The figure of the writer seems to occupy the center of Nathalie Sarraute's latest novel. The opening paragraph projects the image of a man typing, tearing out the page, throwing it away, taking another sheet, continuing to pound on his typewriter. "Between Life and Death" is however not so much about the writer as about the act of writing. Words are here the true protagonists. (p. 4)

Can one even say that this is a novel? No, if one looks for definable characters, dramatic situations, psychological developments in the habitual sense. Yes, if one believes that it is the prerogative of the novelist to blend levels of reality, to telescope time, to project fears into the as yet unlived moment, to transform even the pettiest of obsessions into a poetic experience.

Perhaps it would be fairer to say that this is a dramatic prose poem about words. "Words" might indeed have been a fitting title, had not Sartre used it recently for his remarkable autobiography. In fact, there are some clear points of contact between these two otherwise very dissimilar works. Both Sartre and Sarraute view words as realities that determine, as well as forces that can liberate. Words oppress, protect, hurt, transform, immobilize—and, above all, survive. They preside over our lives and can become an alibi for not living. Literary creation may well be such an alibi. (pp. 4-5)

[In "Between Life and Death" we] come across sentences such as these: "… I'm alone in the enemy camp … defenseless … protect me." "But she resists, she clutches him, she clings to him, hems him in, he stands up to her, they are fighting, they are locked in struggle." Yet all this talk about enemies, tactical tricks, blocking of roads, fatal encirclement, corresponds neither to the presence of Amazons nor to the excitement of actual battles. Whatever is epic here remains at the purely verbal level. But that is the point of the novel. Words are our enemies, our allies, our traitors. They lock us in, they choke us—and they lead us to a manner of freedom.

Viewed in this light, "Between Life and Death" does tell a story. At the beginning, there is sheer sensitivity to words…. Next comes the awareness that words are not merely vague threats, but sharp weapons….

The cruel games people play with each other (in part, to hide their sense of vacuity and despair) create a relentless nostalgia for a magic order. Words, this time, become the instruments of clarity, composition, a superior calm. But this order has its own limits: this peace resembles inertia, it resembles death. Between life and death: the title of the book clearly defines the problem, not merely in temporal terms, but in terms of the survival of all art, caught between life-giving formlessness and sterilizing formalism. Ultimately, the answer—and the salvation—may well depend on the degree of complicity between the artist and his public. Appropriately, the novel ends with a question: "… Let's look together … does it emit, deposit … as on the hand glass held up to the mouth of the dying … a fine mist?"

The tragic undertones are obvious: the sense of separation and exclusion, the solipsistic urge, the fear of life, the puritanical longing for an absolute. But all this remains subdued. What is so remarkable in the work of Nathalie Sarraute is that she can make so much of what appears to be so very little. It turns out, of course, that it is not so little after all, that her novel illustrates a double paradox. It is fear of life (not fear of death) that produces art, and the production of art in turn generates new terrors.

This climate of seemingly petty anxieties, wounded pride, tormented perfectionism, and yearnings for a protective shell, comes across, with almost total directness…. One question, however, occurs to some faithful readers. How many more novels can one, or should one, write in this vein? (p. 5)