{"id":99798,"date":"2016-06-27T15:30:16","date_gmt":"2016-06-27T19:30:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=99798"},"modified":"2016-06-27T15:38:23","modified_gmt":"2016-06-27T19:38:23","slug":"annie-ernaux-les-annees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2016\/06\/27\/annie-ernaux-les-annees\/","title":{"rendered":"Annie Ernaux, Les ann\u00e9es<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"

Longtime readers of the<\/em>\u00a0Daily will remember\u00a0Matteo Pericoli\u2019s Windows on the World project<\/a>, which featured his pen-and-ink drawings of the views from writers\u2019 windows around the world.\u00a0Matteo is also the founder of the\u00a0Laboratory of Literary Architecture<\/a>,\u00a0an interdisciplinary project that looks at fiction through the lens of architecture<\/a>,\u00a0designing and building stories\u00a0as architectural projects. In this new series, Matteo shares some of his designs and what they reveal about the stories they\u2019re modeled on.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

There is a moment in Annie Ernaux\u2019s autobiographical novel, Les ann\u00e9es<\/a><\/em>, in which the author writes that she \u201cwould like to unify the multiplicity of images of herself\u2014separate, disjoined\u2014through the thread of a story: that of her existence […] fused to the movement of a generation.\u201d (Translation mine.)\u00a0<\/p>\n

This is perhaps the clearest description not only of her literary intent\u2014to tell her life story without invoking the first person\u2014but also of the reader\u2019s experience: trapped in a paradox between History with a capital H<\/em> and a life that inevitably intersects and insinuates itself into historic time.<\/p>\n

From the beginning, Ernaux tells us that the very images of herself are the connecting elements of the two dimensions: those \u201cthings\u201d that will end up being lost as soon as the mind that remembers them dies. Therefore, in order to meld her time with \u201cthe flow of a generation,\u201d she writes about herself without ever using the word \u201cI.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Reading Les ann\u00e9es <\/em>feels like being immersed in a narrow space made of emotions, a sense of growth, and moments of striking illumination. This space is submerged below a larger, overbearing volume\u2014historic events that feel remote but that constantly shed light on our progression.<\/p>\n

Seen from the outside, the volume, whose own weight has caused it to sink into the ground, is fractured by a series of irregular slivers\u2014thin slits that never let us doubt History\u2019s solidity. Some of these openings on its smallest facade provide access to a path, which presents a completely different spatial sensation compared to the monolithic structure containing it.\u2028 The connection between the inner path, the void (our experience as visitors and readers of Les ann\u00e9es<\/em>), and its surrounding structure can be better understood when light penetrates the void from its many narrow openings.<\/p>\n

\"Ernaux_Cross-Section\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s clear right away that the inner space won\u2019t passively follow the mass of History. In fact, we do not realize (if not at the end) that while History was carrying on above us, we were in fact descending, accompanying Ernaux through her life until the very last moment, when she offers her final images that she doesn\u2019t want forgotten.<\/p>\n

\"Ernaux_Preliminary-Sketch\"<\/a> In collaboration with Giuseppe Franco.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Longtime readers of the\u00a0Daily will remember\u00a0Matteo Pericoli\u2019s Windows on the World project, which featured his pen-and-ink drawings of the views from writers\u2019 windows around the world.\u00a0Matteo is also the founder of the\u00a0Laboratory of Literary Architecture,\u00a0an interdisciplinary project that looks at fiction through the lens of architecture,\u00a0designing and building stories\u00a0as architectural projects. In this new series, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":272,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22546],"tags":[22974,21331,14359,12976,2861,8755,15329,22975,22550,452,13134],"class_list":["post-99798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-literary-architecture","tag-annie-ernaux","tag-blueprints","tag-buildings","tag-drawings","tag-history","tag-italo-calvino","tag-laboratory-of-literary-architecture","tag-les-annees","tag-literary-architecture","tag-matteo-pericoli","tag-sketches"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nWhat Does an Annie Ernaux Novel Look Like as a Building?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Matteo Pericoli\u2019s new Literary Architecture series looks at fiction through the lens of architecture, designing and building stories as architectural projects.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" 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