Annie Ernaux is a proclaimed feminist, not very sensitive to literary ceremonies.
And she does not hesitate to remind this in each of her media interventions.
The awarding of the Nobel Prize for Literature?
While she is the first French woman to receive it, in December 2022, she bluntly declared, to
Marie Claire
, that
“to go and get [her] medal in Stockholm from the hand of a sovereign, of royalty” had
“nothing to do with writing”
for her
.
Her speech provoked various reactions, some were shocked at the lack of recognition she showed, others applauded, despite the global prestige of the Nobel Prize.
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In fact, she affirmed, in an interview with AFP in December 2022, that the Nobel is
“an institution for men”
which is manifested, according to her,
“by this taste for a tradition, in the costumes”
.
“Did you feel out of place?”
, the journalist then asks him.
The answer bursts forth, affirmative:
“Yes, absolutely.”
To the remark of the journalist who said to her
"if you hated the awarding of the Nobel Prize, you would be even more horrified by the introduction ceremony at the French Academy"
, the novelist replied:
"I have always said that I I would never go to that old nerdy thing.”
What did the Sages of Quai Conti do to deserve these words?
The answer lies in these eternal debates around the French language, in particular with the use of inclusive writing and the use of gendered pronouns
“iel and iels”,
which she uses for her part.
Also read: Annie Ernaux: the incredible Nobel Prize effect on the sale of her books
Feminization of spelling, use of the pronoun
“iel”
…
“They opposed the feminization of spelling for years,
” she laments.
They continue to denounce the gendered pronouns he and they.”
The position of the French Academy on these subjects is known, but should we recall it?
If it accepts the feminization of titles, grades and profession names, in that it follows the use of the French language, this is not the case for inclusive writing, which is part of an activist approach and constitutes poses
“a mortal peril”
.
For the institution,
"the multiplication of orthographic and syntactic marks that it induces results in a disunited language, disparate in its expression, creating a confusion which borders on illegibility"
, as it declared in a press release on the so-called
“inclusive”
writing
and published in October 2017.
“By focusing attention on the obsession with gender, it restricts the relationship with language by inhibiting a broader expression of thought
,” said the Sages in an open letter published in 2021. As for the neutral pronoun
“iel”
(contraction of
“he”
and
“she”
for people who do not define themselves by any gender, editor’s note), recognized by the online version of Robert, the former Permanent Secretary of the French Academy, Hélène Carrère d’Encausse, declared in 2022 that it was simply a
“publicity stunt”
.
Read also Inclusive writing, pronoun “iel”… When the “inclusivism” of companies scares away
The French Academy follows custom.
But what is it for “iel”?
Does the man in the street use it?
There is room for doubt.
Academician Pascal Ory questioned its relevance at the microphone of Radio Classique in December 2021 during the public debate around the personal pronouns
“la or le”
to adopt behind the word
“Covid”
:
“We will see in a few years, if the “ iel” is in public use, in which case the Academy will register it, or if it will be a whim of an individual
.
More recently, in our columns, Jean-Marie Rouart asked:
“Should the French language bend obediently to all individual or category aspirations?”
And to recall, using the words of the former Minister of National Education Jean-Michel Blanquer, that if feminism is a great cause, it must not
“distort the French language”
.
To the wise...