METAPHORICAL EFFECTS IN THE WORKS OF ANNIE ERNAUX By Regina L. Peszat MA ...

193 Pages·2013·1.39 MB·English

by  Regina Peszat

METAPHORICAL EFFECTS IN THE WORKS OF
ANNIE ERNAUX

By

Regina L. Peszat

M.A., University of Kansas, 2013

Submitted to the graduate degree program in French
and the Graduate Faculty of the University of Kansas
in partial fulfillment of the requirements for
the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

________________________________
Chairperson, Professor John T. Booker

________________________________
Committee Members Professor Van A. Kelly

________________________________
Professor Caroline A. Jewers

________________________________
Professor E. Bruce Hayes

________________________________
Professor Dorice Williams Elliott

Date Defended: 16 May 2013

Copyright 2013
Regina L. Peszat
ii

The Dissertation Committee for Regina L. Peszat
certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation:

METAPHORICAL EFFECTS IN THE WORKS OF
ANNIE ERNAUX

________________________________
Chairperson, John T. Booker

Date approved: 21 May 2013
iii

Abstract

While writing her fourth book, La Place (1984), Ernaux abandoned the genre of the novel
and adopted a new prose style that was devoid of metaphor, and other hallmarks of literary
writing in favor of a “flat” style. In this study, I show that Ernaux’s writing is not as “flat” as it
first appears to be, and that the author has been maneuvering around her ambivalence towards
metaphor—and its strong association with literary style—for a long time. An attentive reading,
as I have illustrated, reveals new dimensions in her writing and opens up her works to fresh
interpretations. An appreciation for the evolution of her style, and the artistic effects hidden
below her écriture plate, requires, however, familiarity with her œuvre as a whole and active
reflection on the reader’s part. This dissertation emphasizes Ernaux’s approaches to metaphor
throughout a body of work that now spans four decades.
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Acknowledgments

For good reason, it is customary to recognize and thank, in writing, those individuals who
have contributed their time, erudition, advice, and encouragement to the completion of major
writing projects. Were I recklessly rich, I would hire a skytyper to write “THANK YOU!” in
puffs of smoke above Fraser Hall to communicate the enthusiasm of my gratitude. I offer,
instead, this modest and more permanent acknowledgment that many individuals helped me
complete this endeavor.
To my advisor, Professor John T. Booker and the members of my dissertation committee:
Professor Van Kelly, Professor Caroline Jewers, Professor Bruce Hayes, and Professor Dorice
Elliott, I am very appreciative of the careful readings and thoughtful feedback that helped me to
improve my ideas and writing throughout the many stages of this dissertation.
To my friends, colleagues and classmates, especially to Professor Kim Swanson, Gillian
Weatherley, and Jeff Kendrick, thank you for sharing your pedagogical materials and expertise,
and for being excellent colleagues.
I would like to thank the Office of Research & Graduate Studies at the University of
Kansas and the Modern Language Association for travel grants which helped to defray some of
the costs of attending conferences. Thank you also to Kim Glover, Pam Rooks, and Pam LeRow
for helping with formatting issues and with the electronic submission of my manuscript.
Last but not least, to Steve and my family.
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Table of Contents

Abstract .................................................................................................................................... iii
Acknowledgments ..................................................................................................................... iv
Table of Contents ........................................................................................................................v
Introduction ................................................................................................................................1
Ernaux’s Place in Literature ................................................................................................2
A Writer Ill at Ease With Literature ....................................................................................5
Hidden Metaphors: The Iceberg Effect .............................................................................. 13
Organization and Overview of Chapters ............................................................................ 18
Chapter 1: Metaphors of Dis-ease.............................................................................................. 23
The (Im)Posture of a Literary Style ................................................................................... 24
Disfiguring a Metaphor ..................................................................................................... 28
More “Entertainment” ....................................................................................................... 34
Figures and Dysfunctional Thinking in L’Occupation ........................................................ 36
Idiots, Addicts, and Other Unsavory Identifications ........................................................... 42
Transfiguration and Transpersonalization .......................................................................... 49
The Pathetic Fallacy From Another Perspective ................................................................. 52
Chapter 2: Culture and Metaphor in Une femme and La Place ................................................... 56
Cultural Differences .......................................................................................................... 56
A Couple of Apple Trees ................................................................................................... 60
The Language of Flowers .................................................................................................. 68
A Metaphorical Funeral ..................................................................................................... 85
The Key to Dreams: Metaphor in Its Natural, Organic, and Nascent State.......................... 87
Identifying With Excrement .............................................................................................. 96
Chapter 3: Metaphorical Juxtapositions, Doubles, and Reversals ............................................. 103
Ernaux’s Sensitivity to Visual Images ............................................................................. 103
Through the Looking Glass ............................................................................................. 106
Lurid Tableaux ................................................................................................................ 109
Optical Illusions and Perceptual Games ........................................................................... 133
Transfiguration of Excrement .......................................................................................... 139
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A Portrait of the Artists ................................................................................................... 143
Traumatic Associations ................................................................................................... 150
Symbolic Violence by Way of Comic Stooges ................................................................. 154
An Ideal Image of Literature............................................................................................ 158
Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 162
Notes ...................................................................................................................................... 169
Works Cited ............................................................................................................................ 179
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Introduction

To anyone who is even casually familiar with Ernaux’s works, a research project
examining metaphors in her writing might seem like a dubious undertaking. After all, the author
herself has claimed to avoid the use of metaphor and other conceits of literary style: “Je ne
connaîtrai jamais la jubilation du style, l’enchantement de la métaphore” (La Honte 70). Siobhán
McIlvanney has noted the “somewhat coercive nature of certain metanarrative remarks” (The
Return to Origins 14) in Ernaux’s writing that seem to serve the purpose of controlling readers’
reactions to her texts, but these self-reflexive intrusions might also purposely misdirect readers’
interpretations of her work. Ernaux would not be the first writer to make disingenuous claims of
authorial intent. Furthermore, one might suspect that as someone who is also agrégée ès lettres,
she would have some literary aspirations, in spite of her claims to the contrary. And, that her
critical audience—trained in appreciating the artistic aspects of texts—might eventually discern
these qualities. In this study I will examine the author’s attitude towards metaphor, and the
evolution of her approach to dealing with metaphor in her œuvre. In the later works, which are
written in her signature flat style and therefore contain very little stylistic embellishment, I will
show that the author nonetheless artfully arranges words and images that produce sophisticated
metaphorical effects. Readers familiar with all of Ernaux’s works are well-positioned to perceive
the intertextual connections and patterns between them that create a fuller, multi-dimensional
body of work. This analysis will also show the attention to detail that the author has taken in
creating her own unique, and dare we say it, literary style.
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Ernaux’s Place in Literature

Annie Ernaux holds a somewhat unique position in the world of letters. She began her
career with Gallimard in 1974 with the publication of her first novel, Les Armoires vides, and has
remained “sous la couverture blanche” of the prestigious publishing house since then, but has
also published with NiL, Stock, and the relatively new publishing house of éditions des Busclats.
Her partnership with what Pascal Quignard has purportedly referred to as “la banque centrale de
la littérature” affords her the freedom to write what and how she wishes: “Moi ce que j’apprécie,
au-dessus de tout, c’est la liberté, c’est une liberté que je mesure avec du recul que je constate
tout le temps, que je compare par rapport à d’autres maisons d’édition” (Interview Le cercle
littéraire de la BnF, 2 mars 2011). The partnership undoubtedly suits Gallimard as well since, as
Simon Kemp points out, she is
an immensely popular writer with the reading public, her books invariably reaching
the best-seller lists. Passion simple remained there for eight months; La Place has
sold half a million copies, and has been translated into sixteen languages. For some
of these readers, Ernaux’s auto-socio-biographies have a profound emotional
importance. (20)
Lyn Thomas has devoted two entire chapters of her book, Annie Ernaux: An Introduction
to the Writer and Her Audience, to the subject of this last point. In one of these chapters, she
discusses the numerous letters Ernaux has received from readers thanking her for the “gift” of
her writing. In reading these letters, Thomas noticed that readers often adopted the author’s style
of expression: “Ernaux’s readers enter her linguistic universe, identifying and reusing key words
and phrases” (134). Thomas herself reads (and judges) Ernaux through her own dual perspective
of academic and “class immigrant.” In the concluding chapter of her book, Thomas explains that
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she had similar experiences of having to navigate between two social universes and how reading
Ernaux’s works brought about a heightened self-awareness regarding her own transition to a
superior social and intellectual position in society:
When my aunts and uncles visited me at Oxford, their accents, clothes and
conversation sent me into agonies of embarrassment; my own masquerade was
revealed as exactly that by this dreaded meeting of my two worlds. Like Ernaux, I
also felt guilty that I saw my family through the (imagined) disdainful eyes of my
fellow students, the children of civil servants and diplomats. Perhaps, in writing this
book, I am at last able to look back, to return the critical gaze, just as Ernaux can
return the stares of the onlookers in « Je ne suis pas sortie de ma nuit ». (174)
Since the publication of Thomas’s book in 1997, Ernaux’s works have continued to attract
critical attention from feminists, sociologists, and literary scholars alike. Fabrice Thumerel
reports that scholarly studies on Ernaux have continued to mount: “[...] depuis quelques années,
les travaux en langue française consacrés à Annie Ernaux se sont accrus de façon exponentielle
[...]” (13).
Critical reactions over the last two decades to Ernaux’s works have been somewhat
divided between those of academics, who generally find her work to be of significance, and
those of another group of critics, mostly from the journalistic press, who, especially since the
publication of Passion simple (1991), have taken issue with her writing and her lifestyle.
Thomas, having studied the seventeen dossiers at Gallimard of press cuttings related to reviews
of Ernaux’s books from 1974 to 1997, found that up to that point there were:
two dominant discourses in the journalistic reception of Ernaux’s work [...]. The
first is the attempt to disqualify Ernaux from the literary sphere, to argue that