A review by jenna_le
Dangerous Liaisons by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos

4.0

"I regret that I have not the talents of a thief. Should these not, in fact, enter into the education of a man who is mixed up in intrigues? Would it not be agreeable to filch the letter or the portrait of a rival, or to pick from the pockets of a prude the wherewithal to unmask her? But our parents have no thought for anything...."

Having long been a fervent partisan of Ernest Dowson's best poems, especially the sublime "Cynara," I was not surprised to find Dowson's translation of this French classic to be a delight, stylistically: so many grammatically complex long sentences...so deliciously rococo! I was also impressed by the relative depth and sensitivity of Laclos's characterization of the Marquise de Merteuil, particularly in Letter 81, wherein her backstory is presented; I found this all the more remarkable given that Merteuil is a woman character written by an 18th-century male author. And while the novel's plot is admittedly at first slow to pick up steam, I was gratified to find it speeds up amply by the end.

I have to say, however, that I'm annoyed by the way courtships seem to have been conducted in the 18th century (the way they're portrayed in this novel, anyway). The script seems to be that someone declares their "love" for someone else, is politely rebuffed, and then goes on to self-righteously harangue their rebuffer for their "pitilessness," "hardheartedness," etc., until they finally guilt them into making a concession...and this strategy of faux-moral browbeating apparently worked for some people? How?? I think I would've run for the hills.

Anyway, here are a couple other quotes that tickled me:

"That is so like men! All equally rascally in their designs, the weakness they display in the execution they christen probity."

"The woman who consents to talk of love soon finishes by feeling it, or at least by behaving as if she did."

"It is not that I doubt your skill, but it is the good swimmers who get drowned."

"What merit lies therein that is really your own?...[W]it, in truth: but jargon would supply its place at need."