Claudine and Annie

1903
Colette
Claudine and Annie
C+

The last Claudine story is actually narrated by Annie, a naive new friend of Claudine's.  Annie has a domineering husband, too, Alain, her childhood sweetheart who early on made her his "slave."  But we learn in this story that if you're already submissive and/or if you and your husband don't really love each other, it's not good for him to be domineering.  On Claudine's advice, Annie decides to divorce (or be divorced from) Alain.  As in Anna Karenina, there's a great difference between being the "innocent" and the "guilty" party in the divorce, from a legal standpoint more than a moral one.  But Annie is willing to be accused of adultery, even though Alain is the one who did the cheating.

I think this story is better than the middle two Claudine tales, partly because the change in narrators freshens things up, and partly because it's nice to have different settings, in this case mostly the vacation spots of the idle upper-middle-class.  Spas certainly come across differently than in Anna Karenina.  And another point of comparison with AK, Annie is a bit like Kitty with her innocent crushes on women, although Anna never seduces Kitty like Claudine is tempted to seduce Annie.

"1903" moments:  a discussion of birth control, a reference to "cinema," and another mention of male feminists.

Overall, this collection averages a C+, although I'd mostly just recommend the first story.  And I guess I should mention that Colette's first husband, "Willy" (Henry Gauthier-Villars), used to take the credit for them.  He was 14 years older than her, and unfaithful.  They separated in 1906 and divorced four years later.  I like to imagine that Claudine, une Divorcée would've been the next sequel.  Or better yet, Claudine et Fanchette.