The Sea Wall

First published in 1950, The Sea Wall is the third of Marguerite Duras's novels. It is the story of a French widow, who, attracted by the romantic lure of colonial Indo-China, invests her savings in a tract of land along the Vietnamese coast in the early part of this century. Her land, however, is worthless; the flood tides of the Pacific destroy each year's crops, and no wall can keep the ocean at bay.

But though battered by inexorable natural forces and degrading oriental poverty, the widow and her two children do not surrender easily to despair. Mother, daughter and son instead struggle - with mixed success - against the elemental absurdity of human existence that is symbolized by the devouring sea.