The Nun

Diderot’s The Nun (La Religieuse) is the seemingly true story of a young girl forced by her parents to enter a convent and take holy orders. A novel mingling mysticism, madness, sadistic cruelty and nascent sexuality, it gives a scathing insight into the effects of forced vocations and the unnatural life of the convent. A succ? de scandale at the end of the eighteenth century, it has attracted and unsettled readers ever since. For Diderot’s novel is not simply a story of a young girl with a bad habit; it is also a powerfully emblematic fable about oppression and intolerance.

This new translation includes Diderot’s all-important prefatory material, which he placed, disconcertingly, at the end of the novel, and which turns what otherwise seems like an exercise in realism into what is now regarded as a masterpiece of proto-modernist fiction.

About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World’s Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford’s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Author: Denis Diderot, Russell Goulbourne
Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Published: 10/15/2008
Series: Oxford World’s Classics (Paperback)
Pages: 234
Weight: 0.4lbs
Size: 7.60h x 5.00w x 0.70d
ISBN: 9780199555246
Language: English