Getting Lost

“If one day people read this journal, they’ll see that there was indeed ‘alienation in the work of Annie Ernaux,’ and not only in the work but even more so in her life.” (49) What is the function of the journal form and how does Ernaux (re)structure her life through it?

Ernaux writes: “My whole life has been an effort to tear myself away from male desire, in other words, from my own desire” (60), “All that attracts him is my status as a writer” (23) and “I also know it’s because he’s a Soviet that I love him.” (73) What is the relationship between the desirer and the desired? What are the cultural and political forces at play in this affair? How does desire shape the writer’s relationship to writing?

“One could not imagine two women more different in terms of height, hair and eye color, body (she’s a little dumpy) and clothing. The mother and the whore” (40) “I’m both mother and whore for him.” (148) How does Ernaux illuminate and subvert the patriarchal dynamics in societal expectations of women?

Why does Ernaux reveal the affair in this book even though she promised S not to write about it? What space does writing offer her that she is unable to find elsewhere in life? What is the relationship between writing, desire and time?