"When I was writing my novel Indelicacy, I felt myself in conversation with Jean Genet’s play The Maids. First performed in Paris in 1947, the play is loosely based on the story of the infamous Papin sisters, who murdered their employer in 1933 in Le Mans, France. I’ve never seen the play performed, though I’ve watched the film version from 1975, directed by Christopher Miles. When I first read The Maids, I wasn’t interested in the idea of murder but in Genet’s highly charged representation of the two sisters, their crazed relationship to each other, as well as to their 'Madame,' and in the depiction of class warfare in a domestic space. More recently, I’ve been thinking, too, about its mad circling of artificiality and authenticity, two sides of the same coin. In their roles as maids in the rooms of Madame’s high-class apartment, Solange and Claire become unhinged, especially when they are there alone. ..."
The Paris Review: Be Yourself Again
W - The Maids, W - The Maids (film)
NY Times: Interpreting ‘The Maids’ Through a Shifting Societal Lens
NY Times: Screen: Exciting 'Maids':American Film Theater Presents Genet Work By Vincent Canby (April 22, 1975)
[PDF] The Maids
YouTube: The Maids (1974) - Glenda Jackson, Susannah York - Trailer
DailyMotion: The Maids (1974) 1:33:47
2017 August: Three Stones for Jean Genet told Patti Smith (2013), 2019 September: Jean Genet in Tangier – Mohamed Choukri, Paul Bowles (Translator)
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