The Hermitage

""I began writing to you a long time ago now."" Thus begins French playwright and novelist Marie Bronsard's The Hermitage (trans. by Sonia Alland), a novella that takes the form of a kiss-off letter written to a former lover 10 years after the relationship has ended. Their breakup was precipitated by the lover's infatuation with another man, and the woman has since lived in seclusion. Her resentment and sense of betrayal, so intimately and dreamily depicted, may evoke in readers vague feelings of voyeurism, as if this poignant missive were sent to them by mistake.