Forty years of HIV/AIDS narratives: Whats next?

This essay proposes to look across HIV/AIDS narratives in order to trace a larger relationship between the onset, development, and perceived disappearance of both HIV/AIDS and HIV/AIDS literature-what I dub its literary epidemiology. I aim to trace and compare both the literary transmission and depiction of HIV/AIDS in the major novels of this genre by authors like Hélène Laygues, Michel Simonin, Hervé Guibert, Erik Rémès, Guillaume Dustan, Tristan Garcia, and Camille Genton. Such a study affords a better understanding of the concepts of life, death, and what the future holds for a literature centered on a disease. This approach offers readers a novel perspective on the literary past and future of French HIV/AIDS literature.