Visual display device with memory and telephone exchange incorporating such a device

DETAILED DESCRIPTION To obviate these disadvantages the invention proposes a display device with a memory of the type incorporating a smectic liquid crystal layer which can assume a transparent state under the action of an electrical field, first and second plates enclosing said layer, at least one first electrode supported by the face of the first plate in contact with the liquid crystal and at least one second electrode supported by the face of the second plate in contact with the liquid crystal and which, with the first electrode, makes it possible to subject part of the liquid crystal layer to an electrical reorientation field, wherein it also comprises means making it possible to momentarily modify the position of the first plate relative to the second in order to bring the liquid crystal into a uniform diffusive state.