Ana Fernandes
CLEPUL, University of Lisbon
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Loneliness in childhood in Le Clézio’s works
Dedalus 24 (2020), pp. 145-161. Download PDF

Abstract
The child is present in most of Le Clézio’s works as the main character or secondary character (whom the main character encounters while wandering); the child is constantly there; everything is as if the author wants to warn the reader of his eternity, of his omnipresence.
Our purpose is to study the relationships that exist between loneliness and the universe of childhood, showing that the world of childhood is, in turn, a world in which children evolve (who remain children from the beginning to the end of the text) and a lost world of adults: a time when they themselves were children. The solitude that characterizes the child’s world, in Le Clézio’s novels, is not free; it is the necessary condition for an intense communion with nature, with the midst of trees, water, sea, mountains, in a single word, with everything that is not man’s creation. It allows the child to discover what the adult does not know or understand.
 
Keywords: Nature, city, adults, childhood, loneliness