text/Pan Caixia
World War II , French countryside. A pregnant woman riding her bicycle alone through a protective dam built by the Germans. When she finally returned home, her husband did not recognize her because of her disheveled face.
Soon after, daughter Anne Elno was born. From then on, the only goal of this couple who came from the bottom of society was to let their daughter cross the class and become a member of " Bourgeois ".
Decades later, their dream came true. Anne not only became a first-class French writer, but in 2022, at the age of 82, she also won the Nobel Prize in Literature .
In her representative work "The Years", she faces the most abyss and most painful parts of her memory, and truly writes herself into the text and embeds it into history.
01
In 1940, Anne Ernault was born in a small town in the Normandy region of France.
Both parents were from rural areas. They opened a cafe and grocery store with loans. Although they worked hard, they still couldn't get rid of poverty.
Amid the long-term hardship, class concepts are deeply rooted. They strive to change their destiny and pin all their hopes on Anne.
In his yearning for the previous class, his father began to consciously teach Anne to practice the table etiquette of Parisians and the rules when facing customers. He demanded that the whole family speak "standard French" and felt inferior about his northern country accent.
At that time, one of Anne's nightmare was: her father forced her to speak the standard French word by word, while she opened her mouth and kept talking.
Despite financial difficulties, her parents still tightened their belts and sent Anne to private school. And this is unique among the surrounding families.
Private schools represent special classes, which are the ladder to Bourgeois.
Children Anne and her father
In school, Anne performed very well. She is the student who is best at reading aloud in the class. Every essay she wrote can be praised. However, she also realized that she was different from the children from middle-class families in her class.
She has no friends of the same age, and she can only feel her existence while reading.
Out of compensation, her mother bought Anne a large number of books and took her to visit monuments and museums, although she was not interested in Egypt's vases.
And his father always tried hard to overcome his timidity. One day, he took Anne to the city library, and after hesitating for a moment, he bravely pushed open the door.
That day, in the quiet hall, the father asked Annie to speak by herself: "We want to borrow books..."
trained Annie to become an intellectual, allowing her to enter a social class that once disdained them. This is her only goal.
18-year-old Annie and her mother
02
Although their parents have tried their best, Annie's growth is inevitably accompanied by shame. A trip made her realize clearly that there was an insurmountable gap between her and Bourgeois.
In August that year, my father took Anne to a tour group, mixed with the glamorous wealthy people, and their shabby clothes made them feel ashamed.
The rich ladies were holding travel guides in their hands, carrying chocolate and snacks in their bags, and their luggage was empty;
When they were eating in the restaurant, they sat alone at a table, and the waiter ignored them;
When they were staying in a hotel, they saw the bathroom, hot water and washbasin in the room, and Annie seemed to have come to another world.
And her real home, because of the lack of a room, she slept in the same bedroom with her parents, neither a refrigerator nor a bathroom, and was always filled with swear words, drunkards and poor families on credit.
"From my parents' career, their financial difficulties, shame has become a part of my body."
In the melancholy of growing up, Anne has a estrangement from her parents. She feels ashamed of her father's dialect and local language, and her mother's unfashionable and unceremoniousness.
What is consistent is the love from parents. When Anne proposed to go to Rouen and study in London, they satisfied her unconditionally, even if they themselves could only rely on potatoes and milk to satisfy their hunger.
1958, 18-year-old Anne worked as a counselor at a summer camp. She was eager for love and spent the night with an instructor, who was already engaged.
Soon after, Annie found out she was pregnant. In French society at that time, abortion was illegal, and she had to go to private clinics and faced the sarcastic eyes and physical pain alone.
It was not until decades later that she had the courage to write this experience, which was the autobiographical novel "Event".
2021, the film " is happening " adapted from her real experience won the Golden Lion Award at the 78th Venice Film Festival in .
When the director recalled the details that he dared not touch with him, Annie's eyes were filled with tears. At that time, the scars left by society on women were never healed in her whole life.
"It's happening" stills
03
After graduating from high school, Anne was admitted to the Rouen School of Literature and the University of Bordeaux for further studies.
In college, she met a male classmate who studied politics. He came from an bourgeois family. The whole family has received higher education, knowledgeable and well-educated.
When summer comes, she takes him back to her home in the countryside.
After graduating from university, Annie entered the marriage as she wished, her husband worked in a government department, and she truly stepped into the upper class.
However, she always goes home alone to visit her parents. Behind her husband's politeness is contempt and disdain.
In 1967, Annie became a middle school teacher, and in her spare time, she began to write.
For several years, my husband worked in different cities, and my family moved around, writing intermittently. Later, her husband was promoted and they went to Paris, and Anne was transferred to work in the French Distance Education Center.
Life is finally stable, but the relationship has cracks. In the constant quarrels and reconciliation, Anne is exhausted, and a list of property division declares the end of the marriage.
After the divorce, Anne, with two sons alone, and had to take care of her mother who suffered from Alzheimer's disease, , and she was almost collapsed at one point.
After her mother passed away, she was lonely and began to long for love again. At this moment, a man walked into her life. He was an Eastern European businessman, married and came to Paris for a short time.
During that time, Anne was always indifferent like a lovely girl, looking forward to his phone or date.
"In that passionate year, his presence affected my life", she learned about his country through the newspapers, constantly dressing herself up just to please him.
And that year, she was already in her 50s.
Until the other party returns to China, the relationship ends. Later, Annie said, "What a luxury when you have passion for someone."
24, Annie and her husband
04
2000, Annie retired from the position of teacher. As she grew older, she felt more and more that “everything was forgotten at an unheard of speed” and that writing a work that reflected the passage of time became increasingly urgent.
That spring, she was invited to China to talk about her writing at some universities in Beijing and Shanghai.
In the alley, in the park, she sees elementary school students wearing school uniforms, brides wearing wedding dresses, and elderly people walking. She feels close.
What kind of memories do they have about their childhood and various periods of life? Anne thought of herself, at that time, her "Eternal Years" was brewing.
"I am in real life only when I am really writing and know clearly that I will complete it."
Everything gives way to writing, even if it is cancer.
Starting from photos from different periods, Anne looks back at the long years that have passed for decades.
Poverty in teenage years, abortion in youth, failed marriage, short-term passion, a long farewell to the mother suffering from Alzheimer's disease. Those scenes were shown in my mind like videos.
From the bottom of birth to the upper class, she never forgot that she was a country girl from the outskirts of the city.
"When I walk through Paris, I always feel like I'm picking a lock in. When I pass by the luxurious boutiques there, I feel strange, and I feel that this is not my world."
She lives in simplicity and keeps a distance from the Parisian literary world, just to write "the book I really want to write."
From the beginning of World War II at birth to the beginning of the 21st century, Anne reproduced the pictures in her memory in original form.
"The duty of a novelist is to tell the facts." For this reason, she did not avoid all the unbearable and hidden pain.
In 2008, after years of thinking and creation, "The Years of Eternity" was finally completed. Anne used simple and sharp words to illuminate the darkness of history with individual light, and wrote a true French folk history after World War II.
That is her own memory and the memory of all French women. Readers from different eras can see their own shadows in the book.
With this work, Anne won the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature.
After learning about winning the award, the 82-year-old still remains ambitious: "I feel a new responsibility to continue to fight for the injustice of this world."
When someone calls her a "female writer", she stressed: "I am not a female writer, I am a writer."
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