Her family live in poverty and Duras identifies herself through this poverty and through her pain. The shame she feels, does not derive from her relationship with the Chinese, but from the financial and unstable situation in her family. She is breaking traditions rules and defying the norms of society which makes her outcast. Her love affair with the Chinese man breaks her away from the people around her. She lives a very autonomous and alienated life. Identity and shame go hand in hand when it comes to the construction of the main character of the novel.The inability to recognise herself as a member of any group or the society she lives in is apparent. They are all damaged in their own ways and the only thing that brings them together is the mutual feeling of shame and suffering. » She felt no sense of belonging in her family which is why the relationship between her and her mother and brothers is so tarnished. «Je lui dis que dans mon enfance le malheur de ma mere a occupe le lieu du reve. She chooses to rebel against colonial traditions and gives into her desires and feels no reason to apologise for her lifestyle.Her actions are justified by her constant unhappiness. Duras is very much shameless in her actions and her attitude towards the life that she chose to live.
There is also an absence as well as a presence of shame in the novel. The feeling of shame is very present in « L’amant », Duras grew up in poverty, the pain that she felt because of her circumstances, forced the feeling hatred and a presence shame towards society, her mother and herself define her identity. j’avais a quinze ans le visage de la jouissance et je ne connaissais pas la jouissance… »The definition of Identity is “the set of behavioural or personal characteristics by which an individual is recognizable as a member of a group”, and the definition of shame is “an emotion that is drawn from a sense of guilt embarrassment and disgrace. « Ce visage de l’alcool m’est venu avant l’alcool. In the novel, she is 15 years of age and is already aware of many things. She allowed her children, especially her daughter to be exposed to society at a young age. We Will Write a Custom Essay Specifically « A cause de ce qu’on a fait a notre mere si aimable, si confiante, nous haissons la vie, nous nous haissons. Her mother was unable to play the role of the protector. She felt so much hatred for the fact that poverty had made her mother suffer and had turned her mad. Duras shows how her mother’s life affected her children’s lives.
Her mother struggled to bring up her children, they were raised in poverty.The majority of the book revolves around the affair she has with a Chinese man and the life that her mother lived and the effect her mother had on her family and her search for her identity. She grew up with two brothers, her mother was a headmistress and her father did while she was still very young. Marguerite Duras was born in Indochina, a region which was part of the French colonial empire in Southeast Asia. The story deals with the culture differences and defiance of society and of tradition and culture. The autobiographical novel, « L’amant » by Marguerite Duras tells the story of the love affair between the young Marguerite Duras and the son and the son of a wealthy Chinese man.
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