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The text argues she did not simply wait for death, but fought her boredom through sustained writing—especially her famed correspondence. It highlights her letters to Voltaire and other figures, emphasizing the scale and intricacy of her remaining correspondence, including the role of dictation after her 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problem does the text connect to Madame du Deffand’s life?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"It presents her greatest misfortune as having been born at all, yet insists she was not simply waiting for death; the book frames her life largely through the problem of ennui and boredom.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"How does Madame du Deffand respond to her boredom?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"She fights against it repeatedly, and the text credits her place in literary history to her fierce but tedious battle: she becomes an indefatigable writer of letters.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"Which correspondences does the book emphasize?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"It highlights her vast correspondence with Voltaire and others, and especially her correspondence with Horace Walpole, noting hundreds of letters and the fact that many were dictated because she was already 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\nhttps://archive.org/details/madamedudeffandi0000mari  \nSHEWAS BOREDANDFOUGHTAGANST HERBOREDOMWHCHONLYBOREDHERSILMORE.  \nJAVIER MARÍAS  \nBorn I95I,Madrid,Spain  \nAll essays are taken from Written Lives,first published in Spainas Vidas Escritas in 2000.  \nMARÍAS IN PENGUIN MODERN CLASSICSA Heart So WhiteAll Souls  \nDark Back of TimeThe Man of Feeling  \nTomorrow in the Battle Think on MeWhen I Was MortalWritten LivesYour Face Tomorrow,Volumes 1-3  \nJAVIER MARÍAS  \n# Madame du Deffand andthe Idiots\n\nTranslated by Margaret Jull Costa  \nPENGUIN CLASSICS  \nUK |USA |Canada |Ireland |AustraliaIndia |New Zealand |South Africa  \n# Penguin\n\nRandom HouseUK  \nThis selection first published 20180OI  \nCopyright CJavier Marias,I999  \nTranslation copyright ◎Margaret Jull Costa,2006All rights reserved  \nSet in i2/I5 pt Dante MT Std  \nTypeset by Jouve(UK),Milton KeynesPrinted in Great Britain by Clays Ltd,St Ives plc  \nISBN:978-0-24I-33948-0  \nwww.greenpenguin.couk  \nPenguin Books is part of the Penguin Random House groupof companies whose addresses can be found atglobal.penguinrandomhouse.com.  \nThe moral rights of the author and translator have been asserted  \nPenguin Random House is committed to asustainable future for our business,our readersand our planet.This book is made from ForestStewardship Council\"certihed paper.  \nContents  \nMadame du Deffand and the IdiotsINabokov in RapturesI3Djuna Barnes in Silence24Oscar Wilde After Prison35Emily Bronte,the Silent Major46  \nMadame du Deffand and the Idiots  \nMadame du Deffand's life was clearly far too long forsomeone who considered that her greatest misfor-tune was to have been born at all.It would be wrong,however,to conclude that she spent her nearly eighty-four years waiting for death.She set out the problemclearly on more than one occasion.\"To live withoutloving life does not make one desire its end,and it  \nJavier Marias  \nbarely diminishes one's fear of losing it.'She neverdespaired,as did her friend and enemy Julie de Lespi-nasse,and she probably never suffered deep woundsof any kind.It was simply that she was bored.  \nWhile it is true that the French word ennui cannotbe translated entirely accurately as boredom,it comesclose enough in meaning and,of course,includes it.Madame du Deffand was bored and she foughtagainst her boredom,which only bored her stillmore.Not that she gave in to it,indeed she owes herplace in the history of literature to one of the weap-ons she used in this fierce but tedious battle:she wasan indefatigable writer of letters and,it turns out,one of the finest.Her correspondence with Voltaireand with others is vast;indeed,the correspondenceshe maintained with the English dandy,politicianand man of letters Horace Walpole comprises eighthundred and forty letters written in her hand,andthese are only the ones that have come down to us.It is even more amazing when one realizes that allthe letters were not,in fact,written in her hand,butdictated,for Madame du Deffand was already blindby the time she knew Walpole.Thus she never sawthe man who was the object of her almost only","cbCaicNJDUhJj54e","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaicNJDUhJj54e","pdf",2025159,68,"English","# Contents\n## Madame du Deffand and the Idiots\n## Nabokov in Raptures\n## Djuna Barnes in Silence\n## Oscar Wilde After Prison\n## Emily Bronte, the Silent Major","[{\"question\":\"What problem does the text connect to Madame du Deffand’s life?\",\"answer\":\"It presents her greatest misfortune as having been born at all, yet insists she was not simply waiting for death; the book frames her life largely through the problem of ennui and boredom.\"},{\"question\":\"How does Madame du Deffand respond to her boredom?\",\"answer\":\"She fights against it repeatedly, and the text credits her place in literary history to her fierce but tedious battle: she becomes an indefatigable writer of letters.\"},{\"question\":\"Which correspondences does the book emphasize?\",\"answer\":\"It highlights her vast correspondence with Voltaire and others, and especially her correspondence with Horace Walpole, noting hundreds of letters and the fact that many were dictated because she was already blind.\"}]","Madame du Deffand and the Idiots | PDF",1790656805]