The Years is a personal narrative of the period of 1941 to 2006 told through the lens of memory, impressions past and present—even projections into the future—photos, books, songs, radio, television, and decades of advertising and headlines, contrasted with intimate conflicts and written notes from six decades of diaries. Local dialect, words of the time, slogans, brands, and names for ever-proliferating objects are given a voice here. The voice we recognize as the author's continually dissolves and re-emerges. Ernaux makes the passage of time palpable. Time itself, inexorable, narrates its own course, consigning all other narrators to anonymity. A new kind of autobiography emerges, at once subjective and impersonal, private and collective. On its 2008 publication in France, The Years came as a surprise. Although Ernaux had, for years, been hailed as a beloved bestselling and award-winning author, The Years was in many ways a departure: both an intimate memoir written by entire generations and a story of generations telling a very personal story.

The Years

Upon her mother’s death from Alzheimer’s, Annie Ernaux embarks on a daunting journey back through time, as she seeks to “capture the real woman, the one who existed independently from me, born on the outskirts of a small Normandy town, and who died in the geriatric ward of a hospital in the suburbs of Paris.” She explores the bond between mother and daughter, tenuous and unshakable at once, the alienating worlds that separate them, and the inescapable truth that we must lose the ones we love. In this quietly powerful tribute, Ernaux attempts to do her mother the greatest justice she can: to portray her as the individual she was. She writes “I believe I am writing about my mother because it is my turn to bring her into the world.”

A Woman's Story

'I will write to avenge my people.' It was as a young woman that Annie Ernaux first wrote these words in her diary, giving a name to her purpose in life as a writer. She returns to them in her stirring defence of literature and of political writing in her Nobel Lecture, delivered in Stockholm on 7 December 2022. To write of her own life, she asserts, is to 'shatter the loneliness of experiences endured and repressed'; to mine individual experience is to find collective emancipation. Ernaux's speech is a bold assertion of the capacity of writing to give people a sense of their own worth, and of one writer's commitment to bearing witness to life, its joys and its injustices.

I Will Write To Avenge My People - WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

In A Girl's Story, Annie Ernaux revisits a night fifty years earlier when she found herself submerged and controlled by another person’s desire and willpower. It was the summer of 1958, the year she turned eighteen, and the man she had given herself to had moved on. She’d submitted her will to his and then found that she was a slave without a master. Now, fifty years later, she realizes she can obliterate the intervening years and return to consider the young woman who, until now, she had wanted to forget completely. And, in the process, she also discovers that this was the vital, violent, and dolorous origin of her writing life—her writer’s identity, built out of shame, violence, and betrayal.

A Girl's Story

Barely educated and valued since childhood strictly for his labor, Ernaux's father had grown into a hard, practical man who showed his family little affection. Narrating his slow ascent towards material comfort, Ernaux's cold observation reveals the shame that haunted her father throughout his life. She scrutinizes the importance he attributed to manners and language that came so unnaturally to him as he struggled to provide for his family with a grocery store and cafe in rural France. Over the course of the book, Ernaux grows up to become the uncompromising observer now familiar to the world, while her father matures into old age with a staid appreciation for life as it is and for a daughter he cautiously, even reluctantly, admires.

A Man's Place

I Simpel lidenskab dokumenterer Annie Ernaux et kærlighedsforhold, hun havde til en gift mand, da hun var omkring halvtreds år. Forholdet varer to år, og i den periode forbinder hun alt, hvad der møder hende, med den mand, hun elsker og begærer. Simpel lidenskab er et litterært og antropologisk studie af et hjerte i brand. Med præcision og mod undersøger Ernaux sin egen tilstand i en periode af sit liv, hvor hun ikke foretog sig andet end at vente på en mand. ”Et værk af lyrisk præcision og diamanthård klarhed.” New Yorker

Simpel lidenskab

WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE A sensational celebration of Annie Ernaux's work—featuring collected writing by critics, journalists, and 24 previously unpublished pieces by the Nobel Prize winner herself—offering a full view of the author's life, writing style, reception by readers, and her thoughts and influence. For fans new to Annie Ernaux as well as longtime readers comes this collection of interviews, critical analysis, and diary excerpts. Magisterial in scope and size, Annie Ernaux: Writing, The Other Life was compiled and edited by Pierre-Louis Fort and was first published in France by Éditions de L'Herne in 2022, a few months before she received the Nobel Prize in Literature. The anthology includes twenty-four previously unpublished Ernaux pieces, as well as literary criticism, essays, interviews, diary entries, letters, and more. Never before published in English, this extensive collection is the fruit of collaboration between six celebrated translators and a groundbreaking work of scholarship and rumination.

Writing, the Other Life

A powerful meditation on ageing and familial love, I Remain in Darkness recounts Annie Ernaux's attempts to help her mother recover from Alzheimer's disease, and then, when that proves futile, to bear witness to the older woman's gradual decline and her own experience as a daughter losing a beloved parent. Haunting and devastatingly poignant, I Remain in Darkness showcases Ernaux's unique talent for evoking life's darkest and most bewildering episodes.

I Remain in Darkness – WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

Taking the form of random journal entries over the course of seven years, Exteriors concentrates on the ephemeral encounters that take place just on the periphery of a person's lived environment. Ernaux captures the feeling of contemporary living on the outskirts of Paris: poignantly lyrical, chaotic, and strangely alive. Exteriors is in many ways the most ecstatic of Ernaux's books – the first in which she appears largely free of the haunting personal relationships she has written about so powerfully elsewhere, and the first in which she is able to leave the past behind her.

Exteriors – WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

Considered by many to be the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature laureate's defining work, The Years is a narrative of the period 1941 to 2006 told through the lens of memory, impressions past and present, cultural habits, language, photos, books, songs, radio, television, advertising and news headlines. Annie Ernaux invents a form that is subjective and impersonal, private and collective, and a new genre – the collective autobiography – in order to capture the passing of time. At the confluence of autofiction and sociology, The Years is 'a Remembrance of Things Past for our age of media domination and consumerism' ( New York Times), a monumental account of twentieth-century French history as refracted through the life of one woman.

The Years – WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

On 7 April 1986, Annie Ernaux's mother, after years of suffering from Alzheimer's disease, died in a retirement home in the suburbs of Paris. Shocked by this loss which, despite her mother's condition, she had refused to fathom, Ernaux embarks on a daunting journey back through time in an effort to recover the different facets of a woman whose openness to the world and appetite for reading created the conditions for the author's own social ascent. Mirroring A Man's Place, in which she narrates her father's slow rise to material comfort, A Woman's Story explores the ambiguous and unshakeable bond between mother and daughter, its fluctuation over the course of their lives, the alienating worlds that separate them and the inescapable truth that we must lose the ones we love. In this quietly powerful tribute to the last thread connecting her to the world out of which she was born, Ernaux attempts to do her mother the greatest justice she can: to portray her as the individual she was.

'I too wanted to forget that girl. Really forget her, that is, stop yearning to write about her. Stop thinking that I have to write about this girl and her desire and madness, her idiocy and pride, her hunger and her blood that ceased to flow. I have never managed to do so.' In A Girl's Story, her latest book, Annie Ernaux revisits the summer of 1958, spent working as a holiday camp instructor in Normandy, and recounts the first night she spent with a man. When he moves on, she realizes she has submitted her will to his and finds that she is a slave without a master. Now, sixty years later, she finds she can obliterate the intervening years and return to consider this young woman whom she wanted to forget completely. In writing A Girl's Story, which brings to life her indelible memories of that summer, Ernaux discovers that here was the vital, violent and dolorous origin of her writing life, built out of shame, violence and betrayal.

A Girl's Story – WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

In 1963, Annie Ernaux, 23 and unattached, realizes she is pregnant. Shame arises in her like a plague: understanding that her pregnancy will mark her and her family as social failures, she knows she cannot keep that child. This is the story, written forty years later, of a trauma Ernaux never overcame. In a France where abortion was illegal, she attempted, in vain, to self-administer the abortion with a knitting needle. Fearful and desperate, she finally located an abortionist, and ends up in a hospital emergency ward where she nearly dies. In Happening, Ernaux sifts through her memories and her journal entries dating from those days. Clearly, cleanly, she gleans the meanings of her experience.

Happening

In her latest work, Annie Ernaux recounts a relationship with a student thirty years her junior – an experience that transforms her, briefly, back into the 'scandalous girl' of her youth. When she is with him, she replays scenes she has already lived through, feeling both ageless and closer to death. Laid like a palimpsest on the present, the past's immediacy pushes her to take a decisive step in her writing – producing, in turn, the need to expunge her lover. At once stark and tender, The Young Man is a taut encapsulation of Ernaux's relationship to time, memory and writing.

The Young Man – WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

The Use of Photography recounts a passionate love affair between Annie Ernaux and the journalist and author Marc Marie, after the two met in January 2003. Ernaux had been receiving intensive chemo for breast cancer during the prior three months, and had lost all her hair from the treatments. At the end of January she had surgery, followed by radiation therapy. The affair took place in different locations and Ernaux describes how, shortly after it began, she found herself entranced each morning by the sight of clothes strewn about, chairs out of place and the remains of their last meal of the evening still on the table – and how painful it felt to put things back in order afterwards. She went and got her camera, and began to take photographs of the scenes of disarray. When she told Marc Marie what she had done, he said he had felt the same desire. Translated by Alison L. Strayer into English for the first time, The Use of Photography is an extraordinary meditation on eroticism, photography and writing, a major work by the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature laureate.

The Use of Photography

In Exteriors, Annie Ernaux concentrates not on the essential details of a relationship with a family member or lover as before but on ephemeral encounters within the larger circle of one's environment and the hundreds of strangers who inhabit it. Here, she captures the feeling of contemporary living on the outskirts of a great city: tortured, chaotic, lyrical, and powerfully alive. Exteriors is, in many ways, the most ecstatic of Ernaux's books, the first in which she appears largely free of the haunting personal relationships she has written about so powerfully elsewhere, the first in which she is able to leave her past behind.

Exteriors

Self-regard, in the works of Annie Ernaux, is always an excruciatingly painful and exact process. Here, she revisits the peculiar kind of self-fulfillment possible when we examine ourselves in the aftermath of a love affair, and sometimes, even, through the eyes of the lost beloved.

The Possession

This narrative charts Annie Ernaux's teenage awakening and then the parallel progression of her desire to be desirable and her ambition to fulfill herself in her chosen profession—with the inevitable conflict between the two. And then she is thirty years old, a teacher married to an executive, a mother of two infant sons. She looks after their nice apartment and raises her children. And yet, like millions of other women, she has felt her enthusiasm and curiosity, her strength and her happiness, slowly ebb under the weight of her daily routine. The very condition that everyone around her seems to consider normal and admirable for a woman is killing her. While each of Ernaux's books contains an autobiographical element, A Frozen Woman, one of Ernaux's early works, concentrates the spotlight piercingly on Annie herself. Mixing affection, rage, and bitterness, A Frozen Woman shows us Ernaux's developing art when she still relied on traditional narrative, before the shortened form emerged that has since become her trademark.

A Frozen Woman

In her spare, stark style, Annie Ernaux documents the desires and indignities of a human heart ensnared in an all-consuming passion. Blurring the line between fact and fiction, she attempts to plot the emotional and physical course of her two-year relationship with a married man where every word, event, and person either provides a connection with her beloved or is subject to her cold indifference. With courage and exactitude, Ernaux seeks the truth behind an existence lived, for a time, entirely for someone else.

Simple Passion

This is Annie Ernaux’s account of her passionate love affair with A., a man some thirty years younger, when she was in her fifties. The relationship pulls her back to memories of her own youth and, at the same time, leaves her feeling ageless, outside of time—together with a sense that she is living her life backwards. Amidst talk of having a child together, she feels time running its course and menopause approaching. The Young Man recalls Ernaux as the “scandalous girl” she once was but is composed with the mastery and the self-assurance she has achieved across decades of writing.

The Young Man

My father tried to kill my mother one Sunday in June, in the early afternoon begins Shame, the probing story of the twelve-year-old girl who will become the author herself and the single traumatic memory that will echo and resonate throughout her life. With the emotionally rich voice of great fiction and the diamond-sharp analytical eye of a scientist, Annie Ernaux provides a powerful reflection on experience and the power of violent memory to endure through time, to determine the course of a life.

Shame

Annie Ernaux's father died exactly two months after she passed her exams for a teaching certificate. Barely educated and valued since childhood strictly for his labour, Ernaux's father had grown into a hard, practical man who showed his family little affection. Narrating his slow ascent towards material comfort, Ernaux's cold observation in A Man's Place reveals the shame that haunted her father throughout his life. She scrutinizes the importance he attributed to manners and language that came so unnaturally to him as he struggled to provide for his family with a grocery store and cafe in rural France. Over the course of the book, Ernaux grows up to become the uncompromising observer now familiar to the world, while her father matures into old age with a staid appreciation for life as it is and for a daughter he cautiously, even reluctantly admires.

A Man's Place – WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

Getting Lost is the diary Annie Ernaux kept during the year and a half she had a secret love affair with a younger married man, a Russian diplomat. Her novel, Simple Passion, was based on this affair, but here her writing is immediate, unfiltered. In these diaries, it is 1989, and Annie is divorced with two grown sons, living outside of Paris, and nearing fifty. Her lover escapes the city to see her there, and Ernaux seems to survive only in expectation of these encounters, saying “his desire for me is the only thing I can be sure of.” She cannot write; she trudges distractedly through her various other commitments in the world; she awaits his next call; she lives only to feel desire and for the next rendezvous. When he is gone and the desire has faded, she feels that she is a step closer to death. Lauded for her spare prose, Ernaux here removes all artifice, her writing pared down to its most naked and vulnerable. Getting Lost is as strong a book as any she has written, a haunting, desperate view of a strong and successful woman who seduces a man only to lose herself in love and desire.

Getting Lost

Getting Lost is the diary kept by Annie Ernaux during the year and a half she had a secret love affair with a younger, married man, an attaché to the Soviet embassy in Paris. Her novel, Simple Passion, was based on this affair, but here her writing is immediate and unfiltered. In these diaries it is 1989 and Annie is divorced with two grown sons, living in the suburbs of Paris and nearing fifty. Her lover escapes the city to see her there and Ernaux seems to survive only in expectation of these encounters. She cannot write, she trudges distractedly through her various other commitments in the world, she awaits his next call; she lives merely to feel desire and for the next rendezvous. When he is gone and the moment of desire has faded, she feels that she is a step closer to death. Lauded for her spare prose, Ernaux here removes all artifice, her writing pared down to its most naked and vulnerable. Translated brilliantly for the first time by Alison L. Strayer, Getting Lost is a haunting record of a woman in the grips of love, desire and despair.

In 1963, Annie Ernaux, twenty-three and unattached, realizes she is pregnant. Shame arises in her like a plague: Understanding that her pregnancy will mark her and her family as social failures, she knows she cannot keep the child. In a France where abortion was illegal, she attempted, in vain, to self-administer the abortion with a knitting needle. Fearful and desperate, she finally located an abortionist and ended up in a hospital emergency ward where she nearly died. In Happening, Ernaux sifts through her memories and her journal entries dating from those days. Clearly, cleanly, she gleans the meanings of her experience.

In her spare, stark style, Annie Ernaux documents the desires and indignities of a human heart ensnared in an all-consuming passion. Blurring the line between fact and fiction, an unnamed narrator attempts to plot the emotional and physical course of her two-year relationship with a married foreigner where every word, event, and person either provides a connection with her beloved or is subject to her cold indifference. With courage and exactitude, she seeks the truth behind an existence lived entirely for someone else, and, in the pieces of its aftermath, she is able to find it.

This extraordinary evocation of a grown daughter’s attachment to her mother—and of both women’s strength and resiliency—recounts Annie’s attempt to first help her mother recover from Alzheimer’s disease and, then, when that proves futile, bear witness to the older woman’s gradual decline and her own experience as a daughter losing a beloved parent. I Remain in Darkness is a new high-water mark for Ernaux, surging with raw emotional power and her sublime ability to use language to apprehend her own life’s particular music.

I Remain in Darkness

Ikonisen ranskalaiskirjailijan moderni muistelmaklassikko. Annie Ernaux kuvaa ainutlaatuisessa muistelmateoksessaan sotienjälkeistä Eurooppaa, jossa voi löytää ammatin, perustaa perheen ja erota, ja jota leimaavat elintasoerot, maaseudun autioituminen, populismi ja kuluttamisen elämäntapa. Kirjailijan muistot ja ajatukset punoutuvat yhteen populäärikulttuuristen teosten ja historiallisten tapahtumien kanssa. Syntyy kollektiivinen muistelma, joka on intiimi ja tunnistettava, yksityinen ja yleinen. Se luotaa mennyttä aikaa ja sitä, jota me parhaillaan elämme. Teos oli ilmestymisvuonnaan 2008 Ranskassa myyntimenestys, ja sittemmin se on kerännyt runsaasti kansainvälistä huomiota, mm. Booker-ehdokkuuden vuonna 2019. "Yksi ranskalaisen kirjallisuuden mestariteoksista" Édouard Louis (Ei enää Eddy) "Yksi parhaista kirjoista, joita koskaan tulet lukemaan." Deborah Levy

Vuodet

Nobel-palkitun kirjailijan tilinteko äideistä ja tyttäristä, nuoruudesta ja ikääntymisestä, unelmista ja todellisuudesta. Kun kirjailijan äiti kuolee Alzheimerin tautiin, hän kaivautuu menneeseen ja yrittää saada kokoon kuvaa tästä omana itsenään - naisena jolla oli myös tyttären ulkopuolinen elämä. Teos on tutkielma tiiviistä mutta vaikeasta äiti-tytärsuhteesta, jossa molemmat häpeävät toisiaan. Ernaux'n voimalliset teokset Äidistä ja Isästä sijoittuvat aikaan ennen Vuodet-teosta, jossa kirjailija käy läpi omaa elämäntarinaansa. Annie Ernaux sai kirjallisuuden Nobel-palkinnon vuonna 2022.

Äidistä

Nobel-palkitun kirjailijan vahva, koskettava kuvaus isästä ja tyttärestä. Annie Ernaux'n isä kuoli tarkalleen kaksi kuukautta sen jälkeen kun Ernaux valmistui opettajaksi. Eleettömän armottomassa teoksessaan Isästä hän pyrkii lähestymään isäänsä - kouluttamatonta, työteliästä ja tunnekylmää miestä - sekä sitä häpeää, jota hän on tuntenut lapsuusvuosien köyhyydestä ja syrjäytyneisyydestä lähtien. Isä onnistui itse etenemään maatyöläisestä kauppiaaksi mutta ei sietänyt tyttärensä sosiaalista nousua sivistyneistöön. Ernaux tarkastelee Ranskaa, joka tuntuu kaukaiselta mutta joka on vain parin sukupolven takainen. Ernaux'n voimalliset teokset Äidistä ja Isästä sijoittuvat aikaan ennen Vuodet-teosta, jossa kirjailija käy läpi omaa elämäntarinaansa. Annie Ernaux sai kirjallisuuden Nobel-palkinnon vuonna 2022.

Isästä

Viisikymppinen naiskirjailija rakastuu lähes 30 vuotta nuorempaan mieheen. Tunteilemattomalla kertojanäänellä hän käy läpi intohimon hetkiä. Tarina ei kerro rakastavaisten huomiota herättävästä ikäerosta tai vanhenevan naisen seksuaalisuudesta; sen sijaan Ernaux analysoi halun, vallan ja kateuden suhdetta. Pieni mutta pakahduttava teos on huikea tiiviste nobelistin koko tuotannon olennaisimmista kysymyksistä.

Nuori mies

La storia di un uomo, di un padre, raccontata con precisione chirurgica, senza compatimenti, dalla figlia scrittrice. Perché quando si tradisce, “scrivere è l’ultima risorsa”. La storia di una donna che si affranca con dolorosa tenerezza dalle proprie origini rurali e scrive dei suoi genitori alla ricerca di un ormai impossibile linguaggio comune.

Il posto

Tra il settembre del 1988 e l'aprile del 1990 una donna trascrive sul suo diario la passione totale e incondizionata che sta vivendo per un uomo, un diplomatico sovietico di stanza a Parigi col quale ha iniziato una relazione durante un viaggio in URSS. Con l'intensificarsi del trasporto erotico e del coinvolgimento emotivo, l'autrice scopre di essere divenuta «una comparsa» nella propria stessa vita, di dipendere in tutto e per tutto dalla presenza di un amante sempre lontano e quasi inconoscibile, diviso fra doveri coniugali e ambizioni di carriera. Senza ritocchi né censure, Annie Ernaux ci offre la registrazione in presa diretta dell'esultanza dei corpi, della claustrofobia dell'attesa, del sentimento che affolla ogni spazio e ogni istante. «Diario di dolore, con qualche lampo di piacere folle», Perdersi è il resoconto nudo di un'ossessione assoluta, di un desiderio che la scrittura non doma né sopisce, ma testimonia con bruciante e disperata verità.

Perdersi

Ottobre 1963: una studentessa ventitreenne è costretta a ricorrere alle vie clandestine per poter interrompere una gravidanza. L’evento restituisce i giorni e le tappe di questa ricerca disperata: l’apatia, le ambiguità dei medici, la vicinanza di qualche compagna di corso e l’incontro con la mammana, sino al senso di fierezza per aver, in un modo o nell’atro, resistito. L’evento ha ispirato il film La Scelta di Anne (L'Événement) di Audrey Diwan che ha vinto il Leone d'Oro a Venezia 2021.

L'evento

2022 års Nobelpristagare i litteratur! I samband med utgivningen av Åren publicerar Norstedts två av Annie Ernaux tidiga böcker i en klassikerutgåva. Dessa två texter om författarens föräldrar ger en förhistoria till den tid som beskrivs i Åren, författarens egen livsteckning. Annie Ernaux far dog exakt två månader efter att hon tagit lärarexamen. I Min far närmar hon sig fadern - denna outbildade, hårt arbetande, känslokalla man - och den skam han bar med sig sedan barndomens fattigdom och utsatthet, i ett Frankrike som känns oerhört avlägset, men som faktiskt bara ligger två generationer bort. Kvinnan är en gripande uppgörelse med mödrar och döttrar, ungdom och åldrande, drömmar och verklighet. När författarens mor dör i alzheimers påbörjar hon en resa bakåt i tiden och för att försöka fånga den riktiga kvinnan, hon som existerade oberoende av dottern.

Min far & Kvinnan

2022 års Nobelpristagare i litteratur! "Jag ville glömma den flickan. Glömma henne på riktigt, det vill säga, sluta längta efter att skriva om henne. Sluta tänka att jag borde skriva om henne, hennes längtan, hennes galenskap, hennes dumhet och högmod, hennes hunger och hennes blod som sinade. Jag lyckades aldrig." I En flickas memoarer söker Annie Ernaux sig tillbaka till sommaren 1958, som hon tillbringade som ledare på ett sommarkollo i Normandie. Hon återvänder till sin första natt med en man. För honom betyder natten ingenting, för henne alldeles för mycket. I akten lämnade hon kvar sin egen vilja och hon känner sig nu plötsligt som en slav utan ägare. Sextio år senare inser hon att hon kan sudda ut åren som gått för att undersöka den unga kvinna som en gång var hon. Genom att skriva En flickas memoarer, som tar henne tillbaka till de outplånliga minnena från den sommaren 1958, hittar Ernaux ursprunget till hela sitt skrivande liv. Ett ursprung som är levande, våldsamt och smärtsamt och som är byggt på skam, våld och svek.

En flickas memoarer

2022 års Nobelpristagare i litteratur! Åren är en berättelse om tiden mellan 1941 till 2006, från författaren Annie Ernaux uppväxt i en arbetarklassfamilj i Normandie, via katolsk privatskola, till tiden som lärare i litteratur i Paris, förortslivet, de två sönerna och slutligen skilsmässan. Men det är inte en genomsnittlig självbiografi, utan ett slags egensinnigt kollektivt minne. Ernaux uppfinner en ny stil som är subjektiv och opersonlig, privat och allmän, och en ny genre - den kollektiva självbiografin - för att på så sätt fånga tidens gång. Ernaux behandlar teman som den katolska prydhetens kollaps, sekulariseringens framfart, p-pillret, abortfriheten och kvinnans frigörelse. Ett annat viktigt tema är hur vi lämnat skammen bakom oss och gått in i ett allt extremare konsumtionssamhälle. Vi kan läsa Annie Ernaux oslagbart träffsäkra essä över samtiden, efterkrigstidens Europa, närmast som ett lackmuspapper över var vi befinner oss idag: i en tid av klasskillnader, populism, sönderfallande landsbygd och alienering. Åren har jämförts med Marcel Prousts stora minnesarbete På spaning efter den tid som flytt , men ur ett folkligt, kvinnligt och samtida perspektiv.

Åren

2022 års Nobelpristagare i litteratur! 1963, när Annie Ernaux är 23 år och utan stadig förbindelse, inser hon att hon är gravid. Hon fylls av skam eftersom hon förstår att hennes graviditet kommer att brännmärka hennes familj och försvåra hennes egna studiemöjligheter. Hon beslutar sig för att ta bort barnet. Den här berättelsen om ett trauma som författaren aldrig kunnat komma över är skriven fyrtio år senare. I Frankrike var abort förbjudet vid den här tidpunkten och hon försöker på egen hand och förgäves att utföra aborten med hjälp av en sticknål. I sin desperation hittar hon en illegal abortutförare och hamnar till slut på akuten där hon är nära att dö. I Omständigheter utforskar Ernaux sina minnen och dagböcker från den tiden och skriver fram en glasklar och osentimental bild av vad som hände och på sätt och vis får omständigheten en mening. Trots att händelsen som boken kretsar kring är placerad nästan 60 år bakåt i tiden känns dess tema dessvärre mer aktuellt än på länge när fler länder skriver om och stramar åt sin abortlagstiftning. Omständigheter gavs ut i Frankrike 2000. Filmatiseringen av boken vann Guldlejonet i Venedig 2021 och filmen distribueras i Sverige våren 2022.

Omständigheter

2022 års Nobelpristagare i litteratur! ”Sen september förra året har jag inte gjort annat än väntat på en man: att han skall ringa mig eller komma till mig.” En kvinna väntar på en man. Under ett år lämnar hon knappt sin lägenhet, lever bara för deras korta sinnliga möten, dikterade av honom. Allt som varit hennes liv - vänner, arbete, kulturella intressen, intellektuella utmaningar - har reducerats till passiv längtan. Smärtan av att så fullständigt leva för någon annan är oundviklig. Men kanske är det ändå värt det. Sinnenas tid, som väckte stort uppseende vid publiceringen i Frankrike 1991, är en djärv återspegling av en mogen kvinnas tankar och handlingar - en beskrivning av passionens väsen, bortom alla sociala och kulturella värderingar.

Sinnenas tid

“Min far ville slå min mor ihjel en søndag i juni først på eftermiddagen.” Sådan begynder Skammen. Annie Ernaux er 12 år, da hun overværer, at hendes far forsøger at slå hendes mor ihjel i kælderen ved familiens café og købmandsbutik. Umiddelbart efter den voldsomme hændelse falder faren til ro. Moren erklærer, at “det er ovre”. Samme eftermiddag tager forældrene Annie med på en cykeltur. Et halvt århundrede senere undersøger den voksne Annie Ernaux, hvad der præcis skete den dag i juni, og hvordan familien kunne eksistere herefter. Jo mere Ernaux dykker ned i fortiden, jo mere indser hun, hvilket spændingsfelt hendes forældre har levet i. Mellem ønsket om social fremgang og skammen over det, de kom fra. Samtidig skildrer Ernaux sin egen skam og sine bestræbelser på at undslippe de konventioner, hun er vokset op med, og i stedet følge sin længsel efter et andet liv end sine forældres.

Skammen

Året er 1989. Annie Ernaux nærmer sig de halvtreds og er fraskilt med to voksne sønner, da hun indleder en affære med en diplomat ved den sovjetiske ambassade i Paris. Han er gift, ikke spor intellektuel og elsker dyre biler. Hendes sult efter ham er umættelig. Hun kan ikke skrive, hun bevæger sig søvngængeragtigt gennem verden, mens hun afventer hans næste telefonopringning eller det næste besøg, som hun aldrig ved, hvornår kommer. Da begæret begynder at falme, føler hun, at hun er et skridt nærmere døden. Fortabe sig er Annie Ernaux’ ucensurerede dagbog fra det år, forholdet til den russiske elsker stod på. I dagbogen er hendes skrift reduceret til det mest nøgne og sårbare. Hvor romanen Simpel lidenskab er en fortættetmeditation over det samme kærlighedsforhold, møder vi i Fortabe sig en kvindes begær, desperation og ensomhed helt umiddelbart og ufiltreret. “Som ANNA KARENINA og MADAME BOVARY må Ernaux’ affære betragtes som et af litteraturens helt store kærlighedsforhold. … Det er, som om man holder hendes hjerte i hænderne.” THE GUARDIAN

Fortabe sig

I Den unge mand fortæller Annie Ernaux om et kærlighedsforhold, hun havde til en tredive år yngre studerende i slutningen af 1990’erne. I nogle måneder lever hun, som da hun var ung: sover på en madras i et iskoldt værelse, frekventerer sin studietids caféer og føler sig for en kort periode – og med en ny følelse af sejr – forvandlet til den ”skandaløse pige”, hun var engang. Hun er på én gang uden for tiden og tættere på døden end nogensinde. Forholdet bringer hende til at tage et afgørende skridt i sit forfatterskab. Den unge mand udkom i Frankrig i 2022. Bogen udkrystalliserer Annie Ernaux’ forhold til tid, klasse, erindring, begær og først og fremmest til det at skrive.

Den unge mand

Hændelsen er en rystende fortælling om en abort og en udforskning af forholdet mellem krop, køn og klasse af den franske stjerneforfatter Annie Ernaux. Som 23-årig noterer Annie Ernaux følgende i sin notesbog: ”Jeg er gravid. Det er et mareridt.” Året er 1963, og abort er forbudt. At fortælle sine forældre om graviditeten er utænkeligt. Hun har heller ikke noget ønske om at få et barn, hun har livet for sig. Hændelsen er en fortælling om en illegal abort i et køkken i Paris. Fyrre år senere dykker Annie Ernaux ned i dagbøger og minder fra tiden omkring aborten. Samtidig reflekterer hun over forholdet mellem krop, klasse, køn og skrift og viser, hvordan en enkelt hændelse kan præge et helt liv. ”Et oprørende, dybt relevant værk – såvel kunstnerisk som menneskeligt. Burde være obligatorisk læsning.” Financial Times

Hændelsen

Årene betragtes som et moderne mesterværk i fransk litteratur. Det er en roman om Frankrig og om en kvindes liv fra 1940’erne og frem. Fra Annie Ernaux’ opvækst i en arbejderklassefamilie i Normandiet til tiden som lærer foran nådesløse klasser med fyrre elever, forstadslivet med mand, to sønner, uendelige mængder indkøb og tilværelsen med en ung elsker efter skilsmissen – og gennem det hele livet som skrivende menneske. Mest af alt er Årene en bog om tid. Den er fortalt fra et kollektivt ståsted og forsøger med afsæt i fotografier og erindringsbilleder at fange selve tidens sprog og gang. Vi sidder med til bords til familiefesterne og oplever de små skred og de store samfundsomvæltninger: efterkrigstiden, studenteroprøret i 1968, seksuel frigørelse, politiske kampe, familierelationer, globalisering og forbrugskultur. Årene er blevet sammenlignet med Marcel Prousts På sporet af den tabte tid, men Annie Ernaux’ perspektiv er folkeligt, intimt og moderne.

Årene

Ook ik heb dat meisje willen vergeten. Haar echt vergeten, oftewel geen zin meer hebben om nog over haar te schrijven. Niet meer denken dat ik moet schrijven over haar, over haar verlangen, haar waanzin, haar stompzinnigheid en haar hoogmoed, haar honger en haar opgedroogde bloed. Het is me nooit gelukt. Annie Ernaux duikt diep in de zomer van 1958, de zomer waarin ze voor het eerst met een man naar bed ging, tijdens een vakantiekamp in Normandië. Die nacht bracht een schokgolf teweeg die twee jaar lang in haar lichaam en in haar leven zou blijven natrillen. Met gebruikmaking van de onuitwisbare beelden aangedragen door haar herinneringen, van foto's en van brieven die ze schreef aan vriendinnen, onderzoekt ze het meisje dat ze is geweest, in een onverbiddelijke slingerbeweging tussen vroeger en nu. Nobelprijs voor Literatuur 2022

Meisjesherinneringen

In de herfst van 1963 gaat Annie Ernaux als studente naar bed met een jongen die ze die zomer had leren kennen. De relatie is geen lang leven beschoren, maar ze is wel onbedoeld zwanger geraakt. Tegen de stroom in besluit ze na een lange afweging clandestien (de wetgeving werd pas in 1975 geliberaliseerd) abortus te laten plegen. En détail, zonder valse emoties en zonder omhaal, beschrijft ze wat er gebeurt. Het voorval is een sublieme indruk van pure eerlijkheid en authenticiteit. Zoals in Ernaux' succesvolle memoir De jaren vormt haar eigen leven de aanzet voor een mentale archeologie, over schaamte, vrijheid, klassenverschillen en feminisme. Nobelprijs voor Literatuur 2022

Het voorval

Een dochter schrijft over haar overleden vader. Zij is nu lerares. Hij werkte zich van boerenknecht op tot kleine winkelier. Zij heeft de sociale grenzen die hem gesteld waren doorbroken. 'Dat ik tot een wereld behoorde die op hem had neergekeken,' was tegelijk zijn trots en tragiek. Zij blikt terug op haar armelijke jeugd en overdenkt haar gehechtheid aan dat milieu, waarvan zij niettemin sterk is vervreemd. 'Boeken, muziek, dat is goed voor jou,' zegt hij. 'Ik heb dat niet nodig om te leven.' Dit ingeklonken verhaal, waarin afstand en intimiteit tegelijk aanwezig zijn, heeft een universele dimensie.

De plek

Dit boek is een collectieve autobiografie van onze tijd. Het vertelt het verhaal over de periode 1941-2006 door de lens van het geheugen, van tegenwoordige en herinnerde indrukken, culturele gewoonten, taal, foto's, boeken, liedjes, radio, televisie, reclame en krantenkoppen. Annie Ernaux slaagt erin een vorm te vinden die zowel subjectief als onpersoonlijk, particulier als collectief is, een nieuw genre in feite, dat beoogt het verleden te vangen. Als vermenging van autobiografische fictie en sociologie is De jaren 'een Op zoek naar de verloren tijd van ons tijdperk van mediadominantie en consumentisme' (The New York Times), een monumentale bijdrage aan de twintigste-eeuwse Franse geschiedenis zoals weerspiegeld in het leven van één vrouw. Nobelprijs voor Literatuur 2022

De jaren

'Mijn vader wilde mijn moeder vermoorden, op een zondag in juni, aan het begin van de middag.' Het is 1952, en het incident waarbij haar vader haar moeder met een mes naar het leven staat, is voor Annie Ernaux de oorsprong van de schaamte in haar leven. Schaamte over het taalgebruik, de tafelmanieren en het sociale gedrag van haar ouders, die zich zo krampachtig proberen te distantiëren van hun afkomst uit de laagste sociale klasse, nu ze zich hebben opgewerkt tot kleine middenstanders met een kruidenierswinkel en een café. Het brute moment vormt de opmaat naar een mentale archeologie, waarin haar dromen, gedachten en gevoelens als meisje van twaalf tevoorschijn komen. En dat alles noteert ze zonder een spoor van retoriek, in ongekunstelde en subtiele bewoordingen. 'De schaamte' is een autobiografische roman die veel meer is dan de reconstructie van een cruciale en traumatische gebeurtenis. 'Een mooi, eerlijk boek over het gevoel dat haar jeugd beheerste.' - Margot Dijkgraaf in NRC Handelsblad 'Dit is een groot sociaal en intiem boek. Lees het!' - Le Point Nobelprijs voor de Literatuur 2022.

De schaamte

'Mijn moeder is gestorven op maandag 7 april [1986] in het bejaardencentrum van Pontoise, waar ik haar twee jaar geleden had geplaatst.' Deze nuchtere beginzin noteert Annie Ernaux een week na de dood van 'de enige vrouw die werkelijk iets voor mij betekend heeft'. Ze gaat door met schrijven in de hoop dat het iets oplevert 'op het raakvlak van het persoonlijke en algemene, van de mythe en de geschiedenis [...] een waarheid over mijn moeder [...] die slechts met woorden gevonden kan worden.' Het resultaat is een tekst die, in droge en concrete taal, een heel persoonlijke en universele smart onthult.

Een vrouw

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