The article analyzes nine novels of a Salvadorian writer, Horacio Castellanos Moya, written between 1994 and 2011, and indicates elements that could be considered to be paradigmatic of the current Central American narrative and its links to the topic of the recent past of the countries of the region, namely, militarisms, political violence, civil war and its consequences, as well as criminal violence and political frustration. The aspects that are analyzed are the distortion of the classic model in of the police, the possible therapeutic value of literature, and finally, the problem of collective and individual identity affected by violence.

Key words: Violence, Central America, novel, Horacio Castellanos Moya, El Salvador.

The article takes as its subject the possibility of perceiving women as constituting a distinct subgroup of the subaltern. Following a theoretical introduction to this concept, the article focuses on the practical application of the notion in Canadian literature, discussing the two major female-authored Canadian novels published in the 1970s, that is Margaret Atwood’s Surfacing and Margaret Laurence’s The Diviners. Although Atwood’s and Laurence’s novels highlight the influences of the opposite colonial centres, the postcolonial situations and reflections of the main female characters appear quite similar. Indeed, both Atwood’s narrator and Laurence’s Morag Gunn seem to be depicted as doubly colonised: as women, and as Canadians. However, there exists a possibility of reading the protagonists as occasionally acting from a position of superiority towards those subaltern to them, namely the Native population.

Key words: Canadian literature, feminism, postcolonialism, subalternity.

The father figure in twentieth-century novels usually appears only as a part of the family. It is rare for a father to become the main protagonist of the book; he is frequently presented as an “addition” to the mother. Rightly or not, the father figure is, however, a symbol of authority and power in the family, hence writers have a tendency to present the parent-child relationships as difficult, bitter, and very, very complex. The situation is not much different in modern Italian literature, in which relationships with fathers during childhood are often a starting point for adult problems. In this article, I try to analyze this phenomenon on the basis of two novels written after 1950: Caro Michele by Natalia Ginzburg and Volevo i pantaloni by Lara Cardella.

The study of Mauritian Literature and the environment from an interdisciplinary perspective arouses various concerns and questionings such as the protection of planet Earth, the relation between characterisation and natural settings, the nature-culture dichotomy and nature writing. The fictionalisation and poeticization of Mauritian and Indian Ocean islands’ natural spaces in Loys Masson’s novels depict both man as Nature’s saviour and Nature as man’s saviour, in such a way that Nature’s raison d’être becomes Literature and aesthetics. Nature exists because it will eventually turn into a Book. Born at the end of the 20th century in American universities and closely linked to geocriticism and ecopoetics, ecocriticism thus provides new insights into Masson’s novels while reviving traditional French philosophical thoughts by Jean-Jacques Rousseau or Michel Serres.

The present article seeks to analyse the figure of the Wandering Jew in five 20thcentury French novels (Carnet de route du Juif errant by Alexandre Arnoux, Les Entretiens d’Ahasvérus by Louis de Launay, Marches du Juif errant by Henry-Jacques, Jésus raconté par le Juif errant by Edmond Fleg and Histoire du Juif errant by Jean d’Ormesson). Its main goal is to answer the question to what extent the original image of the Jew is reproduced in the abovementioned prose works. In order to carry out his plan, the author takes into account the crucial and stereotypical characteristics which constitute the very nature of the Jewish vagabond. He tries then to point out major differences between the five novels and the popular version of the Ahasverian legend. The study of those elements shows that contemporary texts related to the immortal man break off with the traditional version of the legend and thus bear testimony of the so-called “death of the myth”.

Maryse, a postmodern novel by Francine Noël, offers an ironic look at the baby boomers’ uncertain axiology. We focus on the multiple levels of irony inherent in the portrait of the characters of the novel. Our analysis of the ironic discourse has two interpretative components. First, we closely examine the dialogue between two characters, lovers, which reflects, as in a mise en abyme, the baby boomers’ generally accepted idea of the couple. Second, we study the ironic discourse of the couple from the social perspective, as seen through Maryse’s sentimental affair, whose personal and professional journey exemplifies the intertextual game found in other French classic novels (Marcel Proust’s À la recherche du temps perdu and Quebecois novels (Gabrielle Roy’s Bonheur d’occasion).

Key words: The postmodern novel, the couple, intertextual game, the baby boom generation, the literary portrait of a protagonist, the ironic.

The aim of deportation and expulsion of the Acadians during the so-called Grand Dérangement, also known as the Great Upheaval, was to deprive them of their land, which is presented in their history and literature. The idea of space is in this case closely connected with the question of identity in Acadian literature. Not referring directly to the above-mentioned historical events, Garcia Couturier explores in her novelistic diptych the relation between identity and space. Although Couturier’s writing is largely based on categories which characterise Acadian literature, she is able to go beyond them in order to concentrate on individual identity and liberty. She also investigates metaphorical expulsion, which shows her desire for autonomy from tradition and underlines modern aspects of the two novels.
The aim of the article is therefore to examine the narrative representation of the space, its symbolic function and its role in shaping both individual and collective identity in Couturier’s novels.

Concentrated on four short novels by the prominent Mexican modernist writer Amado Nervo (1870–1919), namely, El donador de almas (1899), Mencía (1907), El sexto sentido (1913) and Amnesia (1918), this article argues that Nervo uses the fear sentiment in a subtle and quiet way, but nonetheless effective in its purpose of generating an atmosphere of unrest and mystery. Although Nervo’s stories show similitude with those of, for instance, R. Darío and L. Lugones, through a skilful use of dark humor, ironic distance and moderate skepticism, the author creates a disturbing and mysterious world very much of his own. In this article, Nervo’s fantastic texts are also viewed in the context of the rich Spanish American Modernist movement.

Key words: Mexican Literature, Fantastic Literature, Spanish-American Short Novel, Spanish-American Modernism.

Ananda Devi’s family island, Mauritius, constitutes the background for her novels. Mauritius is a multiethnic society whose population is approximate to that of Warsaw, with four main religions and seventeen or eighteen languages (depending on a source), of which eight are used every day. However, this socio-cultural variety which we can find practically everywhere (in common life, beliefs as well as in literature), still remains taboo. The problem of social exclusion is one of the main threads in Devi’s novels. She describes people whose beliefs, convictions, behaviours and external appearance differ from what is commonly accepted by the society. She gives a voice to socially excluded individuals, giving them a chance to speak for themselves. The author concentrates on marginalization and rejection of women who are “different” due to appearance, deformation of the body, or bad karma.

Key words: Ananda Devi, Mauritius, social exclusion, women.

Being an author whose main struggle has been to track down relentlessly ready-for-use thought structures, the use of literary topoï is far from being self-evident for Boualem Sansal. That’s why the appearance of a topos in his novels is always the sign of a thoughtful aesthetic and ethic choice. Thus, great literary topoï of 17th and 18th centuries novels embodies, in his mind, the golden age of a fully potent fiction. Dealing with a harsh reality and expected to complete french readership expectations of documentary sources, Boualem Sansal’s work constantly intends to reassert the role of a fiction that has been too much tamed, for him, in modern literary aesthetics. That’s the way we can understand his occasional but meaningful use of topoï.

In the present work, I wish to concentrate on two examples of detective fiction in Spain, that is on Arturo Pérez Reverte’s The Flanders Panel and Alicia Giménez Bartlett’s Serpientes en el paraíso. Both novels are centred on a character of a female detective. After a closer look, we can see that both detectives have found themselves in a similar situation. Julia, the amateur, and Petra, the professional, exist and work in a typically masculine world of detectives and police officers, struggling with the gender issues and roles. By analysing their situations, I wish to present a case study of two female detectives and their reactions, responses and attitudes towards the masculine world of sleuths, thus providing a complete picture of both protagonists.

Key words: female detective fiction, machismo, Arturo Pérez Reverte, Alicia Giménez Bartlett, Petra Delicado.

This paper analyses contemporary Spanish American novels whose plots are motivated by a private investigation into the mysteries that lead to collective memory. In the second half of the 20th Century many Latin American countries were being torn apart by civil wars, guerilla wars and dictatorships. The societies in these countries (Argentina, Chile, Bolivia and Central American countries) have not yet come to terms with their personal and collective wounds and crimes. Recent history has not yet been totally restored. The official versions of history have been distorted and the heroes of the novels analyzed here begin their private investigation of facts, which leads them to uncover not only the mysteries in the recent histories of their countries, but also the political affiliations of members of their own families. As these heroes are always
somehow involved with writing, their para-detective search turns out to be a struggle about a discursively and textually formed identity, as well as a negotiation of values between the public and the private, between official historiography and the memory of individuals and their families, between the traditional and postmodern sense of patriotism. This process illustrates that in some contemporary Latin American societies, conflicts between the accepted version of history and marginalized private memory correspond to the postcolonial model of identity problems.

Key words: Contemporary Spanish American novel, detective story, identity, postcolonial studies.

The article “Understand and Respect the Other: Autonomy and Autism in the Novel for Teenagers and Young Adults” is a comparative reflection of books that focus on the human relationships that are formed around young protagonists trying to find their own way and the true values of life. These are mostly realistic novels / mirror novels in which illness, disability
or death represent a plot that puts the characters to the test. At crucial moments they are forced to deploy their energy and perseverance, and on that side, they learn to live and be independent. Novels about autism allow to consider new questions concerning identity and otherness, norm and outside the norm. The notion of freedom is viewed differently by the characters who are faced with the dilemma whether the need to care for the sick is a sacrifice or a duty.

The interpretation of Vincenzo Consolo’s novels cannot be complete without taking into account the field of culture from which the writer derives his inspiration. The Sicilian writers’ heritage, e.g. Verga’s, Pirandello’s, Sciascia’s, can be found in almost each of Consolo’s narrations. In the sphere of references to epigones of Italian literature as well as of other contemporary literatures, Nottetempo, casa per casa is a clear example of intertextuality that includes elements of pastiche and parody. This interdependence is illustrated by means of more or less literal quotations and citations. Such a narration, interlaced with citations from D’Annunzio, Verga, Ariosto, Manzoni, Montale, and Shakespeare as well as the Bible, is only seemingly anachronistic. In fact, it evokes memory which is kept by the Author and then, as a consequence, by the Reader. Nottetempo, casa per casa is a novel which materializes the features of postmodernist novels which are based not only on citations but also on parody and the interlacing of different codes and symbols. The stylistic and rhethoric play presented is a result of Consolo’s ideas according to which modern literature should show how to withstand the continuous degradation of culture.

Key words: References, citations, intertextuality, parody, pastiche.

There are many publications on witches both in children’s literature and in scholarly essays. Mona Chollet’s Witches, the Undefeated Power of Women explains that the word has become an emblem of feminism. This article offers a comparative analysis of several recent novels, based on the latter’s thesis, whose aim is to examine how the witch character is constructed, how the authors treat historical data (healer witch, witch-hunt, stake, etc.) and how they renew this character regarding certain issues (identity, transmission, emancipation, etc.). Are the witches of children’s novels carrying feminist demands for young readers?

In the article, the author analyses the fantasy elements noticeable in some of Ananda Devi’s novels. In her first novels as well as in her recent ones, the writer resorts to solutions from the fantasy genre. In L’Arbre fouet, Moi, l’interdite, La Vie de Joséphin le Fou, Pagli, Soupir, Indian tango, Les Jours vivants, Manger l’autre and in Le Jour des caméléons, the Mauritian novelist presents mysterious incipits and open-ended, dreamlike endings, introduces hybridised, often insane characters half animal half human, describes metamorphoses and transformations of man into animal, mentions imaginary sobriquets, ghosts. The aim of the analysis is also to try to explain for what purpose the writer uses fantasy in her work. In the analysis, the author also draws on the research of T. Todorov, P.-G. Castex, L. Vax and V. Tritter.

Writing about memory involves balancing on the limits of the symbolizable and the unspeakable of trauma – individual and social – putting together puzzles in which some of the pieces do not fit and others have been lost. The aforementioned novels, both within the imaginary of disenchanted impotence in the face of the reconstructive faculty of memory in personalities devastated by state violence, share traits that connect them: both confront the difficulties of a pathological narrative by posing it from a delirious and/or dislocated discursive inquiry in which the authors sustain the literary possibility of anamnesis. The aim of this article is to explore the fragmentary, fetishizing construction of the paradoxes of memory in the aesthetic constitution of both novels as the only possible support in front of the irreparable damage produced by social subjugation. Through stylistic traits, the reconstructive, salvific viability of traumatic memory is renewed, and at the same time put into crisis.

The paper is a critical analysis of romance fiction in relation to parental structures visible in patriarchal codes and paternal tropes romance novels pivot around. As such, it provides an insight into the narrative patterns the romance uses to sustain patriarchy as well as recreate the father‑daughter‑like relationship at the center of cultural practices of love.

Arthuriana has a long history of adaptation and appropriation in medieval and contemporary works, and the tradition of such textual borrowing and reworking continues in contemporary “genre” novels, particularly those that invoke associations with knights, honor, and codes of chivalry. One such example are the novels and short stories of the Dragonlance setting. Sturm Brightblade is positioned as a knight who adheres to a code of honor and is given Arthurian character traits, narrative arcs, and a backstory by the various authors that have fleshed out his history. The texts in the Dragonlance setting knowingly use appropriated elements from Middle English Arthurian works and assign them to Sturm Brightblade to give him proper positioning as a knight that would fit in with Arthur’s legendary Round Table.

The three novels that have already been published as part of the Fragments of the World tetralogy planned by Hélène Rioux are composed of chapters that could, in principle, constitute separate short stories or novellas on their own.

However, each novel in the series allows the reader to note the relationship between the characters and places.

The author shows the inhabitants of the Earth during only one day in each novel: an equinoxor a solstice. For the writer and her fictional alter ego, the rhythm of creation is determined by the movement of the Earth around the Sun. Even though Rioux’s characters live in diverse places and in different ways, they are very much alike when faced with the everyday escape from the routine or succumbing to modern rituals.

Key words:  Hélène Rioux, Fragments of the World, rituals, rhythm, routine

Despite the passage of time, the literary output by Jean Genet keeps arousing controversy in both critics and readers. It is due to the contents of his works which reflect the private life of a man who is determined to separate himself from the world of “decent people” and to live among the “aristocrats of Evil”. The present study discusses the interference of various rituals that occur in Genet’s prose writing, full of villains and vagabonds. It analyses five novels: Our Lady of the Flowers, The Miracle of the Rose, Funeral Rites, Querelle of Brest and The Thief’s Journal. The main goal is to describe how those rituals are connected to one another and why Evil can be perceived as a driving force. To present a vast range of this problem, the paper takes into consideration a number of religious, erotic and criminal elements.

Key words: prose works, rituals, religion, eroticism, Evil, delinquency

In this paper, the author analyzes the stereotypical representations of single woman from two French-language Algerian novels: Les Pierres dans ma poche by Kaouther Adimi and La fille de la Casbah by Leïla Marouane. By using different literary techniques, the chosen writers formulate a severe criticism of contemporary Algerian society which, despite the hard-won liberties of the second sex, maintains the status quo by enclosing women in stereotypical social
roles and by stigmatizing those who do not do not conform to societal standards.

The Latin American Homo Sexualis of High Modernity. Jaime Bayly’s Narrative Fiction

Jaime Bayly is one of the most controversial Hispanic-American writers of recent times. Both his provocative media image and his writings — which supposedly reffer to his personal experience — focus on gay themes. The aim of the present article is to show, by way of the work of literary scholars who engage in queer theory and sociologists who examine questions of sexuality, how certain changes in the sexual dimension of human life typical of societies of so-called high modernity (although with marked influences from Latin American culture), are reflected in th Peruvian’s writings. Situating Bayly’s novels in a broader literary and social context, the article attempts to shed light on the cultural construction of gender and sexuality.

Key words: (homo)sexuality, hypermasculinity, hegemony, identity.

The Women’s Models and Alternative Sexuality in the Novels of Lucía Etxebarria Love, Curiosity, Prozac and Doubts and Beatrice and the Heavenly Bodies

The main aim of this article is to present ways in which a controversial Spanish novelist, Lucía Etxebarria, expresses and subverts traditional social models and sexual identity of Spanish women at the end of the twentieth century by creation of female protagonists such as a promiscuouos girl, a workaholic executive or a housewife that tend to deconstruct socially normative conceptualizations of their roles and sexuality and they search for alternative constructions of feminine identity, both social and sexual one. It seems that a lesbian model of relationship is alternative to a monogamous compulsory heterosexuality.

Key words: Spanish feminine literature, women’s sexual identity, lesbian model, Lucía Etxebarria.

The present article offers an analysis of Cristina Ali Farah’s novel, Madre piccola. Even though it is generally believed that postcolonial novels have only been written in English, Farah’s book can definitely be classified as such, as it examines the specificity of the Italian post-colonial period, as well as the situation of women and other minority groups. Madre piccola portrays the lives of four women living on the border of two cultures. The nomadic society presented in the text-marked by temporariness, moving from one place to another-is not perceived as “local” anymore, but is presented in a more global context. The title Madre piccola means “mother’s aunt” in the Somalian language, and is an example of a word-for-word translation. Importantly, the world of women and immigrants as depicted by Farah has not been known in Europe so far. That world is far more emancipated and modern than one could expect. Ali Farah’s writing tackles not only the nature-and preservation-of what is local, but also the development of the global culture.

Key words: Post-colonial Italian women’s literature, immigrants, nomadic society.

François Blais, one of the most interesting writers of the new generation in Quebec, most often places the action of his novels in Mauricie where he was born. What is more, his texts are rich in cultural elements, especially intertextual, that are the part of the author's game with a reader. All in all, Blais is interested in the banality, the everyday life, often illustrated with the adventures of universal and banal characters, who could come from anywhere. The reader is therefore dealing on the one hand with the novel deeply inscribed in contemporary Quebec culture, on the other hand, the daily life of Blais’s characters seems to be common for all people. The paper focuses on the possibilities of translating François Blais's novels, in particular on a possible transfer of the specificity of the literature that plays with the universal and the local.

Nino Ricci, an award-winning English-speaking Italian descendant, and Nelly Arcan, suicidal Quebecker from Montreal, portray contemporary womanhood as seen through the lenses of oppression. In Ricci’s Lives of the Saints the figure of mother becomes a curse of the woman’s son, whose whole existence is conditioned by his mother’s incidental and adulterous pregnancy. The mother shifts from the position of an individual to the position of a symbol by becoming sinful representation of her disobedience in the relation to social rules. She is dominated by masculine gaze and rules established by men. Inversely acts Cynthia, the prostitute in Nelly Arcan’s Putain, who chooses her fate intentionally but who is equally conditioned by the social environment in which she grew up. Being a prostitute is an act of succumbing to masculine tyranny.

Key words: womanhood, oppressor, subjugation, Ricci, Arcan.

The vampire, represented in various media forms, has always scared or fascinated people. Dracula’s current descendants have become a “consumer good” ; the vampire figure is now displayed for commercial purposes, which are profitable both for publishing houses and television productions. In contemporary children’s literature which blends sentimental and paranormal events, vampires once so scary, shiver in fear in front of some of their counterparts. Fear is no longer the sole privilege of the bloodsuckers’ victims ; novels for young adults are populated with living dead who are no longer the sole embodiment of loathsome otherness. Capable of both loving and suffering, they feel fear like mere mortals. Vampires, once awfully stressful and intimidating characters, now shiver in fear in front of some of their counterparts. This is quite an unprecedented turn of events !

Key words : vampires, fear, novels for teenagers

One cannot question the fact that a motif of a letter occupies a very significant position in the eighteenth century French paintings and literature. Although the motif of a woman reading a letter was used much earlier by the Dutch painters such as Vermeer, there are also many eighteenth century French painters (Raoux, Fragonard, Chardin or Pierre), who show women devoted to this particular activity. Thus, the popularity of letters in literature and art results from an important role correspondence played at that time. This paper emphasizes the description of a process of writing letters by a protagonist and its further influence on the receiver’s emotional and physical state of mind and body. Letters comprise a source of pleasure for both — a writer and a reader. In painting, a letter serves as the key to the interpretation of a painting, though its content is neither revealed nor comprehensible. The way of presenting characters and space, and a central position of a letter in the considered paintings may determine the interpretation — it can be treated as a signal of a relationship between lovers or its reminiscence. Considering the intimacy of the presented scene and a confidential character of a love letter, the canvas can differently predispose the receivers and make them think about sentimental intrigues.

Key words: Epistolary esthetics, reading scene, writing scene, Enlightenment’s paintings, Enlightenment’s novels.

The article proposes to reconsider the place taken by Nelly Arcan’s work in the women’s and feminist thinking in Quebec in the last years. The author discusses the concepts like the passivity of writer’s main characters, her conception of femininity and the fatalism which characterize her female characters. The aim of the article is to shed light in Nelly Arcan’s vision and renewal of the contemporary Quebecer literature. Her intimate, provocative, furious and dark novels bring out the deadlock on the women’s thinking nowadays and challenge the achievements of the claims of the feminist movements.

The topic of this article is an analysis of space presented in Victor Hugo’s novel Les Misérables. The specific emphasis is put on the novel’s attributes which provoke fear in the reader. Apart from characteristic features of other subgenres of popular novel Les Misérables includes a significant number of gothic novel’s elements and consequently fits squarely in literary horror fiction. The majority of these characteristics is related to a presentation of anxiogenic space which is an embelmatic example of gothic genre. It manifests itself thorough an existence in a novel of gloomy, terrifying, death- related places namely, Waterloo battlefield, old Vaugirard cemetary, the areas of Chelles forest. Several buildings depicted by Victor Hugo for instance the ruins of Gorbeau and Petit-Picpus-Saint-Antoine monastery resemble black dwellings (demeures noires) – due to their image and their narrative functions in the text – which are currently demonstarted in Gothic fiction novels.

Key words: gothic novel, black novel, literary horror fiction, anxiogenic space, fear, teror, fright, black dwelling

The article discusses the stereotype of road novel in Québec in the 21st century, exemplified by François Blais’s sixth novel entitled Document 1 published in 2012. Blais’s novel appears different from the typical road novels by playing with the genre’s codes in order to create something altogether new. The aim of the article is to shed light on the character development, the representations of place and the journey itself presented in the novel.

Constructing Gender in Fred Vargas’s Anti-Normative Crime Fiction

Fred Vargas’s crime novels do not fit into any established type of the crime genre. Defying the existence of an ordinary person, the author creates singular characters with odd behaviours and extraordinary capacities, partly in order to challenge gender norms. These characters question existing notions of femininity and masculinity, while at the same time revealing what the author believes to be traditional images of male and female attributes and behaviours, and thereby they implicitly reproduce. Physical appearance, weight in particular, is a central aspect of all female characters intended to challenge gender norms, whereas the male characters display a more diverse approach. The characterisation of such female protagonists seems to be directed primarily against a social norm defining femininity as “tallness, slimness and beauty,” whereas the extraordinary features of the male characters relate more clearly to previous models of investigators found in the crime genre.

Key words: Fred Vargas, crime fiction, gender, literary genre. Le roman policier est marqué

The first-person narrative novels, Mes parents by Hervé Guibert and Biographie I, II by Yves Navarre, are part of the characters’ crisis writing where the reason of evil is always the father’s presence. Without hiding behind fictitious names, both writers reveal personal stories centered on the inevitable conflict between father and son. The family theme brings them together while their behavior makes them different. The first part of our study, “The Rejected Father,” focuses on Hervé Guibert’s violent language and attitude towards his father he will never accept. The second part, “The Rejecting Father,” is an analysis of Yves Navarre’s struggle of reconciliation with his father disappointed by his sexual preferences.

The aim of this paper is to show that the novels El Señor Presidente (1946) by Asturias, El otoño del patriarca (1975) by García Márquez and La fiesta del Chivo (2000) by Vargas Llosa represent dictatorship as a mythical‑ritual system. The discourses the autocratic power creates and promotes, reveal mythological characteristics: atemporality, cult of personality and a manichaean genealogic narrative, all subjugated to the functional explanation‑legitimization axis. The latter should be understood — rather than in rational terms — as a performative action, which takes place via a ritual system, constantly re‑actualizing the original mythical narrative. The modalities of ritual we distinguish in the three texts are: tortures, national holiday and sexuality. All these activities — indistinctly if performed by the dictator himself or by his institutional machinery — reveal common characteristics, among which I stress the condition of  ‘excess’ regarding their hypothetical pragmatic role.

Key words: dictatorship novel, Latin America, mythical‑ritual system, excess

Although the works of Michel Tremblay are replete with references to other authors, it is the phenomenon of autotextuality that becomes the focal point of the analysis in this article. The author of “Chroniques du Plateau Mont-Royal” and numerous plays and novels binds them all together by resorting to the recurrence of his figures. Thus, the figure of Mother, a figure grafted onto the network of Michel Tremblay’s works, undergoes a metamorphosis from boisterous and authoritarian Nana Tremblay (in the autobiographical prose and drama) to a symbol of ideal motherhood embodied by The Great Mother of Tremblay’s universe. She gives the beginning to both new life and new writing and hence she becomes her writer-son’s inspiration and creative muse.

Key words: Michel Tremblay; autotextuality; metamorphoses; mother; writing

This article is aimed at analyzing the break between fathers and their children in the texts of Boubacar Boris Diop, in which another figure often replaces that of the biological parent. Participating in the identity construction of his foster son, the spiritual father grants him memory which is contradictory to the official history. This clash, omnipresent in Boubacar Boris Diop’s novels, testifies of a change of paradigm revealing a deep crisis of the father figure in African postcolonial societies. We are indeed very far from the mythicized image of the pater nobilis which used to be omnipresent in African literature.

Flaubert undeniably represents a fascinating case with regard to stereotyping, especially if one considers not only his masterpiece, Madame Bovary, but also his last volume, left unfinished in perhaps a symbolic way, Bouvard et Pécuchet, and the collections of clichés included in his Dictionnaire des idées reçues and Le Sottisier. What is prosaic is important for the novelist. Moreover, in his Correspondence we find a real and fascinating interest in the topic of the cliché. A key sentence concerning what is commonplace suggestively describes Charles Bovary’s conversation: “Charles’ conversation was as flat as a pavement, and people’s ideas paraded on it in their ordinary outfit, without vibrating with emotion, with laughter or with daydreaming” (my translation). Essentially, our aim is to dwell on language and gesture stereotypes as presented in some of Flaubert’s novels as well as in the short story Un cœur simple (A Simple Heart) and even in his travel notes. Furthermore, through the agency of Jean-Paul Sartre’s ample work L’Idiot de la famille (The Family Idiot), it is our aim to look into the language mechanisms which lead to mal du siècle in Flaubert’s view, namely the stupidity of wanting a conclusion and the circulation of received ideas.

The purpose of the article is to compare the best known historical novel by Ippolito Nievo, published in Britain as The Castle of Fratta, to Federico De Roberto’s I Viceré. Nievo drowned to death in 1861, the same year De Roberto was born. The year, which also officially marked the establishment of the Kingdom of Italy, represents a turning point in the history of Italian literature. As the comparison of the two novels shows, the idealistic and optimistic attitude preceding 1861 was to disappear a few years later, as it became apparent that the upper classes lacked the competence and morality needed to lead the new Kingdom.

Key words: Ippolito Nievo, Federico De Roberto, historical novel, Risorgimento.

The Condition of Woman and Modelling of Femininity in the Novels of Marguerite Duras

Marguerite Duras’s writings are a part of a broadly defined discourse on the condition and role of women in a patriarchal society. The author criticises the fact that women are excluded from the public sphere and deprived of the right to self-determination and choice. Consequently, her heroines rebel against the existing mores and are determined to break with their current existence. By shaking off motherly supervision, the protagonists are capable of achieving their own aspirations and of transgressing to independence even against public opinion. The hidden and suppressed longings of the heroines manifest Duras’s own experiences. Through an image of a strong and courageous woman, the author shows a representative of her own gender — a multi-dimensional character, capable of self-discovery, defying reality, and expressing her own sexuality. The search for love, one of the leitmotifs of Duras’s works, reflects the author’s desire to discover and name her own female identity.

Key words: woman, identity, freedom, desire, rebellion, transgression.

Femininity in Canadian Children’s Literature. An Analysis of the Incomparable Mademoiselle Charlotte

The influence of children’s literature on the development of gender identity has been well established. However, it seems that many children’s books are conveying stereotypical representations of genders as well as notable iniquities among males and females characters. Therefore, to counterbalance the detrimental effects that this could have on gender role socialisation, books that are presenting positive, non-traditional representations of masculinities and femininities should be put forward. In this regards, the incomparable Mademoiselle Charlotte, the beloved main character of a young Canadian readers series, is certainly bringing her share to the diversity of female models. In this article, this unconventional, eccentric lady is the subject of our interest.
A content analysis was performed on the seven novels of the series in order to highlight many facets of her persona that could influence the developing minds of young readers by broadening their perceptions regarding variable femininities.

Key words: children’s literature, social construction of gender, femininity, stereotypes.

In the rich history of Icelandic literature, the most famous literary genres are undoubtedly the medieval sagas and the contemporary criminal novels. However, those genres are as not as far from each other as one may think, since masterpieces of Icelandic medieval literature are sometimes summoned by contemporary authors, as is shown in The Flatey Enigma (Icelandic: Flateyjargáta), a criminal novel by Viktor Arnar Ingólfsson which is built around the story and the contents of the Book of Flatey, a famous fourteenth Icelandic manuscript. The present article provides an analysis of the place and function of the manuscripts and the medieval texts it contains: the results obtained show that their main function is to help the development of the plot, although some intertextual references also have a didactic dimension, whereas others provide information about the relations between the characters and the Book of Flatey.

For many years excluded and marginalized, Jewish women have managed to alter the definitions of Jewish ritual in an attempt to find more self‑conscious ways of religious expression. My paper examines how literature reflects this process by demonstrating different strategies employed by women writers to bridge the gap created by androcentric narratives. Given the example of two novels: E.M. Broner’s A Weave of Women (1978) and Allegra Goodman’s Paradise Park (2001), I discuss the changing role of Jewish women in Judaism. Whether by mirroring the male rituals, or reshaping the existing foundations of Jewish practice and thought, they have managed to change the performance and conceptualization of modern Judaism; the process, which is by no means completed.

Key words: Judaism, ritual, Jewish women, American‑Jewish literature

Dans ses romans, Ananda Devi a toujours su nous plonger dans des textes anoblis par des peintures locales où l’Inde matricielle figure à travers la représentation d’un univers cosmogonique dominé par le symbolisme magico-spirituel indien. Certaines interprétations homogènes, fruits des constructions historiques, occultent, voire négligent parfois l’hétérogénéité très ancrée des traditions indiennes à Maurice. Ce « contraste bipolaire » (Sen, 2007), somme des épissures imaginaires et des interfusions culturelles constituent pourtant l’humus de l’identité mauricienne construite au fil de l’histoire coloniale. L’auteure s’illustre alors à travers ses écrits en tant qu’une figure majeure de cette forme de représentation binaire de l’univers mauricien. Notre étude vise à dévoiler les amalgames imaginaires qui circulent dans les textes de Devi en partant des formes de discours et de savoirs subrepticement disséminés dans les motifs tels le « sari » et « la chevelure ». En nous appuyant sur une grille d’analyse ethnocritique, nous allons montrer comment les romans de Devi, véritables « ethnotextes » (Motsch, 2000), parviennent par un effet méiotique, à façonner un « nouvel humanisme » aux antipodes des représentations « orientalistes » (Said, 1978) et ethnocentriques de l’Inde vue par l’Occident.

Two recognised French‑speaking authors of Haitian descent, two real earthquakes, two different continents, one subject. If the situation is similar at the beginning, how is the plot built? What are the heroes’ attitudes towards natural disasters? How to live afterwards? The article attempts to identify the rituals and ceremonies in those two recent novels focusing on the earthquakes’ impact on the everyday life and social relations of the heroes.

Key words: Earthquake, Laferrière, Dalembert, Haïti

This comparative essay focuses on an ancient, multi-faceted process of rewriting, that the author tries to explore through his personal experience as a writer. Bourneuf begins with by writing about his scholarly research dealing with the influence of one author on another (especially the French-Canadian poet Saint-Denys Garneau) and proceeds to raise the question whether literature is indeed a continuous process of rewriting the same stories, characters, themes and myths. As a professor of literature and a writer, the author muses over the impact that French and foreign literatures had on his own literary career as the author of essays, short stories and novels.

Key words: rewriting; comparatism; essay writing; story writing; myths

The aim of thise paper is to show how the setting out of the narrative voice determines the historical discourse. The analysis of the narrative voice leads to some considerations about memory and to the examination of recollection in these two novels. That, in turn, allows an exploration of the way in which the historical discourse is constructed. In those cases where the voice in the historical discourse is given to subaltern subjects, they contribute to a more plural history.

Playing with reader’s fear is one of the objectives of fantastic literature. The present study, analysing two traditional fantastic motifs: of a ghost and of a dream, indicates the importance of time and space in Anne Duguël’s novels Gargouille and Le corridor. Particular attention was drawn to two space structures inextricably linked with time: the haunted house in Gargouille and the dream world in Le corridor. The aim of this analysis is to show how the author uses chronotope in order to arouse the reader’s fear.

Key words: fear, neofantastic, ghost, dream, Anne Duguël

The article focuses on a secret connivance between the author of “Palimpsestes” Gérard Genette and the novelist Jacques Poulin. It reveals how different modes of rewriting developed by Genette have been applied and reproduced in Poulin’s novels. The paper focuses on the rewriting of Defoe and Kerouac in “Les grandes marées” and “Volkswagen Blues”, on reference and borrowing in “La tournée d’automne” and autotextuality in “La traduction est une histoire d’amour”.

Key words: novel; rewriting; theoretical surveys; Jacques Poulin

Dans le présent texte, l’auteure se penche sur le phénomène de la transgression omniprésente dans l’œuvre romanesque d’Ananda Devi. À partir de ses premiers romans jusqu’au dernier, l’écrivaine présente les personnages commettant une transgression. Cela concerne ses personnages féminins et masculins. Cependant, le lecteur évalue plutôt différemment le comportement des héros deviens par rapport à celui de ses héroïnes qui en général brisent des normes dans le cadre d’une révolte contre le diktat du patriarcat. Elles se transforment souvent de victime en bourreau L’objectif de cette analyse est de décrire différentes formes de transgressions, des plus légères aux plus graves. Dans son étude, l’auteure s’appuiera entre autres sur les travaux de G. Batailles et de M. Foucault.

The aim of the present article is to address the notion of négritude in its variety of aspects, as expressed in poetry, essays and novels. The movement founded its principles on the belief in a common black identity and was aimed at the elevation of the traditional African culture and heritage. Despite its undeniable positive influence, the movement met with criticism from a number of black intellectuals and writers who tended to regard it as being insufficiently militant and who pointed out that its concepts were based excessively on the “white aesthetic” and “the white man’s vision of the world”.

Key words: Négritude, black culture, African traditions, glorification, negation.

In the nineteenth century, Paris was an uncertain place due to several causes. The middle-class felt a threat to a society which was being redefined in an unexpected way and lost its traditional marks. Paris, as a mythical and symbolic city, offers then an ideal framework to the detective novel from its origins, kind of novels that spreads the insinuation of the danger in the city. Emile Gaboriau, father of the French detective novel, plays on the fear and the anxiety towards this changing world. The capital presents a dark and scary atmosphere convenient to the mystery and crime. Thus, the lower class is seen as wild and dangerous; the city which spreads out presents blurred and disturbing borders; finally, the night strengthens the dark face of Paris exciting the fantasies and emphasizing the fears.

Key words: detective novel, Paris, nineteenth century, night, crime, border, popular class

Con la crisis de 2008, se produce un reajuste de las relaciones sociales. Esta reestructuración también se refleja en la ficción a través de una renovación discursiva alternativa a la canónica, a la vez que potencia la construcción ficcional de una nueva realidad como reflejo de la sociedad. Las novelas de la crisis ofrecen una amplia modalidad temática sobre la asimilación de la crisis por parte de los narradores más contemporáneos. En este artículo se analizará El Dorado, de Robert Juan-Cantavella, publicada el mismo año en el que comienza la crisis, presenta el triunfo del neoliberalismo y del consumismo en los años previos a través de la ciudad de vacaciones. Por su parte, La trabajadora, de Elvira Navarro y Cicatriz, de Sara Mesa ofrecen desde una perspectiva realista la repercusión de la crisis sobre las estructuras urbanas y la precariedad laboral derivada de la misma.

Catalan writer Joan Perucho, one of the most recognized Hispanic authors of fantasy literature, presents in his works experimental and avant‑garde subjects that are typical of the postmodern era. Nevertheless, his literary texts go far beyond parody and meaningless games. The main objective of this article is to analyse Peruchos’ novels taking into account the dichotomy between transcendence through believing — that is to say, strategies configured to transcend the spiritual void of the last century — and immanence understood, on the one hand, materially (as intertextual frames, forms, and procedures) and, on the other hand, culturally (as rituals related to law, moral, ethics, or gastronomy in the everyday life).

Key words: fantasy literature, Joan Perucho, transcendence, immanence, ritual

The article focuses on the analysis of Sergio Kokis’ novel “Errances” as an example of contemporary transvalorization of the myth of Odysseus. Kokis’ novel is treated as a „récit odysséen” (an „Odyssean narrative”), i.e. a type of fiction characterized by the theme of an exile’s return to the native land and the exploration of the protagonist’s narrative identity by means of metafictional devices. In the process of rewriting the Homeric epic and 20^th century versions of the myth of Odysseus (Nikos Kazantzakis’ “The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel” and Joseph Conrad’s novels), Sergio Kokis deconstructs the concept of the return to the native land defined in terms of territory and ethnicity. What emerges from the novel, is a concept of the ethos of the eternal wanderer based on the shattering of the illusion of collective belonging as the source of identity.

Key words: Odysseus; transvalorization; narrative identity; return 

This article compares the functions of rituals in the novels of Abdelkebir Khatibi and Tahar Ben Jelloun (La mémoire tatouée, Harrouda, L’Enfant de sable, La Nuit sacrée). The aim of the study is to show that Abdelkebir Khatibi and Tahar Ben Jelloun represent the traditional rituals of the body as elements of a hybrid language (corpslangue). This “language tattooed on the body” expresses the plurality of the North African culture and the contradictions of Moroccan society. It shows the Moroccan individual torn between the loyalty to tradition and the need for transgression.

Key words: Moroccan culture, rituals, tradition, transgression

An interview with Ananda Devi, which was conducted by Associate Professor Anna Czarnowus and Dr Marta Mamet-Michalkiewicz in 2019. The author talks about her own multilingualism, the novels where she dicusses violence, including sexual violence, her literary inspirations, the symbolism of her texts, female anger and feminism, the cultural meaning of cooking, and her novel 'The Living Days'.

In the past, literature for children and adolescents reflected society’s belief that young readers were not supposed to think for themselves. Stories were vehicles to provide direct, simple moral lessons. Those moralistic books reinforced gender and good / evil tropes, leaving little room for interpretation, moral grey areas and non-traditional gender roles. In this paper, we examine two contemporary books, Le Combat d’hiver (2006) et Le Chagrin du roi mort (2009), as examples of how youth literature has evolved. In both books, readers are presented with complex characters, plots and themes that encourage personal reflection. Morals are not something to be taught but rather felt.

Les références à la notion du Karma abondent dans l’œuvre romanesque d’Ananda Devi, figure féminine majeure de la francophonie littéraire de l’océan Indien. Ces références évoquent un destin tragique en rapport avec l’idée d’exil pour la communauté indienne installée à l’île Maurice à la faveur de la traversée du Grand Océan. Or, cette traversée des « eaux obscures » (Kala pani) est un tabou, une malédiction dans l’hindouisme. Installés dans l’espace insulaire de Maurice, les indo-descendants que présentent les œuvres de Devi vivent une sorte d’éternel retour de cette malédiction originelle, la communauté se sentant châtiée par un sentiment de déracinement, qui rappelle sans cesse le lien indéfectible avec la mère patrie la culture ancestrale. À partir de deux romans du cycle dit hindouisant d’Ananda Devi, et en prenant appui sur les travaux de Mircea Eliade (2009) sur les symboles et les structures mythiques, cette étude ambitionne de montrer que la mort est une figure de réincarnation dans une nouvelle vie. L’analyse conduit ainsi à comprendre que le Kala pani est un espace-temps tragique, en même temps, qu’il est un espace-temps d’immersion purificatrice, et de renaissance symbolique dans l’imaginaire des exilés que la romancière met en scène.

Convaincus que l’univers matériel n’est qu’une prison, que toute évasion finit par l’échec, les héros des romans français de la fin du XIX^e siècle tombent dans le piège de l’impuissance. Envahis par le pessimisme, les protagonistes ne renoncent pas à la lutte : ils cherchent le salut dans l’art, la névrose, l’occultisme en inventant de subtils subterfuges pour tromper les sens d’agréables illusions. Dans notre étude nous essayerons de montrer comment les héros de Huysmans, Villiers de l’Isle-Adam et Gourmont relèvent ce défi, avec ou sans succès, au péril même de leur équilibre physique et mental. Par mépris d’une hostilité ambiante, les protagonistes transforment l’imagination en une force supérieure capable de dominer le réel. Contraints à cette recherche désespérée du nouveau, du rare, de l’étrange, les romanciers tentent de vaincre les chimères de l’impuissance.

Cet article propose d’aborder la description des corps féminins ainsi que la nourriture dans deux œuvres d’Ananda Devi, Le sari vert et Manger l’autre. Les corps des femmes et la nourriture possèdent dans ces œuvres une relation étroite au point où la nourriture est souvent employée pour décrire ces corps féminins, les ramenant à un élément que l’on consomme puis évacue. Pour les femmes du Sari vert et Manger l’autre, la nourriture est tare, insulte mais aussi échappatoire et rébellion. Ce faisant, nous verrons comment cette lecture alimentaire des corps ramène les femmes à une vision d’objet, de bien de consommation et les destitue de leur identité.

La représentation des corps maltraités, parfois difformes, des personnages, le plus souvent trop maigres, rarement obèses, est l’un des points les plus saillants de l’écriture de Devi. Nous souhaiterions observer en elle une dialectique du vide et du plein. Jeûne ou boulimie cannibale pourraient en effet ne pas simplement incarner, dans un cas une référence hindoue, dans l’autre, les dérives d’une société de consommation occidentale. En comparant la dissémination des formes de la nourriture dans des œuvres « occidentales » de Devi (Les Jours vivants (2013), Manger l’autre (2018)) et dans des œuvres « indo-mauriciennes » (Le Voile de Draupadi (1993), Le Sari vert (2009)), on pourrait y lire les marques d’une ascèse paradoxale, autosacrificielle. Les œuvres s’inscrivent dans la même poétique puissante et obsessionnelle de la chair — généralement abjecte et pourrissante – ouvrant sur une redéfinition de l’humain et du vivant qu'elle commente dans ses essais Fardo (2020) et Deux malles et une marmite (2021). Les romans « s’alimentent» des imaginaires pluriels de l’écrivaine pour construire un questionnement métatextuel sur la radicalité de la création et la nature du Beau.