A song by Jeanne Cherhal, extracts from newspapers, a comic strip by Aurélia Aurita, letters from Simone de Beauvoir, Pierre Desproges, an appeal from actress Dominique Blanc to award her the Nobel, texts by Nicolas Mathieu, Delphine de Vigan, but also unpublished works by the author, excerpts from her diary, manuscripts, photos… The Notebook of the Herne devoted to Annie Ernaux, judiciously published a few months before she received the prestigious Nobel Prize for Literature on October 6, is an invitation to “to explore the very entirety of the Ernausian project, in its most diverse variations and achievements”emphasizes Pierre-Louis Fort, university professor of literature at Cergy-Paris University, who coordinated this Notebook.
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This multi-entry book, with an approach that is both sensitive and scientific, which enlightens as much as it touches through its testimonies, was composed in symbiosis with the writer, with a view to touching “specialists, early readers, and those who know it less”.
Pierre-Louis Fort reveals for franceinfo behind the scenes of this Notebookwhich shows how much the work of this writer has “shifted the limits of the literary field and of the very conception of literature”.
Franceinfo Culture: how did you work on the Notebook of the Herne devoted to Annie Ernaux choice of texts, choice of contributors, etc?
Pierre-Louis Fort: The idea of Notebook of the Herne took shape at the end of 2020. Annie Ernaux, who had always refused to have a volume dedicated to her in this collection until then, agreed to embark on this adventure, which was a human, literary and scientific adventure. Human because most of the participants immediately accepted, with enthusiasm, to write a text about their relationship with Annie Ernaux and her books, literary because Annie Ernaux (who has embarked on a real work of archivist from her -even as she says in the volume) gave a lot of unpublished writing for the Notebook (as well as interviews, photos, letters), and finally scientific because the volume, if it offers sensitive testimonies, also gives pride of place to literary criticism.
What general idea guided your work?
The general idea was to vary the points of view (writers, academics, directors, playwrights, artists, etc.) around the work and to go through all the work carried out so far by Annie Ernaux, not neglecting any of its aspects (literary, sociological, historical, political…): to explore the very entirety of the Ernausian project, in its most diverse variations and achievements. This desire for a broad course was supported by the idea of being able to reach a dual audience: specialists, first-time readers, and those who know it less.
Would you have worked differently after his Nobel?
I don’t believe that working after the Nobel would have fundamentally changed things. But since we are talking about the Nobel, you will have noticed that the actress Dominique Blanc, Member of the Comédie-Française, called for it with all her wishes in her text: the future proved her right, with what brilliance!
Did Annie Ernaux intervene in the composition of the Notebook and if so how?
Annie Ernaux was constantly available for the Notebook, showing incredible generosity: she sent me unpublished texts, copied some of them if they hadn’t already been typed, opened her family albums and her mail covers… Together we made choices because that we couldn’t keep everything. As regards more specifically the composition of the volume, I worked it out and presented it to Annie Ernaux. We made some adjustments but the composition almost imposed itself. You can read the Notebook from the beginning to the end or choose its entries: the reader is very free, and this freedom is important to enter the flesh of the words of Annie Ernaux.
“Le Cahier invites you to take a walk along the many paths that one of the densest and most beautiful works of our time traces”
Pierre Louis Fortat franceinfo Culture
What can we discover in this Notebook of the Herne ? How does it shed light on Annie Ernaux’s work and career?
the Notebook allows both to discover and rediscover the work and career of Annie Ernaux. We can rediscover texts that we have read in the eyes of others, which allows us to extend our own reading and to question again the echo of the Ernausian voice in us. You can also discover a very large set of unpublished works by the author, from different periods. This is the first time that Annie Ernaux has made available so many traces of her writing, through the strata of time.
For you, how is Annie Ernaux’s work unique and what place does this work hold in the history of 20th and 21st century literature?
Annie Ernaux’s work is unique in that it completely renews the relationship to self-writing. Since the beginning of her work, and even more markedly from the 1980s, the author has constantly worked on form, making her I a “transpersonal I” as she has been able to write it, daring the subjects of writing that can cause scandal, thus shifting the limits of the literary field and of the very conception of literature.
“With each new publication, Annie Ernaux completely reinvents herself.”
Pierre Louis Fortat franceinfo Culture
There is also the Ernausian sentence, not really “flat writing” but on the contrary a sentence chiseled in its simplicity, sometimes tending to the outline, anchored in the real which it wants to account for while questioning it. Annie Ernaux has a unique style: you recognize her as soon as you read her, a style that literally takes readers on board and delights them.
Is this the first time (to my knowledge) that an autofiction work has been awarded the Nobel? What do you think ?
Annie Ernaux does not really recognize herself in autofiction, which is a label sometimes used to evoke her work. No fiction therefore at home but a dive into reality “in itself and outside of itself”. The fact remains, if we want to use current categories, that it comes from the writings of the self, the “I” with an autobiographical dimension to go quickly. But an “I” whose experience resonates in each and everyone, an “I” which is in the opening and not the closing, an “I” which is immediately ours, beyond the borders of sex, class , of country. Annie Ernaux’s work is the very one which, rooted in intimacy, makes ours play in refraction. A sensitive and strong work, intimate and committed. The awarding of the Nobel is an infinite joy for those who love the work of Annie Ernaux, a strong and luminous reward for a work that is just as important.
Notebook Annie Ernaux (Editions de L’Herne, 320 pages, 33 €)