La maternité: le temps de la (non)solitude des mères dans Un heureux événement (2005) d’Éliette Abécassis et Fièvre de lait (2020) de Yasmina Behagle

The article explores the connection between motherhood and the solitude experienced by woman-mother in two contemporary French novels: Un heureux événement (2005) by Éliette Abécassis and Fièvre de lait (2020) by Yasmina Behagle. Based on a feminist critical approach, the study highlights the omnipresence of solitude during three phenomenological nodes of female life connected to motherhood: pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period. First, it examines the numerous changes that occur in a woman’s life when she becomes pregnant. Then, it presents her detachment from her body during childbirth. Finally, it discusses the challenges woman face during the postpartum period. The analysis of emotional instability and the body dissatisfaction during pregnancy and the postpartum period, as experienced by the protagonists in Abécassis’ and Behagle’s novels, demonstrates how motherhood affects female subjectivity and intensifies a woman’s sense of solitude throughout her maternal experience.