INTERVIEW
Frédéric Lenoir has, in his lifetime, published some fifty books translated into more than 20 languages for a global sale on the planet estimated at some 7 million books! Writer, historian of religions and director of the School of Higher Studies in Social Sciences, he released at the beginning of the month his new novel: The Consolation of the Angel . At the microphone of Philippe Vandel, in Culture media on Europe 1, Frédéric Lenoir returns to his story, which is actually a dialogue between two characters.
"One of the two is Hugo, who is 20 years old and desperate for life, who finds that everything goes wrong and sees no meaning in his life, so much so that he decides to kill himself", explains novelist. He continues: "He misses his attempt and ends up in the hospital".
A meeting that changes a destiny
It is there that he makes an encounter that will change the course of his life. In his hospital room, Hugo settles next to an old lady of 92 years named Blanche. "She had a long life but also full of trials and unlike Hugo, she loves life," says Frederic Lenoir. The whole novel is about the exchanges between the two and how Blanche will give Hugo a taste for life. The two protagonists, emblematic, embody on the one hand who is going to die and who has no choice and on the other one who has all the life before him but who wants to finish. "It's a philosophical tale," describes the writer. "I wanted to give a number of intimate convictions about the meaning of life and the meaning of our existence."
"There are two wolves in you"
Throughout the dialogue, in addition to the "intimate convictions" of the author are delivered tales of various cultures. Like this Native American story: "An old sage said to his grandson, 'There are two wolves in you, there is one white and one black, the white wolf is all the good that is in you, who wants to grow, to improve, the black wolf is mean, he wants to harm others and to take everything, who will win? The little boy does not know and the wise man answers him: 'The one you feed'. "
To learn more about how the meeting of Blanche will change the life of Hugo, go to all bookstores with this Consolation of the Angel , published by Albin Michel editions November 6, 2019.