Parole Text:Buch

Marie Rosa Tietjen reads Der Ausbruch by Albertine Sarrazin

I’m as cold as a popsicle, what can I do?  (Albertine Sarrazin)

Albertine Sarrazin’s wild but short life provided enough material for three bestselling novels. She was the female counterpart of the male-dominated genre prison novel.
At 18 months, she was adopted by a middle-aged French couple, at the age of ten raped by an unknown guy and then sent to a reform school by her parents. Using the day-release she was permitted for her oral A-levels, she escaped and hitch-hiked to Paris to work as a prostitute and pickpocket. When she met her lover from school, Emilienne, in Paris again, they decided to rob a boutique using arms and weapons.
In prison, Albertine began her career as a writer, describing day-to-day life in jail. In August 1964 she was released and used her prison notes as a source for the first two novels she wrote, L’Astragale and La Cavale, which, supported by the feminist philosopher Simone de Beauvoir were published in 1965. They were celebrated as literary sensations and interviews, television appearances, a literary prize and translations into 16 different languages followed.
Albertine Sarrazin died at the early age of 29 after a kidney surgery.

Both novels „Der Ausbruch“ and „Querwege“ are available at Ink Press in a new translation by Claudia Steinitz.