Children of our time (novel)

Children of our time ( French original title: Les Petits Enfants du siècle ) is a bestseller published by Christiane Rochefort in 1961 .

content

The entire story takes place in France in the 1960s . Josyane (Jo) is the oldest daughter in an extended family. She tells the reader her life story from her childhood to young adulthood. The relationship with her mother and father is not very emotional throughout the book. Since she is the oldest of countless children, she is employed by her parents at a very early age to run the household and do a great deal of chores. Jo does not feel well in this situation because the mother keeps getting pregnant and then comes back with a "new" child after nine months, which is why she hardly takes care of Josyane. In addition, Jo has to run the household alone, because her father and younger siblings just don't feel like doing it. She can only find peace in the evening when all the other family members are already asleep and she can do her homework in the kitchen. Life seems to change for Jo when she meets Guido. He is 30 years old, of Italian descent and arouses Josyane's first feelings of love. Their romance doesn't last long, though, because Jo has to go on vacation with her family. When she returns, Guido seems to have disappeared from the earth. She looks for him for half an eternity, even drives to the city where he lives, but she never finds him, which is why she often cries herself to sleep. Years go by, her mother has more children and Jo still thinks of Guido every now and then when she meets Philippe. He finally seems to be right for her; they both fall in love and eventually start a family.

Characters

The main character in the book is Josyane .

At the beginning she is about 11 years old and tells the reader what has already happened in her family in the first years of her life. Josyane seems to be very naive and gullible, because she allows herself to be exploited by several people and has been mourning her first love for an eternity, which simply disappeared. It is only at the end of the book that she becomes really happy when she meets her great love Philippe and has her first child with him at the age of around eighteen.

Josyne's parents have no emotional bond with their eldest daughter, they only see her as a means to an end. They are not very rich and live with their many children in a new block in the suburb, a banlieue that is home to many working-class families.

Guido is an Italian who pretends to be macho. After Jo comes back from a vacation trip with her parents, he has disappeared without a trace and will never be heard from again.

Philippe does not appear until the end of the book. He and Josyane meet when Jo accompanies her father to the hospital to bring home twins that their mother has just given birth. Due to a misunderstanding (Philippe thought Jo was the mother of the twins), the two start a conversation and fall in love.