Literature or life: the obsession with litterarite at Jorge Semprun

This article tries to provide both an overview of the yet unknown work of Jorge Semprun and a new reading freed from the usual interpretations linked to the deportation memory. It analyzes the writing strategies of the author-witness who tries to impose his work in the literary field. By studying the way Semprun writes his own memories of the deportation and of his commitment as a high member of the Communist Party, a central paradox appears: his writing seems obsessed with being literary, and yet it keeps displaying the gratuity of literature, which is thus considered as unessential compared to reality.