Module Content and Indicative Topics 

As a follow-up to the first-year module FREN0069 (‘French Literature 1’) this module aims to introduce second-year students who are taking French for Beginners 2 to aspects of French and Francophone literature by considering various genres of writing, different periods and themes. This module will allow students to develop the analytical skills they will need in subsequent years to study literary texts in greater depth and get them to reflect critically on the question of reading French texts in translation. The teaching will be organised around two five-week blocks (20 hours in total) which will focus on specific texts representative of literary periods, movements or genres. 

In 2022-23, the first block will focus on experimental writing in the 20th/21st centuries, considering two short modern texts, Annie Ernaux’s La Place (1983) (English translation: A Man’s Place (1992)) and Philippe Besson’s En l’absence des hommes (2001) (English translation: In the Absence of Men (2002)). Both Ernaux and Besson are prize-winning contemporary authors who are known for their short, emotive, intimate texts. Ernaux’s A Man’s Place tells the story of the childhood and education of a female narrator (who is perhaps the author?) and especially her relationship to her father, reflected upon in the wake of his death. In the Absence of Men, Besson’s first novel, is set during the First World War and follows the character Vincent both in his friendship with Marcel Proust (the famous author who is present as a character in this work) and in his love for the soldier Arthur. Both works engage explicitly with Proust, although in different ways, and reflect on what it means to write in French after Proust, either autobiographically (Ernaux) or historically (Besson). They are also both experimental in form and style, as we will examine. 

The second block will be on nineteenth-century literature: we will study Stendhal’s Le Rouge et le Noir (1830), Alfred de Musset’s Lorenzaccio (1834) and Théophile Gautier’s Mademoiselle de Maupin (1835). 

This is a compulsory module for second-year students studying for the BA in Comparative Literature with ab initio French as their chosen language. 

Recommended Reading 

In preparation for the module, we advise reading the following core texts: 

Philippe Besson, In the Absence of Men, translated by Frank Wynne (London: Vintage, 2003). 

Annie Ernaux, A Man’s Place, translated by Tanya Leslie (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2012). 

Stendhal, The Red and the Black. Ed. Roger Gard. Penguin Classics, 2002. French text: Le Rouge et le noir. Préface de Michel Crozet. Le Livre de Poche 1997. 

Alfred de Musset. Lorenzaccio. Ed. Olivier Bara. Folioplus classiques. 2003. A PDF version in English will be provided. 

Théophile Gautier. Mademoiselle de Maupin. Trans. Helen Constantine. Penguin Classics, 2005. French text: Ed. Michel Crouzet. Folio Classique, 1973. 