You’re scared of spiders, afraid of heights, illness, and the opinion of others. You’re terrified to be betrayed or abandoned, and you’re petrified to the idea that the little gypsy fortune-teller’s predictions may come true. So you stop smoking, you shun insects and medical confidences; you avoid the stage, the airplanes, you don’t fall in love and you don’t lean over balconies. You never take your driving test and you begin reading novels from the last page, like you’d wear a chastity belt. You think you’re ready, that you’ll never be caught off guard, and that nothing can happen to you. Until they discover a butterfly in your chest and you can feel its fluttering wings. Then you simply can’t pretend to ignore it.

Le nénuphar et l’araignée is an autobiographical story about fear that explores the symptoms, the sources, and the origins of anxiety, from the most intimate to the most ordinary.