Un barrage contre le pacifique by duras: A fundamental work or the original overlapping of reality and fiction

Abstract

This article stresses the fact that autobiography and fiction are originally intertwined in Un barrage contre le Pacifique by Marguerite Duras. This interweaving of fact and fiction seriously complicates the reader’s task. The latter is unable to disentangle reality and that which is imaginary as he is incapable of knowing where the account of the author’s life ends and where the narrative begins. It shows that the autobiography, as it is written by Marguerite Duras, isn’t in keeping with the “autobiographical pact” defined by Philippe Lejeune so as, from one text to the other, her personal story is always repeated, rebuilt and reinvented in the act of writing. In this way it constantly evades realism. The article also deals with the particular worth of the Barrage as a fundamental work of Duras’ literary production and a basis as well as an original account of her autobiographical process.