« Monique breaks out » celebrates freedom
If you can calculate the price of freedom, the author Édouard Louis asks after referring the first four monthly rents for his mother’s new apartment. « How many women would choose a different life if they were transferred to the corresponding money? » Louis has the money. And so his mother has the opportunity to leave her drinking and insulting partner.
Monique knows how to do this. Because it is not that she flees from a violent partner. And it is also not the first time that the French writer writes a book about it. Already in his novel « The Freedom of a Woman » published in 2021, he describes the liberation of his mother from a violent relationship. At that time, after more than 20 years of marriage, she separated from her husband, Louis’ father.
A self -confident woman who doesn’t put up with anything anymore
The man who promises a new life at the end of one book is the one in the second the one to whom she flees again. While the previous novel focuses on the dark hours in poverty and monotony, « Monique breaks out » begins with her escape.
Louis draws his mother as a self -confident woman who doesn’t put up with anything anymore. The word « victim » never occurs in this novel, instead a protagonist full of euphoria and curiosity. « I am so happy to try something new, » she cheers with the arms torn up over the first Lebanese food of her life. It is an outbreak to freedom, as the book title aptly describes.
It is not a story of suffering, but an outbreak
Louis does not describe the history of his mother as a story of suffering. Nevertheless, the studied sociologist does not silence the prerequisite for the newly gained freedom. He knows no freedom, writes Louis, who is not an outbreak and thus the result of violence. And so he warns his readers to romantize his mother’s escape. Escape is above all burden and will only be lust later – maybe –.
Nevertheless: Louis describes his mother as so joyful and strong in this book, you can only admire this woman. And her son can be grateful to have written down her story so sensitively.
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