Terra Amata is an early fiction

Fiction

Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical,...

al novel by French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 author and Nobel laureate

Nobel Prize in Literature

Since 1901, the Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded annually to an author from any country who has, in the words from the will of Alfred Nobel, produced "in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction"...

 J. M. G. Le Clézio.

Plot summary

Terra Amata is about a man named Chancelade, and his detailed view of an otherwise ordinary life, from his early childhood to his grave.

Terra Amata

Terra Amata

Terra Amata is an archeological site in open air located on the slopes of Mount Boron in Nice, at a level 26 meters above the current sea level of the Mediterranean. It was discovered and excavated in 1966 by Henry de Lumley...

is an archaeological site near the French town of Nice.

Critical reception

Terra Amata was perceived to center on the "perceptions and activities" of "its protagonist" Chancelade
The work seems to have been "designed to overload the senses"
According to one critic "Chancelade has done nothing, suffered nothing, experienced nothing to make him worth"...regard from that critic. The story is that of Chancelade, from childhood to death; he sees the world in minute detail...""Terra Amata," combines Le Clézio's game-playing as the author with a savage lyricism reminiscent of Thomas Hardy.

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