Amélie Nothomb
Amélie Nothomb was born in 1966. Her father was a Belgian ambassador and she joined a family notable for its writers and politicians. Because of her father’s occupation, much of Nothomb’s childhood was spent abroad, in places as diverse as Japan, China, Laos, Bangladesh, Burma and America. Experiences of Japan and childhood later informed the novel Métaphysique des tubes.
In 1972 Nothomb arrived in China from Japan at the age of five, and the family lived in the multinational diplomatic enclave of San Li Tun in Peking. Le Sabotage amoureux drew on experiences of this time, detailing alliances and conflicts between the area’s children when the notorious ‘Gang of Four’ ruled China. The sudden transition from a Japanese culture whose elevated sense of aesthetics demanded beauty in everything to a Peking saturated with ugliness during the Cultural Revolution has informed both the themes of Nothomb’s writing and her personal view of the world. She has claimed that a harsh binary division between the gorgeous and the grotesque along with nostalgia for a lost beauty was coded into her perceptions at this time.
In 1975 the family left China for New York. However, their stay in the West was brief as her father’s involvement with the United Nations led to a new post in Asia. In Bangladesh Nothomb experienced personal isolation and encountered extreme human misery. She had little in common with local children and forays into the street led her to see damaged and dead people lying abandoned. She has claimed since that this type of exposure prompted both a heightened sensitivity to social injustice and a desire to escape from such disturbing stimuli through reading. For example, in the leper house that their parents supported, she and her sister Juliette tried to effect a double insulation from the horrors around them by shutting themselves in the quiet room reserved for them and immersing themselves in literature.
Diplomatic postings to Laos (1980) and Burma (1982) followed Bangladesh. Lack of access to schools and established libraries meant that Nothomb’s formal education was sporadic. Her parents’ library furnished her with a wide range of books, which she read avidly. These included popular novels, ancient classics and canonical French texts by authors such as Diderot, Proust and Stendhal. She has identified these as key influences on her own writing, laying greater public claim to their literary kinship to that of contemporary Francophone writers. She was particularly fascinated by Stendhal’s Chartreuse de Parme, which became a distorting lens through which she tried to envision a Europe that was exotic in its remoteness from the isolated parts of Asia she inhabited. Perversely, when she returned to Europe it could not live up to the fantasies she had projected onto it, although she now reports feeling more comfortable living in both Brussels and Paris.
Between the ages of thirteen and sixteen Nothomb suffered from anorexia, a condition prompted in part by her desire to hold back puberty, a state that appeared to her as ‘une monstrosité physique’. Her weight at its lowest was 36 kilos and she suffered hair loss. Paradoxically, it was only after she lost the childhood body she felt was a ‘perfect’ fit for her, that, aged seventeen, she began to develop her voice as an author. She has also stated that she unconsciously took over this role from her admired sister Juliette, who had written previously, but had stopped when she also suffered anorexia.
Images of grotesque bodies figure largely in Nothomb’s writing and she has admitted freely that her depiction of the maturation of the female body is equivocal and disturbing. She has stated ‘je n’ai jamais regretté d’un quart de seconde d’être une femme’. Yet she also famously declared ‘Prétextat Tach, c’est moi’, thus identifying herself with the protagonist of Hygiène de l’assassin who strangles his cousin Leopoldine to prevent her becoming a woman. Nothomb however contests the drawing of easy parallels between the depiction of violence in texts and its real-life equivalent. She has argued that the excessive, almost comedic violence of parts of her novels offers a relief from the potentially unassimilable horror of real-life suffering, while leaving space to think through actual conflicts. Given her large teenage readership, this approach seems to resonate with a generation troubled increasingly by body dysmorphia. Nevertheless, some feminist critics have remained less convinced by her apologetics and have criticized her texts’ lack of explicit condemnation of the conflation of the womanly and the grotesque, which can also inform real acts of violence against women.
In 1984 Nothomb started a course in the philology of Romance languages at Brussels’ autonomous university. However she tended to feel alienated by the apparent conformism of Belgian society. She cites Nietzsche as a key influence at that time. In 1988 Nothomb returned to Japan to seek work as a translator. She fell in love and became engaged to a Japanese man, although ultimately did not marry him. Employment in a hierarchical Japanese company proved stressful, an experience that informed Stupeur et tremblements. She went back to Europe and started work in earnest on Hygiène de l’assassin.
Nothomb has written since her late teens. She has stressed frequently how important the act of writing is to her and claims to retain many unpublished manuscripts. Hygiène de l’assassin was her first published novel, issued in 1992 by Albin Michel.
Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s she has published prolifically. Her writing has been translated into up to 30 languages, with some texts also being adapted for film, theatre and opera. Her books feature regularly in French bestseller lists. Several have also gained literary prizes including the Grand Prix de l’Academie Française. In 2008 Nothomb was awarded the Grand Prix Jean Giono for her contribution to literature.
Compiled by Amaleena Damlé (Durham)
Bibliography
Hygiène de l’assassin [Winner of the Prix Alan Fournier and the Prix René Fallet] (Paris: Albin Michel, 1992)
Le Sabotage amoureux [Winner of the Prix de la Vocation and the Prix Chardonne in 1999] (Paris: Albin Michel, 1993)
Les Combustibles (Paris: Albin Michel, 1994)
Les Catilinaires [Winner of the Prix Pas Première and the Prix du Jury Jean-Giono] (Paris: Albin Michel 1995)
Péplum (Paris: Albin Michel, 1996)
Attentat (Paris: Albin Michel, 1997)
Mercure (Paris: Albin Michel 1998)
Stupeur et tremblements [Winner of the Grand Prix de l'Academie Française and the newly-instituted Prix Internet du Livre] (Paris: Albin Michel 1999)
Brillant comme une casserole [Children's stories (for adults) with woodcut images; with Kiki Crèvecoeur] (Bruxelles: La Pierre d'Alun 1999)
Métaphysique des tubes (Paris: Albin Michel 2000)
Cosmétique de l’ennemi (Paris: Albin Michel 2001)
Sans nom (Paris: HFA 2001) [Short story] (Elle [French edition], July 2001; Paris: HFA, 2001)
Robert des noms propres (Paris: Albin Michel 2002)
Antéchrista (Paris: Albin Michel 2003)
Biographie de la faim (Paris: Albin Michel 2004)
Acide sulfurique (Paris: Albin Michel 2005)
Journal d'Hirondelle (Paris: Albin Michel, 2006)
Ni d'Éve ni d'Adam [Winner of the Prix de Flore] (Paris: Albin Michel, 2007)
Le Fait du Prince (Paris: Albin Michel, 2008)
Le Voyage d'hiver (Paris: Albin Michel, 2009)
Une forme de vie (Paris: Albin Michel, 2010)
Tuer le père (Paris: Albin Michel, 2011)
Barbe bleu (Paris: Albin Michel, 2012)
La Nostalgie heureuse (Paris: Albin Michel, 2013)
Pétronille (Paris: Albin Michel, 2014)
Le crime du comte Neville (Paris: Albin Michel, 2015)
Riquet à la houppe (Paris: Albin Michel, 2016)
Translations into Foreign Languages
English
The Stranger Next Door [Translation of Les Catilinaires by Carol Volk] (New York: Henry Holt and Co., 1998)
Loving Sabotage [Translation of Le Sabotage amoureux by Andrew Wilson] (New York: W.W. Norton, 2001)
Fear and Trembling [Translation of Stupeur et tremblements by Adriana Hunter] (New York: St Martin’s Press, 2002)
The Character of Rain [Translation of Métaphysique des tubes by Timothy Bent] (New York: St Martin’s Press, 2002)
Antichrista [Translation of Antéchrista by Shaun Whiteside] (London: Faber, 2005)
The Book of Proper Names [Translation of Robert des noms propres by Shaun Whiteside] (London: Faber, 2005)
Human Rites [Translation of Les Combustibles by Natalie Abrahami] (London: Oberon Books, 2005)
The Life of Hunger [Translation of Biographie de la faim) by Shaun Whiteside] (London: Faber, 2006)
Sulphuric Acid [Translation of Acide sulphurique by Shaun Whiteside] (London: Faber, 2007)
Tokyo Fiancée [Translation of Ni d’Ève ni d’Adam by Alison Anderson] (New York: Europa Editions, 2009)
Hygiene and the Assassin [Translation of Hygiène de l’assassin by Alison Anderson] (New York: Europa Editions, 2010)
Criticism
Amanieux, Laureline: 'Des romans à double-fonds' (La Revue française, 12, December 2001,pp. 149-56)
—: 'La présence de Dionysos dans l'œuvre d'Amélie Nothomb' (Religiologiques, 25, Spring 2002, pp. 131-146)
—: 'Lecture analytique del'incipit du Sabotage amoureux' (L'École des lettres, 11, 15 March 2002, pp. 39-54)
—: 'The myth of Dionysus in Amélie Nothomb's work' [Revised version of article in Religiologiques 25 - see above] in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 135-141)
—: Amélie Nothomb: l'éternelle affamée (Paris: Albin Michel 2005)
—: 'Amour, meurtre, et langage, dans l'oeuvre d'Amelie Nothomb' (L'Esprit Createur: A New Generation: Sex, Gender and Creativity in Contemporary Women's Writing in French ed. by Gill Rye [Special issue], 45.1, Spring 2005)
—: Récits siamois, identité et personnage dans l'oeuvre d'Amélie Nothomb (Paris: Albin Michel, 2009)
—: Autrement dit: Amélie Nothomb [CD] (Mons: Autrement dit, 2009)
Bainbrigge, Susan: Culture and Identity in Belgian Francophone Writing: Dialogue, Diversity and Displacement (Oxford: Peter Lang [Modern French Identities], 2009)
—: '"Monter l'escalier anachronique"': Intertextuality in Mercure' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 114-126)
Bainbrigge, Susan and Den Toonden, Jeanette [eds.): Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice (New York: Peter Lang, 2003)
Berglund-Hall, Elizabeth: ‘The Violence of Desire in Amelie Nothomb’s Novels’(Women in French Studies, 17, 2009, pp. 103-15)
—: ‘Writing Amélie-the-Writer: Nothomb’s Autofictional Quest for Jouissance’ (Nottingham French Studies, 53.3, Autumn 2014)
Caine, Philippa: '"Entre-deux" Inscription of Female Corporealilty in the Writing of Amélie Nothomb', in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 71-84)
Campagnoli, Ruggero: 'Mercure d'Amélie Nothomb au sommet de tour livresque' in Les Lettres belges au present [Actes du Congrès des Romanistes allemands (University of Osnabruck 17-30 September 1999)] (Frankfurt/M.: Peter Lang, 2001, pp. 309-18)
Chevillot, Frédérique: 'Antechristique, Amelie Nothomb: de rire, de guerre et des femmes dans Le Sabotage amoureux' (Women in French Studies: Ecriture courante: Critical Perspectives on French and Francophone Women ed. by Mary Rice-DeFosse and Cathy Yandell [Special issue], 2005, pp. 158-67)
—: 'Rira bien qui rira pour la primultième fois: Les Catilinaires d'Amélie Nothomb' (Women in French Studies: Selected Essays from Women in French International Conference 2006, University of New Hampshire [Special issue], 2008, pp.165-77)
—: 'Amelie Nothomb: l'invitation à la lecture' in Les Femmes et la lecture ed. by Catherine R. Montfort (Women in French Studies [Special issue], 2012, pp. 195-212)
—: ‘“Amo ergo neco”: les tueuses nothombiennes’ Devi’ in Rebelles et criminelles chez les écrivaines d’expression française ed. by Frédérique Chevillot and Colette Trout (Amsterdam/New York: Rodopi, 2013)
—: ‘Le jeu protéen d’Amélie Nothomb dans Une forme de vie ou de l’art de la contre-prétérition’ in Protean Selves: First-Person Voices in Twenty-First-Century French and Francophone Narratives ed. by Adrienne Angela and Erika Fülöp (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014)
Chung, Ook: 'Une enfance épique' (Liberté, 36, 3, 213, June 1994, pp. 221-226)
Clemmen, Yves-Antoine: 'Où a quand même lieu la littérature francaise: situer Nothomb à la rentrée littéraire 2005' (Contemporary French and Francophone Studies, 11.4, October 2007, pp. 481-88)
—: ‘Sur les traces d’Amélie Nothomb: cohérence des fragments (Contemporary French and Francophone Studies 18.4, September 2014, pp. 447-454)
Clisson, Isabelle: 'Le Japon d'Isabelle, Le Japon d'Amélie' (Lesbia Magazine, 192, April 2000, pp. 29-31)
Collington, Tara: 'Hugo à la rencontre de Rabelais: l'esprit carnavalesque dans Attentat d'Amélie Nothomb' (Études françaises, 42.2, 2006, pp. 149-166)
Constant, Isabelle: 'Construction hypertextuelle: Attentat d'Amélie Nothomb' (French Review, 76.5, April 2003, pp. 933-940)
Cottille-Foley, Nora: 'Abomination et sacralisation dans Hygiène de l'assassin d'Amélie Nothomb' (Chimères: A Journal of French Literature, 27, Spring 2003, pp. 47-57)
Cowles, Mary Jane: ‘Close Encounters of the Abject Kind: The Intercultural Female Body in Amelie Nothomb’s Japan’ (Women in French Studies, 19, 2011, pp. 94-107)
David, Michel: Amélie Nothomb: L'écriture illimitée (Paris: L'Harmattan, 2013)
Dalmolin, Eliane: 'Vouloir montrer : le spectacle de la réalité chez Annie Ernaux, Lydie Salvayre et Amélie Nothomb' in Nomadismes des romancières contemporaines de langue française ed. by Audrey Lasserre and Anne Simon (Paris: Presses de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 2008, pp. 103-13)
Damlé, Amaleena: '"Death and the Maiden": Murder and Eroticism in the Work of Amélie Nothomb' in Aimer et mourir: Love, Death, and Women’s Lives in Texts of French Expression ed. by Eilene Hoft-March and Judith Holland Sarnecki (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2009, pp. 98-126)
—: ‘The Becoming of Anorexia and Text in Amelie Nothomb's Robert des noms propres and Delphine de Vigan's Jours sans faim in Women's Writing in Twenty-First-Century France: Life as Literature ed. by Amaleena Damlé and Gill Rye (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2013, pp. 113-26)
—: The Becoming of the Body: Contemporary Women's Writing in French (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2014)
David, Michel: Amélie Nothomb, le symptôme graphomane (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2006)
De Decker, Jacques: 'Amélie Nothomb', La Brosse à relire: Littérature belge d'aujourdhui (Avin/Hannut: Éd. Luce Wilquin, 1999, pp. 146-53)
Dewez, Nausicaa: 'Mercure d'Amélie Nothomb au miroir des livres' (Versants : Revue Suisse des Littératures Romanes, 53-54, 2007, pp. 291-308)
Fülöp, Erika: ‘Amélie’s Horse: Writing as Jouissance in Nothomb’ in Cherchez la femme: Women and Values in the Francophone World edited by Erika Fülöp and Adrienne Angelo (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2011)
Garcia, Daniel: 'Les silences d'Amelie' (Lire, September 2006)
Gascoigne, David: 'Amélie Nothomb and the Poetics of Excess' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 127-134)
Gorrara, Claire: 'Speaking volumes: Amélie Nothomb's Hygiene de l'Assassin' (Women's Studies International Forum, 23.6, 2000, pp. 761-66)
—: 'L'Assassinat de l'écriture: Amélie Nothomb's Les Combustibles' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 105-113)
Guyot-Bender, Martine: 'Coding Japan: Amelie Nothomb and Alain Corneau's Stupeur et tremblements' (Sites: Contemporary French and Francophone Studies 9.4, Autumn 2005, pp. 367-76)
—: 'Amélie Nothomb's Dialectic of the Sublime and the Grotesque' in Novels of the Contemporary Extreme ed. by Alain-Philippe Durand and Naomi Mandel (London/New York: Continuum, 2006, pp. 121-31)
Helm, Yolande: 'Amélie Nothomb: "l'enfant terrible" des lettres belges de langue française' (Etudes Francophones, 11, 1996, pp. 113-20)
—: 'Amélie Nothomb: Une écriture alimentée àla source de l'orphisme' (Religiologiques, 15, Spring 1997, pp. 151-63)
Hugueny-Léger, Elise: ‘Filatures de soi: Detectives, Disappearances and Deceit in the Crime Autofictions of Calle, Laurens and Nothomb’ in Rewriting Wrongs: French Crime Fiction and the Palimpsest, ed. by Angela Kimyongür and Amy Wigelsworth (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014)
—: ‘“Naissance et mort de l’auteur”: les investigations d’Amélie Nothomb’ (Itinéraires: Littérature, Textes, Cultures 2014, 3, 2015 [Special issue: Le polar en Europe: réécritures du genre ed. by Véronique Desnain]) available online at https://journals.openedition.org/itineraires/2553
Hunter, Adriana: 'Narrative Voice in Amélie Nothomb's Stupeur et tremblements : A Translator's Impression' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 172-175)
Hutton, Margaret-Anne: '"Personne n'est indispensible, sauf l'ennemi": l'œuvre conflictuelle d'Amélie Nothomb' in Nouvelles Écrivains: nouvelles voix? ed. by Nathalie Morello and Catherine Rodgers (Amsterdam: Rodolpi, 2002, pp. 111-27)
Jaccomard, Hélène: 'Self in Fabula: Amélie Nothomb's Three Autobiographical Works' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice edited by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 11-23)
Jennings, William: ‘Homecoming and Childhood Identity in the Work of Amélie Nothomb’ (The New Zealand Journal of French Studies, 31.2, 2010)
Jones, Katie: Representing Repulsion: The Aesthetics of Disgust in Contemporary Women’s Writing in French and German (Oxford: Peter Lang [Studies in Contemporary Women’s Writing 2], 2013)
Jordan, Shirley Ann: 'Amélie Nothomb's Combative Dialogues: Erudition, Wit and Weaponry' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 93-104)
—: Contemporary French Women's Writing: Women's Visions, Women's Voices, Women's Lives (Oxford/Berne: Peter Lang, 2004)
Kemp, Anna: ‘The Child as Artist in Amélie Nothomb’s Robert des noms propres’ (French Studies 67.1, January 2012, pp. 54-67)
—: Kemp, Anna: ‘Amelie the Aesthete: Art and Politics in the World of Amelie Nothomb’ in Women's Writing in Twenty-First-Century France: Life as Literature ed. by Amaleena Damlé and Gill Rye (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2013, pp. 237-50)
Klekovkina, Vera A.: 'Scandale d'Amélie Nothomb: violence mimétique et jouissance scopique' (Women in French Studies, 20, 2012, pp. 59-74)
—: ‘A Fatal Journey in Baudelaire and Nothomb’ in Reading Communities: A Dialogical Approach to French and Francophone Literature / Communautés de lecture: pour une approche dialogique des œuvres classiques et contemporaines ed. by Oana Panaïté (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2016)
Korzeniowska, Victoria B.: 'Bodies, space and meaning in Amélie Nothomb's Stupeur et tremblements' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 39-49)
—: 'Identification, identity and allegiance in Amelie Nothomb's Stupeur et tremblements and Métaphysique des tubes' (Women in French Studies: Ecriture courante: Critical Perspectives on French and Francophone Women ed. by Mary Rice-DeFosse and Cathy Yandell [Special issue], 2005, pp. 168-79)
Larkin, Áine: ‘The Ballet Body Beautiful: Pleasure and Pain in Amélie Nothomb's Robert des noms propres’ in Cherchez la femme: Women and Values in the Francophone World ed. by Erika Fülöp and Adrienne Angelo (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2011)
Le Garrec, Lénaïk: 'Beastly Beauties and Beautiful Beasts' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 63-70)
Lee, Mark D.: ‘“Amélie Nothomb est un homme dangereux”: constructions médiatiques de l’identité’ in This ‘Self’ Which is Not One: Women’s Life-Writin in French ed. by Natalie Edwards and Chris Hogarth (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2010, pp. 119-36)
—: 'Amélie Nothomb: Writing Childhood's End' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 143-153)
—: Les Identités d'Amélie Nothomb:de l'invention médiatique aux fantasmes originaires (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2010)
—: 'L'Étranger chez Amélie Nothomb' in Francographies: Identité et altérité dans les espaces francophones européens ed. by Susan Bainbrigge, Joy Charnley, and Caroline Verdier (New York: Peter Lang, 2010)
Libens, Christian: 'Chère Amélie' (Revue Générale, 131, 3, March 1996, pp. 91-95)
Lindley, Elizabeth: ‘The Monstrous Female: Images of Abjection in Marie Ndiaye’s Hilda’, in The Beautiful and the Monstrous: Essays in French Literature, Thought and Culture ed. by Amaleena Damle and Aurelie L'Hostis (New York/Berne: Peter Lang [Modern French Studies, 87, 2010)
Malgorzata Wierzbowska, Ewa: 'Les relations familiales dans le roman d'Amélie Nothomb Antéchrista' in Relations familiales dans les littératures française et francophone des XXe et XXIe siècles. La figure de la mère ed. by Murielle Lucie Clément and Sabine Van Wesemael (Paris, L'Harmattan, 2008, pp. 235-44)
Margaux, Kobialka: La création d'Amélie Nothomb à travers la psychanalyse (Paris: Le Manuscrit, 2004)
McCall, Ian: ‘“Merry Christmas Amélie-san”: Filmic Intertext in Nothomb’s Stupeur et tremblements’ (Nottingham French Studies, Spring 2008, pp. 75-88)
McIlvanney, Siobhan: '"Il etait une fois...": Trauma and the Fairytale in Amelie Nothomb's Robert des noms propres' (Dalhousie French Studies; Representations of Trauma in French and Francophone Literature [Special issue], 81, Winter 2007, pp. 19-28)
Oberhuer, Andrea: 'Réécrire à l'ère du soupçon insidieux : Amélie Nothomb et le récit postmoderne' (Études françaises, 40.1, 2004, pp. 111-28)
Pries, Désirée: 'Piscina: gender identity in Métaphysique des tubes' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 24-35)
Rice, Alison: '"Que faire du corps?" La maitrise de soi dans Robert des noms propres d'Amelie Nothomb' (Nouvelles Études Francophones, 20.2, Autumn 2005, pp. 171-183)
Revial, Gaëlle: 'Amélie Nothomb. Mon portrait entouré de masques' in L'écrivain masqué, suivi d'un entretien avec Patrick Chamoiseau ed. by Beïda Chikhi (Paris: Presses de l'Université Paris-Sorbonne [Lettres francophones], 2008, pp. 179-85)
Rodgers, Catherine: 'Nothomb's anorexic beauties' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 50-63)
Saunier, Émilie: ‘Le social dans le texte et le texte dans le social: Reconstruire et comprendre une “sociologie spontanée” des rapports de domination dans les oeuvres d’Amélie Nothomb’ in Ce que la sociologie fait de la littérature et vice-versa ed. by Brahim Labari (Paris, Publibook [coll. Sciences humaines et sociales], 2014, pp. 93-114)
Terasse, Jean-Marc: 'Does Monstrosity exist in the Feminine? A Reading of Amélie Nothomb's Angels and Monsters' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003), pp. 85-90]
Topping, Margaret: 'Orientalism and Fairytale in Amelie Nothomb's Autofictions' in Redefining the Real: The Fantastic in Contemporary French and Francophone Women's Writing ed. by Margaret-Anne Hutton (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2009, pp. 81-97)
Wilson, Andrew: '"Sabotage, eh?": Translating Le sabotage amoureux from the French into the Canadian and the American' in Amélie Nothomb: Authorship, Identity and Narrative Practice ed. by Susan Bainbrigge and Jeanette Den Toonden (New York: Peter Lang, 2003, pp. 167-171)
Wierzbowska, Ewa Malgorzata: ‘Les relations familiales dans le roman d’Amélie Nothomb Antéchrista’ in Relations familiales dans les littératures française et francophone des XXe et XXIe siècles: II. La figure de la mère ed. by Murielle Lucie Clément and Sabine Van Wesemael (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2008, pp. 235-244)
Wilwerth, Evelyne: 'Amélie Nothomb: sous le signe du cinglant' (Revue Générale, 132, 6-7, June-July 1997, pp. 45-51)
Zumkir, Michel: Amélie Nothomb de A à Z : Portrait d’un monstre littéraire (Bruxelles: Le Grand Miroir, 2003)
Interviews/in the Media
Ahmad, Nusrat: 'Amélie Nothomb et le surréalisme bruxellois' (Railissimo: Mmagazine de la SNCB, 1999)
Amanieux, Laureline: 'Un entretien avec Amélie Nothomb' (27 April 2001)
Berto, Michel: Interview (Bruxelles, ma Région, 2) available online at http://www.bruxelles-maregion.com
Bourton, William: 'Amélie chez les doux-dingues' (Le Soir, 14 March 1998)
Lee, Mark D.: 'Entretien avec Amélie Nothomb' (The French Review, 7.3, February 2004, pp. 562-75)
Lortholary, Isabelle: 'Amélie Nothomb: Chapeau noir pour manteau bleu' (Elle, (July 30 2001)
Tombeur, Madeleine [et al/]: 'Amélie Nothomb et Christine Delmotte' (Le Logographe, 3 April 1998)
Turpin, Etienne: 'Une histoire belge á la sauce nippone' (Top Ouest)
‘J’ai un ennemi en moi’ (Psychologies magazine, 2000) a