De l’autrefois au lendemain – l’être au chronoscope
From Yesteryear to Tomorrow – A Being Under The Chronoscope

Summary/Abstract: This article analyses the ways in which the Belgian writer Michel Lambert constructs an onto-fictional universe for a being who, put under a chronoscope, experiences the retrospective return of the self, of the past (considered superior to the present) and the prospective search for the other. This being who is obsessed by the past is analysed by means of a fictional apparatus that captures flashes of memory, starting from a moment that triggers his reliving of memories that waver uncertainly between the real and the imagined (fictionalized) scenes from his past. We analyse this key moment of temporal reversal, which the writer calls “the electric hour,” in order to define the fictional identity of this being. The initial impulse of recollection leads to a difficult quest for the self, one marked by suffering and silence (both of which are central themes of the short stories). In addition, words lose their representational power to communicate and to bring beings closer to one another. This feeling of alienation is aggravated by the impression that words can do no more than reach another mute being. The basic scheme of Lambert’s writing consists of a fragmentary construction of intimacy, which we follow in both its ontological and poetical aspects.

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