The White Notebook

This work lays bare the early brilliance and philosophical conflicts of André Gide, a towering figure in French literature

 

Nobel Prize–winning writer André Gide lays bare his adolescent psyche in this early work, first conceived and published as part of his novel The Notebooks of André Walter, completed when he was just twenty years old. This profoundly personal work draws heavily on his religious upbringing and private journals to tell the story of a young man who, like the author, pines for his forbidden love, cousin Emmanuelle.

 

This unique portrait of Gide as a young man presents the passions and conflicts, temptations and anguish he would explore in maturity.

André Gide (1869–1951), winner of the 1947 Nobel Prize for Literature, was a celebrated novelist, dramatist, and essayist whose narrative works dealt frankly with homosexuality and the struggle between artistic discipline, moralism, and sensual indulgence. Born in Paris, Gide became an influential intellectual figure in nineteenth- and twentieth-century French literature and culture. His essay collections Autumn Leaves and Oscar Wilde, among others, contributed to the public’s understanding of key figures of the day. He traveled widely and advocated for the rights of prisoners, denounced the conditions in the African colonies, and became a voice for, and then against, communism. Other notable works include The Notebooks of André Walter (1891), Corydon (1924), If It Die (1924), The Counterfeiters, and his journals, Journal 1889–1939, Journal 1939–1942, and Journal 1942–1949.