Larkin, Áine
(2021)
Living with Dying in France: Contemporary French Writing about End-of-Life Care.
L'Esprit Créateur, 61 (1).
pp. 68-80.
ISSN 1931-0234
Abstract
THE FRENCH NATIONAL HEALTHCARE system enjoys a reputation for excellence, both in terms of outcomes for patients and the accessibility of care. However, the 2016 overview of French health policy put out by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development raises concerns about the appropriateness of some care in the French healthcare system, calling for better engagement of patients in the decision making process about treatment options.1
This article examines the representation of terminally ill patients’ experience of the French healthcare system in
two recently published auto pathographical narratives.2
In Réparer le monde, Alexandre Gefen defends the idea that twenty-first-century French literary culture “a vu l’émergence d’une conception que je qualifierai de ‘thérapeutique’ de l’écriture et de la lecture, celle d’une littérature qui guérit, qui soigne, qui aide, ou, du moins, qui ‘fait du bien.’”3 Gefen’s point is valid for
the two authors whose work will be explored here, and can also be applied fruitfully to French society more broadly and its medical system as it accompanies its citizens at the end of life. “Je suis vouée simplement à imaginer une
écoute post mortem et me satisfaire d’avoir été un peu utile,” says Marie Deroubaix, pressing for legal reform to euthanasia laws in France through her book 6 mois à vivre: J’ai choisi de mourir dignement (2012).
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