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Overview
“Annie Ernaux’s work,” wrote Richard Bernstein in the New York Times, “represents a severely pared-down Proustianism, a testament to the persistent, haunting and melancholy quality of memory.” In the New York Times Book Review, Kathryn Harrison concurred: “Keen language and unwavering focus allow her to penetrate deep, to reveal pulses of love, desire, remorse.” In this “journal” Ernaux turns her penetrating focus on those points in life where the everyday and the extraordinary intersect, where “things seen” reflect a private life meeting the larger world. From the war crimes tribunal in Bosnia to social issues such as poverty and AIDS; from the state of Iraq to the world’s contrasting reactions to Princess Diana’s death and the starkly brutal political murders that occurred at the same time; from a tear-gas attack on the subway to minute interactions with a clerk in a store: Ernaux’s thought-provoking observations map the world’s fleeting and lasting impressions on the shape of inner life.Synopsis
“Annie Ernaux’s work,” wrote Richard Bernstein in the New York Times, “represents a severely pared-down Proustianism, a testament to the persistent, haunting and melancholy quality of memory.” In the New York Times Book Review, Kathryn Harrison concurred: “Keen language and unwavering focus allow her to penetrate deep, to reveal pulses of love, desire, remorse.”
In this “journal” Ernaux turns her penetrating focus on those points in life where the everyday and the extraordinary intersect, where “things seen” reflect a private life meeting the larger world. From the war crimes tribunal in Bosnia to social issues such as poverty and AIDS; from the state of Iraq to the world’s contrasting reactions to Princess Diana’s death and the starkly brutal political murders that occurred at the same time; from a tear-gas attack on the subway to minute interactions with a clerk in a store: Ernaux’s thought-provoking observations map the world’s fleeting and lasting impressions on the shape of inner life.
The New York Times - Alison McCulloch
This slim, hard-to-categorize book by the French writer Ernaux is made up of a series of observations of the quotidian: people on trains, in supermarkets, at the hairdresser; people panhandling in subway cars…Spanning the years 1993 to 1999 and written like diary entries, the vignettes, though grim in their piercing observations, are for the same reason both beautiful and powerful.
Editorials
Los Angeles Times -
"Annie Ernaux was blogging about her daily life long before the blog was invented. If anyone can raise it to an art form, she can. . . . This is a beautiful translation."—Susan Salter Reynolds, Los Angeles Times DiscoveriesNew York Times Book Review -
"Beautiful and powerful."—Alison McCulloch, New York Times Book ReviewForeWord Reviews
"Like a poet, Ernaux writes with dense, image-packed language; like a novelist, she seeks compelling characters to appear and disappear throughout her text."—Rachel Mennies, ForeWord ReviewsLe Devoir
“La Vie extérieure bears witness to the desire, the need to capture life, even the insignificant. It attests to the memory that we have of others, including strangers, and in whom Annie Ernaux searches for and recognizes herself. La Vie extérieure is also a book of assessment and indignation. The writer reacts to human distress, war, poverty, and to the arrogance of power.”—Johanne Jarry, Le Devoir (Montreal)World Literature Today
"Annie Ernaux somehow succeeds in expressing the personal, whether it be . . . a description of her terror during a tear-gas attack in the subway, or her references to the importance of the role of writing in her own life. . . . It successfully compels the reader to reflect critically on our current era."-E. Nicole Meyer, World Literature Today
Los Angeles Times Discoveries
"Annie Ernaux was blogging about her daily life long before the blog was invented. If anyone can raise it to an art form, she can. . . . This is a beautiful translation."— Susan Salter Reynolds, Los Angeles Times Discoveries
ForeWord Reviews
Like a poet, Ernaux writes with dense, image-packed language; like a novelist, she seeks compelling characters to appear and disappear throughout her text.—Rachel Mennies, ForeWord Reviews— Rachel Mennies
Los Angeles Times
Annie Ernaux was blogging about her daily life long before the blog was invented. If anyone can raise it to an art form, she can. . . . This is a beautiful translation.—Susan Salter Reynolds, Los Angeles Times Discoveries— Susan Salter Reynolds
New York Times Book Review
Beautiful and powerful.—Alison McCulloch, New York Times Book Review— Alison McCulloch
Alison McCulloch
This slim, hard-to-categorize book by the French writer Ernaux is made up of a series of observations of the quotidian: people on trains, in supermarkets, at the hairdresser; people panhandling in subway cars…Spanning the years 1993 to 1999 and written like diary entries, the vignettes, though grim in their piercing observations, are for the same reason both beautiful and powerful.—The New York Times