Almost reminiscent of the format of Tropismes, the individual pieces composing L'Usage de la parole are more abstract and more profound, less anchored to a particular individual or group, than the sketches contained in Nathalie Sarraute's earlier work. Here the author is delving into the significance of language itself, often deflected from its original meaning by continual usage and habit. In each case she takes as her point of departure some commonplace word or expression, which she then subjects to microscopic scrutiny. It is too much to say that Sarraute dissects language. Rather, like a sensitive turning fork, she picks up echoes and reverberations and transmits them to her reader….

Like the writer in Entre la vie et la mort, Sarraute is fascinated by words. They are, of course, the writer's stock-in-trade. But how often words are misunderstood, even when they are intended to persuade and convince. The...