Used – J'aurais Dû Épouser Marcel - Françoise Xenakis - Anne Carrière

Author(s): Xenakis Françoise Publisher: Editions Anne Carrière Publication: 11/12/2009 Number of pages: 189 Number of books: 1 Weight: 238 g Dimensions: 20.6 x 14.1 x 1.7 EAN: 9782843374692 Summary:

Françoise Xenakis was born in 1930 in Sologne, the dark Sologne of ponds, mists, and spellcasters. When the time came, she delved into her fragments of memories and recounted the stories of these strange women known in her village as "white widows." Most of them were former girls from public assistance, who arrived one day in a rickety bus and were placed on farms. The boys became carters, the girls cowherds, and, equally lost, they often "shacked up." In 1914, the boys were conscripted, and almost none of them returned. They were not even declared dead on the field of honor, but missing. What to do with these young women alone in the village? They were housed in a tiny development built for the occasion, and the Republic granted them a modest pension. In return, an unspoken law required them to observe absolute chastity, maintain the church, and care for abandoned graves. These spinsters never stopped fantasizing about their men's return. In these stories, we find Françoise Xenakis's boisterousness, humor, audacity, and her immense tenderness for the losers.