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Derborence (novel)Derborence is a French-language novel by Swiss writer Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz that was first published in 1934 and for which two English translations have been published. It is a love story set in the Alps, against the backdrop of a natural disaster.

Plot
As is the custom in the Swiss Alps around midsummer, Antoine Pont and his uncle by marriage, S�raphin, have taken their cows up into the mountains in search of fresh pasture. It quickly becomes apparent that Antoine is bored and pining for Th�r�se, his wife of two months. One night, a landslide crashes down on the summer village, apparently killing Antoine and S�raphin along with many other herdsmen.

When news of the disaster reaches the village from which Antoine and his uncle hail, its inhabitants are plunged into mourning. Th�r�se learns of Antoine�s fate just as she discovers that she is pregnant. The thought that her child will be born an orphan fills her with despair. Her mother, Philomena, tries in vain to comfort her, while mourning the loss of her brother S�raphin.

Seven weeks and a day after the landslide, Antoine emerges from the rock that, by a stroke of luck, buried him without killing him. When he tries to return to his village, however, he is mistaken for a ghost. He manages to persuade Th�r�se that he is flesh and blood, but when he learns that S�raphin perished in the disaster, he refuses to believe it. Convinced that his uncle is still alive and merely trapped beneath the boulders, as he was, Antoine decides to return to the site of the landslide to rescue S�raphin. When Th�r�se discovers that her husband has left the village, she realises what he intends to do and goes after him, hoping to convince him to return to the world of the living. The novel ends with their confrontation in the unrecognisable landscape of the collapsed mountain, during which she wins him round.

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