Ces dernières années, les publications d’écrits autobiographiques de personnes avec autisme se multiplient et connaissent un important succès. Elles donnent la parole à des personnes que leur handicap empêche habituellement d’exprimer leur vécu et leur expérience. Nous avons étudié les récits autobiographiques publiés de cinq personnes avec autisme en faisant l’hypothèse que le style littéraire et les thématiques abordées dans ces œuvres illustrent la séméiologie, la psychologie et la phénoménologie du trouble, tout en mettant en évidence des différences individuelles. L’étude stylistique des textes montre de nombreuses particularités de style telles que l’utilisation particulière d’ellipses, de métaphores et de comparaisons, ou l’utilisation d’un registre didactique et argumentatif, qui peuvent être mis en lien avec le trouble autistique et qui éclairent le fonctionnement psychique des auteurs. Dans les thématiques abordées par les auteurs, celles concernant les relations sociales, la communication, l’identité, les émotions et les troubles sensoriels révèlent chez les auteurs des préoccupations en lien avec leur handicap. Ce qu’ils en disent met en lumière leur perception de ces problématiques spécifiques ainsi que les stratégies adaptatives mises en œuvre pour les dépasser. Cette étude littéraire et psychopathologique de récits autobiographiques de personnes avec autisme permet une appréhension originale, plus vivante et intime des handicaps éprouvés par les personnes avec autisme et ouvre des perspectives nouvelles en termes d’accompagnement des sujets et de recherche.

The number of publications of autobiographical narratives written by individuals with autism has markedly increased during the recent years and these books have encountered a growing interest among readers. Narratives of individuals with autism represent a unique opportunity for these people to express themselves and share their experience given that their disability usually severely restrains those opportunities. Previous attempts by Freud and Jaspers to analyze autobiographical narratives of patients were mostly focused on the symptoms and the psychopathological analysis of patients’ experience. On the contrary, these works did not take the literary features of the texts into account. However, in the literacy domain, the style of an author is considered as reflecting his/her personality as well as his/her singular perception of the world. We therefore aimed to study the published autobiographical narratives of five authors with autism: three were from native French authors and two were French translations of english-speaking authors; two further autobiographies were not included as they were not written by the authors themselves. We hypothesized that the literary style and the topics covered in the texts would illustrate the symptoms, psychology and phenomenology of the disorder, while revealing features specific to each of the authors. The stylistic analysis revealed numerous stylistic features. Most of autobiographical narratives took the form of a testimony and included an obvious moral or didactic component. The narratives were highly and explicitly structured but the style was also notably original. Authors made a peculiar use of metaphors and comparisons, which did not exhibit a clear poetic purpose. They rather aimed to describe the particular view of the world of the authors and make it understandable for the reader. A particular use of ellipsis was also noted. This particular stylistic feature consists in the suppression or omission of a part of a narrative without making it impossible to understand. Authors seemed to use ellipses involuntarily and missing information often referred to emotions or social relationships. Finally, authors’ descriptions of their circumscribed interests were rich, detailed, but also repetitive and sometimes took a prominent space in their narratives with regard to other life events that were reported. Moreover, their descriptions of people were often unique and surprising: they were poorly detailed and focused on specific physical or psychological characteristics of the person, this preventing the reader to get a global impression of the character. All these stylistic features appeared related to the autism disorder and revealed the psychic functioning of the authors. Regarding the topics covered by the authors, those related to social relationships, communication, self, emotions and sensory disturbances revealed how concerned the authors are by their disability. Authors’ narratives also shed light on their perception of these particular difficulties as well as on their maladaptive strategies to overcome them. To conclude, the present literary and psychopathological analysis of autobiographical narratives of individuals with autism allows a unique, more vivid and intimate comprehension of the limitations experienced by them. It paves the way to new perspectives for research and care.