Manon Lescaut - Works That Cite Manon Lescaut

Works That Cite Manon Lescaut

In the novel The Lady of the Camellias by Alexandre Dumas, fils, Manon Lescaut is an all-important model and point of comparison for Marguerite's life, loves, and death. In the opening pages, the narrator encounters a copy of Manon Lescaut in the auction of Marguerite Gautier's estate, and buys it. He reflects that Marguerite died alone in a "sumptuous bed" and Manon in the desert in her lover's arms, concluding that the former is worse, for Marguerite died "in that desert of the heart, a more barren, a vaster, a more pitiless desert than that in which Manon had found her last resting-place." The narrator learns this copy of Manon Lescaut was a gift from Armand to Marguerite, Armand telling him that she read the story "over and over again," making notes in the margins and "declar that when a woman loves, she can not do as Manon did." (But of course she does because she must: hence the tragedy.) In Act I of Dumas's play The Lady of the Camellias, the characters attend a performance of the ballet Manon Lescaut.

In chapter 4 of Oscar Wilde's novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, Dorian leafs through a copy of Manon Lescaut while waiting for Lord Henry.

In Book II chapter 28 of Stendhal's novel Le Rouge et le Noir, Julien and the woman he pretends to court, Madame de Fervaques, watch the opera Manon Lescaut while Julien is really thinking about his other lovers, Madame de Rênal and Mathilde de la Mole.

Michael Fane, the hero of Compton Mackenzie's controversial novel, Sinister Street, reads Manon Lescaut just before plunging into his own hopeless pursuit of a 'fallen woman'.

In Leopold von Sacher-Masoch's Venus im Pelz (Venus in Furs), the masochistic hero Severin refers approvingly to the Chevalier's love for Manon even after she has left him for another man.

In the mystery novel Clouds of Witness by Dorothy L. Sayers and its series adaptation by BBC Television, Lord Peter Wimsey solves the case by reference to Manon Lescaut.

Manon Lescaut is mentioned in a novel written by an important Romanian writer, Mihail Drumes. In one of his novels, entitled Invitatie la vals, referring to Carl Maria von Weber's "Invitation to the Dance" (later orchestrated by Berlioz), a comparison is made between the novel's main character and Manon Lescaut.

Czech poet Vítězslav Nezval wrote an adaptation of Manon Lescaut in form of verse drama. Nezval's version was written in year 1940 for theatre of Emil František Burian. In Czech literature it is traditionally considered as better than Prévost's original and as one of Nezval's masterpieces. Nezval's drama has seven acts, centre of each act is a ballade. Manon Lescaut is still widely read in Nezval's version, it was also adapted to film (1970, directed by Josef Henke, starring Jana Preissová as Manon, Petr Štěpánek as de Grieux). In similar way Nezval adapted The Three Musketeers.

The novel is mentioned at the very end of Michel Foucault's Life of infamous men.

Thomas Pynchon refers to Puccini's Des Grieux a number of times in his early short story "Under the Rose," found in his Slow Learner collection, as well as in V.

North Gladiola, a 1985 novel by James Wilcox, opens with a reference to Manon Lescaut, and mentions the character again later in the text.

The title of the novel is paraphrased in James Joyce's Finnegans Wake at 203.21 as "Nanon L'Escaut", which also refers to the 17th-century French courtesan Ninon de l'Enclos and to the Escaut River.

In the novel Murder on the Ballarat Train by Kerry Greenwood Miss Henderson was reading the book on the train when her mother was murdered.

Manon is also referenced in the films Manon des Sources (1953 by Marcel Pagnol and 1986 by Claude Berri) and Jean de Florette (entitled Ugolin in 1953 by Marcel Pagnol and 1986 by Claude Berri). Pagnol's 1962-1964 novels were derived from his movie. Beyond the name of the heroine, her grandmother was referenced as having sung Manon.

The film Lady of the Tropics (1939), directed by Jack Conway, with Hedy Lamarr and Robert Taylor is said to be inspired by the novel.