Les Liaisons Dangereuses

by Pierre Choderlos De Laclos

  At the time when you left me, I was less tormented; true, I was rather agitated as well as full of regrets but I attributed that to my impatience at the presence of my maids who came in just as you were leaving. They always take too long for my liking to attend to me and this time it dragged on far, far longer even than usual. Above all I wanted to be alone; I was sure that with such sweet memories all around me, once I was on my own I should enjoy the only sort of happiness I could expect to find in your absence. How could I have foreseen that though, whilst you were there, I was strong enough to bear the turmoil of such a rapid succession of shifting emotions without faltering, I couldn’t bear to go over them again now that I was by myself … My error was soon brought cruelly home to me … And now, dear heart, I find myself hesitating whether to tell you everything … Yet aren’t I yours, all yours? Ought I to hide any of my thoughts from you? Ah, that would surely be impossible; only I must beg you to forgive my involuntary weaknesses, none of which come from my heart… Following my usual practice, I had sent my women away before getting into bed …*

  Epistle to Margot*

  Why be afraid of admitting it? I’ve taken up with Margot. Yes, Margot! Do you think that’s funny? What’s in a name? It’s the thing itself that counts. Margot’s not well-born, no empty, grand, fancy titles; like her humble forebears, she’s poverty-stricken. As for wit, to tell the truth, even at her wittiest, I’d sooner she kept her mouth shut. But Margot has such lovely eyes that one single glance is worth more than riches, wit, or birth. Good God! Am I to submit to our peculiar society’s crazy notions and pathetically crawl along to consult a d’Hozier* to discover whom I’m supposed to like? No, Cythera’s amiable son* isn’t afraid of marrying beneath him: often the mysteries of love lead this God, with his common tastes, to show a preference for a shepherdess over the lady with sixteen quarterings of nobility.* Anyway, who knows what the uncertain future has in store for my girl? Margot’s still young, just learning the game. Only give her time to turn into a trollop and maybe Fate will soon make her a Marquise or a Comtesse;* a pretty face, a heart that’s fancy-free, make fine titles of nobility. Margot’s poor, agreed: why would she need to be rich? Aren’t plump curves and a warm heart treasures enough? She has a wealth of love, what else does she want in the way of riches? They’re a source of trouble, a nuisance, and those who try to enjoy them fritter them away, and those who keep them don’t enjoy them. So I think all those people are wrong and Margot proves to me every day that you can be happy in love without high birth or money.

  And what about wit? … I can hear our fine talkers, our clever dicks exclaiming: ‘What’s that? No wit? What sort of enjoyment is that? What about all those sweet nothings, the chit-chat, the puns, which a lover skilfully trots out to fill the boring gaps between lovemaking? If you’re prevented from talking, what can you do once you’ve done all you can? Ah, our clever dicks aren’t very well up in this particular matter. What’s the problem? Once you’ve done it all, you just start again. And even if you don’t, there’s an easier form of pleasure which you can enjoy without the effort of thinking: sleep helps to give your senses and your heart more of a rest than all that soft soap from people who are full of fine words, swearing a hundred times to love you for ever but never proving it more than once.

  O mistress mine, whom I love so fondly, who holds me so fast, the time spent writing these verses is probably wasted; you’ll never read them, because … you can’t read; but bear with an old foible of mine: try as I may, I can’t break myself of my inveterate habit of thinking; but at least, I make a point of thinking only of you. Come here beside me: Pleasure is awaiting your return. Come to me and on that day, I’ll exchange the thankless laurels of Parnassus for the myrtles of Love.

  The Procession A Tale*

  Dear friends, ’twas a festive day, a holy day! As you know, on such occasions, all good Christians devoutly make ready to prove with zeal their love of God. What you may not know—but you must take my word for it—is that at times of such religious fervour the Devil also increases his malice and boldly challenges God’s omnipotence! He spares no mischievous trick to inflame our senses and our heart. More often than not God wins the day but sometimes the Devil does triumph: listen to this tale which proves my point.

  Liza was in the flower of her youth: simple, modest, as lovely as she was virtuous; rather pious; what’s more, contrary to normal custom, she’d reached her sixteenth birthday and still kept her virginity. Satan’s aware of this and on this holy day intends to play some trick on her—that’s his job. You know our ancient custom and that, on this solemn day, so dear to the people, when The Eternal reveals himself in public, He walks the earth like an ordinary mortal… Now, our young virgin has been specially chosen by the parish priest to accompany her God in the procession, carrying a candle in honour of her virtue.

  Everything’s been arranged: that morning, at the appropriate time, her cousin is to come round and lead her on his arm to church. This cousin, my informant tells me, was a well-built lusty lad; mild-looking but dangerous, a wolf in sheep’s clothing. At first light, already in her best mob-cap, Liza started dressing; her other finery, as simple as herself, was lying all around; a piece of brown boulting cloth would drape her divinely lissom figure which invited love; the thick muslin must hide the curves of her lovely bosom: this was how Liza dressed for holy days.

  In comes Lubin; teasing and full of flattery, the first thing he wants from his cousin is a kiss; but daunted by Liza’s blushing innocence, he restrains his ardour. Audacity is forced to respect true modesty. He strikes a more serious note (he’s already twice apologized) and reluctantly begins to chat: girls are never tired of prattling. They chat, they laugh, the Devil lends a hand to keep the charming conversation flowing along so smoothly that they forget how time is flying. But now she really must get properly dressed because, like Sunday, this special day demands a ceremonial white shift. Liza goes off into a closet but at the very moment when she’s more or less naked, there are sounds in the street outside. What’s happening? Do take a look, cousin. Lubin takes a look and to his surprise sees the godly cortège coming down the street! ‘It’s too late now to get to the church; come and look, Liza, do come, there’s nothing else you can do.’ Urged on by curiosity, forgetting that by itself a shift is not enough to cover her many precious charms, Liza rashly runs over to look. And the cousin? He too takes a look but without saying a word as he runs a discreet eye over these manifold attractions.

  Liza however is looking at the banners and the canopy, then says her prayers. And as she modestly lowers her eyes, gazing down over her lovely bosom, her snow-white tits, needing no support, rise and fall as she breathes; their movement is enticing… Liza sees them, takes fright, goes pale and then, overcome by shame, turns a bright pink; in her confusion she hastily bundles up the folds of her scanty garment. The Devil laughs. O gullible girl! He it was who’d caused her sudden qualms. The result is that Lubin can now see lots of other lovely things! His blood boils, he endeavours to calm himself: in vain! What could he do? The Devil has got into him: he feels bold, then scared, then confident again. Satan is tempting him and Liza is tempting, too. So much, indeed, that, to finish off the adventure, he tries to take advantage of her devout posture; and the Devil shows him the way to do it… At first, Liza wants to escape but is hemmed in against the window. ‘Ah, you Judas, cousin,’ she said to him. ‘Aah!’ Then, to push Lubin off, she makes a move: how clever the Devil is! The effort she made was his real masterstroke. Unwittingly, she’s helping her cousin; her firm resistance is making things easier for him. Still trying to escape, still pushing him away, quietly protesting, the pretty girl, without quite knowing how, lost her virginity. But Lubin is still not satisfied, not he! My author tells that she is said to have lost her virginity three times to his hot pursuit before his tempestuous love abated; so much so that Liza, a novice in this sort of fight, stopped struggling and kept still, resigned to wait until he’d had his fill; such is
the force of habit over us. However, Lubin now has thoughts of withdrawing; the splendid cortège has already moved on. And Liza too, tired by her defeat, is beginning to feel she needs a nice rest. Lubin perches the pretty lass on his lap, comforting her, praising all her charms and promising to love her for ever. Liza was crying and made no reply. Flattery, lover’s vows, gentle caresses, were all to no avail. Finally the doleful beauty said: ‘What’s the good of promises? Give me back what you’ve just taken away.’

  EXPLANATORY NOTES

  Square brackets are used to enclose Laclos’s original notes to his text.

  francs:­ interchangeable with livre; it was worth roughly the English shilling of the day; there were 24 livres in a louis, worth about a guinea or 21 shillings (there were 20 shillings to the pound). 60,000 francs was thus a very considerable sum.

  chronological order:­ the manuscript shows, however, that Laclos played about with dates, often to produce dramatic or ironic effects.

  this work:­ [I must also inform the reader that I have deleted or changed the names of all concerned and should any name happen to belong to any living person or persons, this is sheer coincidence from which no conclusion can be drawn.]

  quite unconnected matters:­ Laclos is teasing; he achieves many dramatic and ironic effects by these means.

  Academicians:­ a sly dig at the French Academy; passages from well-known writers were used as models of good letter-writing in fashionable anthologies. Laclos had a healthy disrespect for too much authority.

  title:­ Les Liaisons dangereuses has the subtitle: ‘or a compilation of letters from one social set and published for the edification of some others’. Laclos wisely refrained from specifying either from which social set the letters purport to have been taken or which they are intended to edify. The title is complemented by an epigraph from the preface to a work adored by Laclos, La Nouvelle Héloïse; it reads: ‘I saw the morals of my times and published these letters.’ Laclos thereby proclaims his own virtuous intentions, no doubt hoping to ward off accusations of immorality. He didn’t succeed; he may not even have expected to.

  diversity of styles:­ this diversity represents not only the individual voices of the correspondents but the particular tone of a voice (indignant, cajoling, gushing, malicious, etc.). Rendering this diversity is, of course, essential in an epistolary novel and Laclos’s skill is unparalleled.

  observations:­ Merteuil’s and Valmont’s letters in particular contain many such maxims and apophthegms about moral and social conduct, in the French moralizing tradition of La Rochefoucauld (1613–80), or of Laclos’s contemporaries Chamfort (1741–94) and Rivarol (1753–1801).

  Ursuline Convent:­ Ursulines were a teaching order. In his Pléiade edition Versini says there was one of their convents in Grenoble which had no better a reputation than their Parisian establishment in the Rue Saint-Jacques.

  Tanville girl:­ [a co-boarder in the convent]; she will be mentioned again.

  in fiocchi:­ all dressed up. Cécile is already fashion-conscious and knows the smart Italian expression.

  dinner-­time:­ taken at midday; the evening meal is supper.

  José­phine:­ [a sister allowed outside the convent.]

  rakery:­ [fortunately good society is beginning to give up these expressions which were very current at the time these letters were written.] The expressions were rouerie and roué, from rouer, to break on the wheel, an extremely painful form of judicial execution reserved for such heinous crimes as treason. The roués were the licentious companions of the debauched Philippe, Duke of Orléans, nephew of Louis XIV and Regent from 1715 to 1723 during the minority of Louis XV, and were considered so depraved as to deserve this ignominious death. Laclos is probably attempting to obscure the dating of this correspondence and thereby mollify his contemporaries by situating the depravity of his characters in this more remote period; we shall see other evidence proving that it was far closer. Nor is Valmont strictly a Regency roué interested only in sensual debauchery; his approach to women is more psychological, even intellectual. See also note to p. 14 on destiny.

  memoirs:­ memoirs, either authentic or fictional, were very popular reading in France at this time. Writing someone else’s memoirs is a typically impertinent notion of Merteuil’s. See also note to p. 100 on Céladon.

  intendant:­ a provincial governor or other very senior administrator of the Crown; but see note below, where she’s described as a judge’s wife.

  monster:­ [to understand this passage, the reader must know that the Comte de Gercourt had deserted the Marquise de Merteuil for the wife of the presiding judge Monsieur de ——; she had given up Valmont for Gercourt and it was then that the Marquise and the Vicomte had become attached to one another. As there was nothing extraordinary in all this and it took place long before the events related in these letters, we saw no point in reprinting any of that correspondence.]

  sixty thousand a year:­ but Gercourt is even wealthier; he can be absolved of the charge of marrying beneath him to fumer ses terres (manure his land) as one aristocrat is said to have put it.

  the rosebud:­ the exact expression used by Lovelace to describe one of the female characters in Richardson’s Clarissa.

  tomorrow evening:­ the increasing reliability of the postal service was important for the epistolary novelist. Laclos uses it to achieve very ironic effects (e.g. letters 125, 126, and 128).

  pretty:­ Laclos uses italics in a variety of ways: to render fashionable jargon (e.g. ‘rakery’); to point the occasional neologism; for quotation from other writers; and most particularly when the correspondents quote from each other’s letters.

  constancy:­ the first mention of an important concept which recurs throughout: it is possible to remain constant and still indulge in passing infidelities.

  follow our destiny:­ an early indication that this libertine’s prime interest is the exercise of male authority, even if violence is required (conquerors). As the aim is to achieve notoriety, vanity is a great spur and too easy a prey is spurned as unworthy of a practised seducer.

  myrtle and laurels:­ the myrtle was sacred to Venus; a wreath of laurels was the crown for a conqueror or a poet. Such classical allusions are commonplace to these cultivated aristocrats.

  a great poet:­ [La Fontaine.] These two lines, a slight misquotation from La Fontaine’s Dedication of his first book of Fables, translate as: ‘And if I do not win the prize, I shall at least have the honour of having tried.’ In letter 10 we shall find Merteuil reading another work by La Fontaine, his erotic Contes, verse tales drawn from, amongst other sources, Boccaccio’s Decameron. Some of Laclos’s youthful versifying has a very similar erotic quality. See The Procession, pp. 376–7.

  No hard feelings:­ in the manuscript, this and numerous other letters of Valmont end with a special sign , which Laclos used regularly in his own correspondence. Versini sees this sign as indicating Freemasonry. However, since these signs do not appear in the text, it must have been decided not to attribute any Masonic associations to Valmont. In eighteenth-century France any suggestion of Freemasonry would have carried a strong connotation of anticlericalism, which Laclos may have wished to avoid.

  Saint-­Roch’­s:­ a smart Paris church; Tourvel is no provincial rustic.

  a prude:­ in the libertine’s book, modesty counts as prudery and piety is ridiculed as inhuman. Laclos is beginning to draw attention to the relativity of moral standards.

  cruel:­ Merteuil is on the road leading to other cruel females, e.g. Madame Clairwil in Sade’s Juliette ou les prospérités du vice (1797), who is even more power-loving and, unlike Merteuil, physically cruel.

  corner of my eye:­ cf. a similar passage in The Procession, p. 377.

  taking the plunge: [we can recognize here that unfortunate taste for punning which was just starting and has since gone so far.]

  pounding…­ fear:­ Valmont is vain; but he may be right.

  Sophie Carnay:­ [in order not to try our readers’ patien
ce too sorely we are omitting many of the letters of this daily correspondence and reporting only those necessary for an understanding of the events involving this group of persons. We are similarly omitting all Sophie Carnay’s letters and a number of those from other people concerned in these adventures.]

  happy:­ the ingenuous and ignorant Cécile seems to think that Knights of Malta are celibates; this would be true only if Danceny were to take his final vows.

  in anyone’­s cap:­ is Tourvel’s hope of reforming Valmont entirely disinterested? It certainly has an ironic touch of over-confidence; but here as in many other passages Laclos implies rather than states motives. Richardson’s Clarissa also speaks of reforming Lovelace.