The Root of It: Deconstructing Creole Identity in Crossing the Mangrove
“I like to repeat that I write neither in French nor in Creole. I write in Maryse Conde,”1 (“Liaison dangereuse,” 2007) is a statement that could not be less accurate for the Guadeloupean writer. Writing in French is especially problematic for post-colonialist Francophone authors; using the language of the colonizer while attempting to dismantle cultural and linguistic hierarchy seems to be an act of futility. To be sure, Conde, the author of Crossing the Mangrove, apparently writes in the French language but she capably deconstructs the notion that a language must be necessarily tied to the culture and history it traditionally represents. Through careful practice of intertextuality (the shaping of one text's meaning through reference or application of a previous text) and narrative experimentation in Crossing the Mangrove, Conde demonstrates that objectivity in every sense is impossible. Using the French language is not an act of capitulation to the colonizer and acceptance of all things “French” in the same way that one person's retelling of an event is not the ultimate truth. In Crossing the Mangrove, Conde presents the strange and dark history of Francis Sancher from multiple perspectives and simultaneously works in aspects of the Western literary canon (specifically, William Faulkner). This emphasis on literary and real-life incoherency is iterated by the symbolic motif of trees and their roots throughout the novel. In analyzing Crossing the Mangrove, it is evident that the amalgamation of intertextuality, shifting narrative perspectives, and the motif of trees and their roots contextualizes the fragmented nature of diasporic identity. Truly, it i...
... middle of paper ...
...d issues of post-colonialism in Crossing the Mangrove. It is clear that Conde favors multiplicity when it comes to ideas of language, narrative, culture, and identity. The notion that anything can be understood through one, objective lens is destroyed through her practice of intertextuality, her crafting of one character's story through multiple perspectives, and her use of the motif of trees and roots. In the end, everything – the literary canon, Creole identity, narrative – is jumbled, chaotic, and rhizomic; in general, any attempts at decryption require the employment of multiple (aforementioned) methodologies.
WORKS CITED
Conde, Maryse. ‘Liaison dangereuse,’ Pour une littérature-monde, (eds) M. Le Bris & J. Rouaud, Gallimard. 2007. Paris : 205–16.
Condé, Maryse, and Richard Philcox. Crossing the Mangrove. New York: Anchor /Doubleday, 1995. Print.
When reading two passages, one by M.F.K. Fisher on the French port of Marseilles and the other by Maya Angelou on the small town of Stamps, I noticed that the passages had some similarities but where entirely different in their effect and the handling of language resources. While Angelou and Fisher organized and constructed their passages similarly, the persona and rhetoric of the authors are opposite.
Fluorescent turquoise waters, a vibrant city culture, as well as an unending supply of mimosas and sunburns within a resort, benefits the common wealthy couple looking for a swell time. When people imagine the Caribbean, they probably visualize the soft sands of the Spice Island Beach Resort. Many people see the Caribbean as relaxing paradise. What people don’t understand, are the years of history hidden behind the mask of many resorts. In the book entitled “Empire’s Crossroads: A History of the Caribbean from Columbus to the Present Day”, Author Carrie Gibson differentiates how people view the Caribbean nowadays, by altering their visualization with four-hundred pages of rich history and culture, that argues the ideology about the Caribbean
... of language and education is the most important in this story and society. The make use of two different languages in a narrative, provides a reader a perplexing yet fascinating image of characterization and customs. Multilingual story telling pushes the reader to decelerate and acquire supplemental focus on the expressions which are in the small fragments, however as soon as the reader has figured out the foreign words, he or she acquires a priceless picture of the theme of this story. The panorama of native words and phrases, cultural perceptions, and class dispute taken from the incorporation of two different languages are helpful for the reader to obtain significance that he or she couldn't gain if exclusively one language was employed in the story. Just as the power of language is applied to unveil a society, a better comprehension is provided to the reader.
It is my intention to compare the book, Dangerous Liaisons by Choderlos de Laclos, to its modern movie version, Cruel Intentions starring Sarah Michelle Gellar. I intend to examine how the original French text was modified in reference to plot, character, morals/values, and themes. I also plan to discuss how these transformations change the meaning of the story and reflect different cultural/historical contexts. There are some major differences between these two works, if only because of when they were written.
Critics of Tim O'Brien's Going After Cacciato have examined its narrative technique (see Raymond) and its position in literature as metafiction (see Herzog). Still other critics have commented on the motif of time (see McWilliams) and the theme and structure (see Vannatta). On the last point, critics find the structure of the novel is fragmented to reveal the nature of the United States' involvement in Vietnam. Unfortunately, this fragmentation makes the novel appear structurally weak. Critics have found no unifying element to the parts to affirm the sense of wholeness readers feel after completing O'Brien's novel. Nevertheless, the reader senses that the seemingly random construction of the novel serves to underscore the random nature of the Vietnam war. However, to lightly dismiss O'Brien's organization as simply fragmentary does great disservice to this American author. A critical examination of a traditional element found in American Literature since its inception--the symbolic use of Nature--unifies Going After Cacciato and places the work firmly in the Romantic tradition. Just as Romanticists have always relied upon Nature to unify and add substantial depth to their novels so, too, has O'Brien. Specifically, a different element of Nature appears in each of the sections of the novel. The novel divides into three distinct parts: the observation post chapters, the recollected history chapters, and the chasing Cacciato chapters. In the observation post chapters, Nature is represented by the sea. In the recollected history chapters, Nature is represented by the land and the fresh water. In the chasing Cacciato chapters, Nature becomes ...
As I was reading, I noticed that most of the characters involved in Crossing the Mangrove have strong opinions stemming from race and class perspective. They live their lives with harsh lenses of judgment by categorizing their fellow Guadeloupian neighbors by race, success, heritage and gender. Francis Sancher came to inhabit the island of Guadeloupe, and people became suspicious of this “foreign stranger”. I found it interesting that most of the women within the novel felt positively towards Francis Sancher, while the men had a strong distaste for him. Though interestingly enough each character seemed to be powerfully drawn to this strange man. “The women secretly had a soft spot for this mastic-bully of a man, so tall and straight under his silvery head of hair. But the men couldn’t stomach him and called him all sorts of names”. In the beginning of the story, no one knew where he actually descended but many liked to guess. Cuba was the main rumor, “As soon as we’d heard he was a Cuban, Papa declared there were too many foreigners in Guadeloupe and that he should be deported with a...
Stoltzfus, Ben. “‘Sartre, Nada, and Hemingway's African Stories.’” Comparative Literature Studies. New York: Garrett, 2005. 205-28. Rpt. in Short Story Criticism. Ed. Jelena Krstović. Vol. 117. Detroit: Gale, 142 vols. 214-21. Print.
Of interest here is the Lacanian (m)Other, engulfment fear, and the perverse and psychotic structures at work in the texts. I will also investigate the novels in terms of the Deleuzian primacy of becoming-woman in the process of a becoming and how this relates to the position of the central females in the texts.
... a border be it physical or psychological. Examining both novels as well as doing secondary research into the Canadian border, will also help in understanding Canadian identity. A deep analysis of the two novels will also overcome the constellations of the symbolic imagery that is narration which will dramatize semantics of belonging, loss, and absence that is within the definite of the historically bound and personal context of Canadian experience.
During the era of maritime exploration and the discovery of the Americas, assumptions were made of the land likening it to not only a paradise, but one that was overrun with cannibalistic natives. These suppositions led to a desire to explore the lands and conquer the savages that posed a threat to man and civilization itself. The consequences of this mass colonization and dehumanization of the natives paved the way for literary pieces that pose as critiques of the era when viewed through a post-colonial lens. When looked at through a post-colonial perspective, a few common themes prevail amongst compared texts. Focusing on the theme of the journey, what it means, and what is at stake, Garcilaso de la Vega’s “The Story of Pedro Serrano” and Juan José Saer’s The Witness both touch on all these themes with great severity, dissecting the purpose of the journey and what it means to be a civilized man.
• AW’s work is deeply rooted in oral tradition; in the passing on of stories from generation to generation in the language of the people. To AW the language had a great importance. She uses the “Slave language”, which by others is seen as “not correct language”, but this is because of the effect she wants the reader to understand.
Philosopher, Edmund Burke once said, “… People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors” (www.brainyquote.com). In regards to Caribbean writers, one writer who it can be said is apt in the intricacies and also perpetuation of African ancestralism is Kamau Brathwaite. Kofi Anyidoho, presently a literature professor at the University of Ghana, in his article “Kamau Brathwaite and the Gift of Ancestral Memory” highlights in great details how Brathwaite’s looking back to the motherland greatly influences his work. In making his points Anyidoho uses inter-textual evidence and also views of persons with specialty in the same area. Structurally, the article is divided in three sections simplifying and zeroing on specific aspects that Anyidoho wants to highlight with great success. Additionally, his diction is indicative of a high academic standard and also of knowledge of African language and culture hence, in the end, one is forced to agree with him that the works of Brathwaite is heavily influenced by his time spent throughout the motherland and also areas of the Caribbean.
A poem that describes the oppression and stereotypes towards the people of Martinique during the French colonization of the country would be “Out of Alien Days” by Aime Cesaire. Cesaire’s own message in his poem has been interpreted by scholars through diverse approaches to the underline meaning of the poem. An understanding of the scholars interpretation of the poem should include a brief discussion about Cesaire’s writing style. The literary critics that interpreted “Out of Alien Days” have their own specific argument as to why Cesaire wrote the poem, and the ideas Cesaire wanted the reader to understand. With the literary scholars opinion of the poem, there are similarities and differences amongst the scholars with respect to Cesaire’s style. In this paper I describe the approach scholars used on the poem “Out of Alien Days”, give a brief understanding of Cesaire’s writing style, acknowledge the specific argument of the scholars, and similarities and differences between the diverse perspectives of the poem “Out of Alien Days”.
It is not only the universal language that suffers when it crosses spatial bounds but its rules that are constantly bent, twisted and altered with the expansion of geographical areas. The world language, often spread through a forced influence is used as a means of catharsis against itself. Poetry by African authors such as Sipho Sepamla and Karen Press shows that writing can never be devoid of the native influence. The prose of Ama Ata Aidoo’s, Our Sister Killjoy and A Small Place redefine the boundaries of genre. The cathartic nature of both these stories makes it harder for them to be genre-specific. The sprouting of several hybrid languages in the world with English as their basis has managed to redefine the English language with respect to writing styles and vocabulary. Having spread around the world through its colonial influence, the Queen’s English, what is the original language is scarcely known, giving way to the more popular vernaculars such as American English. The world language has been stripped of all conventions, having been ‘chutneyfied’ in the form of Hinglish or the more trending Franglais, a marriage of French and English. The original language has been peppered with
The Kingdom of This World by Alejo Carpentier is a historical fiction book focusing on the Haitian revolutionary period. This time period proved to be the perfect opportunity for Carpentier to address the motif of power, the control it has over people and that of transformation. The book pushes these along throughout the pages. The exploitation of power in The Kingdom of This World have a few separate outlets. These come in the form of physical, including sexual, economic, and intelectual, as in knowledge. Through the use of power, various persons in the book experience transformation in a variety of ways. There is physical transformation, political, cultural, and spiritual. This story begins and ends with abuse of power, and in a very real