A powerful tale of love, isolation and loss in post-revolutionary France. The author narrates the tale of Rene, a young man isolated from his family by early tragedy and from a social mileu by his 'mal de siecle'. We are first introduced to Rene, living on an Indian Reservation in America, far from home, as he is pressed by some companions to explain what events in his life have brought hime to choose such a life of solitude and wilderness. We learn of Renes mostly unhappy upbringing and see him travel the world in search of some unknown solution to his lack of belonging or purpose in life. The only person in his life he is able to love and feel close to is his sister Amelie. The only periods of happiness in his life, in fact, have been those spent with his sister.
But Amelie hides a terrible secret which is gradually destroying her - feelings of incestuous love for her brother. The plot builds to a tense and dramatic climax when Amelie confesses to her "criminelle passion" and is overheard by Rene. She finds solice in the church, becomes a nun and is lost to the outside world, and Rene, forever. Desperate without the only comfort and stabilising influence in his life, and shocked by his sisters revelation, Rene abandons the comforts of civilized society and retreats to America.
The book contains an personal insite into the effect of the revolution on an individual member of the aristocracy, as well as the timeless personal struggles of love and family.
Although the book contains several parallels between René's life and Chateaubriand's (Chateaubriand tried to commit suicide at 18, travelled to North America and was very close to his sister) the book is much more than merely an autobiographical tale.
At the time the book was written, René expressed the popular feeling in France and the character was a hero - 'The young man ill at ease.''René' was written as a moralising tale to show the dangers of not following the Christian faith - Amelie dies happy, having found the church but René doesn't find happiness or faith. (Napoleon had at the time signed a pact with the pope to increase Catholicism in France.) However readers did not understand this message, but saw René as rejecting society. The character came to represent the 'mal du siecle' - a search for meaning and identity. The book symbolised a sense of displacement, alienation, uncertainty and longing.