A masterpiece of early 20th-century literature recently recovered from post WWII oblivion as part of Grasset’s prestigious Les Cahiers Rouges series.

Having recently gone up in the world thanks to luck with the stock market, the Kampfs decide to throw a ball in order to launch themselves into society.  Their daughter Antoinette, who has just turned fourteen, dreams of attending.  But Madame Kampf is resolved not to present her daughter, already so grown up, to her admirers.  Instead, Antoinette is forced to sleep in the laundry room, as her bedroom is used as coatroom.

In an unpremeditated fury of revolt and despair, Antoinette takes her revenge.  It is swift and it is horrible.  A cruel, funny and tender examination of class differences, of the dynamic between mother and daughter, Le bal is ultimately dedicated to the torments of childhood, and Antoinette is as unforgettable a character as Arthur Schnitzler’s Mademoiselle Else or Carson McCullers' Frankie.