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3.68 AVERAGE
3.68 AVERAGE
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
La honte est quelque chose de continu, une violence sourde et insidieuse. Invisible tant elle est indicible.
Ernaux nous fait part de l’événement traumatique qui la lui révèle ; la prise de conscience que son quotidien est différent des autres. En tant qu’enfant, en tant que jeune fille, en tant que fille de marchand dans une école privé. En retraçant tous les codes ayant régît sa jeunesse, elle reconstitue a posteriori l’environnement sociale fracturée qui l’a amené à expérimenter cette sensation si particulière.
Ernaux nous fait part de l’événement traumatique qui la lui révèle ; la prise de conscience que son quotidien est différent des autres. En tant qu’enfant, en tant que jeune fille, en tant que fille de marchand dans une école privé. En retraçant tous les codes ayant régît sa jeunesse, elle reconstitue a posteriori l’environnement sociale fracturée qui l’a amené à expérimenter cette sensation si particulière.
"Naturally I won’t opt for narrative which would mean inventing reality instead of searching for it."
I am a longtime fan of Ernaux's pieces, clever bits of memoir and metafiction that convey her particular experience of a moment in time in a way that simultaneously keeps the reader at a distance and has the reader so immersed that it feels as if one is there. This piece is mostly about what we now call imposter syndrome as experienced by Annie, a middle-class girl from the country (a part that sits at the edge of a city.) When she moves to a private boarding school Annie is thrown into everyday life amongst much posher and more cosmopolitan people. The whole is pretty wonderful. The acknowledgment that language is never able to fully embody truth is food for thought, and also leaves the reader a bit off balance. Close to a 5 but I think I will leave this at 4, though I can't quite articulate why I am docking a star.
I am a longtime fan of Ernaux's pieces, clever bits of memoir and metafiction that convey her particular experience of a moment in time in a way that simultaneously keeps the reader at a distance and has the reader so immersed that it feels as if one is there. This piece is mostly about what we now call imposter syndrome as experienced by Annie, a middle-class girl from the country (a part that sits at the edge of a city.) When she moves to a private boarding school Annie is thrown into everyday life amongst much posher and more cosmopolitan people. The whole is pretty wonderful. The acknowledgment that language is never able to fully embody truth is food for thought, and also leaves the reader a bit off balance. Close to a 5 but I think I will leave this at 4, though I can't quite articulate why I am docking a star.
I don’t know what to say about this memoir. I had never considered that perhaps some of the things I had experienced were so devastating that I would never be able to talk about them directly, only talk about everything around them. I have always thought one day, with the right words, I would be able to capture them perfectly and eloquently. I now see that that may be impossible. Even though those moments, as with Ernaux’s, refocused my entire being - my thoughts, my body, my self.
I hope to write this book one day.
Quotes:
“Later on, I would say to certain men: 'My father tried to kill my mother just before I turned twelve.' The fact that I wanted to tell them this meant that I was crazy about them. All were quiet after hearing the sentence. I realized that I had made a mistake, that they were not able to accept such a thing.”
“In fact, now that I have finally committed to paper, I feel that it is an ordinary incident, far more common among families than I had originally thought. It may be that narrative, any kind of narrative, lends normality to people's deeds, including the most dramatic ones. But because this scene has remained frozen inside me, an image empty of language - except for the sentence I told my lovers - the words which I have used to describe it seem strange, almost incongruous. It has become a scene destined for other people.”
“Before starting, I thought I would be able to recall every single detail. It turns out I can remember only the general atmosphere, our respective places in the kitchen and a few words or expressions.”
“From then on, that Sunday was like a veil that came between me and everything I did. I would play, I would read, I would behave normally but somehow I wasn't there. Everything had become artificial.“
“If, as it now seems from a number of indications (needing to reread the lines I have written, being unable to undertake anything else), I have indeed started a new book, then I have taken the risk of revealing it all straight away. Yet nothing is revealed, only the stark facts. That day is like an icon immured within me all these years; I want to breathe life into it and strip it of its sacred aura (which long made me believe that it was responsible for my writing, that it lies somewhere at the heart of all my books).”
“What matters to me is to find the words I would use to describe myself and the world around me; to name what I considered to be normal, intolerable or inconcevable.
But the woman of 1995 can never go back to being the little girl of 1952, who knew nothing beyond her small town, her family and her convent school, and who had
a limited number of words at her disposal. With the immensity of time stretching ahead of her. We have no true memory of ourselves.
To convey what my life was like in those days, the only reliable method I have is to explore the laws, rites, beliefs and references that defined the circles in which I was caught up - school, family, small-town life - and which governed my existence, without my even notic-ing its contradictions; to expose the different languages that made up my personality: the words of religion, the words my parents used to describe their behaviour and daily environment, the serialized novels I read in Le Petit Écbo de la mode or Les Veillées des chaumières, to use these words, some of which I still find oppressive, in order to dissect and reassemble the text of the world surrounding that Sunday in June, when I turned twelve and thought I was going mad.”
“It is a nameless place of origin: as soon as I go back I succumb to a state of lethargy that prevents me from thinking or even remembering, as if the place were going to swallow me up once again.”
“(After evoking the images I have of that summer, I feel inclined to write 'then I discovered that' or 'then I realized that', words implying a clear perception of the events one has lived through. But in my case, there is no under-standing, only this feeling of shame that has fossilized the images and stripped them of meaning. The fact that I experienced such inertia and nothingness is something that cannot be denied. It is the ultimate truth.
It is the bond between the little girl of 1952 and the woman who is writing this manuscript.”
I hope to write this book one day.
Quotes:
“Later on, I would say to certain men: 'My father tried to kill my mother just before I turned twelve.' The fact that I wanted to tell them this meant that I was crazy about them. All were quiet after hearing the sentence. I realized that I had made a mistake, that they were not able to accept such a thing.”
“In fact, now that I have finally committed to paper, I feel that it is an ordinary incident, far more common among families than I had originally thought. It may be that narrative, any kind of narrative, lends normality to people's deeds, including the most dramatic ones. But because this scene has remained frozen inside me, an image empty of language - except for the sentence I told my lovers - the words which I have used to describe it seem strange, almost incongruous. It has become a scene destined for other people.”
“Before starting, I thought I would be able to recall every single detail. It turns out I can remember only the general atmosphere, our respective places in the kitchen and a few words or expressions.”
“From then on, that Sunday was like a veil that came between me and everything I did. I would play, I would read, I would behave normally but somehow I wasn't there. Everything had become artificial.“
“If, as it now seems from a number of indications (needing to reread the lines I have written, being unable to undertake anything else), I have indeed started a new book, then I have taken the risk of revealing it all straight away. Yet nothing is revealed, only the stark facts. That day is like an icon immured within me all these years; I want to breathe life into it and strip it of its sacred aura (which long made me believe that it was responsible for my writing, that it lies somewhere at the heart of all my books).”
“What matters to me is to find the words I would use to describe myself and the world around me; to name what I considered to be normal, intolerable or inconcevable.
But the woman of 1995 can never go back to being the little girl of 1952, who knew nothing beyond her small town, her family and her convent school, and who had
a limited number of words at her disposal. With the immensity of time stretching ahead of her. We have no true memory of ourselves.
To convey what my life was like in those days, the only reliable method I have is to explore the laws, rites, beliefs and references that defined the circles in which I was caught up - school, family, small-town life - and which governed my existence, without my even notic-ing its contradictions; to expose the different languages that made up my personality: the words of religion, the words my parents used to describe their behaviour and daily environment, the serialized novels I read in Le Petit Écbo de la mode or Les Veillées des chaumières, to use these words, some of which I still find oppressive, in order to dissect and reassemble the text of the world surrounding that Sunday in June, when I turned twelve and thought I was going mad.”
“It is a nameless place of origin: as soon as I go back I succumb to a state of lethargy that prevents me from thinking or even remembering, as if the place were going to swallow me up once again.”
“(After evoking the images I have of that summer, I feel inclined to write 'then I discovered that' or 'then I realized that', words implying a clear perception of the events one has lived through. But in my case, there is no under-standing, only this feeling of shame that has fossilized the images and stripped them of meaning. The fact that I experienced such inertia and nothingness is something that cannot be denied. It is the ultimate truth.
It is the bond between the little girl of 1952 and the woman who is writing this manuscript.”
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
A haunting account of how witnessing domestic violence can completely change one's worldview and how lonely one can feel when living with this trauma. As always, the moments of metanarration really appealed to me. The narrator dives as deeply as possible into everything surrounding the events of a Sunday in June 1952 other than the event itself.
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
emotional
informative
reflective
tense
fast-paced
Shame is a lonely, heavy burden that keeps on giving; and as is the case often when social/economic classes meet, it is reserved especially for those who do not have the means to live better, be better, know better.
Ernaux grew up in quite a poor environment, raised by rather rough people, as us clear as she describes her hometown and the divisions lines by class within its quarters (of which she was on the wrong side), and the uncouth experiences that shaped her, topped with when her father tried to kill her mother, followed by them acting like it had been nothing.
But how can it be nothing for a child? If you're not already used to such violence (in which case you have larger problems), seeing your beloved parents in such violence against each other is enough to throw off one's whole understanding of how human relations are supposed to work, how the world is supposed to work. That it's traumatic is undeniable.
Looking back, now highly educated and economically better off, she both remembers the fear, and the shame, and must feel it still, the shame that came into being once she as a child learned to look at herself and her family the way other people did; because shame is not something innate, something that stands alone, but it exists in comparison - you cannot feel shame if you don't know you should be feeling it.
Shame is something you learn; or at least what there is to be ashamed of (because there is nothing objectively shameful, only culturally and subjectively); and that, as Ernaux describes her memories, tends to be intrinsically tied to such things that those with money and power can afford, and those without cannot:
Pretty things, indoor plumbing, warm water, running water, big TVs, a car, a bigger car, an education, a fancier education from a school everybody knows the name of, the knowledge and ability and a way to control one’s anger so that it doesn't devolve into murderous intent - there's always something, big or small, that one can feel ashamed of; and having been raised in a working class family myself where for years we didn't have warm water, and using used things was he name of the day, I can relate to what she is talking about.
But it doesn't stop in childhood, and you could write a book, many a book, of what one can find shameful in adulthood; and another one from the point of view of the mother, almost killed, and the father, almost a killer, and them together, acting like it never happened because how else can you continue living your life?
And then ultimately ask, what is the value of all that shame? How did it help? For Ernaux that question doesn't seem to even register, perhaps because the futile answer is so obvious.
Even so, reading the first chapter, I did not feel that Ernaux had much to say about the event itself, half-forgotten trauma that coloured her life and defied reasoning but happened, let's not forget, so many years ago. Falling back to her usual tricks, the endless lists of snippets of memories, these old things, old ads, old songs, places as they used to be; and in part it felt too familiar, losing its power, no less because this time I shared none with this person with such different nostalgias (no familiar French movies this time).
But taken as a whole, Ernaux's masterful writing, her penchant for thoughtful self-analysis, and her central thesis of working class shame prevails, and the complete thing builds into a formidable creation on shame, violence, and class that is now one of my favourite writings from Ernaux.
Ernaux grew up in quite a poor environment, raised by rather rough people, as us clear as she describes her hometown and the divisions lines by class within its quarters (of which she was on the wrong side), and the uncouth experiences that shaped her, topped with when her father tried to kill her mother, followed by them acting like it had been nothing.
But how can it be nothing for a child? If you're not already used to such violence (in which case you have larger problems), seeing your beloved parents in such violence against each other is enough to throw off one's whole understanding of how human relations are supposed to work, how the world is supposed to work. That it's traumatic is undeniable.
Looking back, now highly educated and economically better off, she both remembers the fear, and the shame, and must feel it still, the shame that came into being once she as a child learned to look at herself and her family the way other people did; because shame is not something innate, something that stands alone, but it exists in comparison - you cannot feel shame if you don't know you should be feeling it.
Shame is something you learn; or at least what there is to be ashamed of (because there is nothing objectively shameful, only culturally and subjectively); and that, as Ernaux describes her memories, tends to be intrinsically tied to such things that those with money and power can afford, and those without cannot:
Pretty things, indoor plumbing, warm water, running water, big TVs, a car, a bigger car, an education, a fancier education from a school everybody knows the name of, the knowledge and ability and a way to control one’s anger so that it doesn't devolve into murderous intent - there's always something, big or small, that one can feel ashamed of; and having been raised in a working class family myself where for years we didn't have warm water, and using used things was he name of the day, I can relate to what she is talking about.
But it doesn't stop in childhood, and you could write a book, many a book, of what one can find shameful in adulthood; and another one from the point of view of the mother, almost killed, and the father, almost a killer, and them together, acting like it never happened because how else can you continue living your life?
And then ultimately ask, what is the value of all that shame? How did it help? For Ernaux that question doesn't seem to even register, perhaps because the futile answer is so obvious.
Even so, reading the first chapter, I did not feel that Ernaux had much to say about the event itself, half-forgotten trauma that coloured her life and defied reasoning but happened, let's not forget, so many years ago. Falling back to her usual tricks, the endless lists of snippets of memories, these old things, old ads, old songs, places as they used to be; and in part it felt too familiar, losing its power, no less because this time I shared none with this person with such different nostalgias (no familiar French movies this time).
But taken as a whole, Ernaux's masterful writing, her penchant for thoughtful self-analysis, and her central thesis of working class shame prevails, and the complete thing builds into a formidable creation on shame, violence, and class that is now one of my favourite writings from Ernaux.