Provincial Passions

THE FAMILY--Frangois Mauriac-- translated by Lewis Galantiere--Covici-Friede ($2). Not all French novelists write of the lighter side of love. Author Mauriac, serious though not quite gloomy, here chronicles with particularizing finger the ill fortunes of love in a French family of the Gironde (southwestern department of France). The book is really two novels whose characters are related. First part: Jean Peloueyre, repulsive but sensitive only son of a rich hypochondriac, has a marriage arranged for him by his father and the priest. The bride is a lovely, sturdy peasant who does not dream of disobeying the priest's order but who shrinks physically from her physically horrible husband. When Jean has given up hope of getting her love, he deliberately contracts tuberculosis and dies. She remains faithful to his memory and reveres him as if he had been a saint. But if he had recovered, she would never have forgiven him. Second part: Fernand Cazenave, cousin of Jean Peloueyre, has been his widowed mother's darling from infancy. They quarrel, however, almost continuously. The mother is a frightful old woman, whose one fear is that her son will marry and thus get away from her. Eventually, a middle-aged man, he does marry, but his wife, already slightly acidified from prolonged spinsterhood, is at first not quite docile enough for him. Fernand sides with his mother against her; the old woman is delighted. One night after a miscarriage his wife dies alone, and Fernand changes sides again. But when, years later, his old mother finally allows Death to take her from him, the ingrained memories of his long life with her gradually conquer the misty recollections of his wife. When Fernand himself has become horribly old, his mother has quite regained him: they are almost indistinguishable.

Author Frangois Mauriac, 42, militant Catholic traditionalist, poet, essayist, novelist, is a native of Bordeaux who went to Paris as a young man to lead the literary life. One of his books, Desert of Love, was crowned by the Academie FranC,hise. Other books: Therese, Destiny.

Translator Lewis Galantiere works for the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

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