ABSTRACT
In Florence Delay lecture, she pleaded for a timely neologism that might prod us into thinking about the stark contemporary lack of convivance. In an interview given to Le Monde, Delay expressed the wish that her election to the Academy would attract other authentic writers to a group too often made up of mediocre novelists, sententious politicians, and old fogies. There are exceptions to this rule, like Alain Robbe-Grillet, with whose recent election, however, Delay had nothing to do. Narrators crisscross, as Delay shrewdly shifts from first-person to third-person forms, from direct to indirect discourse, from ironic authorial intervention to stream of consciousness. Her hallmark has long been a fascinating combination of inventiveness and homage-paying “imitation.” Typically, Delay also tosses in funny bits of carefully researched erudition. He is a medical doctor, specialized in dizziness, who is trying to learn Biblical Hebrew.
