THE WOMAN AND THE PUPPET

Pierre Louÿs, trans. Jeremy Moore (Dedalus Press)

First published in 1898, this French novel receives a new edition from Dedalus, a publisher with a track record of resurrecting lost classics of European fiction. Its author was sadly overshadowed in his own time by his considerably more famous friends — André Gide, Oscar Wilde and Claude Debussy, to name a few. Nevertheless, this slim and seductive study of obsessive love went on to inspire five film adaptations, including Luis Buñuel’s That Obscure Object of Desire (1977). The book certainly retains its dreamlike charm, as it recounts in fragments the tale of a femme fatale — the mysterious and magnetic Concha Pérez — playing off two men against each other. Set during carnival season in Spain, The Woman and The Puppet still simmers with a dark eroticism over a century after its publication. (SP)

Price: £9.99. Info: www.dedalusbooks.com