Class: BS-3

Submitted by: Laraib Batool

Submitted to: Sir Amir Ajmal khan

BOOK REVIEW
Book name: I Remain in Darkness

Author name: Annie Ernaux

Book reviewer: Laraib Batool

INTRODUCTION:
The book I Remain in Darkness is Annie Ernaux's compilation of unedited publication records
that she wrote over the last a couple of years of her mother's life. The record depicts Ernaux's
highly personal response to her mother's decline to Alzheimer's disease. As Ernaux undergoes a
strange onrush of clashing emotions, she ponders on her past and, most particularly, her
association with her mother, Blanche. Although in previous published works Ernaux has
explored ties to her family that were difficult, “I Remain in Darkness” provides an intensely
devoted, quick representation of the bonds between a grown daughter and her dying mother.
“I Remain in Darkness” was for over a decade Ernaux's secret record and almost continued so.
Ernaux pens in her preface that she initially supposed she would not publish her journals,
"Maybe because I wanted to offer only one image, one side of the truth portraying my mother
and my relationship with her."

CRITICAL ANALYSIS:
I Remain in Darkness accounts for the deterioration of Ernaux's mother, Blanche, from
Alzheimer's disease. The first sign that something is wrong came in the summer of 1983 when
Blanche fainted. She was rushed to the hospital where doctors found that she had not eaten or
drunk anything for many days. Ernaux recognized that Blanche can no longer heed for herself,
and she asked her mother to come live with her and her sons. By December, when Ernaux
composed her first journal note, Blanche was already bearing the loss of memory that
Alzheimer incurs. By January 1984, Blanche could no longer write. Her last words, in a letter to a
friend, were, "I remain in darkness."
In February 1984, Blanche, with prostrate and denying eating, was checked into Pontoise
Hospital. She remained there until mid-May when she was referred to a private nursing home.
Her situation there was not good, so she returned to Pontoise for a long-term in geriatric ward.

The next year of her life outlines her drop. Ernaux perceived that her mother seems to have
shrunk up on life. However, Blanche endures on to enough of her previous self to make it clear
to Ernaux that she would sooner be at her home than in the hospital. She also made her
daughter feel accusable for leaving her behind. Blanche's health greatly deteriorated in 1985.
She lost the ability to do just about anything for herself, such as a walk or feed herself. She also
began to recall Ernaux of a child and even an infant baby. Throughout her mother's
hospitalization, Ernaux pursued her regular life. She took holidays, attended concerts,
participated in plays, went to the gallery, got a divorce, had an affair, taught class, wrote
fantasy, and won bookish prizes.

Ernaux also revealed that during her mother's hospitalization, she decided to write an
autobiographical novel about her mother. The image of her mother that she recorded on paper
is incompatible with her mother confined in the hospital. Blanche died in April 1986. Since then,
Ernaux is dismal at her loss. She is incapable to study and continuously imagines; what her
comments about her mother intended. Everywhere she moves and everything she makes
serves as a memento of her mother.

CONCLUSION:
“I Remain in Darkness” is incredibly tough to emotionally digest. It is an effecting account of a
mother enduring a debilitating condition and a daughter attempting to cope with the gradual
loss of her mother. But instead of her efforts, she lost her mother. It was difficult for her to see
her mother dying. It is a masterpiece of depicting the love and emotions between a mother and
a daughter. The author has inscribed about this relationship in A Woman's Story, her
autobiographical novel about a mother and daughter. However, as many years passed, Ernaux
started to question her own wisdom;

"The consistency and coherence achieved in any written work must be questioned whenever
possible."

Read in combination with A Woman's Story, I Remain in Darkness hence presents a

multifaceted picture of the life of a rustic, working-class French woman. Read in isolation from
other Ernaux works, I Remain in Darkness still tells a pitiful story of an effectual love.