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El hombre joven
Annie Ernaux cuenta en estas páginas la relación que mantuvo con un hombre más joven que ella. Una experiencia que la hizo volver a ser, durante varios meses, la «chica escandalosa» de su juventud. Un viaje en el tiempo que le permitió atravesar una etapa decisiva en su escritura.
«A menudo he hecho el amor para obligarme a escribir. Quería encontrar en el cansancio, en el desamparo que le siguen, razones para no aguardar ya nada de la vida. Tenía la esperanza de que el final de la expectativa más imperiosa, la del orgasmo, me hiciera sentir la certeza de que no había goce superior al de la escritura de un libro. Quizá ese deseo de desencadenar la escritura del libro fue el que me condujo a llevar a A. a mi casa a tomar una copa después de cenar en un restaurante donde, por timidez, había permanecido prácticamente mudo. Era casi treinta años más joven que yo.»
«A menudo he hecho el amor para obligarme a escribir. Quería encontrar en el cansancio, en el desamparo que le siguen, razones para no aguardar ya nada de la vida. Tenía la esperanza de que el final de la expectativa más imperiosa, la del orgasmo, me hiciera sentir la certeza de que no había goce superior al de la escritura de un libro. Quizá ese deseo de desencadenar la escritura del libro fue el que me condujo a llevar a A. a mi casa a tomar una copa después de cenar en un restaurante donde, por timidez, había permanecido prácticamente mudo. Era casi treinta años más joven que yo.»
46 pages, Paperback
First published May 5, 2022
190 people are currently reading
10455 people want to read
About the author
Annie Ernaux
79 books10.3k followersThe author of some twenty works of fiction and memoir, Annie Ernaux is considered by many to be France’s most important writer. In 2022, she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. She has also won the Prix Renaudot for A Man's Place and the Marguerite Yourcenar Prize for her body of work. More recently she received the International Strega Prize, the Prix Formentor, the French-American Translation Prize, and the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation for The Years, which was also shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize in 2019. Her other works include Exteriors, A Girl's Story, A Woman's Story, The Possession, Simple Passion, Happening, I Remain in Darkness, Shame, A Frozen Woman, and A Man's Place.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 2,182 reviews
December 5, 2025
This is my third Ernaux. I keep coming back because I am convinced I’m missing something. I’ll probably try another, but I’m disappointed again. It’s like she writes in order to rid the memory of saturation, putting her life through a sepia wash. Desiccated and detached. Maybe I haven’t read the right work yet, and I’ll be happy if my mind changes someday.
July 31, 2024
Just like the four books that I read previously of Annie Ernaux, reading her The young man left me conflicted, coaxing me into ruminating more than I had suspected on the moment I closed the booklet, a flimsy forty pages one can read in the twinkling of an eye. This account was partly written in 1988-90, immediately after the end of this episode in her life, and picked up again and rewritten in 2022.
Reflecting on the relationship that she had in her early fifties with a student almost thirty years her
junior, Ernaux in her typical clinical, pared-down style touches on her usual themes of time, memory, writing, class struggle and social mobility. She needs to write to live and she needs to live to write: "If I don't write them down, things didn't come to an end, they were only lived." Spending their time together in a room in Rouen in front of the hospital where she once had an abortion, being together with the young man catapults her back to her youth, her working class background, her past sexual experiences in shabby and unheated rooms with men that have become as impersonal and fungible in her memory like undergarments.
Openly affirming the relationship in the outside world, she questions the dominant views in society on relationships between men and women showing a huge age gap: admiring and envious towards older men with a woman at their side who could be their daughter; rueful, unforgiving and taunting towards women who dare to engage in a relationship with a much younger man. In Dutch there is a saying that an old billy goat still likes a green leaf which has rather a playful connotation; for old women comes the expression that an old barn burns easily which has more denigratory and furtive undertones, as if such desire of women at riper age is more dangerous.
In her radical honesty, she doesn’t beat around the bush. She sketches how she uses the young man for her own needs of reviving her youth memories and experiences: "He was the bearer of the memory of my first world". "With him I went through all the ages of life, my life."
She revels in being able to dominate him intellectually and economically, also finding pleasure in rivalling with other women about him, cherishing the feeling of being the chosen one when he leaves the companion of his own age for her, enjoying the ambiguity of taking him to the same theater play like she took her son. She is his mistress, not in BDSM, but in initiating him, on her terms, to films, music and literature, more bourgeois food tastes. Somehow she seems to need society’s disapproving gaze, reminding her of dressing provocatively in her youth – maybe that gaze is mostly her own, one that she created in her own mind, a certain desire to be scandalous.
Perhaps unwillingly, in her fervent and ruthless demonstration that she is capable of acting in the same careless way with a younger man as men doing the same to a younger woman, she shows why an age gap might be problematic in a relationship, rather than giving an illustration of (mutual) empowerment and freedom. I admit I find witnessing this kind of instrumentalisation of people discomforting, whatever gender is on the receiving side and serves as a youth exilir - or writing material; it reminded me the undermining effects of toxic leadership in a work context, behaviour which is not a unique predisposition of one gender and of which one can wonder if the possibility of copying such imbalance of power into one’s personal relationships is really something that is desirable, only for the sake of advocating a certain concept of feminism (her statement that writing for her has been a kind of intimate revenge comes to mind).
The more I read by Annie Ernaux, the harder it becomes to attune to the voice of the persona emerging from her pages, while at the same time she takes me on a train of thought that I cannot stop, igniting a wish to understand why her voice at the same time sounds strangely familiar (the class issues, her political views) and disturbingly alien (the navel-gazing, the egotism) - bien étonné de me trouver ensemble with traditionalist, conservative and right-wing criticism of her prose as being “characterised by semantic poverty and minimal syntax in the service of a self-serving narrative”. (Le Figaro).
While reading this book, I came across a comment from Violeta in which she quotes this observation of Milan Kundera:
"Suspending moral judgment is not the immorality of the novel; it is its morality. The morality that stands against the ineradicable human habit of judging instantly, ceaselessly, and everyone; of judging before, and in the absence of, understanding. From the viewpoint of the novel's wisdom, that fervid readiness to judge is the most detestable stupidity, the most pernicious evil. Not that the novelist utterly denies that moral judgment is legitimate, but that he refuses it a place in the novel. If you like, you can accuse Panurge of cowardice, accuse Emma Bovary, accuse Rastignac—that's your business; the novelist has nothing to do with it."
Maybe reading Ernaux brings out the old grumpy moralist in me – just because her work isn’t novelistic and it has become impossible to separate the writer from the work. It is uncomfortably true to life, messy, edgy and disruptive. Maybe that is why I continue to read her.
Reflecting on the relationship that she had in her early fifties with a student almost thirty years her
junior, Ernaux in her typical clinical, pared-down style touches on her usual themes of time, memory, writing, class struggle and social mobility. She needs to write to live and she needs to live to write: "If I don't write them down, things didn't come to an end, they were only lived." Spending their time together in a room in Rouen in front of the hospital where she once had an abortion, being together with the young man catapults her back to her youth, her working class background, her past sexual experiences in shabby and unheated rooms with men that have become as impersonal and fungible in her memory like undergarments.
Openly affirming the relationship in the outside world, she questions the dominant views in society on relationships between men and women showing a huge age gap: admiring and envious towards older men with a woman at their side who could be their daughter; rueful, unforgiving and taunting towards women who dare to engage in a relationship with a much younger man. In Dutch there is a saying that an old billy goat still likes a green leaf which has rather a playful connotation; for old women comes the expression that an old barn burns easily which has more denigratory and furtive undertones, as if such desire of women at riper age is more dangerous.
In her radical honesty, she doesn’t beat around the bush. She sketches how she uses the young man for her own needs of reviving her youth memories and experiences: "He was the bearer of the memory of my first world". "With him I went through all the ages of life, my life."
She revels in being able to dominate him intellectually and economically, also finding pleasure in rivalling with other women about him, cherishing the feeling of being the chosen one when he leaves the companion of his own age for her, enjoying the ambiguity of taking him to the same theater play like she took her son. She is his mistress, not in BDSM, but in initiating him, on her terms, to films, music and literature, more bourgeois food tastes. Somehow she seems to need society’s disapproving gaze, reminding her of dressing provocatively in her youth – maybe that gaze is mostly her own, one that she created in her own mind, a certain desire to be scandalous.
Perhaps unwillingly, in her fervent and ruthless demonstration that she is capable of acting in the same careless way with a younger man as men doing the same to a younger woman, she shows why an age gap might be problematic in a relationship, rather than giving an illustration of (mutual) empowerment and freedom. I admit I find witnessing this kind of instrumentalisation of people discomforting, whatever gender is on the receiving side and serves as a youth exilir - or writing material; it reminded me the undermining effects of toxic leadership in a work context, behaviour which is not a unique predisposition of one gender and of which one can wonder if the possibility of copying such imbalance of power into one’s personal relationships is really something that is desirable, only for the sake of advocating a certain concept of feminism (her statement that writing for her has been a kind of intimate revenge comes to mind).
The more I read by Annie Ernaux, the harder it becomes to attune to the voice of the persona emerging from her pages, while at the same time she takes me on a train of thought that I cannot stop, igniting a wish to understand why her voice at the same time sounds strangely familiar (the class issues, her political views) and disturbingly alien (the navel-gazing, the egotism) - bien étonné de me trouver ensemble with traditionalist, conservative and right-wing criticism of her prose as being “characterised by semantic poverty and minimal syntax in the service of a self-serving narrative”. (Le Figaro).
While reading this book, I came across a comment from Violeta in which she quotes this observation of Milan Kundera:
"Suspending moral judgment is not the immorality of the novel; it is its morality. The morality that stands against the ineradicable human habit of judging instantly, ceaselessly, and everyone; of judging before, and in the absence of, understanding. From the viewpoint of the novel's wisdom, that fervid readiness to judge is the most detestable stupidity, the most pernicious evil. Not that the novelist utterly denies that moral judgment is legitimate, but that he refuses it a place in the novel. If you like, you can accuse Panurge of cowardice, accuse Emma Bovary, accuse Rastignac—that's your business; the novelist has nothing to do with it."
Maybe reading Ernaux brings out the old grumpy moralist in me – just because her work isn’t novelistic and it has become impossible to separate the writer from the work. It is uncomfortably true to life, messy, edgy and disruptive. Maybe that is why I continue to read her.
December 31, 2023
Every time Annie Ernaux has an affair she writes a book about it. Thanks to Fitzcarraldo, I know all about her love life. In this case, she has an affair with a much younger man while she was in her 50w (I think). It seems it wasn’t too much to say about the love story, as the book is very slim. It is not her best and I definitely recommend it only to her die hard fans, like me :)
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August 10, 2024
I love that so much of Annie Ernaux’s work is like
A.E.: Would you like to hear about a scandelous affair I had?
Me: ABSOLUTELY
And then I perch eagerly at her feet and we drink the exquisite wine that is her prose and get all the juicy details that often come as an outpouring of emotional intensity like a faucet with both handles on full. Ernaux writes with no shame and an eagerness to explore the philosophical undercurrents of her life and memory—an exquisite quality that made her more than deserving of her Nobel Prize in 2022—and we see this in her latest offering, Young Man, about an affair she had in her mid-fifties with a university student nearly 30 years her junior. A rather slim volume, Young Man feels more like a short biographical story even compared to her usual 90ish page books, perhaps as this one is more tempered in emotions than, say, the volatile passions of The Possession. Here she gives much of the space to probing self-examinations of her actions that still leave you satisfied, and we see in her writing the fulfillment of her epigraph ‘if I don’t write things down, they haven’t been carried through to completion, they have only been lived.’ Complete with several pages of photographs from the time of the affair, a short autobiography, and lovingly translated by Alison Strayer, Young Man is a tiny morsel of delight for Ernaux fan’s that contemplates themes on aging, power and gender dynamics, and they ways we dig at our own perceptions of self through our juxtapositions with others.
‘My main reason for wanting our story to continue was that, in a sense, it was already over and I was a fictional character.’
Ernaux writes biography like a searing character study of a novel, so bold and unabashed in honesty and insights and always delivered on immaculate sentences that arrive as ‘a series of hits or punches,’ as Amina Cain describes her in her book on writing, A Horse at Night. Originally written 20 years ago right after the affair in the book took place and revised for publication in France in 2022, Young Man has Ernaux mapping her emotional introspections of what this affair with a much younger man meant to her. She admits to being aware of the power-imbalance (‘I was in a dominant position’), aware that others consider her relationship inappropriate, and does admit ‘I used the weapons of that dominance, whose fragility, in a romantic relationship, I nonetheless recognized’ but it is less about justifying herself or apologizing or even any moral judgment and more just about capturing what she was feeling. The whole power imbalance is a lot to consider, and while she does discuss this in terms of the double standard that men often date women uncomfortably younger than them without social shame it doesn’t necessarily come across as if she thought she was giving an attempt at subversive feminism or something.
Though this does touch on a double standard of aging and, as French writer Mona Chollet says, ‘Men don’t age better than women, they’re just allowed to age,’ which is another aspect of older men dating young women as a sort of status symbol to show for themselves ‘their decay is not counted against them.’ She does admit, however, that her reasoning behind the affair is largely the similar: to recapture her own youth. In looking at the young man’s young face ‘mine was young too’ without the reminder of aging she saw in her own husband. ‘Men have known this forever, and I saw no reason to deprive myself.’ With Ernaux you know you are going to get honesty.
‘A mature woman appeared to be more dangerous than a young woman.’
She discusses the frequent looks of disapproval she gets but doesn’t allow them to bother her but ‘reinforced my determination.’ It becomes a way for her to re-experience youth, such as introducing him to places and art new to him that makes them suddenly new for her as well, and she thrives off it. ‘I felt as if I were the same outrageous girl again,’ she writes in reference to a time when, at age 18, her mother felt scandalized by a tight dress she wore drawing a lot of attention, ‘this time, without the slightest sense of shame, but a sense of victory.’ Though she is still always aware of that age gap and how the relationship often makes them both neither of their own generation or the other’s.
Young Man is a bit slight, even for Ernaux, but it is still a nice foray into the aspects of her books that remind me why I keep coming back for more. She is always open and honest, even admitting this whole thing was about her and it wasn’t like she compared him to other men but that all men were basically just one blurr in a photo with herself as the focus. It’s a slice of life shaken up with all its pockets turned out to collect any riches of living that can be examined and valued, and I love that about her works. She charms me every time and I can’t wait for more of her good gossip.
3.5/5
‘I felt only the sweetness of my own continuity and the consistency of my desire.’
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
Thanks to Seven Stories Press for sending me this amazing Annie Ernaux metal font hat for preordering a bunch of her books, because now she and I have matching hats and that pretty much makes us besties, right?
A.E.: Would you like to hear about a scandelous affair I had?
Me: ABSOLUTELY
And then I perch eagerly at her feet and we drink the exquisite wine that is her prose and get all the juicy details that often come as an outpouring of emotional intensity like a faucet with both handles on full. Ernaux writes with no shame and an eagerness to explore the philosophical undercurrents of her life and memory—an exquisite quality that made her more than deserving of her Nobel Prize in 2022—and we see this in her latest offering, Young Man, about an affair she had in her mid-fifties with a university student nearly 30 years her junior. A rather slim volume, Young Man feels more like a short biographical story even compared to her usual 90ish page books, perhaps as this one is more tempered in emotions than, say, the volatile passions of The Possession. Here she gives much of the space to probing self-examinations of her actions that still leave you satisfied, and we see in her writing the fulfillment of her epigraph ‘if I don’t write things down, they haven’t been carried through to completion, they have only been lived.’ Complete with several pages of photographs from the time of the affair, a short autobiography, and lovingly translated by Alison Strayer, Young Man is a tiny morsel of delight for Ernaux fan’s that contemplates themes on aging, power and gender dynamics, and they ways we dig at our own perceptions of self through our juxtapositions with others.
‘My main reason for wanting our story to continue was that, in a sense, it was already over and I was a fictional character.’
Ernaux writes biography like a searing character study of a novel, so bold and unabashed in honesty and insights and always delivered on immaculate sentences that arrive as ‘a series of hits or punches,’ as Amina Cain describes her in her book on writing, A Horse at Night. Originally written 20 years ago right after the affair in the book took place and revised for publication in France in 2022, Young Man has Ernaux mapping her emotional introspections of what this affair with a much younger man meant to her. She admits to being aware of the power-imbalance (‘I was in a dominant position’), aware that others consider her relationship inappropriate, and does admit ‘I used the weapons of that dominance, whose fragility, in a romantic relationship, I nonetheless recognized’ but it is less about justifying herself or apologizing or even any moral judgment and more just about capturing what she was feeling. The whole power imbalance is a lot to consider, and while she does discuss this in terms of the double standard that men often date women uncomfortably younger than them without social shame it doesn’t necessarily come across as if she thought she was giving an attempt at subversive feminism or something.
Though this does touch on a double standard of aging and, as French writer Mona Chollet says, ‘Men don’t age better than women, they’re just allowed to age,’ which is another aspect of older men dating young women as a sort of status symbol to show for themselves ‘their decay is not counted against them.’ She does admit, however, that her reasoning behind the affair is largely the similar: to recapture her own youth. In looking at the young man’s young face ‘mine was young too’ without the reminder of aging she saw in her own husband. ‘Men have known this forever, and I saw no reason to deprive myself.’ With Ernaux you know you are going to get honesty.
‘A mature woman appeared to be more dangerous than a young woman.’
She discusses the frequent looks of disapproval she gets but doesn’t allow them to bother her but ‘reinforced my determination.’ It becomes a way for her to re-experience youth, such as introducing him to places and art new to him that makes them suddenly new for her as well, and she thrives off it. ‘I felt as if I were the same outrageous girl again,’ she writes in reference to a time when, at age 18, her mother felt scandalized by a tight dress she wore drawing a lot of attention, ‘this time, without the slightest sense of shame, but a sense of victory.’ Though she is still always aware of that age gap and how the relationship often makes them both neither of their own generation or the other’s.
Young Man is a bit slight, even for Ernaux, but it is still a nice foray into the aspects of her books that remind me why I keep coming back for more. She is always open and honest, even admitting this whole thing was about her and it wasn’t like she compared him to other men but that all men were basically just one blurr in a photo with herself as the focus. It’s a slice of life shaken up with all its pockets turned out to collect any riches of living that can be examined and valued, and I love that about her works. She charms me every time and I can’t wait for more of her good gossip.
3.5/5
‘I felt only the sweetness of my own continuity and the consistency of my desire.’
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
Thanks to Seven Stories Press for sending me this amazing Annie Ernaux metal font hat for preordering a bunch of her books, because now she and I have matching hats and that pretty much makes us besties, right?
October 4, 2023
The Young Man by Annie Ernaux is a Unique Non-Fiction Listening Experience!
I feel like I've just walked through Annie Ernaux's head...
Random thoughts. Pieces and parts. It feels like miscellaneous notes jotted down on napkins and slips of paper, shoved into pockets and purses, retrieved much later and stored in a private place, then brought together for a short reflection on memories of the past.
The author describes her affair with a university student thirty years her junior where a relationship soon develops without any expectations of a future together. She feels the present is enough.
As Annie lives in the moment with him, her memories swirl, and her story wanders between being a child and her current age of fifty-four years. She credits her relationship with this much younger man as the catalyst for her ability to travel through her life, in her head. While with him and watching him, she sees parts of her younger self in him.
Thirty years earlier, perhaps a comparison to their disparity in age, she never would have chosen to be with him. When they are together in public, being covertly watched, she is the one who stirs the most curiosity. An older woman with a younger man? It's not the norm, yet only one of them is judged....
The Young Man audiobook is a 34M listen narrated by Tavia Gilbert, who captures the essence of Annie Ernaux's words and delivers them perfectly.
The Young Man is a book that generates thoughtful reflection about what's been read. Despite its short length, I don't need to know anything more about this relationship. What's provided is a frank, deeply personal, and boldly revealing snapshot. I enjoyed my first adventure with this Nobel Prize winning author. I now understand the allure of her simple prose and unique topics, and I will be returning for a second look at her work soon.
3.75⭐rounded up!
Thank you to NetGalley, Dreamscape Media, and Annie Ernaux for an ALC of this book. It has been an honor to give my honest and voluntary review.
I feel like I've just walked through Annie Ernaux's head...
Random thoughts. Pieces and parts. It feels like miscellaneous notes jotted down on napkins and slips of paper, shoved into pockets and purses, retrieved much later and stored in a private place, then brought together for a short reflection on memories of the past.
The author describes her affair with a university student thirty years her junior where a relationship soon develops without any expectations of a future together. She feels the present is enough.
As Annie lives in the moment with him, her memories swirl, and her story wanders between being a child and her current age of fifty-four years. She credits her relationship with this much younger man as the catalyst for her ability to travel through her life, in her head. While with him and watching him, she sees parts of her younger self in him.
Thirty years earlier, perhaps a comparison to their disparity in age, she never would have chosen to be with him. When they are together in public, being covertly watched, she is the one who stirs the most curiosity. An older woman with a younger man? It's not the norm, yet only one of them is judged....
The Young Man audiobook is a 34M listen narrated by Tavia Gilbert, who captures the essence of Annie Ernaux's words and delivers them perfectly.
The Young Man is a book that generates thoughtful reflection about what's been read. Despite its short length, I don't need to know anything more about this relationship. What's provided is a frank, deeply personal, and boldly revealing snapshot. I enjoyed my first adventure with this Nobel Prize winning author. I now understand the allure of her simple prose and unique topics, and I will be returning for a second look at her work soon.
3.75⭐rounded up!
Thank you to NetGalley, Dreamscape Media, and Annie Ernaux for an ALC of this book. It has been an honor to give my honest and voluntary review.
July 15, 2025
لا نتمكن من المعرفة الحقيقية للحاضر إلا في المستقبل.
نرغب دائماً في العودة للماضي لنواجهه بنسختنا الحاضرة "الأنضج عقلياً"، ولنمحو أخطاءنا أو نعيش لحظة بسعادة لم نكن ندرك قيمتها وقت حدوثها.
ولأن العودة بالزمن للوراء هى ضرب من الخيال، استعانت آني أرنو بشاب يصغرها بثلاثين عاماً. ليعود بها بالزمن-ليس لمجرد رغبة جسدية أو تجديداً لشبابٍ مضى-بل الأهم هو العودة لماضيها الذي ساعدت تلك العلاقة في استعادته وتأمله وإعادة عيشه برؤية المرأة الناضجة "العارفة العليمة" بأثر الفعل والحدث في ما سبق من حياتها.
لم تنشغل "أرنو" برد فعل من حولها على علاقة عجيبة مثل علاقتها مع هذا الشاب. لم يكن هو نفسه يشغلها بقدر ما انشغلت بمراقبة نفسها من خلال وجوده في حياتها، ومن خلال نظرته لها كامرأة والتي أعادت لها إحساساً قد نسيته.
وكما كَتبْت هى في نهاية حكايتها، عندما وصلت للحظة "الإدراك"، قامت بعملية إجهاضه أو الرحيل عنه. لتبدأ في كتابة أكثر وعياً لتلك الماضي التي استطاعت أن تفك الكثير من شفراته بعد تلك العلاقة.
هل تفهمت منطق الكاتبة فيما فعلته؟ بصراحة لم أستطع أن أضع نفسي تماما في مكانها كما أفعل مع الكثير من الأعمال الأدبية وأتوحد مع البطلة بمشاعرها وأفعالها. ولكن صراحتها مع نفسها ومع تجربتها كانت بالفعل شيئا مثيرا للأهتمام والإعجاب.
تلك كانت المحاولة الوحيدة الناجحة لي مع آني أرنو بعد محاولتان فاشلتان لم استطع معهما أن اتقبل كتابتها.
نرغب دائماً في العودة للماضي لنواجهه بنسختنا الحاضرة "الأنضج عقلياً"، ولنمحو أخطاءنا أو نعيش لحظة بسعادة لم نكن ندرك قيمتها وقت حدوثها.
ولأن العودة بالزمن للوراء هى ضرب من الخيال، استعانت آني أرنو بشاب يصغرها بثلاثين عاماً. ليعود بها بالزمن-ليس لمجرد رغبة جسدية أو تجديداً لشبابٍ مضى-بل الأهم هو العودة لماضيها الذي ساعدت تلك العلاقة في استعادته وتأمله وإعادة عيشه برؤية المرأة الناضجة "العارفة العليمة" بأثر الفعل والحدث في ما سبق من حياتها.
لم تنشغل "أرنو" برد فعل من حولها على علاقة عجيبة مثل علاقتها مع هذا الشاب. لم يكن هو نفسه يشغلها بقدر ما انشغلت بمراقبة نفسها من خلال وجوده في حياتها، ومن خلال نظرته لها كامرأة والتي أعادت لها إحساساً قد نسيته.
وكما كَتبْت هى في نهاية حكايتها، عندما وصلت للحظة "الإدراك"، قامت بعملية إجهاضه أو الرحيل عنه. لتبدأ في كتابة أكثر وعياً لتلك الماضي التي استطاعت أن تفك الكثير من شفراته بعد تلك العلاقة.
هل تفهمت منطق الكاتبة فيما فعلته؟ بصراحة لم أستطع أن أضع نفسي تماما في مكانها كما أفعل مع الكثير من الأعمال الأدبية وأتوحد مع البطلة بمشاعرها وأفعالها. ولكن صراحتها مع نفسها ومع تجربتها كانت بالفعل شيئا مثيرا للأهتمام والإعجاب.
تلك كانت المحاولة الوحيدة الناجحة لي مع آني أرنو بعد محاولتان فاشلتان لم استطع معهما أن اتقبل كتابتها.
Want to read
May 22, 2024going to become an ernaux girl
April 24, 2023
Pues ya está, leído en media hora. Podía dar para mucho el tema, pero apenas esboza su sentir. Estoy pensando después, que un tema tan autobiográfico difícilmente puede armar una novela completa.
Parece como si el editor le hubiera dicho: "¡Annie, que te han dado el Nobel! hay que publicar algo", y ella: "Espera espera que tuve un amor con un muchacho joven, dame un par de horas y te lo mando".
Parece como si el editor le hubiera dicho: "¡Annie, que te han dado el Nobel! hay que publicar algo", y ella: "Espera espera que tuve un amor con un muchacho joven, dame un par de horas y te lo mando".
October 15, 2023
Si je ne les écris pas, les choses ne sont pas allées jusqu'à leur terme, elles ont été seulement vécues.
(If I don’t write things down, they haven’t been carried through to completion, they have only been lived.)
In this, rather a diary entry than a short story, the fifty-something Ernaux recounts her love affair with a student she calls A. who was thirty years her junior at the time.
I read this, because this was the only book I hadn’t read by Ernaux. As the friends who are interested in my reviews know, I love Annie herself, her style of writing and her brusqueness and honesty.
So, if you decide to read an Ernaux, I recommend her ‘Happening’, ‘The Years’, A girl’s Story’, ‘I Remain in Darkness’ and ‘Simple Passion’.
(If I don’t write things down, they haven’t been carried through to completion, they have only been lived.)
In this, rather a diary entry than a short story, the fifty-something Ernaux recounts her love affair with a student she calls A. who was thirty years her junior at the time.
I read this, because this was the only book I hadn’t read by Ernaux. As the friends who are interested in my reviews know, I love Annie herself, her style of writing and her brusqueness and honesty.
So, if you decide to read an Ernaux, I recommend her ‘Happening’, ‘The Years’, A girl’s Story’, ‘I Remain in Darkness’ and ‘Simple Passion’.
July 24, 2025
Le Jeune Homme’s Lament
Sure I had an affair with Annie Ernaux
The famous French writer you all should know
Do I see this as a major achievement?
My answer would have to be both yes and no
Not everyone can say he once bagged a winner
Who would always pay for his cocktails at dinner
Who turned a poor student into a sex god
And made him feel like a saint and a sinner
But why did she write such a miniscule book
About our love affair which for me shook
The very foundations of my universe
Leaving me empty as a coat on a hook?
What am I now but an A. on the page?
The faded memory of some by-gone age
An age not even that memorable
Was I merely a prop from her stage?
So yes I had sex with Annie Ernaux
Which was pretty awesome Nobel or no
She’s a great lady and a wonderful writer
I’m just kinda wishing her book had been brighter
April 7, 2025
Nunca me he sentido cómoda con las diferencias prominentes de edad. Independientemente de qué tan mayorcitos estén los que deciden salir con el anciano.
Esta historia nos deja en claro lo consciente que son los adultos mayores que deciden salir con adultos jóvenes. O con menores. El pensar en ese poder que tiene por sobre la persona que apenas inicia su vida les excita más que un cuerpo joven y sin arrugas.
Creo que Annie es una figura por de más controversial. Y aunque esta parte de su vida no me gustó en lo absoluto, siento intriga respecto a otras partes de sus narraciones. Me declaro culpable de mis curiosidades y alimento el ego de una mujer que tomó provecho de un hombre joven.
Blegh. Son mis propios prejuicios los que me hacen disgustar de este libro. Si ustedes no tienen un problema con este tipo de historias, puede que les guste.
Quizá si fuera ficción lo habría degustado como una pieza exquisita respecto al notorio abuso de poder en este tipo de relaciones. Pero al ser una pieza autobiográfica solo siento disgusto.
Esta historia nos deja en claro lo consciente que son los adultos mayores que deciden salir con adultos jóvenes. O con menores. El pensar en ese poder que tiene por sobre la persona que apenas inicia su vida les excita más que un cuerpo joven y sin arrugas.
Creo que Annie es una figura por de más controversial. Y aunque esta parte de su vida no me gustó en lo absoluto, siento intriga respecto a otras partes de sus narraciones. Me declaro culpable de mis curiosidades y alimento el ego de una mujer que tomó provecho de un hombre joven.
Blegh. Son mis propios prejuicios los que me hacen disgustar de este libro. Si ustedes no tienen un problema con este tipo de historias, puede que les guste.
Quizá si fuera ficción lo habría degustado como una pieza exquisita respecto al notorio abuso de poder en este tipo de relaciones. Pero al ser una pieza autobiográfica solo siento disgusto.
March 26, 2024
Annie Ernaux'nun son kitabı Genç Adam; novella demesi zor, uzun öykü bile olmayan bir öykü. Ben açıkçası bu kadar kısma yazmasını çok sevmiyorum, biraz daha uzunca metinlerini daha tatmin edici bulduğumu söyleyerek başlayayım söze. (Yalın Tutku hariç, o olağanüstü yoğun bir metindi çünkü.)
Genç Adam'da Ernaux, ellili yaşlarındayken kendisinden otuz yaş küçük bir üniversite öğrencisiyle yaşadığı ve iki yıl süren tutkulu bir ilişkiyi anlatıyor. Sanırım her Ernaux yorumumda geçen bir sözcük vardır; "dürüst" - yine onu kullanacağım. Öyle dürüst, öyle kendi içine bakarak, öyle çıplak anlatıyor ki. Bayılıyorum, bayılıyorum bunu yapabilmesine. Özkurmacanın hakkını muazzam biçimde veriyor.
Bu minicik metinde yine bir sürü şey var; sevişmek ve yazmak arasında kurduğu ikilik, toplumsal ahlak, her ikili ilişkide ama az ama çok kendini gösteren tahakküm ve iktidar mekanizmaları, elbette ki sınıf -Ernaux eserlerini sınıftan ve kendisinin taşralı genç kızdan şehirli bir küçük burjuva olmaya uzanan yolunu ve bu deneyimi anlamlandırma çabasından muaf düşünemeyiz şüphesiz- hafıza... Bir genç adamla beraber olmanın; o genç adamın hiç deneyimlemediği yıllara dair hafızasını nasıl canlandırdığını, aslında bu ilişkinin tam da bu ihtiyacı karşıladığını öyle güzel anlatıyor ki.
Metnin kısalığına itirazım da bundan zaten. Şu kadarcık metinde öyle çok şey var ki, biraz daha açsa, anlatsa kim bilir nasıl çarpıcı olurmuş kitap diye düşündüm. Bu arada bu ilişki sayesinde hayatında yüzleşmekten uzun süre kaçtığı kürtaj hikayesini anlatabildiğini ve ünlü Olay kitabının da böyle doğduğunu öğreniyoruz Genç Adam'dan.
Son not: kitabın sonundaki fotoğrafı nasıl güzel. Muhtemelen bir akşam vakti, deniz kıyısında, beyazlar içinde, çıplak ayaklarıyla. Ne kadar gerçek bir insan Annie Ernaux. Kusurları, arızaları, öfkeleri, hırslarıyla. Ne kadar gerçek, ne kadar duru karşımızda, bu fotoğraf bana bunları düşündürdü. Kendisi çağdaşımız olduğu için şanslıyız.
Genç Adam'da Ernaux, ellili yaşlarındayken kendisinden otuz yaş küçük bir üniversite öğrencisiyle yaşadığı ve iki yıl süren tutkulu bir ilişkiyi anlatıyor. Sanırım her Ernaux yorumumda geçen bir sözcük vardır; "dürüst" - yine onu kullanacağım. Öyle dürüst, öyle kendi içine bakarak, öyle çıplak anlatıyor ki. Bayılıyorum, bayılıyorum bunu yapabilmesine. Özkurmacanın hakkını muazzam biçimde veriyor.
Bu minicik metinde yine bir sürü şey var; sevişmek ve yazmak arasında kurduğu ikilik, toplumsal ahlak, her ikili ilişkide ama az ama çok kendini gösteren tahakküm ve iktidar mekanizmaları, elbette ki sınıf -Ernaux eserlerini sınıftan ve kendisinin taşralı genç kızdan şehirli bir küçük burjuva olmaya uzanan yolunu ve bu deneyimi anlamlandırma çabasından muaf düşünemeyiz şüphesiz- hafıza... Bir genç adamla beraber olmanın; o genç adamın hiç deneyimlemediği yıllara dair hafızasını nasıl canlandırdığını, aslında bu ilişkinin tam da bu ihtiyacı karşıladığını öyle güzel anlatıyor ki.
Metnin kısalığına itirazım da bundan zaten. Şu kadarcık metinde öyle çok şey var ki, biraz daha açsa, anlatsa kim bilir nasıl çarpıcı olurmuş kitap diye düşündüm. Bu arada bu ilişki sayesinde hayatında yüzleşmekten uzun süre kaçtığı kürtaj hikayesini anlatabildiğini ve ünlü Olay kitabının da böyle doğduğunu öğreniyoruz Genç Adam'dan.
Son not: kitabın sonundaki fotoğrafı nasıl güzel. Muhtemelen bir akşam vakti, deniz kıyısında, beyazlar içinde, çıplak ayaklarıyla. Ne kadar gerçek bir insan Annie Ernaux. Kusurları, arızaları, öfkeleri, hırslarıyla. Ne kadar gerçek, ne kadar duru karşımızda, bu fotoğraf bana bunları düşündürdü. Kendisi çağdaşımız olduğu için şanslıyız.
Read
September 17, 2023Моє перше і, думаю, останнє знайомство з нобелівською лауреаткою 2022 року. Це, напевно, добре, якщо вам подобається цей жанр (чи то пак, тут радше вайб), але мені не подобається. Це її найновіше видання (типу книжка, але насправді оповідання сторінок на 10, якщо набирати 12 кеглем, судячи з того, що аудіоверсія займає 30 хв) - автобіографічна розповідь про роман з молодшим на тридцять років чоловіком. Поміж зворушливих речей про час, смертність, історію до його народження, яку пам'ятає вона, але не знає він, історію після її смерті, яку знатиме він, але вже не дізнається вона, і якісь смішні штуки по суспільне сприйняття - ця книжка настільки французька, що виглядає автопародією на французьку культуру, а я не люблю цей стереотипний французький вайб. Ну, ви знаєте: поєднання прагнення епатажу з якоюсь дикою класовою закостенілістю (ого, головна героїня така бунтарка, вона Не Зважає, що її коханець промокає губи хлібом чи накриває пальцем келих, щоб йому не наливали більше вина, а це ж такі страшні класові маркери - уявіть, у них достатньо нудне життя, аби такою хуїтою перейматися?????), якісь сліди формативних травм від неминучої тіні Пруста (а в Пруста і про спонтанне пригадування було краще, і про, між іншим, існування людини під поглядами інших), ялове французьке лівацтво (коханець головної героїні збирається все життя користатися соціалочкою й не робити нічого - складно уявити, як така мамина черешня може бути об'єктом бажання, але от же ж). Коротше, напевно, я не бачу суті за зовнішнім антуражем, але антураж геть не гріє мою душу.
October 3, 2024
Distance in both economic status (with the 30 year old student being poor and working class in upbringing) and age, with power imbalance and mutual dependence flowing from it, is well captured by Ernaux
He tore me away from my generation, but I was not part of his
Bit short (even for this writer) but the brilliance or Annie Ernaux shines through in how she carefully captured the weirdness of doing things for the first time (from his perspective) versus history imprinted upon experiences in the present (her perspective).
How hard it is to make truly new memories as one ages, and sexism and ageism come back as well. In the end Ernaux analysis of her life has such universality that we can only be happy she lives by the following motto:
If I don’t write things down, they haven’t been carried through to completion, they have only been lived.
He tore me away from my generation, but I was not part of his
Bit short (even for this writer) but the brilliance or Annie Ernaux shines through in how she carefully captured the weirdness of doing things for the first time (from his perspective) versus history imprinted upon experiences in the present (her perspective).
How hard it is to make truly new memories as one ages, and sexism and ageism come back as well. In the end Ernaux analysis of her life has such universality that we can only be happy she lives by the following motto:
If I don’t write things down, they haven’t been carried through to completion, they have only been lived.
October 7, 2023
Il y a cinq ans, j’ai passé une nuit malhabile avec un étudiant qui m’écrivait depuis un an et avait voulu me rencontrer.
The brevity of this work doesn't mean that it's in any way simplistic or straightforward. Ernaux recalls her affair with a younger man, designated A., when she was 54 and he was around thirty years younger.
Partly this is about a relationship that crosses generations, especially one that inverts the socially-acceptable pairing of an older man and younger woman. Ernaux notices the way 'society' is shocked at her behaviour: holding hands with A. in public, lying next to him on a beach.
But, with her usual brutal honesty, she also draws connections between this affair and her vocation of writing; the extent to which her life always serves as material for her books - a somewhat uncomfortable positioning that she never fails to acknowledge.
This affair, too, conjures up memories of Ernaux's past life, especially scenes her readers will have already experienced through her writing: the place where she had a covert abortion, the issues of shame associated with her lower class upbringing, the way she had - even as a teenager - of shocking her observers.
It's become one of my fascinations in contemporary literary to piece together Ernaux's fragmented life through her pieces of writing: this fits with the books which trace other love affairs as well the ones that recall her childhood, adolescence and young womanhood - desire, shame and memory: Ernaux's great topics of which I can never tire, it seems.
May 6, 2022
alors c’est beau, certes. mais ça c’est un article dans une revue littéraire ou un texte lu lors d’un event, pas un roman quoi… sur ma liseuse le corps du texte faisait littéralement 11 pages 🤡
January 4, 2026
"صرت أشعر، أكثر فأكثر، أن بإمكاني تكديس الصور، والتجارب، والسنين، دون الإحساس بأي شيء آخر غير التكرار في حد ذاته."
تجربتي الثالثة مع آني إرنو التي تكتب بشبه سيرة وشبه رواية، أعجبتني تلك التجربة في "الحدث"، ووجدتها أقل من عادية في "العار"، ولكن مع "الشاب" شعرت بروح الحدث مرة أخرى، رغم أن الرواية لا تتعدى خمسين صفحة، ولكنها نقلت مشاعر وأحاسيس حياة كاملة، تحكي إرنو عن موضوع شديد الحساسية، ولكن بجرأة شديدة، تُحسب لها، عن علاقتها بشاب يصغرها بحوالي ثلاثين عاماً، وكيف كان بالنسبة لها الشاب أكثر من علاقة جنسية، ولكنه إحالة إلى تلك المشاعر والذكريات في حياتها، فمروا سوياً بنفس الأماكن التي زارتها، وبالنسبة للشاب فهي ليست علاقة جنسية أيضاً، فهو في وقت تعرفه إليها كانت لديه رفيقة، وتركها من أجل إرنو، رُبما بدأت العلاقة بشكل جسدي/جنسي في بادئ الأمر، وسرعان ما أصبحت لها أبعاد أخرى، تتحدى المجتمع، وتعيش الحياة لنفسها لا للأخرين، ولكن تلك الحكايات من المعروف أنها دائماً ما تنتهي نهاية سوداوية واقعية، ولأن الأحلام لا تحدث في مجتمعاتنا.
نقل المشاعر والأحاسيس كان مُكثفاً ورائعاً، وجدته شاملاً وواصف، وعموماً هذه تجربة سأنصح بها للتعرف على آني إرنو بشكل جيد، فهي تستخدم حياتها الواقعية لتكتبها بشفافية ووضوح وجرأة.
June 1, 2024
I found myself wanting to say something like “this did not need to be written”... but that’s not true, is it? It was entertaining enough! I think the impulse has something to do with the regalia surrounding the actual, physical book. 64 pages, of which only 30 pages make up the actual story. The text is set within giant margins. It’s a 15-minute read at most. Then? 7 blurry pictures of Ernaux. All followed by a short and concise biography of Ernaux, perhaps all too self-aware that most folks would have come to this book as one of the first published in English after the Nobel win. Nothing that you would not have found out from just reading The Years. And this tiny, tiny book? Over 20 Canadian dollars, tax and everything included. Leaves a poor taste in the mouth, I will be honest!
The short story is fair enough, the exploration of a relationship between Ernaux and a much younger man just around the turn of the century. If we assume that 100 represents a complete and utter excavation of memory and context and symbolism into life story, and that 0 represents not telling the story at all, this sits at a 25. If you choose to skip it, nothing horrible will happen.
The short story is fair enough, the exploration of a relationship between Ernaux and a much younger man just around the turn of the century. If we assume that 100 represents a complete and utter excavation of memory and context and symbolism into life story, and that 0 represents not telling the story at all, this sits at a 25. If you choose to skip it, nothing horrible will happen.
January 13, 2023
COMENTÁRIO
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
"O Jovem"
Annie Ernaux
Tradução de Marília Garcia
"Se não escrevo as coisas, elas não encontram o seu termo, são apenas vividas"
"Muitas vezes fiz amor para me obrigar a escrever. Queria encontrar na sensação de cansaço e desamparo de depois, motivos para não esperar mais nada da vida. Nutria a esperança de que, ao fim da espera mais violenta de todas, a de um orgasmo, eu pudesse ter certeza de que não havia orgasmo mais intenso que a escrita de um livro."
Annie Ernaux incorpora - por vezes sexualiza - o ato e o processo de escrita. Pessoalmente, isso é algo que me encanta na sua obra. A presença do corpo, do desejo, da sexualidade em tantos momentos dos seus livros.
"O jovem" é um livro, como se entende pelas citações com que iniciei este texto, é mais um exemplo da escrista despojada, mas cuidadosamente laminada, de Ernaux.
Um livro em que nos fala de um caso amoroso com um homem muito mais jovem do que a narradora/escritora. Onde a mesma analisa e debate as trangressões de classe, a memória e a experiência pessoal como construto de identidades. Um dos apectos mais interessantes da obra de Ernaux está relacionada com o modo como ela experiencia o seu processo pessoal de mobilidade ascendente na escala de classe social e económica. Esse caminho de "transfuga de classe" que ela defende na sua obra contamina, de um modo intenso, diferentes aspectos da sua vida e identidade, são detalhes que os seus diferentes livros nos vão sinalizando.
Assim com estas referências a corpo, sexualidade e classe em pouco mais de 30 páginas Ernaux confima a destreza que me apaixona como leitor e que me levará a ler tudo que consiga da autora.
(li de 12/01/2023 a 13/01/2023. li a edição brasileira deste livro mas a @livrosdobrasil irá publicar brevemente a edição portuguesa)
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
"O Jovem"
Annie Ernaux
Tradução de Marília Garcia
"Se não escrevo as coisas, elas não encontram o seu termo, são apenas vividas"
"Muitas vezes fiz amor para me obrigar a escrever. Queria encontrar na sensação de cansaço e desamparo de depois, motivos para não esperar mais nada da vida. Nutria a esperança de que, ao fim da espera mais violenta de todas, a de um orgasmo, eu pudesse ter certeza de que não havia orgasmo mais intenso que a escrita de um livro."
Annie Ernaux incorpora - por vezes sexualiza - o ato e o processo de escrita. Pessoalmente, isso é algo que me encanta na sua obra. A presença do corpo, do desejo, da sexualidade em tantos momentos dos seus livros.
"O jovem" é um livro, como se entende pelas citações com que iniciei este texto, é mais um exemplo da escrista despojada, mas cuidadosamente laminada, de Ernaux.
Um livro em que nos fala de um caso amoroso com um homem muito mais jovem do que a narradora/escritora. Onde a mesma analisa e debate as trangressões de classe, a memória e a experiência pessoal como construto de identidades. Um dos apectos mais interessantes da obra de Ernaux está relacionada com o modo como ela experiencia o seu processo pessoal de mobilidade ascendente na escala de classe social e económica. Esse caminho de "transfuga de classe" que ela defende na sua obra contamina, de um modo intenso, diferentes aspectos da sua vida e identidade, são detalhes que os seus diferentes livros nos vão sinalizando.
Assim com estas referências a corpo, sexualidade e classe em pouco mais de 30 páginas Ernaux confima a destreza que me apaixona como leitor e que me levará a ler tudo que consiga da autora.
(li de 12/01/2023 a 13/01/2023. li a edição brasileira deste livro mas a @livrosdobrasil irá publicar brevemente a edição portuguesa)
November 16, 2022
“Mi strappava dalla mia generazione, ma io non appartenevo alla sua”.
Brevissimo e folgorante come mai Annie.
E come sempre storia personale e sguardo impersonale si intrecciano in una scrittura scabra e schietta per raccontare lo scandalo di una donna matura che intreccia una relazione amorosa con un giovane universitario: il ragazzo, appunto.
Mostrarsi insieme attira sguardi carichi di un giudizio che è il risvolto opaco di quelli che si rivolgerebbero a una coppia in cui le parti fossero invertite. Ovvero compiaciuti anziché vagamente disgustati.
La donna legge nel volto del ragazzo il riflesso del proprio volto, l’immagine della morte sotto scacco, vita che riluce nel tempo dell’amore e così rallenta la sua corsa.
E ancora una volta la memoria è protagonista. Nell’origine rurale del ragazzo, tradita dal vizio dei gesti e del linguaggio, Annie rivede la propria, sa che è per lei fonte di una scrittura diventata riscatto di classe.
Sa, mentre vive una relazione destinata a finire, che la scrittura è il piacere più profondo, il desiderio più duraturo, come lei stessa dichiara in esergo: una proclamazione di intenti e insieme un dato di fatto:
“Se non le scrivo, le cose non sono arrivate fino al loro termine, sono state soltanto vissute.”
Meravigliosa e intensa come sempre.
Brevissimo e folgorante come mai Annie.
E come sempre storia personale e sguardo impersonale si intrecciano in una scrittura scabra e schietta per raccontare lo scandalo di una donna matura che intreccia una relazione amorosa con un giovane universitario: il ragazzo, appunto.
Mostrarsi insieme attira sguardi carichi di un giudizio che è il risvolto opaco di quelli che si rivolgerebbero a una coppia in cui le parti fossero invertite. Ovvero compiaciuti anziché vagamente disgustati.
La donna legge nel volto del ragazzo il riflesso del proprio volto, l’immagine della morte sotto scacco, vita che riluce nel tempo dell’amore e così rallenta la sua corsa.
E ancora una volta la memoria è protagonista. Nell’origine rurale del ragazzo, tradita dal vizio dei gesti e del linguaggio, Annie rivede la propria, sa che è per lei fonte di una scrittura diventata riscatto di classe.
Sa, mentre vive una relazione destinata a finire, che la scrittura è il piacere più profondo, il desiderio più duraturo, come lei stessa dichiara in esergo: una proclamazione di intenti e insieme un dato di fatto:
“Se non le scrivo, le cose non sono arrivate fino al loro termine, sono state soltanto vissute.”
Meravigliosa e intensa come sempre.
January 2, 2026
Quería que mi primer libro del 2026 fuera uno de Ernaux (es mi #18 de la autora).
Reflexionar sobre la memoria, sobre ser una mujer "joven" y ser una mujer "madura", sobre dinámicas de poder; un viaje en el tiempo a través de acostarse con alguien treinta años menor. Un retrato de una dinámica sexo-afectiva particular que termina por desatar la escritura del libro "El acontecimiento".
Claro que me hubiera encantado que fuera más largo, pero fue fantástico poder leído de una (muy breve sentada) con un café.
(Y gracias, Annie, por haber hecho esto para literalmente para escribir la anécdota).
Reflexionar sobre la memoria, sobre ser una mujer "joven" y ser una mujer "madura", sobre dinámicas de poder; un viaje en el tiempo a través de acostarse con alguien treinta años menor. Un retrato de una dinámica sexo-afectiva particular que termina por desatar la escritura del libro "El acontecimiento".
Claro que me hubiera encantado que fuera más largo, pero fue fantástico poder leído de una (muy breve sentada) con un café.
(Y gracias, Annie, por haber hecho esto para literalmente para escribir la anécdota).
April 25, 2023
Bien escrito, pero parece que faltó papel o tinta. Pequeño truco editorial para publicar lo que sea, gracias al empujón del Nobel. Mujer adulta de cincuenta tiene romance con joven de veinte. Unas cuantas reflexiones interesantes, pero en diez minutos terminaste. Una pequeña estafa. Pero tres estrellas porque su pluma es engolosinadora, aunque me debato en darle dos.
October 17, 2022
Youth. Most of us think fondly back to our youth. We could do no wrong and life was easy, even grand. So what happens when a mid fifty woman has an affair with a young man (he is 25)?
As the author admits, desire and sexuality makes her feel “young again.” For her husband, he wonders “who would want a woman in menopause?” Ouch. Is this also about her husband? Is he not paying attention? Boredom in the marriage?
She is a professor, the young man is a student. Ethically this should be wrong. She even admits that the power dynamic is in her favour. Double ouch.
Or does it come down to vanity. You know that old adage, when men get older they look better, but for women… well I never believed this adage. Would this be the same if the sexes were reversed? Looks are definitely in the mix. What does he see in Hera. She is a professor, is it her mind that attracts him? Being around him makes her recall her old days. They even go to her old college day haunts. Reliving the past?
Once she remembers walking with her parents on the beach boardwalk in a tight fitting dress. She was eighteen. It annoyed her mother but she revelled in the looks. Then she sees some women his age, scantily dressed and tanned. “Are you tempted?” she asks him. Triple ouch.
Agism, sexuality and ethics all thrown in the mix. Ernaux is not shy to talk about challenging issues. I won’t step into the fray. She states in the forward that she needed to write about these events to make them reach their end, not just lived. “Si je ne écris pas, les choses ne sont pas allées jusqu’à leur terme, elles ont été seulement vécues.” All part of her autofiction.
This is more of a short story or at least a very short novela (48 pages). It was originally written in 1998-1999 but published in 2022. This is my second of three Annie Ernaux books ordered from my library, and this one is in the original French.
Once again, she makes me think. I can’t complain. 3.5 stars.
As the author admits, desire and sexuality makes her feel “young again.” For her husband, he wonders “who would want a woman in menopause?” Ouch. Is this also about her husband? Is he not paying attention? Boredom in the marriage?
She is a professor, the young man is a student. Ethically this should be wrong. She even admits that the power dynamic is in her favour. Double ouch.
Or does it come down to vanity. You know that old adage, when men get older they look better, but for women… well I never believed this adage. Would this be the same if the sexes were reversed? Looks are definitely in the mix. What does he see in Hera. She is a professor, is it her mind that attracts him? Being around him makes her recall her old days. They even go to her old college day haunts. Reliving the past?
Once she remembers walking with her parents on the beach boardwalk in a tight fitting dress. She was eighteen. It annoyed her mother but she revelled in the looks. Then she sees some women his age, scantily dressed and tanned. “Are you tempted?” she asks him. Triple ouch.
Agism, sexuality and ethics all thrown in the mix. Ernaux is not shy to talk about challenging issues. I won’t step into the fray. She states in the forward that she needed to write about these events to make them reach their end, not just lived. “Si je ne écris pas, les choses ne sont pas allées jusqu’à leur terme, elles ont été seulement vécues.” All part of her autofiction.
This is more of a short story or at least a very short novela (48 pages). It was originally written in 1998-1999 but published in 2022. This is my second of three Annie Ernaux books ordered from my library, and this one is in the original French.
Once again, she makes me think. I can’t complain. 3.5 stars.
February 4, 2023
Първа среща с Ани Ерно и е любов от първа страница! Отвъд думите! Винаги ми е любиптно да чета автори номинирани или получили Нобел, Пулицър, Букър и още куп други литературни отличия. Не винаги се получава химията между нас, но когато я има е взрив от емоции.
Точно това се получи с Ани Ерно. “Младият мъж” е съвсем кратка новела (няма и 30 странички), но ме завладя с всяка дума и всеки ред.
Освен новелата във втората си част книгата съдържа и кратки автобиографични бележки, които Ани Ерно е предоставила на Нобеловия комитет, редуваши се с факти от живота и, откъси от литературна критика и части от нейни произведения. Честно да си призная на места настръхвах от вълнение. Третата част се състои от кратки въпроси и отговори на тема писане, “Младият мъж” и живота изобщо.
Кратко и телеграфно, едно истинско литературно гyрме - това издание ме накара да искам да чета още от богатото творчество на нобеловия лауреат за 2022!
“В една област - литература, театър, светски порядки - бях негова просветителка, но и това, което ми даваше той, също беше един вид просвещение.
Главната причина за желанието ми да продължаваме връзката си беше, че в известен смисъл тя вече се бе състояла и в нея аз бях литературен образ.”
Точно това се получи с Ани Ерно. “Младият мъж” е съвсем кратка новела (няма и 30 странички), но ме завладя с всяка дума и всеки ред.
Освен новелата във втората си част книгата съдържа и кратки автобиографични бележки, които Ани Ерно е предоставила на Нобеловия комитет, редуваши се с факти от живота и, откъси от литературна критика и части от нейни произведения. Честно да си призная на места настръхвах от вълнение. Третата част се състои от кратки въпроси и отговори на тема писане, “Младият мъж” и живота изобщо.
Кратко и телеграфно, едно истинско литературно гyрме - това издание ме накара да искам да чета още от богатото творчество на нобеловия лауреат за 2022!
“В една област - литература, театър, светски порядки - бях негова просветителка, но и това, което ми даваше той, също беше един вид просвещение.
Главната причина за желанието ми да продължаваме връзката си беше, че в известен смисъл тя вече се бе състояла и в нея аз бях литературен образ.”
June 26, 2024
One thing about Miss Annie... she be f*ing. ;) Jokes aside, this one was bad ya'll. Probably my least favorite Ernaux. Two stars feels generous but I can't bring myself to rate it just one. As far as I can tell, this is her latest publication, published in 2022, the year she was awarded the Noble Prize for literature, and it feels like a cash grab. The book is 28 pages long with huge font... what on Earth are we paying 10€ for?? I got the book used for 3 bucks, mind you, but even that seems excessive. You're done with it in under 15 minutes, and Ernaux gives you no interesting insights whatsoever... but let's start at the beginning.
Ernaux has written many a memoir/vignette about a past love affair (Miss T. Swift might have taken a leaf out of her book), and thus far, I haven't enjoyed a single one. But still, I'd rank Passion simple higher than this garbage. In Le Jeune Homme, Ernaux writes about an affair she had with a young man, when she was in her late 50s and he in his early twenties. She mentions in the book that is supposedly the "normalest" thing in the world for men, but I don't think that's the feminist take she thinks it is. In both cases, it's nasty business and morally abhorrent.
At least Ernaux was aware of her position of dominance over her lover, but that didn't keep her from letting that play in her favor. She reveals that her lover was absolutely obsessed with her, that he wanted a child from her (...he was so young, he didn't even know about menopause, chile...), that he was incredibly jealous, that he constantly talked about their shared future whilst Ernaux was like "let's just live in the present, boo". And it's just super uncomfortable to read. Ernaux doesn't seem to realise how fucked up this relationship was.
I don't wanna judge her too harshly because this vignette is so damn short and Ernaux gives us very few details, but that's another reason why I disliked this book. It felt so nonsensical. So incomplete. She doesn't even go over the details of their separation. At the end, she just states that his time as the "opener of time" in her life was finished and that she was happy she entered the new millennium on her own (the two dated from 1998 to 2000). It's just... nothing.
And that whole "ouvreur du temps" thing was really uncomfortable as well. I appreciate that Ernaux was honest about that, that the whole reason she slept with this man was the fact that he reminded her of her younger self and that he made her feel young again, but it's really manipulative and abusive, and just not a good look at all.
Ernaux opens this book with the following sentiment: "Si je ne les écris pas, les choses ne sont pas allées jusqu'à leur terme, elles ont été seulement vécues." And whilst I understand why that might be a case for a writer like her, it doesn't ring truthful in this particular book. For the first time, it feels like Ernaux is withholding information, like she's not taking accountability in a way that she should. It feels precisely like she didn't go to the finish line. Le Jeune Homme, to me, is an absolute disappointment. Let's see if her lover, A., who never wanted to become the subject matter of one of her books (a wish Ernaux disregards with the publication of this text), will publish a tell-all in 20 years, revealing his side of the story. And I'm not sure if Ernaux will come off unscathed in that instance.
Ernaux has written many a memoir/vignette about a past love affair (Miss T. Swift might have taken a leaf out of her book), and thus far, I haven't enjoyed a single one. But still, I'd rank Passion simple higher than this garbage. In Le Jeune Homme, Ernaux writes about an affair she had with a young man, when she was in her late 50s and he in his early twenties. She mentions in the book that is supposedly the "normalest" thing in the world for men, but I don't think that's the feminist take she thinks it is. In both cases, it's nasty business and morally abhorrent.
At least Ernaux was aware of her position of dominance over her lover, but that didn't keep her from letting that play in her favor. She reveals that her lover was absolutely obsessed with her, that he wanted a child from her (...he was so young, he didn't even know about menopause, chile...), that he was incredibly jealous, that he constantly talked about their shared future whilst Ernaux was like "let's just live in the present, boo". And it's just super uncomfortable to read. Ernaux doesn't seem to realise how fucked up this relationship was.
I don't wanna judge her too harshly because this vignette is so damn short and Ernaux gives us very few details, but that's another reason why I disliked this book. It felt so nonsensical. So incomplete. She doesn't even go over the details of their separation. At the end, she just states that his time as the "opener of time" in her life was finished and that she was happy she entered the new millennium on her own (the two dated from 1998 to 2000). It's just... nothing.
And that whole "ouvreur du temps" thing was really uncomfortable as well. I appreciate that Ernaux was honest about that, that the whole reason she slept with this man was the fact that he reminded her of her younger self and that he made her feel young again, but it's really manipulative and abusive, and just not a good look at all.
Ernaux opens this book with the following sentiment: "Si je ne les écris pas, les choses ne sont pas allées jusqu'à leur terme, elles ont été seulement vécues." And whilst I understand why that might be a case for a writer like her, it doesn't ring truthful in this particular book. For the first time, it feels like Ernaux is withholding information, like she's not taking accountability in a way that she should. It feels precisely like she didn't go to the finish line. Le Jeune Homme, to me, is an absolute disappointment. Let's see if her lover, A., who never wanted to become the subject matter of one of her books (a wish Ernaux disregards with the publication of this text), will publish a tell-all in 20 years, revealing his side of the story. And I'm not sure if Ernaux will come off unscathed in that instance.
Read
October 23, 2024تعجبني هذه الكاتبة في صدقها ووضوحها أمام نفسها وأمام العالم. تتحدث هنا عن علاقتها مع شاب عشريني وهي في الخمسينيات من عمرها. علاقة تتجاوز الحاجة الجنسية، لتدخل في أعماق حاجات أعقد وأكثر غموضا. بالنسبة لها كان "حامل ذاكرة عالمها السابق" وبرفقته كانت تجوب كل مراحل حياتها. أما بالنسبة للشاب فرغبة قالها كشفت الكثير عندما تمنى لو أنه "كان في أحشائها، وخرج منها لكي يشبهها".
إن هذه العلاقة التي يراها المجتمع أشبه بـ"زنا محارم" تحوي على تعقيدات وسراديب هي مرآة لسراديب النفس البشرية. وهو ما يميز أدب هذه السيدة. كتابتها لذاتها بصدق وصراحة المحتضر، هو ما يحتاج إليه الأدب لفهم الإنسان.
إن هذه العلاقة التي يراها المجتمع أشبه بـ"زنا محارم" تحوي على تعقيدات وسراديب هي مرآة لسراديب النفس البشرية. وهو ما يميز أدب هذه السيدة. كتابتها لذاتها بصدق وصراحة المحتضر، هو ما يحتاج إليه الأدب لفهم الإنسان.
September 21, 2023
Read something short was the advice for getting over a reading slump. How perfect it was then that Annie Ernaux’s two new books arrived this evening in the mail.
This one here, The Young Man, at only 35pp is about as short as I think I could find. But as with all Ernaux’s work, part of her brilliance as a writer is portraying such depth and emotional complexities in so few words. Ernaux herself said in a recent interview something along the lines of ‘it’s because my books are so short that they take such a long time to write’.
Here we have the story of an affair she had with a man 30 yrs younger than her. All of Ernaux’s talents are at full strength, depicting this relationship that they knew was already over whilst it was at its most passionate. She also eloquently makes the point that in public they were the centre of unwanted attention, though were the roles reversed, no one would bat an eyelid at a man with a female partner 30 yrs younger. (Perhaps we might, but granted it would not create nearly as much attention.)
I also have Shame, her other new title. So hopefully will get to that soon, and put an end to this reading slump!
This one here, The Young Man, at only 35pp is about as short as I think I could find. But as with all Ernaux’s work, part of her brilliance as a writer is portraying such depth and emotional complexities in so few words. Ernaux herself said in a recent interview something along the lines of ‘it’s because my books are so short that they take such a long time to write’.
Here we have the story of an affair she had with a man 30 yrs younger than her. All of Ernaux’s talents are at full strength, depicting this relationship that they knew was already over whilst it was at its most passionate. She also eloquently makes the point that in public they were the centre of unwanted attention, though were the roles reversed, no one would bat an eyelid at a man with a female partner 30 yrs younger. (Perhaps we might, but granted it would not create nearly as much attention.)
I also have Shame, her other new title. So hopefully will get to that soon, and put an end to this reading slump!
April 30, 2024
dün gece bir de bunu okudum. ama şunu söyleyebilirim bu ne novella, ne öykü… annie ernaux’cuğumun en derinliksiz kitabı olmuş ki başkası olsa kimse bunu kitap diye basmaz zaten.
hani defterinizi açmış biten bir ilişkinin ardından şöyle 10 sayfa hislerinizi yazmışsınız gibi diyeyim. buradaki ilişkide kadın 50’lerde, erkek 20’lerde, arada 30 yaş fark var, sorun da bu.
ama bu da sorun olarak resmedilmiyor zaten, biteceği belli bir ilişki. kadın gençliğinin, fakirliğinin, geldiği o alt sınıfın izlerini bulup tarihini tekrar yaşıyor, genç adamsa üst sınıftan biri olarak gördüğü bu deneyimli, olgun ve maddi olarak rahat yazar kadınla hoş bir birliktelik yaşıyor. bence winwin.
ernaux’nun yaşamından bildiğimiz kesitler var anlatılanda… kürtajı, annesi ama anlık düşünceler olarak gelip geçiyo hepsi. sadece bu ilişki yaşanmasaydı ben kürtajımı anlatacak cesaret bulamazdım diyor, eh iyi ki yaşanmış o zaman.
ben pek çoklarının aksine arada yaş farkı olan ilişkilerin -rıza dahilinde yaşanırsa- insana iyi gelebileceğini düşünüyorum. yani her babası yaşında adamla gördüğünüz genç kadın istismar edilmiyor olabilir, keza genç erkek de. kendisinden çok büyüklerden ya da kendisinden çok küçüklerden (ve bu zamanla değişebilir) hoşlanmak ve çekici bulmak da insana dair.
sonuç olarak annie ernaux’muz menopoza girdikten sonra genç bir bedenle misler gibi ilişki yaşayıp seks eylemiş, sefası olsun.
ama bu metni annie ernaux nobel almasa ya da ünlü bir yazar olmasa basılır mıydı bilmem…
hani defterinizi açmış biten bir ilişkinin ardından şöyle 10 sayfa hislerinizi yazmışsınız gibi diyeyim. buradaki ilişkide kadın 50’lerde, erkek 20’lerde, arada 30 yaş fark var, sorun da bu.
ama bu da sorun olarak resmedilmiyor zaten, biteceği belli bir ilişki. kadın gençliğinin, fakirliğinin, geldiği o alt sınıfın izlerini bulup tarihini tekrar yaşıyor, genç adamsa üst sınıftan biri olarak gördüğü bu deneyimli, olgun ve maddi olarak rahat yazar kadınla hoş bir birliktelik yaşıyor. bence winwin.
ernaux’nun yaşamından bildiğimiz kesitler var anlatılanda… kürtajı, annesi ama anlık düşünceler olarak gelip geçiyo hepsi. sadece bu ilişki yaşanmasaydı ben kürtajımı anlatacak cesaret bulamazdım diyor, eh iyi ki yaşanmış o zaman.
ben pek çoklarının aksine arada yaş farkı olan ilişkilerin -rıza dahilinde yaşanırsa- insana iyi gelebileceğini düşünüyorum. yani her babası yaşında adamla gördüğünüz genç kadın istismar edilmiyor olabilir, keza genç erkek de. kendisinden çok büyüklerden ya da kendisinden çok küçüklerden (ve bu zamanla değişebilir) hoşlanmak ve çekici bulmak da insana dair.
sonuç olarak annie ernaux’muz menopoza girdikten sonra genç bir bedenle misler gibi ilişki yaşayıp seks eylemiş, sefası olsun.
ama bu metni annie ernaux nobel almasa ya da ünlü bir yazar olmasa basılır mıydı bilmem…
May 6, 2024
3.5. Slim even by Ernaux standards: as an audio book, this was a half hour’s listen on a short walk. It was absorbing, just as with every other book of hers I’ve read, but I prefer reading her in hard copy so I can go back over her prose, which really is a good part of the fun. Here, Ernaux recounts an affair she had with a student 30 years her junior.
A., the young man, seems to function as kind of a human version of Proust’s madeleine, prompting Ernaux to recall her own student past as she visits him in his student flat in the same town where she once went to university. She observes his crude table manners, contemplating that she can do so without irritation now that her own working class upbringing around the same habits is in her distant past. She sees, too, how people observe the scandalizing age difference between them - she contrasts this with how men who date young women are viewed, and she likens it to a satisfying memory of herself promenading in a tight dress while out with her parents as a young woman.
In addition to his role as a madeleine, the young man serves a very practical purpose for Ernaux’s writing: “Often, I would make love in order to force myself to write…I hoped that the most violent ending there is — that is, an orgasm — would prove to me once and for all that there’s no greater pleasure than that of writing a book.”
So interesting, and so cold!
A., the young man, seems to function as kind of a human version of Proust’s madeleine, prompting Ernaux to recall her own student past as she visits him in his student flat in the same town where she once went to university. She observes his crude table manners, contemplating that she can do so without irritation now that her own working class upbringing around the same habits is in her distant past. She sees, too, how people observe the scandalizing age difference between them - she contrasts this with how men who date young women are viewed, and she likens it to a satisfying memory of herself promenading in a tight dress while out with her parents as a young woman.
In addition to his role as a madeleine, the young man serves a very practical purpose for Ernaux’s writing: “Often, I would make love in order to force myself to write…I hoped that the most violent ending there is — that is, an orgasm — would prove to me once and for all that there’s no greater pleasure than that of writing a book.”
So interesting, and so cold!
March 22, 2025
People come in and out of our lives and most serve a purpose, whether to teach, inspire, challenge, or support us. In
The Young Man
, A. briefly became a part of Annie Ernaux’s life, offering her a sense of vitality, different perspective on time, aging, and desire.
“The present is enough, never mentioning the present was only duplicate of the past.”
This brief memoir may have been too short and could have provided more depth into the relationship from before to the start to the end and even after.
“The impression was a sign that his role in my life…and mine in his…had come to an end.”
“The present is enough, never mentioning the present was only duplicate of the past.”
This brief memoir may have been too short and could have provided more depth into the relationship from before to the start to the end and even after.
“The impression was a sign that his role in my life…and mine in his…had come to an end.”
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