Writer friends (and other humans), have you seen the film Violette? I found this portrayal of relatively unknown writer Violette Leduc incredibly poetic and in the end, which was a happy ending, so satisfying. I will say getting to the end was slightly painful, due to that (somewhat familiar) ungraceful, haphazard way artists sometimes find their true selves. The film’s heroine, the illegal saucisson smuggler and budding writer, reminds me of myself a little bit (ok, a lot). This film also makes me think of one of my favorite films of all time, An Angel at My Table, about writer Janet Frame. Cheers to these directors, Martin Provost and Jane Campion, for bringing these women’s lives into the light.
“My case is not unique: I am afraid of dying and distressed at being in this world. I haven’t worked, I haven’t studied. I have wept, I have cried out in protest. These tears and cries have taken up a great deal of my time. I am tortured by all the time lost whenever I think about it. I cannot think about things for long, but I can find pleasure in a withered lettuce leaf offering me nothing but regrets to chew over. There is no sustenance in the past. I shall depart as I arrived. Intact, loaded down with the defects that have tormented me. I wish I had been born a statue : I am a slug under my dunghill. Virtues, good qualities, courage, meditation, culture. With arms crossed on my breast I have broken myself against those words.” ― Violette Leduc, La Bâtarde