Jacques Cazotte: Le diable amoureux (French language, 1980, Flammarion)
French language
Published Jan. 22, 1980 by Flammarion.
The Devil in Love (French: Le Diable amoureux, 1772) is an occult romance by Jacques Cazotte which tells of a demon, or devil, who falls in love with a young Spanish nobleman named Don Alvaro, an amateur human dabbler, and attempts, in the guise of a young woman, to win his affections.
French critic P.G. Castex has described The Devil In Love as "the very initiator of the modern fantasy story".
Canadian critic Carlo Testa has described The Devil In Love (in review of Stephen Sartarelli's 1993 translation) as a "terminus a quo" in the history of the demonic subgenre".
The Le Diable amoureux started a literary style known as fantastique, where surreal events intrude on reality and the reader is left guessing whether the events actually occurred or were merely the product of the character's imagination.
(Source: Wikipedia)
Le diable amoureux est un très court roman, agréable à lire. Premier récit fantastique français il date de 1772, et semble a priori être une banale histoire de cœur, d’amours difficiles, de jalousies et de rivalités. L’ensemble est un résultat étrange, entre réalisme et fantastique. De nombreux auteurs s’en seront par la suite inspirés. Sympathique.
