The Insignificant Burden of the Forgotten Little People

In several surveys conducted on Facebook, here and there within literary groups, obscure or luminous, elitist or popular, deserted or teeming, anarchic or measured like a Swiss clock, Pierre Michon's name systematically gallops back into the top ten most adored writers. And considered with, as an example, his work Tiny lives, that famous scent of forgotten lives that moves us to the point of bringing tears to our eyes. But why is it that the name Pierre Michon always comes up—like daily bread, a loaf we all scramble to get our hands on?

Before answering that, it’s important to know that these Tiny lives are a series of eight lives that have been ignored and forgotten, names that have fallen into disuse—names that no longer ring in anyone’s ears nor evoke any memories. These unsuspected lives, swept away by death or disappearance, are linked to Pierre Michon (the supposed narrator) solely by blood or by chance encounters. And through one of the powers of writing—that of bringing the past back to life, of restoring its breath—Pierre Michon infuses these lives with words, so that they may breathe again, so that blood may flow, so that they may warm the dead skin. And to commemorate these memories—making liberal use of fiction when memory falls short, imagining what might have become of this or that person, such as his ancestor Antoine Peluchet, for example, banished by his father and vanished, whose only tangible proof of his time on earth remains a relic preserved in an old cookie jar. Of this relic, as well as other clues the reader will discover while reading the book, Pierre Michon recalls:

«The relic is a small biscuit-clay statue of the Virgin and Child, utterly expressionless beneath a glass and silk case that conceals, in a sealed double bottom, the tiniest remains of a saint. This object followed the chain of ownership I have described all the way to me, taking on all those names; and all the names I have mentioned are attested here and there by the headstones in the cemeteries of Chatelus, Saint-Goussaud, and Mourioux, unchanging beneath the blazing sun and in the frost of the nights; and all the transient flesh that inhabited these names turned to the relic when they had to grapple with the essential, when, in its living nest, the being collides with itself and from that collision emerges or vanishes, when one must be born and die.»

Made-to-order souvenirs

Perhaps if these Tiny lives have so deeply moved—and continue to move—the French-speaking readership is because everyone, in these eight accounts of lives—narrated, explored in depth, and reclaimed through words—finds themselves selfishly and intimately reflected in them, imagining (as if in a mirror) once the book is closed, a relic from their own family onto which they, in turn, can superimpose the living backdrop of a family drama or a sparkling moment of joy, consolidating the past through intuition, repainting the walls as they go, filling in the gaps in memory with magnesium cement. Creating—since we must, for we know one day and forget the next—memories on demand to recall and restore the truth of what once was.

From the little people and villages of France

And if people are so eager to grab a slice of Pierre Michon’s bread, isn’t it because it’s a country loaf—crispy and golden, just as it should be, in the French tradition? These Tiny lives are those of rural people in the Limousin region, at the beginning of the twentieth century.^th century, in the Creuse department. In other words, these are the hard lives of ordinary people, living in small, little-known villages, at a time when women—like Elise, for example— tended to and maintained the household—from the cooking pot to the housework—sweating under their aprons while the men sweated under their hats in the fields, baling hay or herding livestock. Thus, Pierre Michon’s ancestors are not so different from our own, for country life remains country life. Some dream of striking it rich in distant lands. Others stay behind, tear each other apart, inflict violence upon one another, make peace, and love each other madly. But everyone lives, and in the evening, when sleep takes hold of our bodies and weighs down our eyelids, everyone dreams.

«The wind blows over Saint-Goussaud; the world is certainly violent. But what violence has it not endured? The merciful ferns hide the sick earth; bad wheat, silly stories, cracked families grow there; from the wind the sun rises, like a giant, like a madman. Then it fades away, as did the Peluchet family: so it is said, when the name ceases to be associated with the living. Only tongueless mouths can still utter it. Who lies obstinately in the wind?»

Style

Ultimately, what appeals about Pierre Michon is surely the same thing that appeals about others—one might say a Proust, an Aragon, a Bobin, a Duras, an Ernaux, or a Despentes (let’s dare to use this catch-all term)— it is the uniqueness of his writing and the confident development of a distinct style. In these Tiny lives, the sentences string together like pearls on a bride’s necklace. The writing is the work of a master craftsman—compelling, exquisite, rich in color, and evocative. The semicolon serves as a connecting point, lending rhythm and liveliness to the descriptions, while parentheses, from time to time, serve to contain the narrator’s doubts. Of course, one must add a polished vocabulary and a powerful, natural poetry capable of anything. A poetry capable of embracing the poor, rural world and the viper beneath the brambles. A poetry capable of tipping the scales of human lives with the insignificant weight of the forgotten common folk. And isn’t this insignificant weight—this human weight, this featherweight that is ultimately as heavy as a sacred anchor—clear proof that every life matters?

«He stroked little snakes very softly; he was still talking. The cigarette butt burned his finger; he took his last puff. The first sun hit him, he staggered, held on to tawny dresses, handfuls of mint; he remembered women's flesh, children's looks, the delirium of the innocent: all this spoke in birdsong; he fell to his knees in the overwhelming signifiance of the universal Word. He raised his head, thanked someone, everything made sense, he fell dead again.»

Write to the author: [email protected]

Photo credit: © Babsy/Wikipedia

Pierre Michon
Tiny lives
Editions Gallimard
1984
224 pages

buy