Littérature postcoloniale

Apolline Dosse - publié le 17/06/2024

[Fiche] Sri Lankan writer Shehan Karunatilaka’s novel ((The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida)) tells the story of a war photographer, gambler and closeted gay in Colombo during the 1980s civil war. One day, he wakes up in a bureaucratic afterlife while his body is sinking in the Beira Lake, and he is given seven moons to figure out how he died. The novel addresses the issue of transgression, whether it concerns Maali’s personal identity, his photographs which hold the subversive power to bring (...)

Charline Dossat - publié le 22/05/2024

[Fiche] In ((Glory)), Zimbabwean writer NoViolet Bulawayo gives voice to a multitude of unheard animal citizens who resist political oppression in the fictional kingdom of Jidada. She offers an original fable about her country, paying tribute to victims of the regime while glorifying collective strength.

Marie-Gaëlle Drouet - publié le 13/05/2024

[Fiche] This paper will consider how Salman Rushdie’s novel ((Victory City)) is eminently framed by multiple acts of creation involving questions of agency, artistry and resistance. In his fifteenth novel, Rushdie tells the epic story of the young orphan girl Pampa Kampana who is endowed with magical powers by a goddess and who subsequently creates the city of Bisnaga, literally meaning “Victory City” – a city supposedly modelled on the 14th century-Hindu kingdom of Vijayanagar, South (...)

Fleur-Ann Dany Brouard - publié le 14/03/2024

[Fiche] In ((The Doctor and the Saint)), Arundhati Roy compares and contrasts the lives and beliefs of Mahatma Gandhi and B. R. Ambedkar, the father of the Indian Constitution. Analyzing the two men's trajectories, Roy seeks to explain their conflict on the subject of Untouchability during the Second Round Table Conference (1931). In doing so, she dismantles the myth of Gandhi's sainthood and radical progressivism while defending and justifying Ambedkar's attack on Hinduism. Through its (...)

Mathilde Branchereau - publié le 14/02/2024

[Fiche] In ((A View of the Empire at Sunset)), Caryl Phillips proposes a fictionalised version of the life of novelist Jean Rhys – a Creole woman from Dominica expatriated in Europe – as a mirror image of the decline and dissolution of the British colonial Empire over the course of the 20th century. By depicting the protagonist’s struggle to find a sense of belonging, the novel highlights how colonial subjects may be confronted to a feeling of identity ambivalence and a loss of bearings.

Vanessa Guignery, Jaine Chemmachery, Cédric Courtois - publié le 25/01/2024

[Conférence] Cette page propose trois interventions sur le genre du "Refugee writing". Vanessa Guignery présente tout d'abord les modalités et définitions de ce genre, puis Jaine Chemmachery analyse les formes littéraires et intermédiales des ((Refugee Tales)), inspirées des ((Canterbury Tales)) de Chaucer, et du projet "28 for 28". Enfin, Cédric Courtois se penche sur la forme de la nouvelle, qui a pu être qualifiée de "mineure" et que les autrices de son corpus ont choisie pour (...)

Saugata Bhaduri - publié le 09/03/2023

Connected to the question of nationalistic and identitarian assertions versus the other-regarding 'worlding' of literary-critical praxis is the question of the Global South – questions more specifically connected to colonialism, postcolonial discourse, and new-imperialism. To what extent can postcolonialism offer a suitable methodological toolkit for studying literature today? Conversely, what are some of the current discontents with postcolonialism, arising particularly from emerging insights (...)

Saugata Bhaduri - publié le 02/03/2023

If, rather than being rooted in sectarian identity politics, reading strategies for literary and cultural practice have to be other-regarding, and not be cocooned within one’s self-same monolingual and monocultural universes, it calls for translation and comparative literature – where one goes beyond literary and cultural texts in one’s own language and reaches out to the other – to become mainstays of such a practice. To what extent would an emphasis on going beyond one’s own (...)

Saugata Bhaduri - publié le 23/02/2023

This first lecture focuses on recent developments in the area of Literary Theory, or to be more specific, on how ideology critique, which would have been one of the methodological mainstays of reading literature and culture under the aegis of Literary Theory, has been challenged over the last couple of decades, in the form of post-critical and post-theoretical developments, to lead to more ‘affective’ modes of dealing with literature and culture. The move, from the late 1990s, towards (...)

Jumana Bayeh - publié le 12/01/2023

Egypt's Arab Spring was experienced as a mediated event in two notable ways. First, in the immediate successes of Tahrir Square, Facebook was heralded as a fundamental agent of the uprising and responsible for the fall of Mubarak. Second, the failure of the 'Spring' with the election of an Islamist and a counter-revolution that saw the rise of a military dictatorship, news reports sought to make sense of the country's rapidly flailing political fortunes. Missing from both these forms of (...)

Elsa Lorphelin - publié le 27/10/2022

Cet article examine trois nouvelles de Jean Rhys, « Again the Antilles » (1927), « Pioneers, Oh, Pioneers » (1969), et « Fishy Waters » (1976). Conçues comme un cycle de nouvelles, toutes trois mettent en scène un personnage récurrent et déclinent le thème de la mise au ban d’un homme par la communauté créole. Cette exclusion, loin de n’être qu’un phénomène social, est avant tout un phénomène discursif qui évacue la voix des marginaux et permet à Jean Rhys de proposer (...)

Manon Boukhroufa-Trijaud - publié le 20/10/2022

This article aims at shedding light on the work of Menka Shivdasani, a key figure of contemporary Indian poetry in English. It highlights her involvement in the collective poetry scene of Mumbai and her commitment to connect it to the world. It also focuses on the singular poetic voice she elaborates in the personal itinerary of her poetic work, shaping the self-portrait of a woman poetess in contemporary India.

Annalena Geisler - publié le 15/06/2022

In ((Americanah)), Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie tells the story of high school lovers Ifemelu and Obinze, their experiences of migration to the US and the UK, and their reunion 13 years later back in Nigeria. Through the means of defamiliarization and the depiction of Ifemelu’s sense of alienation in the US, Adichie sheds new light on America’s relationship with race and racism.

Annalena Geisler - publié le 25/05/2022

Even before winning the prestigious Booker Prize in 2019, Bernardine Evaristo had been an integral part of the British literary landscape, not only because of her experimental style, but also due to her activism and wish to cut down discrimination in the literary institution. In ((Girl, Woman, Other)), the British writer with Nigerian and Irish roots, attempts to give a voice to Black British women, who have long been invisible and voiceless in the public sphere.

Jumana Bayeh - publié le 30/01/2020

In this talk, Jumana Bayeh (Macquarie University, Sydney), author of ((The Literature of the Lebanese Diaspora: Representations of Place and Transnational Identity)) (2014) outlines her latest project which proposes to trace the representation of borders and the nation-state across a century of Arab writing in English.

Amitava Kumar, Natacha Lasorak - publié le 25/10/2019

Amitava Kumar is an Indian writer and journalist who teaches literature at Vassar College. In this interview, he talks about his collection of essays ((Away: The Indian Writer as an Expatriate)) (2004) and his novel ((Immigrant, Montana)) (2017), and focuses on the notion of "home", immigration, the caste system and the political situation in India.

Sandrine Soukaï - publié le 19/09/2019

This article examines two Indian novels ((Clear Light of Day)) (1980) by Anita Desai and ((The Shadow Lines)) (1988) by Amitav Ghosh along with ((Burnt Shadows)) (2009) by Anglo-Pakistani novelist Kamila Shamsie, books written about the Partition of India that accompanied independence in 1947. Partition led to violence on an enormous scale; the exact number of people who were killed has never been ascertained, and estimates vary between one and two million. Partition also caused massive (...)

Udaya Kumar - publié le 18/06/2018

Udaya Kumar (Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi) était Professeur invité à l’ENS de Lyon du 12 au 30 octobre 2017 et a donné trois conférences en anglais sur la littérature Dalit du Sud de l’Inde. La troisième de ces conférences porte sur la représentation des phénomènes de possession dans la littérature Dalit et sur l'impact politique du suicide.

Udaya Kumar - publié le 27/04/2018

Udaya Kumar (Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi) était Professeur invité à l’ENS de Lyon du 12 au 30 octobre 2017 et a donné trois conférences en anglais sur la littérature Dalit du Sud de l’Inde. La première de ces conférences explore la représentation du système des castes dans la littérature Dalit.

Zia Haider Rahman, Marion Coste - publié le 27/03/2017

Zia Haider Rahman, originaire du Bangladesh, écrit son premier roman, ((In the Light of What We Know)), après une carrière sur Wall Street et auprès de l’ONU. Une plume sobre et fluide mène le lecteur du Bangladesh rural à New York et aux campements de l’ONU en Afghanistan. Les deux personnages principaux, vivant chacun des décalages culturels entre leurs origines et le monde qu’ils habitent, semblent marqués par le constat qu’un exilé pourrait finalement n’être « qu’un (...)

Azarie Aroulandom, Brigitte Gauthier - publié le 16/09/2014

Azarie Aroulandom est consultant international auprès d’institutions publiques et d’entreprises privées françaises et étrangères : Ministères des Affaires étrangères et de la Coopération, Chambre de Commerce, Organisations internationales (UNESCO, BIRD, FAO, BIT, CNUCED, ONG….). Il enseigne le Management-et la négociation interculturelle, le Transfert de Technologie, la culture et civilisation indienne et africaine à l’Université d’Evry.

Azarie Aroulandom - publié le 16/09/2014

Au vingtième siècle, la culture fut dominée par un immense génie Rabindranath Tagore, l’un des plus grands philosophes et poètes de l’histoire du monde. On a dit de Rabindranath Tagore (7 mai 1861-7 août 1941) qu’il fut le Léonard de Vinci de la Renaissance bengali. Tagore naît le 7 mai 1861 au Bengale, à Calcutta, la plus importante ville de l’Inde à cette époque. Il est le quatorzième enfant d’une famille aisée, il grandit dans l’ombre d’un père savant et (...)

Helen Oyeyemi - publié le 18/06/2012

"You read of extreme cases of ((jamais vu)) in the newspapers. There was one recently involving a husband who, after eighteen years of happy stability with his wife, told her he had a surprise for her. He blindfolded her, then ‘hit her over the head with the blunt end of an axe, fracturing her skull in three places.’ She survived and tried to forgive him, even vouched for his good character in court. The husband-turned-attacker, unable to explain his moment of terminal hostility, deferred to (...)

Helen Oyeyemi, Patricia Armion - publié le 08/06/2012

Helen Oyeyemi took part in the sixth edition of the Assises Internationales du Roman, organised by the Villa Gillet and Le Monde. She was kind enough to read an extract from ((White is for Witching)), her stunning Neo-Gothic novel.

Helen Oyeyemi, Patricia Armion - publié le 06/06/2012

Helen Oyeyemi took part in the sixth edition of the Assises Internationales du Roman, organised by the Villa Gillet and ((Le Monde)). She answered our questions on ((White is for Witching)), a stunning Neo-Gothic novel.

Florence Labaune-demeule - publié le 31/05/2011

((The God of Small Things)), roman publié en 1997, permit à son auteur, la romancière indienne Arundhati Roy, de recevoir le Booker Prize la même année. Publié dans de nombreux pays et traduit en plus de quarante langues, ce roman a été applaudi à maintes reprises par la critique, notamment en raison de l'analyse subtile des relations humaines qui y est abordée. Comme le dit A. Roy elle-même, « The book really delves, very deep I think, into human nature. The story tells of the (...)

Florence Labaune-demeule - publié le 30/05/2011

Le roman d'A. Roy, ((The God of Small Things)), fait la part belle à la théâtralisation, que cette dernière se manifeste par de courtes références intertextuelles à Shakespeare par exemple, ou par de plus longs renvois au kathakali, genre dramatique typique du sud de l'Inde, qui allie théâtre, danse, chant et musique. La théâtralisation, dans ce roman, prend aussi un sens beaucoup plus général, car on observe que la codification extrême, parfois excessive, de la société (...)

Fabienne Labaune - publié le 30/05/2011

Cet article se propose d'analyser le sens des petits riens qui donnent leur titre au roman. Ils seront vus comme un système de signes qui renvoient d'abord à la société et sont au service de la satire. Mais le déchiffrage de ces signes invite à voir le roman comme un palimpseste et les petits riens comme les signes de l'expérience traumatique ou de ses traces, donc comme les signes de l'exercice de la mémoire. Enfin, on montrera que les petits riens valent pour eux-mêmes, dans leur (...)

Catherine Pesso-miquel - publié le 13/05/2011

This article on Arundhati Roy's novel focuses more particularly on the idea of dividing lines, turned into parodied, ridiculous devices, and on their transgression. Analysing in particular the love scenes between the two lovers and the incest scene between the two twins, it attempts to define the differences rather than the similarities between such scenes, asking the question: is transgression necessarily linked with progression? The article will show that Roy, like other Indo-Anglian novelists (...)

Elsa Sacksick - publié le 02/05/2011

((The God of Small Things)) est une œuvre sous le signe du retour. Celui-ci s'inscrit dans le rapport à l'espace, au temps, dans la construction narrative et se révèle affecter la langue elle-même. Nous verrons, après avoir étudié les différentes modalités du retour en tant que réitération, que s'il prend à première vue la forme d'un ressassement, d'une régression ou d'un bégaiement, il apparaît également à l'origine d'un rythme puissant qui scande l'écriture et lui insuffle (...)