I don’t think I have read too many works by Nobel prize winners in literature but here is one example. It took me a little time to get into this book maybe because in the beginning I thought I was going to be reading fiction. This is not a story in that sense but it is the narrative of the second half of the 20th century and into the last 25 years, from a French angle. It is however not a history book but more of a memoir or an autobiography, but a collective autobiography and written in the third person, thus giving a sense of distance from too much that is personal and subjective.
This is France and in particular Paris, and the societal experience of a people set in relation to events and experiences that take place globally and sometimes within their own country. The descriptions of changing family dynamics and the effects of ageing are beautifully written and inevitably resonate with any reader who has two family generations younger than themselves.
The author’s approach to punctuation is sometimes rather cavalier and I’m not sure I sorted out the reasoning behind this. Many full stops are missing at the end of short paragraphs … or maybe they are not designed as paragraphs? I will think about this.
In the end this book gave me a lot of reading enjoyment and a great deal to consider and process. It also made me want to write about my life alongside events that have taken place during those years. My Years.