The New Yorker: Fiction · The New Yorker
Lucinda Rosenfeld Reads Annie Ernaux
October 1, 2023·46 min·4 clips
Lucinda Rosenfeld reveals how Annie Ernaux's simple, declarative prose changed her view of what literature can be.
As heard by us
A precise, quietly aching reading of Ernaux on mothers, daughters, old habits, and the cruelty of time.
Annie Ernaux's "Returns" becomes a spare, cutting study of going home: a daughter arriving in her old town, visiting her mother, and slipping back into habits she recognizes at once, from refusing the taxi to measuring herself against old economies and routines.
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