LE DEMON DU BIEN: The Demon of Good

The third of this mordant, nihilistic but brilliant tetralogy introduced by The Young Girls and Pity For Women (Knopf) carrying on the deliberations of the sophisticated, degenerate writer, Costals, re marriage to a pretty but featherweight young girl he seduced, a marriage only contemplated out of kindness to her but which he feels will be intolerable. The plot does not progress; it is merely a succession of the pros and cons of his sacrifice which assumes gigantic proportions, controversial argumentation on a very worldly and malicious plane.