Autobiography is given a new form, at once subjective and impersonal, private and collective, in Nobel Prize winner Annie Ernaux’s genre-bending masterpiece. Translated by Alison L Strayer.
The Years is a narrative of the period 1941 to 2006 told through the lens of memory, impressions past and present, photos, books, songs, radio, television, advertising, and news headlines. Local dialect, words of the times, slogans, brands and names for ever-proliferating objects are given voice. The author’s voice continually dissolves and re-emerges as Ernaux makes the passage of time palpable. Time itself, inexorable, narrates its own course, consigning all other narrators to anonymity.
Annie Ernaux
About the Author
Annie Ernaux was born in Seine-Maritime, France, in September 1940. In October 2022 she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Alison L Strayer
About the Translator
Alison Strayer was born in Saskatchewan, Canada, in July 1958.The Years is the collective memoir of a generation, an almanac of collaged experiences, words, advertisements, graffiti, clothes, films, habits, beliefs.