Annie Ernaux, 2022 Literature Nobel Prize laureate

Annie Ernaux received the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature “for the courage and clinical acuity with which she uncovers the roots, estrangements and collective restraints of personal memory”. Although a prolific and successful writer who from the 1970s has tackled personal and provocative subjects (such as abortion and female sexuality), she has often been criticized for the alleged poverty of her style. 

Ernaux follows French Nobel literature laureates Patrick Modiano (2014) and Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio (2008), as well as Claude Simon (1985), Jean-Paul Sartre (1964), Saint-John Perse (1960), Albert Camus (1957), François Mauriac (1952), André Gide (1947), Roger Martin du Gard (1937), Henri Bergson (1927), Anatole France (1921), Romain Rolland (1915), Frédéric Mistral (1904), and the now relatively forgotten Sully Prudhomme (1901).

Ernaux also joins the small group of female French Nobel laureates who have been distinguished in other fields: Marie Skłodowska Curie (1934) and Irène Joliot-Curie (1935), for their work on radiation; Françoise Barré-Sinoussi (2008), for the discovery of HIV; Emmanuelle Marie Charpentier (2020) who researches genome editing; and Esther Duflo Banerjee (2019) for her work against global poverty.

Here is a bibliography based on holdings at Cambridge University Library (UL) and at the Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics (MMLL); some of these works are also available as ebooks.

Main works of Annie Ernaux:

• Le jeune homme. Gallimard, 2022, 2022.7.186
• Mémoire de fille. Gallimard, 2016, C204.d.5807; A girl’s story / translated by Alison L. Strayer. London: Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2020, electronic legal deposit
• Regarde les lumières, mon amour. Seuil, 2014, C3BE, C203.d.7560
• Retour à Yvetot. Éditions du Mauconduit, 2013, C203.d.7809
• L’atelier noir. Busclats, 2011, UL, LSF; MMLL, F7.ERNA.10
• Écrire la vie. Gallimard, c2011 [A compilation of Ernaux’s works], C203.d.473 ; MMLL F7.ERNA.11 :1-2
• L’autre fille. NiL, c2011, F7.ERNA.9
• Les années. Gallimard, c2008, C201.d.4733; The Years / translated by Alison L. Strayer. London: Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2018, electronic legal deposit
• L’usage de la photo / Annie Ernaux, Marc Marie. Gallimard, c2005, UL, LSF; MMLL, F7.ERNA.13
• L’occupation, Gallimard, c2002, 2004.7.302
• Se perdre, Gallimard, 2001, C200.d.1405
• La vie extérieure: 1993-1999, Gallimard, c2000, 2002.7.149
• L’événement, Gallimard, 2000, UL, 2003.7.521; MMLL, F7.ERNA.7:1-2; Happening / translated by Tanya Leslie. London: Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2019, electronic legal deposit
• Une femme. Gallimard, 1989; 1992 printing, UL, 1999.7.1300; 2011 printing, MMLL, F7.ERNA.3:1–5
  A woman’s story / translated by Tanya Leslie. London: Quartet, 1990, 1992.7.215 
• Journal du dehors, Gallimard, c1993, UL, 1999.7.1368; 1999 printing, MMLL, F7.ERNA.5; Exteriors / translated by Tanya Leslie. London: Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2021, electronic legal deposit
• La femme gelée, Gallimard, 1998, c1981, MMLL, F7.ERNA.1, UL, 1999.7.1338
• Les armoires vides, Gallimard, c1974; 1998 printing, 1999.7.1336
• Je ne suis pas sortie de ma nuit, Gallimard, c1997, 9003.d.7165; 1999 printing, UL, 9003.d.7165; 2001 printing, MMLL, F7.ERNA.6; I Remain in Darkness / translated by Tanya Leslie. London: Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2019, electronic legal deposit
• Ce qu’ils disent ou rien, Gallimard, 1997, c1977, UL, 1999.7.1337; Do what they say or else / translated by Christopher Beach and Carrie Noland. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2022, Ebook Central DDA
• La honte, Gallimard, c1997, 9003.d.6805
• Passion simple, Gallimard, c1991, 1999.7.1367; 2001 printing, MMLL F7.ERNA.4:1-2 and UL 1999.7.1367; Passion perfect / translated by Tanya Leslie. London: Quartet, 1993. 1995.7.2079; Simple passion. London: Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2021, electronic legal deposit
• La place, Gallimard, c1983, 1997 printing, MMLL, F7.ERNA.2:1–5; edited by P.M. Wetherill, London: Methuen Educational, c1983, 1987 printing, UL, 9735.d.3273; Positions / translated by Tanya Leslie. London: Quartet, 1991, 9001.d.614; A man’s place. New York: Seven Stories Press, c2012; London: Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2020, electronic legal deposit

Interviews:

• Le vrai lieu: entretiens avec Michelle Porte. Gallimard, 2014, C3BE, C204.d.491
• L’écriture comme un couteau; entretien avec Frédéric-Yves Jeannet, Stock, c2003, UL C3BE, C202.c.3633, MMLL, F7.ERNA.12
• Écrire, écrire, pourquoi ? Annie Ernaux: entretien avec Raphaëlle Rérolle, Éditions de la Bibliothèque publique d’information, 2011, DOAB Directory of Open Access Books

Critical studies:

• Cahiers Ernaux / sous la direction de Pierre-Louis Fort. Herne, 2022, 701:01.b.10.138
• Annie Ernaux: un engagement d’écriture / Pierre-Louis Fort et Violaine Houdart-Merot éds, Presses Sorbonne Nouvelle, 2015, online, C210.c.8638
• Annie Ernaux: l’intertextualité / sous la direction de Robert Kahn, Laurence Macé et Françoise Simonet-Tenant, Mont-Saint-Aignan: Presses universitaires de Rouen et du Havre, 2015, 738:47.c.201.353
• Annie Ernaux: le temps et la mémoire / Francine Best, Bruno Blanckeman, Francine Dugast-Portes; avec la participation d’Annie Ernaux. Colloque de Cerisy, Stock, 2014, C209.c.3840
• Annie Ernaux: se mettre en gage pour dire le monde / Thomas Hunkeler et Marc-Henry Soulet éds. Genève: Métis Presses, c2012, C203.d.1165
• La Place d’Annie Ernaux, Analyse de L’oeuvre / Lise Ageorges, Brussels: Lemaitre Publishing, 2011, online
• Annie Ernaux: de la perte au corps glorieux / Michèle Bacholle-Bošković. Rennes: Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2011, C206.c.8297 and online
• Annie Ernaux: se perdre dans l’écriture de soi / sous la direction de Danielle Bajomée et Juliette Dor. Klincksieck, c2011, 738:47.c.201.134
• Escenas de la vida de Annie Ernaux: diario de lecturas, 2005-2008 / Moisés Mori. Oviedo: KRK, 2011, C202.d.6883
• Annie Ernaux: perspectives critiques / textes réunis par Sergio Villani. New York: Legas, c2009, 738:47.c.200.784
• Annie Ernaux, une poétique de la transgression / Elise Hugueny-Léger, Bern: Peter Lang, 2009, UL C205.c.368; MMLL F7.ERNA.205 :1–2
• Annie Ernaux: étude de l’œuvre / Francine Dugast-Portes, Bordas, c2008, LSF
• Writing shame and desire: the work of Annie Ernaux / Loraine Day. Oxford: Peter Lang, 2007, 738:47.c.200.688
• Annie Ernaux : une oeuvre de l’entre-deux / études réunies par Fabrice Thumerel. Arras : Artois presses université, c2004, 738:47.c.200.209
• Annie Ernaux: The Return to Origins / Siobhán McIlvanney. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2001, online; UL, 2002.9.311, 738:47.c.200.20; MMLL, F7.ERNA.206
• »Du mauvais goût«: Annie Ernauxs Bildungsaufstieg als literatur- und gesellschaftskritische Selbstzerstörung; Eine Untersuchung ihres Werks mithilfe textlinguistischer, psychologischer und soziologischer Kriterien / Heike Ina Kuhl. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag, 2001. 701:22.c.17.33; 2016 reprint, de Gruyter eBooks Complete
• Annie Ernaux: an introduction to the writer and her audience / Lyn Thomas, Oxford: Berg, 1999, UL, 738:47.c.95.1363; MMLL, F7.ERNA.203:2
• Annie Ernaux, ou, L’exil intérieur / Claire-Lise Tondeur, Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1996, 735:07.c.11.28
• La place et Une femme d’Annie Ernaux / Marie-France Savéan, Gallimard, 1994, MMLL, F7.ERNA.204:1–2
• Annie Ernaux / Denis Fernandez-Recatala, Monaco, Éditions du Rocher, 1994, 9004.d.8030.
• Ernaux: La place, Une femme / Loraine Day & Tony Jones, Glasgow: University of Glasgow French and German Publications, 1990, UL, L735.c.71.10; 1995, MMLL, F7.ERNA.200:1-3

Many more academic studies analyse Ernaux’s works along those of other writers such as Jean Genet, Sophie Calle, Marguerite Duras, Roland Barthes, Marcel Proust, Pierre Michon, Nathalie Sarraute, Marie Redonnet, Jeanne Hyvrard, etc. You can find them in iDiscover.

Irene Fabry-Tehranchi

Short film of INA : Annie Ernaux presents “La place” dedicated to her father (1984).