Exactly two months after Annie Ernaux passed the tests to become a teacher, her father passed away. Ernaux's father had developed into a stern, realistic guy who gave his family little compassion despite having received minimal education and being appreciated only for his labour since he was a little child. Ernaux's dispassionate observation in A Man's Place reveals the humiliation that followed her father throughout his life as he describes his gradual ascension towards monetary comfort. She carefully examines the value he placed on etiquette and language, which came to him so unnaturally while he tried to support his family in rural France with a grocery store and cafe. As her father ages throughout the course of the novel, Ernaux develops into the unflinching observer who is now well-known to the world.