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Our new translation of Gérard de Nerval's novella 'Sylvie' is now available for browsing and download, here. 

In ‘Sylvie’ Gérard explores the theme of time lost and recalled, thereby influencing Proust. The work's most obvious literary descendant though is Alain-Fournier’s ‘Le Grand Meaulnes’, while its antecedents are Rousseau’s ‘La Nouvelle Héloïse’ and Goethe’s ‘Sorrows of Young Werther’. 

Evoking the landscape, towns, and villages of the Valois region north-east of Paris, Gérard mixes autobiographical and fictional elements, keeping the topography and the timeline of the story somewhat vague, though basing the story on actual places and events. 

Gérard here remains true to the theme of unrequited love which pervades all his work, and which enhances the subtle atmosphere of the tale.