Writing Wounds GENUS: Gender in Modern Culture 4 Russell West (Berlin) Jennifer Yee (Newcastle-upon-Tyne) Frank Lay (Cologne) Sabine Schülting (Berlin) Writing Wounds The Inscription of Trauma in post-1968 French Women's Life-writing Kathryn Robson Amsterdam - New York, NY2004 Cover photo: gettyimages/photodisc © The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of "ISO 9706:1994, Information and documentation - Paper for documents - Requirements for permanence". ISBN: 90-420-1921-2 ©Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam - New York, NY2004 Printed in the Netherlands For my parents, and for S. This page intentionally left blank Acknowledgements I would like to thank the editors of the Journal of Romance Studies for permission to reproduce here a revised and extended version of my article “Falling into an abyss: remembering and writing sexual abuse in Béatrice de Jurquet's La Traversée des lignes”, which first appeared in the Journal of Romance Studies 2.1 (Spring 2002), 79-90. I should also like to thank the University of Newcastle for research leave that has enabled me to complete this book and the Arts and Humanities Research Board for funding the doctoral thesis from which this book has emerged. This book finds its origins in my doctoral thesis, undertaken at the University of Cambridge. I would like to thank first and foremost my thesis supervisor, Emma Wilson, for her seemingly endless encouragement and inspiration throughout the writing of the thesis and since. I am also warmly grateful to Victoria Best and Jennifer Yee for their friendship, stimulation and help with various drafts of this book. For intellectual debate and emotional support I would like to thank Emily Butterworth, Simon Gaunt, Thomas Lepeltier, Jackie Storey and Emily Tomlinson. Finally I am immensely grateful to my family, and to Simon Meacher, for their continued emotional and practical support throughout the writing process. This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Preface: Writing Wounds 11 Introduction: The Story of Trauma in “Trauma Theory” 17 Hysterical Heroines: From “Dora” to Marie Cardinal’s Les Mots pour le dire and Autrement dit 37 Writing (through) the body: Hélène Cixous’s Dedans and “Stigmata” 61 “Perdre pied”: The Inscription of Sexual Abuse in Béatrice de Jurquet’s Autobiographical Fiction 85 Chantal Chawaf’s Le Manteau noir: Survival, Departure and Bearing Witness 109 Choking on Words: Sarah Kofman’s Autobiographical Writings 133 Ghost-writing the Holocaust: Charlotte Delbo’s Auschwitz et après 157 Conclusion: Re-Reading the Wound 183 Works Cited 191