This is Colette's famous love story about the romance between an older woman and a younger man. Lea de Lonval is a magnificent and aging courtesan facing the end of her career. She has devoted the last six years to the amorous education of the exquisitely handsome and spoilt Cheri - a playboy half her age. When an advantageous marriage is arranged for Cheri, Lea reluctantly decides their relationship must end. But neither lover can foresee how deeply they are connected, or how much they will have to give up. First published in 1920, it was instantly greeted by Marcel Proust and Andre Gide as a masterpiece. VINTAGE FRENCH CLASSICS - five masterpieces of French fiction in gorgeous new gift editions. 'This most French of all French writers tells us how love sometimes binds and keeps a woman from breathing freely or how it may shape and support her and help her to be beautiful . . . One thinks of her as the female voice of Paris . . .' New York Times