Tropisms and The Age of Suspicion

by Nathalie Sarraute

critical essays, tr Maria Jolas

Genres: Essays, France, Nonfiction, Criticism

136 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1963

About the author

Nathalie Sarraute (July 18, 1900 in Ivanovo, Russia – October 19, 1999 in Paris, France) was a lawyer and a French writer of Russian-Jewish origin.

Sarraute was born Natalia/Natacha Tcherniak in Ivanovo (then known as Ivanovo-Voznesensk), 300 km north-east of Moscow in 1900 (although she frequently referred to the year of her birth as 1902, a date still cited in select reference works), and, following the divorce of her parents, spent her childhood shuttled between France and Russia. In 1909 she moved to Paris with her father. Sarraute studied law and literature at the prestigious Sorbonne, having a particular fondness for 20th century literature and the works of Marcel Proust and Virginia Woolf, who greatly affected her conception of the novel, then later studied history at Oxford and sociology in Berlin, before passing the French bar exam (1926-1941) and becoming a lawyer.
In 1925, she married Raymond Sarraute, a fellow lawyer, with whom she would have three daughters. In 1932 she wrote her first book, Tropismes, a series of brief sketches and memories that set the tone for her entire oeuvre. The novel was first published in 1939, although the impact of World War II stunted its popularity. In 1941, Sarraute, who was Jewish, was released from her work as a lawyer as a result of Nazi law. During this time, she went into hiding and made arrangements to divorce her husband in an effort to protect him (although they would eventually stay together).
Nathalie Sarraute dies when she was ninety-nine years old. Her daughter, the journalist Claude Sarraute, was married to French Academician Jean-François Revel.

From Wikipedia

Reviews

[Mark Fabiano · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read Tropisms thanks to John Gardner referring to it in his "The Art of Fiction," as an example of a most expressionistic example of the (then) contemporary non-realistic movements.

And it is definitely "irrealistic" as it renders "tropes'or expressionistic vignettes which present at once a nearness of impression of character, as in a close modernistic interior stream of consciousnesses but also at the same time remaining at a distance, by refusing to tell a story,m or develop plot or character in the usual manner.

Fascinating and splendid.

I haven't read the literary essays yet but will eventually get to them in the last half of this edition that is called The Age of Suspicion.

Here are some examples that I found interesting.
Sentence without a verb:
"On the outskirts of London, in a little cottage with percale curtains, its little back lawn sunny and wet with rain."

Her style has a way of conveying a lot of information in a short space so that while most of the vignettes run 2 pages or so, I found myself having to re read them a couple of times because of their density.

It sort of reminds me of The Waves by Virginia Woolf but its not even as concrete as that, in that, we never "know" the characters per se though we do know them by the way the way certain details repeat.

At less than 55 pages its worth a read if you like experimental works.

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book combines fiction and non-fiction could be a good start with Sarraute, after finishing this I'd want to check out a full novel. In the pieces of literary criticism Sarraute compares writers and the writing process of authors like Balzac, Flaubert, Dostoyevsky, with writers of her day, looking briefly at the writing of Henry Green, Ivy Compton-Burnett and Albert Camus.

[Terry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mary read some with me! Wonderful small vignettes of life