Under the Sun

A classic of world literature by the author of the novels «A Life» and «Bel-Ami». Travel sketches by an outstanding short story writer, a subtle observer of human characters and destinies. Guy de Maupassant writes simply, with irony and ruthless honesty — reflecting on people and customs, on culture and, not least, on himself.

At the heart of the book are real historical events: the author recounts a perilous journey to troubled Algeria, where uprisings by the local population against French colonial oppression were breaking out.

At times Maupassant, who could see through people completely, found Paris unbearable — amid the crowds in the streets, the tiresome places, intrusive thoughts, and the hated Eiffel Tower. Then he would leave for other shores and other countries, because “travel,” he wrote, “is a kind of door through which one leaves familiar reality to enter an unknown reality that seems like a dream.”

This edition includes travel sketches first published in the collections «Under the Sun» and «A Stroll by the Way», devoted to the writer’s journeys through Algeria and Tunisia, Greece and Sicily.