French Literature Reviews - 2026
W. Marx, Living in the Library of the World
Comparative and World Literature
Review published in Acta Fabula (March 2021, vol. 22, no. 3):
"Reader of the World" by Caroline Anthérieu-Yagbasan.
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William Marx, Living in the Library of the World
Paris: Fayard, Collège de France, "Leçons inaugurales du Collège de France" collection, 2020.
EAN 9782213717173.
80 p. — Price 12EUR
Inaugural lecture delivered at the Collège de France on Thursday, January 23, 2020
"Our historically situated love of literature paradoxically demands, as our primary duty, that we wrench ourselves away from the historicity of that very literature. It is in the name of literature that we must detach ourselves from it. This is why we must in a single movement build and explore the world or total library—and I do mean world library, not world literature.
One reads world literature, but one reads in the world library, one lives in the library of the world: two radically different attitudes." — W.M.
Table of Contents
Read an excerpt from the book…
Thomas Römer
Antoine Compagnon
William Marx
Living in the Library of the World
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A former student of the École normale supérieure and agrégé in Classics, William Marx is a philologist, historian, and literary critic. He was a professor of comparative literature at Paris Nanterre University. His most recent books are The Hatred of Literature and A Gay Science (Minuit, 2015 and 2018). Since October 2019, he has been a professor at the Collège de France, holding the Chair of Comparative Literature.
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The inaugural lecture holds a distinct place in French academic tradition, serving as a formal introduction to a newly appointed chair at the Collège de France. William Marx is a philologist, historian, and literary critic, as well as a former student of the École normale supérieure and agrégé in Classics. He has served as a professor of comparative literature at Paris Nanterre University and assumed the Chair of Comparative Literature at the Collège de France in October 2019.
This publication presents William Marx's inaugural lecture delivered at the Collège de France on Thursday, January 23, 2020. The volume also includes a foreword by Thomas Römer and a preface by Antoine Compagnon, appearing in the publisher's inaugural lecture collection. Readers interested in contemporary comparative literature may find it relevant.