On The Joys and Pains of Making Art: The Autofiction of Serge Doubrovsky
Doubrovsky lived as if he had to write about it
Because they offer unique perspectives on multiple historical and personal events (and because they have sold well!), it is very regrettable and remarkable that as of yet no novels by French writer and academic Serge Doubrovsky have been translated into English. This can be, at least partially, attributed to the fact that his writing style is rather peculiar: envision pages-long paragraphs with phrases divided only by commas, plenty of references that would escape non-French and non-academic readers and chapters that jump around different timelines and you get the standard Doubrovsky novel, of which it would certainly be a monumental task to produce a smooth English translation. I believe that it would not be impossible to do so, however, and I am curious about the possibility of later on working on helping his literature be discovered and enjoyed by the Anglosphere. In the meantime, I am pleased to discuss one of his latest novels, Laissé pour conte, which was published in 1999 and whose title can be roughly translated as Left As a Tale. This title will make sense soon, but here’s a hint — Doubrovsky notably coined the term autofiction to describe fictionalized, novelized accounts of one’s life. Other noteworthy French authors who have explored the subgenre include Annie Ernaux, Hervé Guibert, and Édouard Louis. Autofiction novels, unlike autobiographies, take more liberties to play around with the chronology, affects, and accuracy of what is being told but still adhere somewhat to depicting real events.
Going back to the title — what exactly does Doubrovsky feel has been left (interpreted, taken) as a tale? According to Doubrovsky, his own life events that he had transcribed for a small but loyal audience had, now that he was living by himself in Paris during old age, started to feel as if they were nothing but tales. His childhood in the middle of the German occupation of France, his studies in English literature in Dublin, his teaching jobs in France and America, his marriage, his lovers, his productive career as an 17th century French drama specialist — it all slowly eroded into nothing but pages and pages that he re-reads nostalgically now and then. As he describes the pain of receiving almost no phone calls and spending weeks in chronic pain, he looks at the writing he has produced and cannot help but wonder if for his readership — which ranges from casual readers to academic ones who have written entire dissertations on his works — have forgotten that he is a real person and not just a character in a multivolume novel. However, judging by this novel alone, Doubrovsky (who passed away only 3 years ago in 2017) and his work were much more than amusing stories to pass the time. His autofiction finds relevance for multiple reasons.
The Memory of the German Occupation Period
Scattered throughout Laissé pour conte, Doubrovsky’s passages about his childhood and adolescence during World War II are invaluable. His father was a tailor of Slavic-Jewish origins and his mother a housewife of Alsatian-Jewish descent who during her youth longed to be an actress but found happiness instead forming a family. They lived a relatively calm life until the German occupation of France, when they had to retreat to a countryside house with some relatives and, for a while, hide in a basement and constantly worry about the possibility of being sent to the concentration camps in Germany if caught. Doubrovsky explains that these traumatic experiences inevitably shaped his worldview and life events — there are plenty of suggestions, for example, that he feels as if his youth had been stolen from him because of having to hide. Additionally, he reminds readers of the guilt associated with being too young to act in any way against the spread of Nazism in Europe but not young enough not to be aware of what was at stake for Jews and other minorities across Europe during this time. Lastly, even during these bleak times, he makes sure to note that the kindness of his own family and of strangers who hosted them and helped them obtain medical attention and food when needed showed him that maybe not all hope is lost. It is after witnessing this kindness that he decides that, would he survive, he would continue documenting his survival through writing.
On Being a Global Citizen
The internationalism and ethnic multiplicity of Doubrovsky’s novel is definitely one of the reasons why it is fascinating to read. Doubrovsky was born in France and his first language was French, but fondly spoke of his father and relatives speaking Yiddish and Russian amongst each other. Furthermore, even though his family was culturally French, he still often felt as an other, especially as anti-Semitism grew before and during World War II. The perspective of a French Jew is further enriched, first, by a short period in Dublin when he attended Trinity College to study English. There, he explored the distinctions between people from the upper classes, who spoke with an English accent, and working-class Irish people, who spoke with a local dialect. He also befriended thanks to academia people from all over Europe and around the world with whom he found more similarities than, for example, a working-class Irish girlfriend he dated for a while whom he was nervous to introduce to his academic friends because she would have nothing in common with them. He also found in Ireland a type of Catholicism that was far more conservative than the French variant that made meeting women a harder task for him.
After Ireland, Doubrovsky’s next breakthrough was his move to America, where he taught at Harvard, Brandeis University, Smith College and NYU. Not only did he have to acclimate to American culture upon moving, but he had also come to realize that each of these institutions had a unique culture of its own. Harvard felt at times too rigid and unwelcoming for a new instructor like him, while Brandeis, a newly founded Jewish university, felt like a paradise for poets and intellectuals surrounded by the beautiful landscapes of Massachusetts. Smith College, much smaller and located in a rural area, proved to be a nice getaway from the urbanism of the Boston area, but soon enough his wife and him wanted to go back to a city and ended up settling in New York City. The bustling “skyscraper island” (the nickname he gives to New York City) would be the background for some of the most turbulent moments in his life — his divorce and a string of intense romantic relationships unfolding as he built a career as an academic.
The novel is a great resource for someone looking for people who documented the wave of French immigrants (academics, mostly) who came to the United States during and after World War II and enriched the intellectual life of this country. It also shows how humans move around and negotiate different identities throughout their lives in order not just to adapt to their circumstances but also to survive.
Love and Art
Two elements that are inextricably linked in Laissé pour conte are the author’s experiences with love and his art. Doubrovsky describes in detail his love affairs with different women [in this text: Claudia (an American economist)-Eliska (a Czech scientist)-Rachel (an American literature academic)] to show how each of them have shaped his writing. His love for these women, he openly states several times, are muses for his novels. The negotiation that takes place between himself and them — during sex, when deciding what to do for the weekend or what to do with their lives — is what says the most about Doubrovsky’s character. While love is often portrayed in literature as a force that can surpass all, in Doubrovsky’s autofiction love is far more complex. For instance, when Claudia asks for them to separate because she no longer wishes to accompany him to Paris every two years while he teaches there at the NYU satellite campus, he does not concede to her requests and accepts a separation instead. Years later, when Rachel asks him to stop spending his weekends in Queens with his daughters and to bring them over to their shared apartment instead, he refuses to compromise and says his weekend getaway in Queens is part of a delightful, revitalizing routine that he cannot give up. Scenes such as these that depict the often banal transactions that can make or break relationships complicate simpler romanticized understandings of love and affection.
Finally — one final word on affection. The second-to-last chapter is perhaps the oddest in this monumental work: the author reviews a chapter about him on a short story compilation written by his therapist Akeret about his patients. Doubrovsky feels as if his therapist and friend has written a malicious, narcissistic representation of Doubrovsky because he had always been jealous of his popularity as a writer and his multiple love affairs. This chapter also states that Akeret wrote this erroneous account of Doubrovsky because he was jealous that while Doubrovsky lived a chaotic life for the sake of artistic fame, Akeret remained an obscure therapist with an unexciting life centered around his immediate family. As bold as these accusations are (perhaps this dispute is worth exploring later on), Doubrovsky utilizes this section to link art to lived experiences. Indeed, his suffering in German-occupied France, his love affairs throughout his youth and adulthood and his sharp loneliness after reaching the peak of literary fame were no doubt catalysts for all that he had to write. Perhaps, even if he vehemently rejects this idea while addressing Akeret, he did live as if he had a life to write about. Should we strive for such a life? That’s a personal choice.
