French Literature Reviews - 2026
A. Compagnon, L'Âge des lettres
Writers: Biography, Letters and Memoirs
Bibliographic reference: A. Compagnon, L'Âge des lettres, Gallimard, 2015. EAN13: 9782070107216.
Antoine Compagnon, L'Âge des lettres
Paris: Gallimard, 2015.
EAN 9782070107216.
176 p.
Price 15EUR
Publisher's overview:
"Roland Barthes had considered entitling a lecture 'Proust and Me'. Upon reflection, he called it 'Long ago, I used to go to bed early'. Not that he saw any presumption in the first formulation. Used by him, he said, and not by a witness, it implied no comparison, but expressed identification. Far from equating himself with Proust, he was humbly following in his footsteps. If I understand him correctly, it would have been bold of me to name this very book 'Roland and Me', since I saw him live for a few years. Having not rubbed shoulders with Proust, nothing prevented him from saying 'Proust and Me', whereas I could not write 'Roland and Me' with utter simplicity. In truth, it is neither a matter of comparing oneself nor of identifying, but, thirty-five years after his death, of looking back—as I often do in my mind—upon our friendship, retracing its stages, rummaging through my memory, rediscovering what I owe to him, and thanking him for what he gave me, for the progress he helped me make. One does not embark on this sort of inquiry unless one feels compelled and driven to do so. One resists it until the moment it becomes unavoidable. This is my search for Roland."
Antoine Compagnon has published with Éditions Gallimard Les antimodernes : De Joseph de Maistre à Roland Barthes (2005), Le cas Bernard Faÿ : Du Collège de France à l’indignité nationale (2009) and La classe de rhéto (2012).
Antoine Compagnon is a prominent scholar of French literature and a professor associated with the Collège de France and Columbia University. His scholarly work frequently investigates the history of literary institutions, the dynamics of modernity, and the transmission of critical thought across generations. In LÂge des lettres, he turns his attention toward autobiography and intellectual history, reflecting on a formative personal acquaintance with one of the twentieth centurys most influential semioticians and literary critics. The volume serves as both a personal memoir and a meditation on the nature of discipleship within the academic and literary field.
This reflective essay will particularly interest students and scholars of modern French literature, intellectual history, and the sociology of culture. It sheds light on the institutional and interpersonal networks that shaped French criticism in the decades following the Second World War. By examining the debt owed to an intellectual mentor, the book addresses broader questions about how literary authority is established, remembered, and passed on. It complements Compagnon's earlier studies on the antimodern tradition and the French educational system by offering a more intimate perspective on the transmission of knowledge.