Nathalie Sarraute, Fiction and Theory: Questions of Difference by Ann Jefferson (review)

Abstract

Reviews 840 Reading J\Jathalie Sarraute. Dialogue andDistance.By EMERO'BEIRNE. Oxford: Clarendon Press.I999.Vi+ 259PP. On thecover ofEmerO'Beirne's bookisa sepiaphotograph ofNathalie Sarraute gazing quizzically at thereader from hergarden. The octogenarian author (the photo wastaken inI980)looks decidedly ill-at-ease perched onaniron bench and surrounded byempty chairs. Thisimage ofthewriter asa solitary figure, exiled in familiar surroundings, works well, however, as a visual restatement ofO'Beirne's subtitle, 'DialogueandDistance': bothcapture nicely thetension between isolisme andfraternite, between self andother, that drives allSarraute's work. Focusing onthe dynamics ofthis opposition, O'Beirne's concern iswith howtheSarrautean text speaks tothereader andhowthereader responds, with howmeaning isconstituted inthevery process ofdialogue. Shetherefore carefully andskilfully unpicks this dialogue, tracing itsevolution from novelto novelin thelight oftheories of intersubjectivity, inparticular, Lacan'sconception ofthe formation ofthe subject in language. Regrettably, O'Beirneomits consideration ofthehalf-a-dozen playsSarraute wrote intheI970Sand I980S,a curious omission, onemight think, in a study focusing on thedialogic aspects ofwriting, although sheclaimsthatdramatic dialogue isfundamentally diffierent from that found inthenovels. Herinterest, she argues, liesinthe'kindofdialogue [Sarraute] attempts toestablish through the textual address' andinthepresence intheproseworks ofa 'unifying authorial discourse' which sheclaims tobe 'necessarily absent from thedialogues ofdrama proper' (p 9). O'Beirne isright tostress theauthorial control ofmeaning inthe construction ofdialogue, butthis view ofthe limitations thus placed onthereader's creative freedom is nota newone in Sarraute criticism, and it is somewhat surprising that herbookdoesnotacknowledge this. Moreseriously, theassertion rather thanthedemonstration ofauthorial absence from thetheatrical dialogues invites argument: forinstance, can theauthor notbe said to be present at unconscious levels inthemetaphorical substructures that transcend theboundaries between individual speeches? A contrastive analysis ofSarraute's approach to dialogue across the two genres might havehelped tosettle the issue. On itsownterms, Reading J\/athalie Sarraute is,nevertheless, a finely honedand authoritative essay that extends thefamiliar linguistically-based approaches tothis author tochart with precision thewaysinwhich theforms ofthetext condition reader response. As such,itwillappealmainly tothosescholars forwhomthe fascination ofSarraute's writing isattributable more toits formal construction than toanyunderlying personal dimensions. UNIVERSITY OFNORTH LONDON JOHN PHILLIPS ;Nathalie Sarraute, Fiction and7heo7y. Questions ofDiference. By ANN JEFFERSON. (Cambridge Studies inFrench, 64)Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2000. Xiii + 2I4 pp- £37 5° AnnJeffierson herefollows upherexcellent work for thePleiadeCEuvres comybletes with a study ofNathalie Sarraute's treatment ofdiffierence, not asa theme ortheory, butasa constant preoccupation inher work. From a broad critical baseembracing linguistics, anthropology, literary and feminist theory, Jeffierson explores the paradoxes ofa writing that demands recognition ofitsdiffierence, butseeks toerase difference through identification with thereader inthesameness ofthetropisms. Thereislittle on Sarraute's plays, butJeffierson covers interviews andlectures as MLR,96.3,200 I 84I wellascritical essays andfiction, while a helpful index allows readers tofollow up individual texts ifthey sowish. There isalsoa useful bibliography. Part I dealswith difference inhuman relations, difference assource ofdissension andasrequisite ofindividuality. Itconcludes with anaccount ofSarraute's effiort to 'transmute diXerence into sameness', andherconversion ofphenomena similar to whatKristeva termed 'abjection' (ambiguity, indistinctness ofbeing)intoart, through anaesthetic capableof'transcending thelimits ofintersubjective relations while still subscribing totheir dynamic' (p.76). PartII, calling on feminist theorists from Beauvoir to Cixousand Irigaray, examines Sarraute's treatment ofthe('real'or metaphorical) bodyand sexual difference. Thevery physical impact oftheSarrautean text ischaracterized inone of JeXerson's many memorable formulations, as'a rhetoric ofthe body addressed to a bodywith theaimofpersuading thereader ofa certain truth aboutthemind' (p.go). Sarraute's refusal togender herwriting as 'ecriture feminine' is lucidly analysed anddefended (p.95).Jefferson makes theoften overlooked buttelling pointthatforSarraute's generation, 'feminism didnotmeanthedemandfor positive recognition of theirdiXerence, but,on thecontrary, a crusadefor acknowledgement ofthesameness ofthetwosexes'(p.98).Writing, for Sarraute, represents anescapefrom gender andaccesstothestatus ofundiffierentiated Cetre hUmaXn (P. IOI). Genre isthefocus ofPartIII,which outlines Sarraute's apparent acceptance of traditional categories ('essai', 'roman','poeme'),but her blurring of their boundaries. Commenting onthe provocative interventionism practised bySarraute asa critic/heretic, constantly undermining orthodoxy infavour of'the immediacy andspontaneity ofreaderly contact' (p. I29), Jefferson convincingly argues that her 'so-called critical writing isnotsomuch a form ofcriticism asa defence ofreading' (P. I30), aimingultimately 'to producea universal fusion whereboundaries, distance anddiXerences will nolonger exist' (p. I44).Jefferson further suggests that theputative generic diffierence ofEnfance, with itstendency toproduce authoridentity , is retrospectively counteracted bytheidentity-busting strategy oftune t'aimes pas,tobring itbackintothesameness of'a continuous fictional evolution' (P. I47). The bookis subtly argued and supported throughout bydetailed...