Célestine (Mirbeau)

Above all, in the course of some twenty years of exploitation at the hands of various odious employers, her sharp sense of observation has equipped her to identify all the moral failings of the well-to-do, and she makes use of her personal diary to avenge herself of her humiliations by wrenching off their mask of respectability to expose their essential nastiness: "It's not my fault", she says, "if their souls, stripped naked of their veils, exhale such a strong odour of corruption".

Her only distraction comes on Sundays, when she is able to listen to the village gossip in a ‘dirty little haberdasher's' house, where she can chat with Rose, the servant-cum-mistress of the Lanlaire's ridiculous neighbour, Captain Mauger.

[1] By contrast, she is fascinated by the mysterious Joseph, the gardener-coachman – a notorious antisemite and an extreme antidreyfusard who, to begin with, disturbs and intrigues Célestine a great deal, and on whom she tries to spy for a while.

[2] If Célestine herself is unable to give positive substance to her revolt, and resigns herself to climbing the social hierarchy instead of trying to overthrow the established order, what more can be expected of the oppressed and exploited masses?

By her contradictions, Célestine illustrates the pessimism of Octave Mirbeau[3] the novelist, who does not believe in the power of reason to control human behaviour, nor considers that man is perfectible, but who instead sees in "the law of murder" the ruling principle that dominates not only nature, but also society and the relationship between men and between the sexes.