The Companion

The Companion (1923) by Victor Margueritte is the second novel in the trilogy that begins with his 1922 controversial best-seller, The Bacheloress, and concludes with The Couple (1924). In contrast to the victimized Monique Lerbier, heroine of The Bacheloress, who appears in this novel in a supporting role, Annik Raimber is, a staunch proto-feminist with unwavering integrity, who never comprises her principles. When confronted with marriage and a family, professional success, and security, but at the price of, alternately, subordination and subjugation, Annik resists, maintaining her optimism that she is on the right path toward self-fulfillment. But does her brand of fulfillment exist in a world of entrenched ideology? The Companion is an exploration of both feminist self-direction and, more generally, the boundary between individuality and the pervading social norms. As its author, Margueritte, writes: “A logical consequence of my study of feminine mores, Le Compagnon claims, in fact, and loudly, the right to say everything, in accordance with the honest naturalist meth