Duo And, Le Toutounier : Two Novels

In Duo, Colette observes, with masterly astuteness and perception, two characters whose marriage is foundering on the wife's infidelity. Acting out the final crisis, Alice and Michel have the stage to themselves so that nothing is allowed to distract from the marital dialogue. Le Toutounier continues Alice's story after Michel's death and her move to Paris. There she and her two sisters live in a shabby, homely apartment; fiercely independent, reticent, hard-working, needing men but showing little sign of loving them, they speak a private language and seek comfort in the indestructible sofa (toutounier) of their childhood.