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Marie Darrieussecq: Pig Tales

Marie Darrieussecq in Paris discussing her feminist satire of sex, power and corruption.

This month World Book Club visits Paris, France to be guests of the iconic bookshop on the Left Bank of the River Seine, Shakespeare & Co. There Harriett Gilbert and a bookshop audience talk to acclaimed French writer Marie Darrieussecq about her extraordinary novel Pig Tales.

Pig Tales is the story of a young woman who works at a shady Parisian massage parlour, becoming a favourite with her lustful clients until, that is, she slowly and alarmingly metamorphoses into a pig.

A dark feminist fable of political and sexual corruption, and a grim warning of what can happen in a society without a soul, Pig Tales scandalised its readers when it first came out and became the most popular first novel published in decades.

(Picture: Marie Darrieussecq. Photo credit: Charles Freger.)

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49 minutes

Last on

Thu 9 Mar 202303:06GMT
BBC World Service South Asia

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Recording World Book Club in Paris

Recording World Book Club in Paris
Harriett Gilbert and Marie Darrieussecq recording at Shakespeare and Company bookshop.

Broadcasts

  • Sat 4 Mar 202312:06GMT
    BBC World Service except East and Southern Africa & West and Central Africa
  • Sun 5 Mar 202300:06GMT
    BBC World Service South Asia
  • Sun 5 Mar 202303:06GMT
    BBC World Service except East and Southern Africa, South Asia & West and Central Africa
  • Sun 5 Mar 202314:06GMT
    BBC World Service East and Southern Africa & West and Central Africa only
  • Sun 5 Mar 202317:06GMT
    BBC World Service News Internet
  • Wed 8 Mar 202310:06GMT
    BBC World Service
  • Thu 9 Mar 202300:06GMT
    BBC World Service except South Asia
  • Thu 9 Mar 202303:06GMT
    BBC World Service South Asia

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