The de Mondez house

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The house de Mondez ( French: L'hôtel de Mondez ) is a short story by the French writer Maurice Druon from 1956.

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Marseille in a side street of the Canebière near the Reformed Church after the First World War : the canon of honor Augustin de Mondez - small in stature - passes the time writing. The three desks in his study are necessary because he always writes - quasi parallel - on three books. He is currently working on a work on the Phocean colonization of his hometown. Since the publication of his four-volume manual on the ecclesiastical treasures of Provence - that was forty years ago - he has not lacked a reputation in Marseille. For his sister Mademoiselle Aimée de Mondez, who is two years older than him - she is even smaller than him - he will remain the Abbé forever and ever. If the Abbé has to hide something from Aimée, for example a honey pot, the 45-year-old niece Minnie - the busty wife of the nephew Count Vladimir - is his ally. Compared to her short relatives in the de Mondez house, Countess Minnie appears almost like a giantess.

Vladimir - on the threshold of old age - had wondered at the time when the proud Minnie, "this blonde, huge creature", had thrown herself on his neck. After his wife's affair with Monsieur Dudoy de Saint-Flon began, the horned husband Vladimir saw the light: he had been taken from Minnie because of his title. Saint-Flon could only have got a countess. At the time, the de Mondez had welcomed Minnie, the daughter of a former judge, with open arms, mistakenly believing that there were assets. Minnie and Vladimir have a failed son - Count Louis de Mondez, called Monsieur Loulou. The middle-class Fraulein Marie-Françoise Asnais wants to become a countess and approaches Monsieur Loulou with the intention of marrying. The Asnais family from Rue Paradis are wealthy. The girl's great-grandfather picked up the olives himself. Minnie and Vladimir, who live in more than modest circumstances, would like this connection at just the right time.

Minnie's precious bracelet, an heirloom, is gone. Aimée accuses Teresa of Calvi of theft. On the occasion of such accusations, pent-up hardship breaks out of the hard-working maid. Teresa screams bitterly that Monsieur Loulou has made her pregnant. At home in Corsica she could no longer be seen. When Marie-Françoise learns of Monsieur Loulou's misconduct, she never wants to see her father-to-be again. The Abbé Augustin cannot hear Teresa's howling. When the prolific hobby writer learned the truth, he mused: It might be possible, the child will be the only de Mondez. But as a man of the church he is not allowed to adopt it. So his sister has to serve. The aged maiden Aimée is reluctant, but ultimately has to bow to the will of her brother.

Teresa's child, a tough boy, is called Ange - Ange-Aimé-Vladimir-Napoléon de Mondez. Teresa had insisted on Napoleon. The last Ange de Mondez had come to an end under the guillotine during the Revolution . Little Ange looks like the face of his grandfather, the shoemaker from Calvi. Speaking of grandfather - Count Vladimir pulls out an old pram and presents his grandson Ange to the better people in Marseilles. On the other side of the street, Monsieur Dudoy de Saint-Flon met him during the defile. The two noble passers-by greet each other.

Marie-Françoise forgives Monsieur Loulou because she still desperately wants to become Countess de Mondez. Around four hundred guests have been invited to Marie-Françoise's wedding with Monsieur Loulou. Minnie's bracelet is found again. It had been moved. The Abbé Augustin hands over the precious jewelry under the eyes of Aimées and Minnies to the young bride.

Quote

  • The Abbé Augustin thinks up a speech that he wants to give to the bride on the occasion of Loulou's wedding celebration: "... You are marrying an address, a facade, a house, a title, an illusion."

literature

Used edition

  • The de Mondez house. German by Ewald Czapski. 87 pages. Volk und Welt, Berlin 1970 (1st edition 1968) ( Spektrum series , issue 6)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ French Canebière ( shopping street in the old town of Marseille)
  2. ↑ French Reformed Church
  3. ↑ French Rue Paradis
  4. ↑ Edition used, p. 83, 14. Zvo