Writing about Oneself and Writing about the Other in Women’s Autofiction

a Comparative Analysis of ‘‘A Woman’s Story’’ by A. Ernaux and ‘‘Wound’’ by O. Vasyakina

Abstract

The article is devoted to the consideration of two autofictional texts about the death of a mother, a French one and a Russian one: ‘‘Une femme’’ (‘‘A woman’s story’’) by A. Ernaux, published in 1987 and ‘‘Wound’’ by O. Vasyakina, published in 2021. The relationship between ‘‘the Other’’ and ‘‘I’’ in both texts is determined by the oppositions of mother and daughter; deceased and alive; a woman who bears patriarchal attitudes about the concept of ‘‘femininity’’ and a woman who overcomes them. The image of the mother in both texts is universalized: in ‘‘A woman’s story’’ through the socio-historical context and in ‘‘Wound’’ through the intertext. Besides, the key way of self-characterization of the subject in  ‘‘A woman’s story’’ and ‘‘Wound’’ is to observe the grief and the act of writing in the process of mourning. Both texts are organised by a symbolic journey with a goal to accept the mother and the connection with her. In the autofiction of Ernaux a journey is based on the linear development and in the autofiction of Vasyakina – on the flashbacks. Such ‘‘journeys to acceptance’’ are established as a feature of a group of women’s texts about maternal death: ‘‘Une mort très douce’’ by S. de Beauvoir, the pretext of ‘‘A woman’s story’’ and ‘‘And the One Doesn’t Stir without the Other’’ by L. Irigarey, the pretext of ‘‘Wound’’.