardship in Paris. As the crisis pushes the family to the brink of dissolution, Tatiana struggles to adapt to life in Paris and waits in vain for her cherished first snow of autumn.
  • Published: 1 November 2007
  • ISBN: 9780099493976
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 112
  • RRP: $29.99
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About the author

Irène Némirovsky

Irène Némirovsky was born in Kiev in 1903, the daughter of a successful Jewish banker. In 1918 her family fled the Russian Revolution for France where she became a bestselling novelist, author of David Golder, All Our Worldly Goods, The Dogs and the Wolves and other works published in her lifetime or soon after, such as the posthumously published Suite Française and Fire in the Blood. She was prevented from publishing when the Germans occupied France and moved with her husband and two small daughters from Paris to the safety of the small village of Issy-l'Evêque (in German occupied territory). It was here that Irène began writing Suite Française. She died in Auschwitz in 1942.

portrait photo of Irène Némirovsky

Also by Irène Némirovsky

Suite Francaise
The Dogs and the Wolves
Jezebel
The Fires of Autumn
The Misunderstanding
The Wine of Solitude
Fire in the Blood
See all

Praise for Le Bal

With its cool, understated prose and sharp psychological accuracy, this is perfect for a train journey... A reminder of what good writing can achieve in a very few words

The Times

A cruel, sophisticated tale making the terrible beautiful without diminishing for one moment the horrors of displacement and war

Guardian

A genuine artist

Julian Barnes

This book is a masterpiece

Sunday Express

It is quite outstanding, full of beauty, pain and truth... We are lucky to have this book

Sunday Telegraph