, Maupassant’s shortest novel, was written in Étretat in his native Normandy between June and September 1887. It appeared in three instalments in the

and then in volume form in 1888, together with the essay “Le Roman” [“The Novel”].

Pierre and Jean are, or so it seems, the two sons of M. Roland, a jeweller who has retired to Le Havre, and his wife Louise; one has trained as a doctor, the other as a lawyer. By the end of the novel, which covers a few weeks in the family’s life, Jean is engaged to Mme Rosémilly, a young widow, and Pierre has left as a ship’s doctor on a transatlantic liner. These superficially normal events in a respectable middle-class setting conceal a family crisis, provoked by the legacy left by a former family friend, Léon

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Citation: Cogman, Peter. "Pierre et Jean". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 21 January 2004 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=11359, accessed 03 December 2024.]

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