My favorite e-book was written before the French revolution and published after it. For a book of irony it is befitting that ıt had been first read in Germany through a translation by Schiller, before the French themselves had the ability to enjoy it.
The writer , Denis Diderot, was an homme de lettres, writing philosophy, art criticism and literature. He remained renowned but poor, so that when his daughter married he sold his great library to supply her a dowry. Katherine the great of Russia bought the library, returned it to Diderot making him her librarian (talking about the prophet in his own country).
After having been incarcerated for blasphemy when publishing the "Letter on the Blind", he signed a letter of submission promising to never write anything prejudicial against religion again. His most controversial works, and Jacques le Fataliste is one of them, hence were circulated only after his death.
The book's subject is the relationship between servant Jacques and his master. They're just travelling to a vague destination, and to chase the boredom of the journey the master asks Jacques recount the story of his loves. Jacques's account is continuously interrupted by other people and mishaps. A “reader†asks concerns but is interrupted by the impatient author, who threatens to kill everyone if the reader does not shut up.
Jacques insists that everything that happens down here is written in the big book up there comprises the truth and nothing but the truth. When recounting his injury caused by a stray bullet, he informs us that the most painful injury is the injury of the knee.
Within the winding narrative, a tale is told of the Madame de la Pommeraye. Goethe considered it one of the finest love stories, and it was made into a movie by Robert Bresson in his 1945 film “Les dames du Bois de Boulogneâ€. (The dialogue for the film was written by Jean Cocteau.)
The Czech writer Milan Kundera dramatised the novel in 1981, under the title Jacques et son maître.
Diderot’s book borrows from Lawrence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy and the author admits that he inserted an entire passage from Tristram Shandy into the story (How good copyright law had not been enacted yet.)
To give an idea of Diderot’s wit I translate the beginning of the book:
“How did they meet? By accident, like everyone. What were their names ? What do you care? Where did they come from ? From the closest village. Where did they go ? Does one know where one goes? What did they say? The master did not say anything and Jacques said, that his captain said that all the good and bad that happens to us down here is written up there.
Milan Kundera’s version may be the most easily accessible, since Diderot's language and philosophical humor are unfamiliar to many readers in the 21st century.
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