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A Man's Place
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A Man's Place
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Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?
This memoir will resonate with readers interested in social history, family dynamics, class struggles, and introspective, literary biographies. It suits those who appreciate unsentimental and thought-provoking explorations of personal and societal change.
Barely educated and valued since childhood strictly for his labour, Ernauxβs father had grown into a hard, practical man who showed his family little affection. Narrating his slow ascent towards material comfort, Ernauxβs cold observation in A Manβs Place reveals the shame that haunted her father throughout his life.
Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and
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Description
Annie Ernaux's father died exactly two months after she passed her exams for a teaching certificate. Barely educated and valued since childhood strictly for his labour, Ernaux's father had grown into a hard, practical man who showed his family little affection. Narrating his slow ascent towards material comfort, Ernaux's cold observation in A Man's Place reveals the shame that haunted her father throughout his life.
She scrutinizes the importance he attributed to manners and language that came so unnaturally to him as he struggled to provide for his family with a grocery store and cafe in rural France. Over the course of the book, Ernaux grows up to become the uncompromising observer now familiar to the world, while her father matures into old age with a staid appreciation for life as it is and for a daughter he cautiously, even reluctantly admires.
'Ernaux has inherited de Beauvoir's role of chronicler to a generation.' - Margaret Drabble
Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?
Critics praise Ernaux for her unsentimental and incisive storytelling. Frances Wilson of the Telegraph highlights that Ernaux transcends typical memoir, portraying herself as an emblematic figure caught in the historical process of social class change. Mia Colleran of the Irish Times commends the book as both a biography bound by class and a reflective inquiry into the art of life writing. Ernaux's portrayal of parental relationships is noted as both a form of betrayal and a compelling exploration of social and familial tensions.
Book Details
INFORMATION
ISBN: 9781913097363
Publisher: Fitzcarraldo Editions
Format: Paperback / softback
Date Published: 28 October 2020
Country: United Kingdom
Imprint: Fitzcarraldo Editions
Contributors:
- Translated by Tanya Leslie
- Translated by Tanya Leslie
Audience: General / adult
DIMENSIONS
Width: 125.0mm
Height: 197.0mm
Weight: 250g
Pages: 80
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About the Author
Born in 1940, Annie Ernaux grew up in Normandy, studied at Rouen University, and later taught at secondary school. From 1977 to 2000, she was a professor at the Centre National d'Enseignement par Correspondance. Her books, in particular A Man's Place and A Woman's Story, have become contemporary classics in France. The Years won the Prix Renaudot in France in 2008, the Premio Strega in Italy in 2016, and was shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize in 2019. In 2017, Annie Ernaux was awarded the Marguerite Yourcenar Prize for her life's work.
Also by Annie Ernaux
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A Girl's Story β WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
A Girl's Story by the illustrious Annie Ernaux, recipient of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature, is a profound exploration of female identity and the complex nuances of memory. This deeply resonant narrative revisits the summer of 1958, a pivotal moment in Ernaux's youth spent as a holiday camp supervisor in Normandy. During this summer, Ernaux experiences her first night...Paperback$3299Unit price /UnavailableAvailableShips in 4-6 weeks -
The Years
The Years by Annie Ernaux is an extraordinary autobiographical narrative that transcends the traditional boundaries of memoir. Available in English for the first time, this remarkable book has established itself as a literature classic, lauded globally for its unique approach to storytelling and profound introspection. Spanning from 1941 to 2006, Ernaux's work doesn't merely recount her own life, but instead...Paperback$2900Elsewhere:$3400Unit price /UnavailableAvailableShips in 4-6 weeks -
The Use of Photography
The Use of Photography recounts a passionate love affair between Annie Ernaux and the journalist and author Marc Marie, after the two met in January 2003. Ernaux had been receiving intensive chemo for breast cancer during the prior three months, and had lost all her hair from the treatments. At the end of January she had surgery, followed by radiation...Paperback$3299Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
I Remain in Darkness β WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
I Remain in Darkness is a deeply moving exploration of ageing, memory, and familial bonds by Nobel Prize-winning author Annie Ernaux. This poignant memoir traces Ernaux's efforts to support her mother, who is grappling with Alzheimer's disease, a condition that slowly erodes her memory and identity. As the disease progresses, Ernaux finds herself bearing witness to her mother's inevitable decline,...Paperback$2799Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
A Woman's Story β WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
On 7 April 1986, Annie Ernaux's mother, after years of suffering from Alzheimer's disease, died in a retirement home in the suburbs of Paris. Shocked by this loss which, despite her mother's condition, she had refused to fathom, Ernaux embarks on a daunting journey back through time in an effort to recover the different facets of a woman whose openness...Paperback$2799Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Look at the Lights, My Love
A meditation on the big-box superstore, from 2022 Nobel laureate Annie Ernaux For half a century, French writer Annie Ernaux has restlessly explored stories and subjects often considered unworthy of artistic reflection. In this exquisite meditation, Ernaux turns her attention to the phenomenon of the big-box superstore, a ubiquitous feature of modern life that has received scant attention in literature....Paperback$3099Unit price /UnavailableAvailableShips in 3-4 weeks -
I Will Write To Avenge My People - WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE I will write to avenge my people. It was as a young woman that Annie Ernaux first wrote these words in her diary, giving a name to her purpose in life as a writer. She returns to them in her stirring defence of literature and of political writing in her Nobel Lecture,...Paperback$2100Elsewhere:$2299Unit price /UnavailableAvailableShips in 4-6 weeks -
The Young Man β WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
In her latest work, Annie Ernaux recounts a relationship with a student thirty years her juniorβan experience that transforms her, briefly, back into the scandalous girl of her youth. When she is with him, she replays scenes she has already lived through, feeling both ageless and closer to death. Laid like a palimpsest on the present, the past's immediacy pushes...Paperback$1999Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Shame β WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
'My father tried to kill my mother one Sunday in June, in the early afternoon.' Thus begins Shame, the probing story of the twelve-year-old girl who will become Annie Ernaux, and the traumatic memory that will echo and resonate throughout her life. With the emotionally rich voice of great fiction and the analytical eye of a scientist, Annie Ernaux provides...Paperback$2799Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Exteriors β WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
Annie Ernaux, the laureate of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature, delves deep into the essence of contemporary existence in Exteriors. Set against the backdrop of the outskirts of Paris, Ernaux crafts a narrative that is both poignantly lyrical and chaotically vibrant. Through her meticulous observations and profound reflections, she captures the raw and unfiltered pulse of urban life, making...Paperback$2799Unit price /UnavailableAvailableShips in 4-6 weeks -
A Man's Place β WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
A Man's Place, winner of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature, is a poignant and unflinching memoir by acclaimed author Annie Ernaux. Through precise and unembellished prose, Ernaux crafts a vivid narrative of her father's life. The story begins with a moment of deep personal contradiction: Ernaux's father passes away just two months after she earns her teaching certificate. This...Paperback$2499Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
The Young Man
The Young Man by Annie Ernaux is the celebrated author's most recent work, published in 2022, and winner of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature. This dazzling and breathtaking account explores her passionate affair with a man 30 years her junior. "A sublime book." - Olivia de Lamberterie, Elle "Once again the work of the writer Annie Ernaux appears as...Paperback$2400Unit price /UnavailableAvailableShips in 4-6 weeks
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