The Diary of a Chambermaid

Number 155

Title: The Diary of a Chambermaid

Author: Octave Mirbeau

Summed up in one line: Oh, you naughty girl!

Overall: One of the best things about downloading books from the net is that you’re often given little to no information about the book other than it’s title, and this can lend itself to a really interesting reading experience in the case of historical diaries because you have no idea if it’s fact or fiction. I don’t know about you but I get a bit more invested in stories, especially tragedy, if I believe it’s real- and The Diary of a Chambermaid is pretty chock full of horrible and saucy happenings.

Fisherman’s daughter Celestine has an awful childhood, but thanks to nuns, she learns to read and write and ends up bouncing around the linen closets of the bourgeoisie, none of whom impress her very much at all. She describes the current, frequently terrible happenings in the small country chateau she has wound up in, and also recounts past adventures in Paris.

I have to say, if you jump into it blind, it’s...nearly credible? There's an effort in the preface to convince you it is, but there were a couple of times I found myself thinking ‘this girl’s life is unbelievable!’ and/or ‘well, that was convenient…’ and once I think her hair colour changed, but I don’t think it really looses out too much by being just fiction. Rather than being stupendous, it becomes an 19^th century romp, slightly better than, say, The Scarlet Pimpernel, if only because the characters are more realistically gross. I suppose the novel is meant as a kind of satire, but as what it's satirising is pretty well wedged in history now, I think I'll leave it to others to review it on that score. 

When I found the book on Goodreads, I was surprised to note it’s genre is apparently ‘French Literary Erotica’. Personally I didn’t think it was particularly detailed enough to go as far as to say it’s erotica, but then it was published in 1900, when English authors general idea of erotica was to stage whisper at the reader ‘and then they had –sex-!’

I suppose Octave takes it that scandalous step further by adding, under his breath, ‘and she LIKED it!’

And I will: caution sensitive readers against the few anti-jewish characters in the book. It’s a trait of the character rather than a perspective of the book, but still unpleasant. Also they say ‘outraged’ instead of ‘raped’ throughout. Not sure what to make of that.