From the book
The Gods Are Athirst
Anatole France · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Meaning
Lemma.
A cabriolet is a light carriage, here a hired vehicle with very high wheels. The narrator insists that nothing is unusual about the carriage or driver. Its ominous force belongs instead to Gamelin, who does not use such vehicles and imagines it carrying Élodie toward luxury beyond his reach. This is expressly an inward hallucination and painful premonition, not a supernatural event or objective description of her destination.
Places to read
- Chapter IV, paragraph 33Frenchle cabriolet qui l’avait amenée: the ordinary hired vehicle. Read the narrator’s normalising description before Gamelin’s subjective vision.