Shame by Annie Ernaux, translated by Tanya Leslie. Advance Reader Copy (eARC) from the publisher via NetGalley included. No affiliate links were used. Read my full disclosure policy here.
‘My father tried to kill my mother one Sunday in June, in the early afternoon.’
Annie Ernaux’s Shame, translated from French by Tanya Leslie, opens with the directness readers have come to expect from her work. Ernaux was twelve when she witnessed her father’s attempt to kill her mother. This traumatic event divided her life into before and after as she ‘waited for the scene to be repeated.’ It did not happen again, but the expectation compounded the shame that Ernaux ‘began living in.’
Shame is Ernaux’s exploration of the aftermath of that June 1952 afternoon as she tries to understand why shame was her overriding reaction. Shame is not an easy emotion to share with other people. Or yourself. Ernaux spent years downplaying shame’s impact on her life and relationships. Her relationship with her parents, but since shame is far-reaching, it impacts every relationship. It was not always to the same degree or in obvious ways, but it was under the surface.
Yet, shame thrives in silence. It convinces us that no one will understand. It tricks us into thinking we are alone. As Ernaux discovers through confronting her shame, people may not completely understand your experience, just as you may not fully understand theirs, but that does not mean we are alone. Or that shame is something we can never shake.
In Shame, Ernaux carefully excavates her trauma, interrogates her memories, and shows people’s shame is interlinked, regardless of our differing root causes. I used excavates deliberately because, to the reader, it feels like Ernaux is removing layers of earth to uncover the core of what makes us human. I highly recommend it!
Shame by Annie Ernaux, translated by Tanya Leslie, is published by Fitzcarraldo Editions in the UK & Ireland and by Seven Stories Press elsewhere. Happenings is available in paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats.
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