num_pages: 100
description: Hugues Viane is a widower who has turned to the melancholy, decaying city of Bruges as the ideal location in which to mourn his wife and as a backdrop for the narcissistic wanderings of his disturbed spirit. He becomes obsessed with a young dancer whom he believes is the double of his beloved wife, leading him to psychological torment and humiliation, culminating in a deranged murder. This 1892 work is a poet's novel, dense, visionary, and haunting. Bruges, the 'dead city', becomes a metaphor for Hugues' dead wife as he follows its mournful labyrinth of streets and canals in a cyclical promenade of reflection and allusion--the ultimate evocation of Rodenbach's lifelong love affair with the enduring mystery and mortuary atmosphere of Bruges.
language: English
title: Bruges-La-Morte
titlecomplete: Bruges-La-Morte
characters: Hugues Viane
genres: Classics, French Literature, France, Gothic, Novels, Belgium, Literature, 19th Century, Fiction, Belgian
ratings_count: 2261
places: Bruges
publisher: Dedalus Limited