Simple Passion

Can I just begin with what a conundrum the title is? Lets think about this critically...does "simple passion" even exist? isn't Ernaux doing the whole concept of passion a major disservice by declaring it to be simple? I mean passion is what fuels lives, and ends them. Passion is the byproduct of desire and desire is our drive for life therefore can passion be simple? Conceptually no, it cannot be because it leads us to ask where does it come from, and why can we not control being over taken by this emotional wire puller? However physically it can be simple, its a feeling, a force beyond our control and for better or for worse we're just along for the ride, and this is what Ernaux cleanly demonstrates: the power and control of passion. Ernaux does not live her life in the present like most people do, she either lives it in the distant past or in the ominous future. She states "I would start expecting his phone call again, with all the more suffering and anxiety as the date of our last meeting receded." This passage encompasses her living in the past from when she last saw A and worrying about the future in which she may never see him again. To Ernaux time passing is a nuisance, if she is with A she wants to to go slower, if she is without him she needs it to go faster; to her the past is the only life that she would like to live and the future is where she wants to live. This mirrors the time she spends with A, her relationship with this man only exists in the past tense, she can dream about the possible future with him. but in the present he's a phantom. Ernaux has a unique writing style where she includes little autobiographical asides, but why include these? Not only do they help pushing along the story or provide vital background information but I felt they were included to develop herself more in her own anecdote. The way we are introduced to Ernaux is as the first hand perspective of being the other woman, and how dreary it is. She has nothing to gain from this situation except for being pawed at by a cheating drunk who will leave her hours later and yet this manages to be the only thing she desires for. While the asides flesh out Ernaux into being an actual human and not just some lifeless formless being, they also open up the readers to the possibility of a role change in the lover beloved dynamic. The lover wants to worship the image upon a pedestal, an untouchable icon of all the perfection their heart desires while the beloved wants to maintain that image and status, so is Ernaux the beloved or is A? In a way she is both, she desires A and worships him, she accepts all of his faults freely and still longs for him endlessly. However she can also be considered the beloved, after all she is the "other women" in the relationship, the one A is cheating on his wife to worship, the one He sees as an idol fair enough to return time and time again. This leads us to another question, can the beloved desire the affections of the lover as much as the lover desires to bestow their affections upon their beloved? Perhaps this is why they only spend limited time together, if not their mutual desire would surely collapse. Ernauxs portrayal of being the other woman is brutally honest and a bit gritty at times but I don't see it as a negative image on women as a whole, I see it as a negative portrayal of people in general. In this story both the man and the woman are seen in and unsavory light, she as an empty vessel of a woman only being able to feel desire for one thing in life, and he as a user with a single track mind in regards to women. The only thing people in this story are guilty of is being slaves to desire, Ernaux lives only for the moments that she is with A and A is only seen as alive in his past exploits with Ernaux. Yes, she lives through A solely but she is not the first and not the last person to love obsessively through their lover. While the story may not be representative of the entire population of lovers in the world it does represent a descent number of them, primarily the ones who suffer for their love because they live the most passionately through it. The depiction of the erotic film as related to Ernauxs writing is similar to the cathartic effect of theater. What she writes should not make you feel comfortable, or rather it should portray something so shocking that if you were to experience it in your own life either first or second hand that you would fear repercussions, guilt, anxiety, self loathing, etc. It should make the reader feels invited, unabashed to experience it through her. Like the erotica film watching two people have intercourse in detail while they know they are being watched is one thing, a curious guilty pleasure one can indulge in alone. Yet if you were one of the people engaging in the act and realized that it was later going to be publicized and watched by other the negative feelings flood into ones being.  This comparison invites us to experience through her what we would be too ashamed to admit or to experience on our own.