Belle de Jour by Joseph Kessel

Belle du Jour was made famous by the successful 1967 Luis Buñuel film starring Catherine Deneuve. I found it a complete surprise, a psychological drama I could not put down, with fine writing turning into a noose of tension as the chain of events maims them all.

Séverine is an affluent young wife of a respected Parisian doctor, Pierre, whom she loves unconditionally. The two act like newlyweds years into their marriage. When their friend Henri remarks that another housewife they know spends her afternoons working at a brothel for extra money, she finds him odious; he makes a pass at her anyway. Outwardly appearing pure and beyond anything like that, a desire awakens to explore her inner sexual life. Not with her husband, but for herself. Fantasies of being taken roughly; sensual bliss. Madame Anaïs welcomes her into her respectable brothel, finding her sweet and nice; that type does well. Two to five while her husband is at work. Madame takes half. On her own terms, she is soon working as a high-class prostitute every weekday. She is given the name Belle de Jour (a take on the French for morning glory, a flower which only blooms in the day - opposite to Belle de Nuit, a woman of the night). She lets herself be taken in bestial sensuality, an intoxication at mixing the two women inside her.

Marcel, a gangster and pimp with gold teeth, never misses a day with her, turning possessive when he insists on seeing her at night. Discovering her second life, he appears at her home.

When Pierre's friend Henri visits the brothel, he also discovers Séverine's secret, yet he assures her he will not tell her husband. Fearing he will, Séverine enacts a plan which will slip her into the vortex of the whirlpool she has fallen into.

This caused a scandal in 1928 (translated to English in 1962) accusing Kessel of licentiousness, but his intention was to explore the divorce that can exist between body and soul. It reads as timeless today. Séverine is in charge, but there is the danger of a male author describing the inner sexual desires of a woman, who then gets punished for it. I knew the subject was prostitution, but was impressed when it devolved into noir tragedy.

Catherine was just 22 when the film was made; clothing by Yves St. Laurent. Buñuel did not like the book and added his surrealism, changed key moments, and a different ending. Internationally acclaimed, it won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival.

1962 / Hardcover / 192 pages