Metropolitan Mosaics and Melting-pots : Paris and Montreal in Francophone Literatures 1443847712, 9781443847711

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Metropolitan Mosaics and Melting-Pots

Metropolitan Mosaics and Melting-Pots: Paris and Montreal in Francophone Literatures

Edited by

Pascale De Souza and H. Adlai Murdoch

Metropolitan Mosaics and Melting-Pots: Paris and Montreal in Francophone Literatures, Edited by Pascale De Souza and H. Adlai Murdoch This book first published 2013 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Copyright © 2013 by Pascale De Souza and H. Adlai Murdoch and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-4771-2, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-4771-1

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements ................................................................................... vii Introduction ................................................................................................. 1 Paris and/or Montreal: A Double Vision of Migrant Negotiation Pascale De Souza and H. Adlai Murdoch Chapter One ............................................................................................... 28 Migration and Identity in Haitian Québécois Literature Susan Ireland and Patrice J. Proulx Chapter Two .............................................................................................. 45 Babel à Montréal : ces Nomades qui « Tropicalisent » la Planète Isabelle Choquet Chapter Three ............................................................................................ 64 Mon Pays, ce n’est pas l’Hiver : Montréal dans La Dot de Sara de Marie-Célie Agnant Pascale De Souza Chapter Four .............................................................................................. 83 Le Parc Montréalais dans Évangéline Deusse d’Antonine Maillet Pierre Dairon Chapter Five ............................................................................................ 104 America Seen through the Eyes of the North, With the Soul of the South Brian McLoughlin Chapter Six .............................................................................................. 117 Île de France: The Construction of an Insular City in the Work of Édouard Glissant Christina Kulberg

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Chapter Seven.......................................................................................... 136 Parisian Alternative Cartographies: Meandering the Ambivalent Banlieue in Wilfried N’Sondé’s Fiction Véronique Bragard Chapter Eight ........................................................................................... 156 A Reluctant Migrant in Paris: Malamine, un Africain à Paris Binita Mehta Chapter Nine............................................................................................ 182 ‘France and Africa Gone West’: Intertextuality and the Interrogation of Francophonie in Alain Mabanckou’s Writings Winifred Woodhull Chapter Ten ............................................................................................. 204 Nina Bouraoui’s Detoured Journey to the Métropole: Paris by Way of Brittany Lydie Moudileno Chapter Eleven ........................................................................................ 223 Entrevue avec Fabienne Kanor Anny Dominique Curtius Contributors ............................................................................................. 238

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We would like to thank Professor Anne Donadey, San Diego State University, and Professor Dominique Jouve, University of New Caledonia for their help editing and proof-reading the articles written in French, and Professor Jean Abel Pierre, University Paris Sorbonne (Paris IV), for his help with Haitian creole. We would like to thank Marielle Barrow, a Trinidadian artist and scholar for the painting featured on the cover. Entitled “Transitions,” it refers to a time and space of transition and the process of finding peace through coexistence of disparate entities, differing perspectives and even contradictions.

INTRODUCTION PARIS AND/OR MONTREAL: A DOUBLE VISION OF MIGRANT NEGOTIATION PASCALE DE SOUZA, LANGUAGE AND CULTURE INSTRUCTOR. FOREIGN SERVICE INSTITUTE AND H. ADLAI MURDOCH, PROFESSOR OF FRENCH, TUFTS UNIVERSITY

France: Migrant Marginalization within a ‘Color-Blind’ Francité A number of thematic tendrils work in combination to construct the discursive foundation for this volume. The first is migration, a phenomenon whose global scale, particularly in the second half of the twentieth century, effectively transformed – from a demographic, ethno cultural, and linguistic point of view – the longstanding features of many of the world’s metropolises and, in so doing, simultaneously impacted those of the migratory points of origin as well. Secondly, focus and specificity are given to this phenomenon by concentrating on the innate and unspoken paradoxes of such migration as they have affected and reshaped what are perhaps the two principal migrant destinations for speakers of French; Montreal, the second-largest metropolis of the francophone world, and Paris, long a center of international migration, especially for migrants coming from former (or current) French colonies. Finally, our analysis incorporates the ways in which migration itself mediates transformations of society and subject in both the originating and the destination cohorts. Immigration into France increased exponentially from the onset of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Movement from the southern sector of Europe, from countries like Italy, Greece, Portugal, and Spain, as well as from Eastern Europe, grew in response to French economic growth

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Introduction

and the improvements in health and living conditions for the working class. The scale of this population shift was simultaneously tinged with the beginnings of a racialized labor force of France’s colonial “others,” as Tyler Stovall points out: France … had a history of receiving immigrants unmatched in Europe: in 1911 the census recorded over one million immigrants on French soil. Most of these came from nations bordering France, and these patterns of immigration continued during the war. Over 300,000 Europeans, primarily Spaniards, Italians, and Greeks, worked in France between 1914 and 1918. Yet the real innovation was the importation of “exotic” labor from the French colonies and China (2003: 303).

Later in the 20th century, another substantial wave of immigration occurred between 1920 and 1930, increasing the percentage of immigrants from 3 to 6.6 percent by 1931, by which time France had the highest proportion of immigrants of any western country, with a percentage equaled to a figure of 3 million immigrants or so; remarkably, this was a higher ratio of immigrants than obtained in the United States at the time. Even today, around one third of people in France have a foreign relative. In the 1930s, a large cohort of about 600,000 Polish workers also arrived, and a comparable number of Spaniards settled there after the Spanish Revolution. The implications of this multifaceted ethno cultural presence for the construction of French identity, particularly within a context of a racialized othering of migrants and their descendants, will be considered shortly. Given patterns of othering and discrimination, it is not too much of a leap to posit the implied whiteness of the French nation-state. Indeed, it is the very arrival of these groups in increasing numbers, beginning around the turn of the twentieth century, and the preferential treatment given to particular categories of immigrants that laid the foundation for the idea of une blanche France. As Elisa Camiscioli explains, “The predominance of white immigration to France in this period – namely Italians, Belgians, Spaniards, and Poles – has led researchers to assume that race was inconsequential to the rebuilding of the nation. The assimilability of these immigrants, however, was predicated on their membership in what contemporaries defined as ‘la race blanche,’ allowing mass immigration to play a critical role in the consolidation of a white European identity” (55). As a result, groups like the Italians and the Portuguese, the latter of whom constitute the largest immigrant component in France at the time, have arguably wrought the most substantial and far-reaching changes on the national landscape, while the loaded term “immigrant” has been used

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across the board to stigmatize a variety of “othered” ethnic minority groups, many of whom – like the Guadeloupians and the Martinicans, but also including people from former French colonies like Senegal, Vietnam, and the Maghreb – are not immigrants at all, and have often been French for generations. The basic binary structure of this oppositional relationship, implicitly segregating a national “us” from an excluded and foreign “them,” is of long standing, finding its origins in this period of European immigration, as Maxim Silverman clearly indicates: Citizenship has traditionally been linked to nationality in France. The institutional structures distinguishing nationals from foreigners – established largely in the second half of the nineteenth century during intense industrialization, colonial expansion and the construction of French national identity – are still important determinants of inequalities in France today. It was this institutional process that transformed the hazy distinction between nationals and non-nationals into a clear division between them. The demarcation of two separate identities is, at the same time, the construction of inequalities between them (1991: 333, 335).

Here, then, is the key sociocultural structuring force that both over determines and undergirds prevailing notions of French identity. Indeed, as increasing postwar immigration produced major shifts in ethnicity, class and cultural differences, as well as national identity, generating an everincreasing reduction of migrant difference to the singular signifier “black,” it became inalterably clear that, as Winifred Woodhull puts it, “binarist conceptions of ethnic and national identity ignore both the constitutive role of colonialism in the formation of French national identity during the Enlightenment and the transformation of the French nation-state since World War II” (33). These patterns of discrimination and exclusion have become the sine qua non of the ethnic migrant experience, regardless of issues of origin and citizenship. In sum, then, the first half of the twentieth century saw the steady development and promotion of Frenchness as whiteness. In this regard, Tyler Stovall’s assessment is unsparing: Definitions of Frenchness and citizenship have often been racially coded in the nation’s history … the France of the Third Republic presided over colonies peopled by subjects devoid of the rights enjoyed by men in the metropole. The fact that most of the citizens were white and most of the subjects black and brown meant that the very nature of Frenchness was conditioned by race. This distinction between white citizens and nonwhite subjects lay at the base of French identity as white identity (2004: 54).

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Introduction

The advent of the postcolonial era, with the creation of the four Départements d’Outre-Mer in 1946, the outbreak of the Algerian War in 1954, and the wave of independence in Africa forced the nation to confront the growing presence of racial and minority difference on the French mainland. In essence, race and nationality had long been implicitly conjoined. As Elisa Camiscioli points out, “The construction of the French race occurred in tandem with that of the ‘white race,’ with each project mutually reinforcing the other. This resulted in the consolidation of a supranational European identity and an image of the French race as fundamentally white” (56). The period traditionally considered as the pinnacle of European colonization was that following the Berlin conference of 1885 which, building on the acquisition of Caribbean possessions in the 17th and 18th centuries, and the French invasion and seizure of Algeria in 1830, witnessed a mad grab of land and minerals, largely on the African continent, which literally carved up territories and divided peoples like the proverbial cake. Following World War II, there was a tectonic shift in ideas and norms regarding colonization, such that decolonization increasingly became the order of the day. The departmentalization law transforming France’s quatre vieilles colonies (Martinique, Guadeloupe, Guyane and Réunion) into an integral part of the French nation was passed in 1946; Britain witnessed the independence of India in 1947, and Ghana and Senegal led the way to independence among their respective British and French colonial counterparts in 1957 and 1960 respectively. Indeed, decolonization rapidly took on the attributes of a trend, as Brysk, Parsons and Sandholtz point out, Whereas colonies were once seen as legitimate possessions of the great powers, and part of their mission civilisatrice, decolonization became the international norm in the latter half of the 20th century […] In other words, the identities of Britain, France and Spain are shaped in part by relationships with their ex-colonies, and the familial construction of those ties produces a sense of ongoing solidarity and responsibility (270).

Interestingly, and ironically, even, it was this drive toward independence that would open up the gates for the empire’s (re)turn to the center. If a key paradox of the post/colonial-independence movement was the creation of populations free to (re)define themselves, an increasing number would do so from within the geopolitical ambit of the former colonizing power. This resulted in the paradoxical extension of the (neo)colonial presence, as Brysk, Parsons and Sandholtz continue,

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As decolonization became an active issue in the 1950s, well-developed defenses of French colonial policies became arguments for post-colonial ties. France had sought colonies to claim the vast untapped wealth of Africa, to bolster itself strategically against other Great Powers and to extend the ‘civilizing mission’ and glory of French culture. For many elites on right and left, decolonization did not alter these goals. An entity called ‘Eurafrique’ remained the key to France’s future” (278).

But even as neocolonial exploitation flourished, a series of migratory waves set about transforming the very face of Frenchness in the metropole, the foremost of which originating from the French Caribbean, Algeria and sub-Saharan Africa. With French Caribbean migration toward the metropole catalyzed in the first instance by the advent of the departmentalization law in 1946, which made citizens of the inhabitants of the quatre vieilles colonies, and in the second by the resulting right of unimpeded entry within a departmental context for these post-colonial populations, ultimately this confluence of events led to the establishment of BUMIDOM (Bureau pour le développement des migrations dans les départements d'outre-mer) whose goal was to furnish a state-organized and -controlled labor pool. These migratory moments resulted both in transgression and transformation. While postwar immigration into France was largely driven by massive labor shortages, as it was in most of the rest of Europe, the paradox of the DOMs is that their populations were not foreigners seeking entry, but nationals moving from the periphery to the center of the nation-state. Specifically for the DOMs, however, the shape of such population movement into France was catalyzed by BUMIDOM. Between its inauguration in April 1963 and its dissolution eighteen years later, BUMIDOM funneled over 160,000 workers from Guadeloupe, Martinique, French Guiana, and Réunion onto the French mainland, many of whom sought to escape rising unemployment in their own territories. For example, a comparison between metropolitan France and its Caribbean DOMs shows that in 1982, unemployment stood at 8.4%, in the former versus 12.8% in the latter. By 1970, over 150,000 French West Indians were resident in France, having largely arrived within the space of a single decade. By the time BUMIDOM's work came to an end in 1982, one person in four born in the French West Indies was living in France; by 1990, the total number of people in France claiming French West Indian descent had risen to a remarkable 400,000, of whom 2/3 were born on the Caribbean and 1/3 on the mainland. This metropolitan Caribbean population is now approaching the figure of three-quarters of a million, accounting for over 1% of the total French population. An alternative

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Introduction

perspective shows that there are almost twice as many people of French West Indian descent or birth currently resident on the French mainland than make up the entire population of either Guadeloupe or Martinique, more than 80% of whom reside in or near Paris. Its influence is transforming the landscape of French cultural identity in a myriad of ways, largely through the ever-increasing penetration of West Indian-oriented literature, music, radio stations, and films into mainstream French culture. In addition, this sociocultural phenomenon is also made increasingly visible through the installation of Caribbean communities in specific metropolitan suburbs such as the département of Seine Saint-Denis, or the towns of Bobigny, and Aulnay-sous-Bois. Paradoxically, their racial difference would make targets of these migrant citizens of Caribbean origin, especially among far-right groups since they did not physically and culturally resemble the Français de souche or European migrants, and so were marked implicitly and automatically as foreigners. This conjunction between physical appearance and racial assumption is the seamy underbelly of French racism, as Silverman has noted: The major official classification of people in France is in terms of nationality: you are either a national or a foreigner (‘étranger’), there being no official and institutional categories to define people once they have French nationality. . . . This is complicated further. . . . The official distinction between nationals and foreigners is confused by the popular and political blurring of the terms ‘foreigner’ and ‘immigrant’ (‘immerge’). Strictly speaking, not all foreigners are immigrants and, conversely, not all immigrants are foreigners (1992: 2–3).

Yet arbitrary assumptions of origin, place, and otherness would continue to be made not only on the basis of outward appearances but also in the face of the overwhelming presence of immigrant groups on the French mainland, especially those European groups whose numbers, as we have seen, far surpassed those of the displaced Antillean French citizens. The consequences of France’s 330-year long colonial occupation of Algeria also became increasingly evident on the mainland. The fact that Algerians were French subjects but not French citizens did not hinder their arrival in France in large numbers after the end of World War I to fill a pressing labor shortage, reaching the 100,000 mark in 1924. Meanwhile, French and European settlers, known as pieds noirs (presumably because they wore black boots to work in the fields), who had been given land steadfastly blocked political reforms that would have given native Algerians a voice in government. In the wake of a similar, if qualitatively more extreme situation after 1945, political reforms introduced under the

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Statute of Algeria (1947) granted Algerian men full citizenship in mainland France, giving rise to large-scale population transfers between Algeria and France. At the same time, longstanding patterns of discrimination towards ethnic Algerians in Algeria, including, or especially, those who wanted to leave for France, continued unabated, as Todd Shepard points out, Official documents and official statements continued to define all people from Algeria as French citizens – until the so-called exodus … In the midst of the exodus the French government abandoned the legally accurate affirmation that all people from Algeria were equally French. Through a series of legal and bureaucratic shifts, officials denied almost all “Arabs,” “Berbers,” or “Muslims” from Algeria the right to keep their existing French citizenship (95-6).

The end result of this blatant ethno cultural discrimination meant that the number of Algerians in France rose under the terms of the Evian Accord settling Algerian independence in 1962, going from 300,000 Algerians around 1956 to over 500,000 Algerian nationals by 1965. At the same time, having (re)classified ethnic Algerians as “refugees,” the French government built on the fiction by inscribing them as non-French in official reports, negating their citizenship and erasing unpalatable facts of colonial history. In his Study of the Problems Posed by the Repatriation of Refugees from Algeria, Professor Robert de Vernejoul wrote that “these non-French Muslims … are not repatriates in the true sense of the term … they are refugees.”1 Meanwhile, the hundreds of thousands of European settlers who had left Algeria in 1962-3 received priority treatment with regard to public housing, while Algerian immigrants were housed in shanty-towns, the last of which were only demolished in 1977. By the late 1970s, many Algerians and their families had been moved to public housing estates and run-down banlieues. This overall situation was exacerbated by the fact that up to 100,000 Algerians who had served in the French armed forces (harkis) arrived in France in 1962, fearing massacre in Algeria by nationalists. It is here, then, that we can arguably locate the birth of the contemporary tensions that continue to separate France from its Muslim minority. The arc of sub-Saharan African immigration to France paints a somewhat different picture, falling within the ambit of a transnational 1

Etude des problèmes posés par le repatriement des réfugiés d’Algérie; Rapport présenté au nom du conseil économique et social (Paris: Conseil économique et social, 1963).

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black experience within the metropole. Interestingly, the overall framework traced by this experience sets up a core paradox at the heart of the black experience in France. The range of issues that this phenomenon touches on is indeed remarkable, as Dominic Thomas suggests: Of course, to talk about the question of blackness in France is to consider a plethora of influences, including the African American presence, the negritude movement, important cultural figures such as Senghor, Césaire, Léon-Gontran Damas, and Frantz Fanon, the emergence of African student organizations and unions, France’s connection with its Overseas Departments and Territories, migrant and clandestine workers, the sapeurs, and contemporary African writers … Paris played a defining role in the elaboration of the “African experience,” in the formulation and reformulation of a global blackness (10).

The first important influx dates back to World War I, when African immigrants came as soldiers to defend the mère-patrie or to fulfill quotas for substitute labor. On the one hand, France’s incorporation of African cohorts into its military forces conformed almost exactly to pre-existing French colonial stereotypes of savagery and moral weakness, furthering the notion that the predisposition of such troops to unbridled bloodletting would substantially advance the war effort, as Stovall makes clear: The French viewed Africans as completely uncivilized, violent cannibals prone to animal-like behavior. During the war this stereotype translated into a belief that Africans would make good soldiers because of their supposed predilection for bloodletting. In particular, African soldiers in wartime France were often associated with decapitation, the belief being that they would go into berserker fits on the battlefield, using their sabres to chop off enemy heads with savage glee … If images of savagery proved a positive attribute for French colonial soldiers during World War I, moral weakness was a distinctly negative one for French colonial labor. The laziness of colonial subjects is a constant theme of French exoticist literature, so much so that a central mission of empire was seen to be civilizing the natives by teaching them the values of hard work. Sexual abandon, or lust in the tropics, complemented the image of the indolent colonial subject (2003: 299-300).

As this lengthy quote makes clear, the distinct patterns and attitudes that undergirded mediated and enabled colonial hierarchies of racial and cultural difference remained firmly in place even as the nation imported large numbers of colonized men for its armed forces; Stovall points out that “the French government began conscripting African soldiers in 1912. Roughly 200,000 colonial soldiers served in France during the Great War”

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(2003: 302). In addition, African Americans began arriving in France in 1917 as part and parcel of the US war effort, and a complex moment of historical significance began to take shape. The American military created two combat divisions for African Americans, but the vast majority of the 200,000 black soldiers sent to Europe with the American Expeditionary Forces were assigned to service units, reflecting a belief that black men were more suited for manual labor than combat duty. Fraternization with the French gave rise to interracial friendships. African American bands often introduced blues and jazz rhythms previously unknown to French audiences, and many black GIs decided to stay in France after the end of hostilities. This was arguably the moment when black culture was born in Paris, and African American musicians, artists, and writers of the Harlem Renaissance found a warm welcome in a growing community largely centered in Montmartre. Yet this positive reception was in stark contrast, to say the least, to France’s ongoing domination and exploitation of its colonized black populations in Africa and the Caribbean, as Professor Adlai Murdoch concluded in “Aimé Césaire, the Colonial Exhibition, and the Modernity of the Black Atlantic”, “perceptions of race and alterity marked the limits of a French praxis of assimilation; assumptions of equality here encountered the unbreachable boundary of colonial racism” (59). At the same time, as Stovall insists, simultaneous postwar efforts to repatriate colonial forces of color while importing workers from other European countries to fill a gaping labor shortage leads to the inescapable conclusion that such efforts were “part of a larger process that racialized French working class identity, and that of France as a whole, as white. In attempting to reverse one effect of the Great War by sending these colonials home, this process of expulsion did not restore prewar certainties but rather created a new vision of France, one constructed along subtle but real lines of racial domination and exclusion” (2004: 53). Put another way, the elites like Césaire and Senghor who were occasionally admitted to the top tiers of the tertiary system of education in the metropole were the exception that proved the rule. As Stovall explains, “The intense French interest in African American culture during much of the twentieth century derived from contradictory perspectives on both blackness and America. From primitivism in the 1920s to anti-Americanism after World War II, African Americans served as a powerful barometer of how the French viewed the world and, by extension, themselves” (1996: xiv-xv). While various measures were tried to limit or regulate the African influx to France, starting in the 1930’s and again after World War II, by the 1960’s there was a visible and growing presence of Black Africans in Paris and some of its suburbs, particularly Belleville. Embodying a vibrant

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and multicultural facet of Paris, Belleville is “an astonishing blend of architecture, of social strata, and of race; estimates of the number of different cultures represented within its boundaries vary between forty and eighty,” (Stott, 355). But two new variables increased and transformed the migratory flows. The first was the policy of family reunion, introduced by Jacques Chirac when he was Prime Minister in 1975-1976, after guestworker programs were officially ended. A second factor was amnesty, granted to 131,000 illegal immigrants in 1981-1982. France became a magnet, attracting a million immigrants in the next five years. In sum, we can reasonably estimate that there are between 2.3 and 3 million subSaharan Africans (including children) in France today. This radical transformation of French society takes place within an overarching sociocultural framework in France that is perceived as increasingly hostile to immigrants in general, and to immigrants of color in particular. Given the inescapable presence of the populations of color that peopled its former colonies, the immediacy of the returning empire’s otherness proved to be overwhelming. Perhaps the primary result here was the 1993 “Pasqua law” named for French interior minister Charles Pasqua, who sponsored it. This piece of legislation sought to stem the flow of migrants by increasing the waiting period for family reunification from one to two years and by denying residency permits to foreign spouses who had been in the country illegally prior to marrying. More specifically, the law had two iterations; the first Pasqua law, passed in 1986, made it easier to expel foreigners and restricted the process of naturalization by marriage. The second Pasqua law (July 22 1993, revised August 24 1993) extended to two years the waiting period for a foreign spouse to gain French nationality by marrying a French citizen. Further, children of foreign nationals born in France were no longer automatically entitled to French citizenship; they were now required to express the desire to acquire French nationality. Similar restrictions would now also apply to those children born in France to French nationals who were themselves born in former French territories. Further tightening occurred through the Debré law of 1997, a bill aimed at restricting the right of immigrants to stay in France regardless of their prior length of residence. Yet, family reunification continues to account for nearly 65 percent of immigration to France nowadays. But such actions and attitudes made it increasingly clear that the category of Frenchness – and the terms and conditions defining it and allowing subjects to qualify for it – was rapidly and inexorably narrowing in the face of what seemed like increasing and inexorable change. This ongoing immigration debate, fueled by successive and wellpublicized crises centering on the growing number of unauthorized

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migrants, or sans-papiers – now estimated to be between 200,000 and 400,000, and perhaps highlighted by the group that took refuge for an extended period in the Saint-Bernard church (1996-1997) to avoid deportation – gave rise to yet another new immigration and integration law, adopted on July 25, 2006. This law sought to overhaul France's immigration system by giving the government new powers to encourage high-skilled migration, fight illegal migration more effectively, and restrict family immigration. Taking effect in 2007, one of its key results was a drastic rise in the number of people deported for not having the required documents -32,900 by the end of 2011, and 36, 800 by the end of 2012, inciting protests from tens of thousands of French citizens and immigrant rights organizations. Both these organizations and several African leaders, particularly those of the countries to which the sans-papiers are deported, have criticized the law's limits on family reunification and its increased requirements for giving legal status to illegally resident immigrants. The inescapable conclusion here appears to be that racism in France – an avowedly and proudly secular nation that claims not to have any minorities since all citizens are equally French – is both pervasive and ongoing. Trica Danielle Keaton makes the point well: At the same level, racism and xenophobia are long-standing social realities in France, with “scientific” racism, legitimizing chattel slavery and colonization, as the most obvious example. Since 1989, these lived experiences have been documented by the National Consultative Commission on Human Rights (CNCDH, Commission Nationale Consultative des Droits de l'Homme). This advisory committee is charged with providing policy analysis to the prime minister in keeping with existing French laws and United Nations human rights resolutions against racial discrimination. Drawing from police reports and public opinion polls, the CNCDH found that France has experienced a “massive” increase in “racial threats” and violence against persons identified as “Arab-Muslims,” “Jews,” “blacks,” and immigrants, or those perceived as such, most notably between 2001 and 2002, the highest in 10 years (2005: 414-15).

In sum, then, the state of contemporary migrant France is a complex one, characterized, in Tshimanga, Gondola, and Bloom’s words, by “tensions between national identity, on the one hand, and infranational and transnational belonging, on the other … point[ing] to the emergence of postcolonial cultural patterns in France in which minority groups … are rearranging and rescripting narratives that structure the notion of Frenchness” (9). One way to view the principles and practices outlined here is to recall that France is shaped by a secular ideal that refuses to recognize ethnic and religious differences in the public domain. Yet, at the

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same time, it may be argued that this implicit splitting of the country along lines of ethnically-driven migrant difference has clearly visible colonial origins that are now shifting the common ground of national subjectivity. As Keaton reminds us, “this emerging national identity arising from the housing projects of Paris is the ever-changing product of a diverse population whose historical presence within the metropole continues to threaten the fabled common culture indicative of French nation-space” (1999: 51) Despite the longstanding claim that the nation solved, and resolved its incipient postcolonial tensions with the act of departmentalization of 1946, the welcome publication of such recent works as La France noire and La Fracture coloniale, the release of documentary films like Noirs de France and Ici on noie les Algériens, and the passage of the Loi Taubira, on May 10, 2001, recognizing slavery and the slave trade as crimes against humanity, an official acknowledgement that new forms of communautarisme reflect current French society is still pending. Such communautarisme will not necessarily lead to a growing set of fragmented identities and allegiances, but rather might successfully inscribe an alternative vision of francité, whereby singular perceptions and definitions of the differential cultural underpinnings of French identity and French citizenship can be recognized and valorized. The primary part which Paris continues to play in this potential construction of communautarisme cannot be underestimated. Both its centrifugal and centripetal roles must however be taken into consideration. The City of Lights has indeed welcomed cultural and political elites into a fruitful exchange which gave birth to such movements as negritude, inspired Glissant’s construction of identity, and even contributed to the advent of créolité. The seminal event of the créolité movement itself can indeed be traced back to a presentation given in the Parisian suburb of Seine-Saint-Denis, by its proponents, on 22 May 1988 during the Festival Caraïbe. Paris has also attracted economic migrants, from metropolitan regions such as Brittany, as well as BUMIDOM-sponsored migrants coming to fill positions in the private sector but also in multiple administrations, as well as Africans and Asians seeking escape from economic and political woes. Its role in this regard differs markedly from a crucible of identity; instead, Paris emerges as the vilified site of a failed migration in such fiction as Edmino and Mbumbo’s comic-book Malamine, un Africain à Paris or Wilfried N’Sondé’s novels exploring the tensions among and between migrant communities living in the banlieues. As some of the essays featured in this publication underline, Paris’ centrifugal role cannot be construed only in terms of international migration but must take into consideration migrants’ interaction with other

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parts of metropolitan France as well. In this regard, the capital city can be construed as both centrifugal and centripetal as some migrants identify stronger cultural ties with their French province than with the capital city as Nina Bouraoui’s main protagonists in Garçon Manqué. Likewise, the advent of deportations and voluntary returns to the native land has opened new perspectives onto Paris seen from the native land but by former migrants. They provide a new vision of the city, falsely magnified as the City of Lights with its museums and monuments as in Verre Cassé by Alain Mabanckou or emerging as one ingredient among many, including life in the province and overseas, contributing to a global path to identity as Fabienne Kanor underlines in her interview. A brief overlook of the five essays pertaining to Paris highlights the multiple roles played by Paris as a francophone hub. In “Ile de France: The Construction of an Insular City in the Work of Édouard Glissant,” Christina Kulberg examines Glissant’s vision of his first encounter with Paris. On the one hand, Paris incarnates an entire culture, reflecting values and mores transmitted via Glissant’s colonial education. On the other hand, it emerges as an insular seat of power, projecting French ways of knowing, seeing, and understanding which annihilate any alternative discourse of identity. This may explain why Glissant experiences Paris first and foremost as a homogeneous whole and reminds oblivious to foreign presence and influence. Its streets are deserted, its squares melancholic, its light simultaneously attracting and diffracting. Reduced to a “kind of open insularity” (Dash 2003, 102), Glissant’s Paris is neither melting-pot nor mosaic. It does not welcome nor reject him, but rather challenges him to explore his own identity and ultimately elaborates his own Caribbean discourse. Glissant’s approach to urban space as an almost utopian crucible contrasts greatly with several other authors’ vision of Paris as a lure for hapless migrants seeking new forms of empowerment. As Véronique Bragard examines in “Parisian Alternative Cartographies: Meandering the Ambivalent Banlieue in Wilfried N’Sondé’s Fiction”, Wilfried N’Sondé depicts characters who are never able to appropriate the famed French metropolis, through their meanderings along the Seine. They remain trapped into the depths of banlieues torn by daily violence, psychological suffering and social marginalization. His three novels examine how to handle life in the borderlands of a society which attracts migrants all the better to diffract them away from the center. Yet, these borderlands also provide nooks and crannies where migrants can meet friends, experience brotherhood, recall their childhood and explore new ways of being. The question remains whether they can ultimately escape geography and

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Introduction

destiny to overcome disillusion through love. N’Sondé’s depiction of Paris and its banlieue is not however limited to this duel vision, as both the center and the banlieue encompass comfortable dwellings and vandalized public spaces. Migrants thus need to negotiate new spaces which can become both havens enabling new encounters and way stations leading towards perdition. In so doing, they contribute to a constant redefinition of borders. In “A Reluctant Migrant in Paris: Malamine, un Africain à Paris” Binita Mehta explores similar issues as seen through a different medium. Malamine, a comic book which has garnered critical recognition, features an African economist with a doctorate from the Sorbonne. Far from being interested in exploring migrant identities as torn between an African heritage and a Parisian locale, Edmino aims to develop a new kind of literature, once which decenters both African and French literary heritage. Melamine’s wandering to various micro-locations in Paris leads him to meet African migrants from all walks of life, including successful black urban professionals. Likewise, Paris is not only characterized by its iconic monuments and its immigrant neighborhood but emerges as a maze of interiors, streets scenes, and bars that could be found in any large metropolis. Through the narrative, we witness a slow transformation in Melamine’s character as he wavers between a potential return to a country which victimizes his own ethnic group and integration in a host society where he fears retribution for expressing any criticism? Ultimately, his personal quest has less to do with finding inscription in a new world than with exploring ways and means to live in any given society as a member of a repressed minority. The following essay follows in Malamine’s footsteps as the main protagonist returns home only to discover that he is trapped into a cyclical retelling of his experience in Paris. In “‘France and Africa gone West’: Intertextuality and the Interrogation of Francophonie in Alain Mabanckou’s writings”, Winifred Woodhull examines how the Congolese writer Alain Mabanckou satirizes societies, both past and present. The novel Broken Glass/Verre Cassé (2005), like much of his writing, challenges lofty ideas that have long seemed unassailable, skewering religious, military, and political leaders and poking fun at renowned writers and thinkers. Once back in Congo at a dive bar called Credit Gone West, Printer, the destitute Congolese migrant tells his story over and over to one and all, even though he considers the African customers at the bar to be beneath him. His stories about Paris yet remain incomprehensible to other patrons. His compulsive retelling of his experience in Paris, his selection of ParisMatch as a source of truths about the City of Light, and his unshakable

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belief in its superiority to all things African reflect his inability to negotiate a new (return) migrant identity. Broken Glass wreaks havoc with the very notion of francophonie, as African, Caribbean, and French texts collide into a heady spiral, constantly displacing each other so that none ever remains near the center nor on the periphery. By mixing multiple means of expression such as art, journalism, and literature, Mabanckou also challenges borders between fiction and non-fiction, enticing us to explore new frontiers. While Paris and its banlieues have been the stage of many identity quests in francophone fiction and poetry, several migrant authors have also reflected upon the interplay between Paris and the provinces in their novels. Brittany and Paris thus both feature prominently in FrancoAlgerian novelist Nina Bouraoui’s exploration of migrant female identity. In “Nina Bouraoui's detoured journey to the Métropole: Paris by way of Brittany”, Lydie Moudileno explores the radical transformation of the displaced and/or diasporic subject, namely Nina torn between an Algerian father and a Breton mother. Brittany has long played a major part in emigration trends, both to Paris and to New France. In Garçon Manqué, Bouraoui however explores it as a postcolonial destination of singular Frenchness. The latter both complicates the identity quest for the main mixed race protagonist and provides her with a steadier anchoring into French values and culture. As her birth place, Rennes exerts a primeval pull on Nina and yet, the vacation weeks she spends with the maternal family emerge as painful moments confronting her with rituals of inclusion and exclusion. Ultimately, while Nina’s migration to Paris aligns her with countless diasporic Breton girls, it also opens opportunities to explore new approaches to the francophone literary quest along a Paris/Province axis. The final essay focusing on Paris is an interview of Martinican journalist and novelist Fabienne Kanor. She shares with Nina Bouraoui the experience of being born in a provincial town (Orleans). Both her parents were however from Martinique. While Orleans as such hardly features in her work as a journalist and writer of fiction, it permeates all her work as she focuses on identity issues facing migrants and in particular the role of West Africa, Martinique and metropolitan France in her personal itinerary and her protagonists’ quest for identity. In her interview, she examines how her childhood experience growing up in a franco-French white city has shaped her subsequent feeling of being constantly in flight, departing for other shores. Having lived in Senegal, Benin, Martinique, and metropolitan France, she now shares her time between Africa, the Caribbean and Europe. Eschewing both the vision of Paris as a melting-pot

16

Introduction

and Glissant’s concept of rhizome, she identifies more with Mabanckou’s vision of Paris as a myriad of small migrant communities from North and sub-Saharan which hardly mingle with each other, let alone with local Parisians. In her view, the Caribbean experience of migration to the metropolis differs insofar as rifts emerge more along generational lines. While the first generation hardly interacted with its new milieu, second or third generation migrants are more fully integrated, forging a new migratory trajectory. Kanor illustrates the emergence of a new hybrid identity as she explores migrant communities in various European hotspots of illegal migration such as Melilla and Lampedusa and African cities such as Saint-Louis du Senegal. She characterizes her next novel as an odyssey, joining in this regard the likes of Alain Mabanckou in Black Bazar or Edem Awumey in Les Pieds Sales. Such authors ultimately challenge post-colonial approaches to Paris, living in a transient world where borders between fiction and non-fiction, provinces and main city, countries, and even continents dissolve, opening new doors into francophone discourses of identity.

Montreal: Migrant Isolation and Canadian Cosmopolitanism While it shares with Paris a common heritage as a centrifugal center attracting migrants from overseas as well as more recently from Quebecan villages and Acadie, Montreal presents quite a different picture from that of Paris. Long the principal francophone city in North America, its preeminence as a center of immigration and culture is unsurpassed. Scooter Pegram makes the point well: The city of Montréal is the second most important French-speaking municipality in the world (after Paris) and is Québec's largest and most important urban area. Montréal plays a major role in the development of Québec; the sole area of North America where French is spoken as the principal language. That said, Montréal is a city that was constructed and colonized by the British, and to this very day it has a substantial Englishspeaking minority population. Furthermore, and perhaps most importantly, Montréal is a multicultural, cosmopolitan metropolis and an international city (4).

Is Canada cosmopolitan? In his recent book, Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers, Kwame Anthony Appiah proposes a moralistic framework that embodies two principal values: “universal concern” for all humanity beyond traditional boundaries of family and nation, and a

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“respect for legitimate difference” (xv). Seen in these terms, Appiah's cosmopolitanism arguably seeks to combine a universalist ethic with a nuanced acknowledgement of difference. Given the valorization of immigration, diversity and tolerance within the Canadian national discourse, it is this cosmopolitan, international character undergirding the city of Montreal that places it on a par with Paris as a hub of migration and its corollaries of multiculturalism. But first, it behooves us to take a broader look at Canada itself, and at the migrant context and culture that have shaped it as a nation. Ineluctably and irrefutably, Canada is a country structured and peopled by its immigrant population. Although, on the face of it, this fact appears to align Canada demographically and socioculturally with its smaller but more prominent neighbor to the south, Canadians proudly assert their completely separate and different approach to immigration as one of the key factors that makes them distinct from the United States and the tensions around immigration policy that have long helped to define the latter. In a recent report, Irene Bloemraad asserts that: Despite having a much greater proportion of immigrants in its population than other Western countries, Canada is far more open to, and optimistic about, immigration than its counterparts in Europe and the United States. According to a 2010 survey, about two-thirds of Canadians feel that immigration is a key positive feature of their country. Indeed, those Canadians who most strongly identify themselves as patriotic are also the most supportive of immigration and multiculturalism (1).

This positive impression held by the majority of Canadians regarding the role immigration plays in Canadian national identity is borne out by the statistics; as a recent New York Times report put it, “Few nations take more immigrants per capita, and perhaps none with less fuss.” (DeParle) Indeed, it might reasonably be claimed that immigration, along with its corollaries of demography and culture, play a key role in the construction of Canadian national identity. As Bloemraad continues, “Canada has reinvented its national identity away from that of a British colony or a shadow of the United States to one that embraces immigration, diversity, and tolerance” (1). From this perspective, the comparisons become even more interesting when Canadian attitudes are paired with those prevailing in Britain and France, as Bloemraad shows: Compared to the citizens of other developed immigrant-receiving countries, Canadians are by far the most open to and optimistic about immigration. In one comparative poll, only 27 percent of those surveyed in Canada agreed that immigration represented more of a problem than an

18

Introduction opportunity. In the country that came closest to Canadian opinion, France, the perception of immigration as a problem was significantly higher, at 42 percent. The most widespread objections came from the United Kingdom, where 65 percent of people surveyed saw immigration as more of a problem than an opportunity … Among transatlantic countries surveyed in 2010, Canada had by far the highest percentage of foreign-born residents, about 20 percent of the population; by comparison, immigrants were only 11 percent of the population in the United Kingdom … the foreign born mak[e] up a far greater proportion of the population in Canada than in countries such as the United States, France, Germany, and Italy (2).

Clearly, then, Canadians by and large regard immigration in a positive light; it is also noteworthy that, in contrast to many migration-oriented nations, the relatively high proportion of foreign-born residents in the national population is not perceived as a problem. The scale of this migrant presence is at the core of Canada’s vision of itself as a tolerant, diverse, multicultural country. This is borne out in part by the fact that, again in stark contrast to several other migration-centered host nations, violence related to political or ethno cultural tensions around migration has been notably absent in Canada. As Bloemraad shows, “Riots over immigration and minority issues have occurred in France, the United Kingdom, and Australia over the past decade, but not in Canada. In fact, no riots or incidents of street violence have broken out over diversity issues since the liberalization of immigration laws in the 1960s ushered in massive non-European migration” (6). Be that as it may, however, the situation around migration in Canada is by no means idyllic. Indeed, when it comes to its ‘visible’ minority migrants, or migrants of color, migrationoriented tensions begin to tick inexorably upward in Canada, to the point where geography appears to demarcate a distinction without a difference. If Quebec is the francophone center of Canada, Montreal arguably plays a similar role for Quebec. At the time of the Canadian census of 2006, the city of Montreal proper had 1.6 million inhabitants, rising to 3.9 million in the Greater Montreal Area. It is estimated that 26% of the population of Montreal, and 16.5% of that of Greater Montreal, belong to a visible minority group. Of this larger class of non-whites, Blacks are the largest component, with Montreal having the 2nd highest number of Blacks in Canada after Toronto. Many, if not most, of these Black migrants are of Haitian origin. As Haitians fled the persecutions of ‘Papa Doc’ Duvalier and his feared Tonton Macoutes, Montreal increasingly became a hub of refuge and (re)settlement for this community, despite the forbidding weather and (at least in part) because of the city’s francophone focus.

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Montreal is the largest French-speaking city in Canada, in North America as a whole, but also the second-largest French-speaking city in the world after Paris. The 2006 census revealed that 66.5% of its people spoke French as a first language, while 1.3% were primarily Haitian Creole speakers. Other languages spoken in this truly cosmopolitan city include among others Chinese, Greek, Portuguese, Vietnamese, Punjabi, Tagalog, Polish, and Armenian. While about 90% of Haiti’s population is exclusively Creole-speaking, some claim that the francophone focus of the Montreal agglomeration works to offset this potential exclusionary pattern. Pegram thus argues that “Québec is a Francophone society into which Créole speaking Haitians can integrate with relative ease. Concerning the latter reason, because French is the official language of Haiti and is the primary vernacular used by the Haitian élite, it has long been considered as a useful device in order to achieve upward mobility among all Haitians, despite an overall lack of comprehension in French by the vast majority of the population” (3). In the event, as migrants from the Haitian elite were increasingly outnumbered by immigrants from the working and peasant classes, the notion that French represented a linguistic panacea for this group, mediating and easing assimilation into the metropolitan Montreal mainstream, would be progressively undermined by an all too familiar set of sociocultural attitudes and prejudices. Be that as it may, Haitian Creole is the sixth most spoken language in Montreal and the seventh most spoken language in the province of Quebec, helping to produce a situation where the visible and audible social, cultural, performative, and political presence of Haitians in Montreal is unmatched in any other North American city. Montreal’s Haitian population of approximately 100,000 gives it pride of place among the North American Haitian diaspora, as Pegram goes on to argue: Concerning demographics, the Montréal region serves as the magnet and principal destination in Canada for all arrivals from Haiti. More than 95% of all Haitians in Canada live in Québec, with over 90% of them residing in the Montréal metropolitan area ... Haitians are also extremely visible in Québécois culture: working as journalists and broadcasters in the media, contributing to the arts, as well as contributing to pop culture via the entertainment industry. It is important to note that this type of visibility does not exist in other areas of the North American Haitian Diaspora. For example, there are few, if any Haitians who have achieved similar success in the United States; despite the fact that the New York City area alone has a Haitian population estimated to be over 500,000 people (aside, perhaps, from Wyclef Jean and a few other exceptions) (3).

20

Introduction

But despite, or perhaps because of this overwhelming Haitian presence, along with that of other communities of color, Quebec appears to be the place where Canadian multiculturalism faces the greatest challenges. Indeed, it might be claimed that integration is seen to be preferable over diversity, as Bloemraad claims, “It is in Quebec that we see the greatest skepticism toward diversity and multiculturalism policies and a greater preference that immigrants assimilate into the dominant Francophone culture.” (10) At the same time, these communities of color have clearly been shown to be victims of discrimination in a number of areas, particularly by comparison with white Canadians; Bloemraad argues convincingly that there is: evidence of unequal economic outcomes for ‘visible minorities” compared to those of European origins. Statistical analyses of Canadian census data over the past three decades show that visible minorities tend to earn less than Canadians who are not visible minorities, even after controlling for education, age, and similar determinants of economic outcomes, and even among those born in Canada. Audit studies of job hunting, in which identical résumés are submitted for the same job, but where researchers vary the ethnic origins of candidates’ names and place of birth, find that job applicants with ‘Anglo’ names have an advantage despite identical credentials (10).

What is remarkable about this last phenomenon is that it mirrors almost exactly studies carried out among France’s minority populations of color; in both France and Quebec, similar outcomes have shown preferences in the categories of both jobs and housing for a Jean Dupont or Philippe Tremblay, Anne Durand or Marie Gagnon over someone named Ousmane, Mohammed, or Fatima. This pervasive phenomenon of name-based discrimination seems to apply across the board to minority groups of whatever stripe, pointing to the prejudicial conditions encountered by Haitian migrants to Quebec despite their potential familiarity with and fluency in French. However, Haitian migrants find themselves subject to other forms of discrimination as well. As it turns out, language is also one of these areas of tension, as Pegram points out, Due to the fact that French-speaking Québec finds itself in a minority position in English-speaking North America, immigrant youth in Québec encounter much pressure to abandon their cultural heritage and assimilate into the majority Francophone culture … immigrants are expected to assimilate into the fabric of majority society. Pressure to shed one's heritage language (in favour of French) places immigrants in a subordinate

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position in terms of their capacity and social standing … young Haitians remain marginalized by Québec society (5-6).

These patterns of discrimination and exclusion become much more marked when they are applied to Haitians as a group within the sociocultural framework of Quebec. When Haitians are asked to identify themselves within a context of belonging, the distinctions become clear, as Pegram shows, “Haitians are a visible minority within the Québec mosaic … To the question ‘how do you identify yourself,’ … a strong majority of Haitian youth (91%) regardless of birthplace identify themselves either as ‘Haitian only’ or ‘Haitian first, Québécois second’ … a slight majority of Québec-born Haitians (54%) identify themselves as being ‘Haitian only.’ A slight minority of Haitian-born respondents (44%) share the same identification (7).” This overwhelming sense of cultural memory, identification with their land and culture of origin extends across first- and second-generation migrants and, indeed, often trumps the geographic and political realities of Canadian birth. The reasons for this insistent identification with Haiti are no doubt legion, but some part of it can be laid at the door of an ongoing exposure to a range of Canadian discrimination practices. This can take a variety of forms; from police who automatically associate Blacks with crime, to preconceived notions of Haitians (even the Canadian-born ones) as delinquents and troublemakers because of an internalization of Haitian stereotypes, to tensions regarding education and the job market. In any event, as Pegram’s inescapable conclusion shows, “Haitian youth in Montréal do not distance themselves from their ethno cultural origin, regardless of their place of birth or total overall years spent in Québec” (7-8). In a certain way, it can in fact be claimed that there is a strong correlation between perceived racism on the one hand, or a sense of being part of a pervasively dominated group, and identity construction and the integration strategies of young Haitians on the other. Put another way, reverting to the locus and culture of origin can operate as a defense strategy when minority subjects are made to deal with the ongoing realities of race-based exclusion. It is the distance between this sense of disenfranchisement and the paradoxes of legal but not social belonging that ultimately undergirds this transnational phenomenon of Haitianness, As Pegram concludes, “Regardless of how young Haitians identify themselves (males or females), the majority feel that they are not included as being ‘Québécois’ or considered as equal partners by the majority culture regardless of their good faith” (11). If, however, “many young Haitians will conclude that issues relating to racism and discrimination are keeping them from reaching the pinnacle of Québec society” (13), then it is perhaps by making particular modes of subjectivity and identity possible

22

Introduction

for Haiti’s Canadian cohort, by reaching some modicum of acceptance between Quebec’s desire for Francophone integration at the provincial level, and a recognition of the province’s Haitian community beyond the boundaries of the visibility of racial difference, that the patterns of belonging outlined here will broach new possibilities. Even more so than Paris, Montreal emerges as a central locus of migration within the francophone world. Any Francophone approach of its centrifugal role must include an examination of its role in terms of interaction with other parts of Quebec and Acadie as well as due consideration to the impact of the Haitian diaspora on reshaping the city. As Ireland and Proulx, Choquet and De Souza underline, migrants of various age, gender and educational background contribute to the emergence of Montreal as a vibrant multicultural metropolis but also reflect some failed trajectories leading back to a lost native land. Any exploration of the city must also take into consideration its centripetal impact as migrants return home and provide a new vision of their not-sonative land. This particular aspect of migration is given due focus in several of the contributions, culminating in a paper offering a complex new vision by Dany Laferrière, a Haitian/Quebecan/American author who ultimately joins Fabienne Kanor in her global vagrancy as a new crucible of identity. In “Migration and Identity in Haitian Québécois Literature”, Susan Ireland and Patrice Proulx examine how Haitian Quebecan writers “explore the complex relationships between immigration, place, and identity” (Ireland and Proulx) in their depiction of the evolving identity of Montreal. After providing a short overview of contributions by authors such as Dany Laferrière and Marie-Célie Agnant, they focus on the representations of cartography and migration in Emile Ollivier’s posthumous novel La brûlerie and in particular his depiction of displaced protagonists as “êtres de frontière” (La brûlerie 182). Ollivier’s corpus reflects his evolving perception of Montreal from a destination of forced exile to a celebrated home. In Les urnes scellées, the professional shift of the main protagonist from archeology to cartography marks a turning point in Ollivier’s representation of Montreal as a locale where migrants can eshew the past and turn towards mapping a new future for themselves and their new home. A paradox then emerges as through becoming citizens of their own Montreal neighborhood, they ultimately find ways to integrate the Haitian network into “celui, infini et aléatoire, de l’intertextualité sans frontières” (La brûlerie 210). Their quest highlights the possibility of finding multiple forms of belonging for migrants in urban centers throughout the world.

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In “Babel à Montréal : ces nomades qui ‘tropicalisent la planète’, Isabelle Choquet further explores this evolving perception of Montreal in Ollivier’s work, examining the linkages between Ollivier’s last published essay Repérages and his novel La Brûlerie. Her reading of Repérages and in particular of Ollivier’s exploration of geographical and psychological alterity, sheds new light on his literary endeavor to highlight the opportunities for cultural exchange provided by life on the Côte des Neiges. Arguing that the concept of root is more suitable to trees, he prefers the concept of route for human beings. In his analysis of postmodernity, Augé underlines our evolving rapport to time and space and its impact on the concept of individuality. The expansion of urban centers, with its concomitant transfer of population and emergence of multiple transit locations both prevents the emergence of singular identities and provides new locales which enable “diverses sortes d’actions humaines, actions productives, reproductives, interprétatives, performatives” (Ollivier, “L’enracinement”, 92). As Ollivier underlines, the Côte-des-Neiges neighborhood is “troué de portes de toutes sortes ouvertes sur l’infini : le métro, l’autobus, le funérarium” (Ollivier, Brûlerie 240). Coffee shops provide opportunities for migrants to build new urban identities which may indeed become a future crucible of the human condition. In “Mon pays, ce n’est pas l’hiver : Montréal dans La dot de Sara de Marie-Célie Agnant”, Pascale De Souza proposes a gendered exploration of Montreal in Marie-Célie Agnant’s La dot de Sara. In her novel, Agnant underlines how Montreal shapes migrants’ lives and cartography of space but also how it is transformed by their impact as they mix oraliture and writing to negotiate the city. De Souza approaches the novel through a dual lens; the first is provided by Michel De Certeau in L’Invention du Quotidien, wherein he highlights the differences between resistance and opposition, portraying the former as a form of external intervention and the latter as an internal strategy. The second, and parallel one, is rooted in the marooning strategies of slaves. De Certeau’s dual system echoes the strategies adopted by slaves as they resisted the plantation system either by fleeing and staging raids against plantations (la grande marronne) or by staying and finding ways to sabotage the system from within (la petite marronne). While in Haiti, living, working and shopping locations formed a tightly woven cluster mingling personal and commercial exchange. In Montreal, however, female migrants are faced with a diffracted landscape where connecting these locales requires lengthy and often perilous travel. Strategies inspired by oppositional tactics provide them with new ways to negotiate the urban setting and ultimately to reshape it into a more homely network. Their strategies weave the spoken and written word together,

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Introduction

transforming “both the city space and its attendant metaphors of reading and writing” (Fulton 246). One seminal strategy consists in drawing a path from home to church by marking the trees along the way. This strategy highlights how contrary to Ollivier who eschewed the root in favor of the route, Agnant proposes an innovative way to reconcile the rooted tree and the migrant en route. The following essay likewise examines the role trees can play in providing migrants with both roots and routes as they seek ways to fit within their new urban space. In “Le parc montréalais dans Evangéline Deusse d'Antonine Maillet”, Pierre Dairon analyses how internal migrants from a small Quebecan village and from Acadie and international ones face similar challenges as they settle in Montreal. Written by the Acadian author Antonine Maillet, the play Évangéline Deusse explores the role of location and history in shaping migrants’ identity. Her main character is an older female migrant, who like two of Agnant’s protagonists, came to Montreal to care for her grand-children. The Acadian fir-tree which she plants in a small urban park provides her with an opportunity to delve into her origins and to reexamine her identity in terms of a rhyzomatic network. While in her first publications, Maillet rooted the reemergence of Acadian identity into Acadian soil, in Évangéline Deusse, she explores Acadian identity as a migrant concept. The urban park is also an exiled space, providing limited access to soil in a cityscape, where a fir-tree can grow. Such access is both an opportunity and a challenge. The fir-tree planted by Évangéline must both survive the initiatives of the local guards intent on uprooting all newcomers trees and the defacing actions of local pigeons. Thanks to the conjoined efforts of the internal migrants, the tree takes root and emerges as a polysemic metaphor. In the final essay about Quebec entitled “America seen through the eyes of the North, with the soul of the South”, Brian McLoughlin looks into the perception of Quebec and Montreal from without as he explores how two American and one Quebecan women seeking sun, solace and sex in a Haitian resort view the United States and Quebec. Three short stories by Haitian Quebecan writer Dany Laferrière (1953-) are the basis for French Palme d’Or winner Laurent Cantet’s (1961-) 2005 film Heading South. Directed by a member of the global North, with a script by Laferrière, this Franco-Canadian production explores how characters from the North, including Montreal, view Haiti and in turn reflect on their own countries of origin. In his essay, McLoughlin analyzes the power play among the various protagonists, challenging our expectations regarding (dis)empowerment in the resort. As the main protagonist, a Haitian gigolo named after Legba, the Vodun god of the crossroads, rejects opportunities

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to obtain a foreign passport and manipulates his American lovers. In so doing, he emerges as a master trickster who leads the audience into a more nuanced vision of Québécois/Haitian relations. Throughout this introduction and the essays featured here, Paris and Montreal appear both as sharing some similarities and diverging greatly. Which Paris is still hailed as a cultural metropolis which has contributed to much of the debate on francophonie and the emergence of new identity constructs, Montreal’s role in such constructs through international conferences and salons du livre is foreshadowed by its construct as a refuge away from political or economic woes. The history of migration and identity construction in France and Canada has followed divergent paths. On the one hand, despite 20th and 21st century contributions by visible minorities, the construction of francité as a republican, secular, white concept which continues to pitch France as a nation where one model fits all, or rather all fit within one model. Quebec has approached immigration from a totally different perspective as it fought to preserve its francophone identity from the threat of English (language) domination and espouse multiculturalism as a fundamental Canadian principle. Given such divergences, the thematic similarities among the articles featured here appear all the more striking. Authors explore the impact of migrants on reshaping both cities, focusing on some of their well-known sites but also their lesser-known quartiers and infamous suburbs. They explore the construction of identity among internal and international migrants, explore space as a dual/duel concept pitting center against periphery both within the country, and Paris versus its suburbs or provinces, Montreal versus small villages or Acadie, and without Paris and Montreal within the francophone world. They examine how some migrants succeed in merging roots and routes while some follow other trajectories leading them back to a native land which is no longer home. Ultimately, they underline the emergence of an interconnected world where Paris and Montreal must carve a new identity as two among many crucibles of identity.

Works Cited Appiah, Kwame Anthony. Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers. New York: W.W. Norton, 2006. Print. Bloemraad, Irene. Understanding “Canadian Exceptionalism” in Immigration and Pluralism Policy. Washington, D.C.: Migration Policy Institute, 2012. Print.

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Brysk, Alison, Craig Parsons and Wayne Sandholtz. “After Empire: National Identity and Colonial Families of Nations.” In the European Journal of International Relations, vol. 8, no. 2 (2002), pp. 267-305. Print. Camiscioli, Elisa. “Race Making and Race Mixing in the Early TwentiethCentury Immigration Debate.” Transnational Spaces and Identities in the Francophone World. Ed. Hafid Gafaiti, Patricia M. E. Lorcin, and David G. Troyansky. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2009. 53– 70. Print. Dash, Michael J. “Caraïbe fantôme: The Play of Difference in the Francophone Caribbean.” Yale French Studies, 103 (Spring 2003): 93105. DeParle, Jason. “Defying Trend, Canada Lures More Migrants.” The New York Times, November 12, 2010. Accessed on 02/13/2013: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/13/world/americas/13immig.html?pa gewanted=all&_r=0 Fulton, Dawn. “The Disengaged Immigrant: Mapping the Francophone Caribbean Metropolis.” French Forum 32.1-2 hiver/printemps 2007. 245-62. Keaton, Trica Danielle. “Arrogant Assimilationism: National Identity Politics and African-Origin Muslim Girls in the Other France.” Anthropology and Education Quarterly, Vol. 36, No.4 (2005), pp. 405423. Print. —. “Muslim Girls and the ‘Other France’: An Examination of Identity Construction.” Social Identities: Journal for the Study of Race, Nation and Culture, 5:1 (1999), 47-64. Murdoch, H. Adlai. “Aimé Césaire, the Colonial Exhibition, and the Modernity of the Black Atlantic.” International Journal of Francophone Studies, Vol. 14, nos. 1&2 (2011), 57-74. Print. Pegram, Scooter. “Being Ourselves: Immigrant Culture and SelfIdentification among Young Haitians in Montréal.” In Ethnic Studies Review, volume 28, no. 1 (2005), 1-20. Print. Potvin, Maryse. “Second-Generation Haitian Youth in Quebec. Between the `Real' Community and the `Represented' Community (N1).” Canadian Ethnic Studies, Vol. 31, Issue 1 (1999), 43-72. Print. Shepard, Todd. “Excluding the Harkis from Repatriate Status, Excluding Muslim Algerians from French Identity.” In Transnational Spaces and Identities in the Francophone World. Hafid Gafaiti, Patricia M.E. Lorcin, and David G. Troyansky, eds. Lincoln. University of Nebraska Press, 2009, 94-114. Print.

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Silverman, Maxim. Deconstructing the Nation: Immigration, Racism, and Citizenship in Modern France. London: Routledge, 1992. —. “Citizenship and the Nation-State in France.” Ethnic and Racial Studies, 14, 3 (July 1991), 335-49. Stott, Carolyn. “Belleville au pluriel: Representations of a Parisian Suburb in the Néo-polar.” Hexagonal Variations: Diversity, Plurality and Reinvention in Contemporary France. Jo McCormack, Murray Pratt and Alistair Rolls, eds. Paris: Rodopi, 2011, 355-70. Print. Stovall, Tyler. “National Identity and Shifting Imperial Frontiers: Whiteness and the Exclusion of Colonial Labor after World War I.” Representations 84 (2004): 52–72. Print. —. “Love, Labor and Race: Colonial Men and White Women in France during the Great War.” French Civilization and its Discontents: Nationalism, Colonialism, Race. Tyler Stovall and Georges van den Abbeele, eds. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2003, 297-321. Print. —. Paris Noir: African Americans in the City of Light. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1996. Print. Thomas, Dominic. Black France: Colonialism, Immigration, and Transnationalism. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007. Print. Tshimanga, Charles, Didier Gondola, and Peter J. Bloom. “Introduction.” In Frenchness and the African Diaspora: Identity and Uprising in Contemporary France. Charles Tshimanga, Didier Gondola, and Peter J. Bloom, eds. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2009. Print. Woodhull, Winifred. “Ethnicity on the French Frontier.” Writing New Identities: Gender, Nation, and Immigration in Contemporary Europe. Ed. Gisela Brinker-Gabler and Sidonie Smith. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997. 31–61. Print.

CHAPTER ONE MIGRATION AND IDENTITY IN HAITIAN QUÉBÉCOIS LITERATURE SUSAN IRELAND ORVILLE AND MARY PATTERSON ROUTT PROFESSOR OF LITERATURE, GRINNELL COLLEGE

AND PATRICE J. PROULX PETER KIEWIT DISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR OF FRENCH CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE, UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA-OMAHA

…je lui dis aussi qu’un vrai travail d’écriture sur Montréal devrait commencer par mettre en scène la parole nomade, la parole migrante, celle de l’entre-deux, celle de nulle part, celle d’ailleurs ou d’à côté, celle de pas tout à fait d’ici, pas tout à fait d’ailleurs (Ollivier, La brûlerie 56). …ne pourrait-on pas se demander si l’identité collective québécoise n’est pas constituée d’une mosaïque d’ethnicités qui a fini par provoquer un éclatement de l’identité nationale?" (Ollivier, Repérages 40)

Canada has long been viewed as a country of immigrants and has often been described as "one of the more successful examples of tolerant multiculturalism—a mosaic" (Walter 243). In a similar vein, recent studies of the demographic constitution of the metropolitan center of Montreal demonstrate the extent to which immigration has shaped one of Canada’s largest cities. While nearly 98% of Montreal’s population was of French or British descent in the nineteenth century, the twentieth and twenty-first centuries have witnessed the arrival of a large number of immigrants from such countries as Italy, Lebanon, Morocco, Vietnam, and Haiti. This influx of different cultures and ethnic groups, which raises questions related to home and belonging, has in its turn led to a rethinking of Québécois identity. Consequently, terms such as intercultural and

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transcultural, and the related notions of hybridity, liminality, and the inbetween, recur insistently in discussions of the plural nature of Montreal. Many Québécois authors from diverse cultural backgrounds have chosen to portray the shifting configurations of the city by exploring the complex relationships between immigration, place, and identity. Montreal’s neighborhoods feature prominently in a number of these works and suggest a multilayered immigrant geography that reflects patterns of migration to, and within, the city. This recent corpus of urban texts thus exemplifies Priscilla Ferguson’s observation that “No city exists apart from the multitude of discourses that it prompts. Topography is textuality” (Paris as Revolution 38). Taken together, these works attest to the various ways in which immigrants transform their host culture and are transformed by it—a phenomenon that Eloise Brière calls “the remapping of cultures in contact” (“Quebec and France” 155).1 In addition, as Sherry Simon remarks, this reconfiguration takes place in “contact zones,” neighborhoods that embody the “polyglot and hybrid culture” of the ever-changing modern city (8). This essay will explore representations of the urban space of Montreal in Emile Ollivier’s posthumous novel La brûlerie which, with its emphasis on cartography and migration, is emblematic of works by authors from the Haitian diaspora living in Quebec. Our analysis will examine in particular how Ollivier’s displaced protagonists negotiate their interstitial position as “êtres de frontière” (La brûlerie 182) in order to create a livable space in the country of emigration. In his illuminating study of migration and post-1946 Haitian literature, Martin Munro observes: “Such is the desire to leave Haiti that one is tempted to say that the only place that the people have ever inhabited is that of exile, that the Haitian people are rooted in uprootedness, and that to be Haitian is to be in exile” (5). The Duvalier dictatorship, the main factor behind this deracination in the post-World War II period, has driven thousands into exile, many writers and intellectuals among them.2 In this sense, the exodus of Haitians during the dictatorship illustrates Sylvie Bernier’s contention that exile is rarely motivated by the desire to

 1

For this reason, the concept of remapping is, as Brière contends, “as fundamental to the debate on integration, assimilation, and multiculturalism in France as it is in Quebec, where talk centers around communautés culturelles, cultural communities united by their use of French, essential to the survival of Quebec, but who maintain their cultural distinctiveness” (“Quebec and France” 155). 2 As Corine Tachtiris affirms, “The fact of late-twentieth-century Haitian migration is inseparable from the reign of François and then Jean-Claude Duvalier from 1957 to 1986. In addition to extreme poverty, the Duvalier regimes were marked by brutal political oppression and extreme forms of censorship” (442).

30

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experience new places, but rather “s'accomplit sur fond de conflit social et intègre à la mémoire individuelle l'histoire collective” (18). Indeed, this incorporation of the collective past into personal memory underscores the strong socio-political dimension of what Anthony Phelps calls “des textesexorcistes” (qtd. in Jonassaint 116).3 Although the term refers to Phelps’s own early works, which denounce the abuses of the Duvalier dictatorship, it applies equally well to texts by other Haitian authors such as MarieCélie Agnant’s Un alligator nommé Rosa, Gérard Etienne’s Le nègre crucifié and Un ambassadeur macoute à Montréal, Emile Ollivier’s Paysage de l’aveugle, and Dany Laferrière’s Le cri des oiseaux fous. The latter, for example, takes the reader on a nightmarish journey through Portau-Prince and into the unsavory depths of Baby Doc’s regime, thus creating a powerful picture of a “peuple en peine” (24) struggling to survive in a country where torture, killing, and imprisonment have become commonplace. The works evoking the diasporic world inhabited by Haitian exiles in Montreal address many issues faced by migrants in general, including physical and psychological alienation and the difficulty of adapting to life in a new culture. Laferrière’s Chronique de la dérive douce, for example, comprised of 365 minimalist vignettes, provides a compelling portrait of the disorientation, solitude, and aspirations of a newly arrived immigrant who struggles to survive after coming to Montreal from Haiti in the summer of 1976. At the same time, the lost homeland is powerfully depicted in nostalgic works that portray the world of childhood and adolescence, as in Laferrière’s L’odeur du café, Le charme des après-midi sans fin, and Le goût des jeunes filles. In one such return-to-childhood text, Ollivier’s Mille eaux, the elderly narrator seeks to reclaim “le temps mythifié de l’enfance perdue” (120). In this lyrical work, childhood serves as an image of irreplaceable loss and of an “imaginary homeland” that now exists only in memory (Rushdie 10):4 “le vert paradis de l’enfance” (164), “un monde enchanté, royaume d’odeurs et de sensations fortes” (80). The corpus of writing from the Haitian diaspora thus exemplifies the way in which many authors are haunted by their homeland. As Ollivier

 3

Phelps himself spent time in prison, and his father was incarcerated in the infamous Fort Dimanche. His novels Mémoire de colin-maillard and Moins l’infini constitute good examples of “textes exorcistes.” 4 Ollivier notes in an interview with Suzanne Giguère that the term coined by Rushdie constitutes a good characterization of his own situation: “L’expression ‘patries imaginaires’ de Salman Rushdie me rejoint totalement, parce que je porte mon lieu en moi, dans ma tête" (57).”

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remarks, “Je traîne Haïti comme une obsession” (qtd. in Jonaissant 86).5 This sense of collective history forms a large part of the “baggage” which the exiles have brought with them to Montreal. A character in Agnant's La dot de Sara evokes the effects of this baggage when she reproaches her mother and her mother’s friends for refusing to relinquish the past following their arrival in Montreal: C’est tout ce sentimentalisme qui vous empêche de changer, vous autres. Vous avez beau traverser l’océan attifées comme jamais, ce n’est qu’un leurre, vous restez les mêmes, car dans vos bagages vous emportez toutes vos vieilles hardes, vos vieilles pantoufles qui vous ramènent sans cesse au point de départ, dans les mêmes sentiers, et vous marchez en regardant en arrière (74).

Because of this attachment to the past, protagonists are often depicted as experiencing a “traumatic existential in-betweenness” (Walter 235) as they oscillate between Haiti and Montreal. Indeed, for many emigrants, it is the certitude of returning home that sustains them in their exile: “Ils ne croyaient pas quitter le pays pour longtemps. Selon eux, il n’y avait de départ que dans la perspective d’un retour enrichi des mille parfums, des mille senteurs de l’ailleurs” (Passages 176). This emphasis on what Laferrière calls the “deux grands moments chez un voyageur” (J’écris 19)—departure and return—sets up a dialectic between a series of antithetical notions associated with these two poles: rupture and reconnection, loss and recovery, home and exile, uprooting and belonging. As these oppositions suggest, the idea of return is inevitably tied to that of home as a place to go back to in both the geographical and emotional senses, whether they are able to physically go home or not.6 In her analysis of inscriptions of the city in novels of the Haitian diaspora, Lucienne Nicolas posits that, as the authors’ exile extends indefinitely, the representation of urban space in their writing undergoes a significant evolution, shifting from an often negative depiction of the

 5

Even when recalling the idealized world of his childhood, the narrator of the autobiographical Mille eaux conjures up his painful memories of the Duvalier era: “Ils [Ces souvenirs] sont comme cette autre histoire qui a recouvert d’un drap de sang toute mon adolescence et mes premiers pas d’adulte. Mais elle est connue celle-là: la dictature, l’exil, l’errance. Cette histoire je la porte en moi, collée à ma peau comme de la glu. Souvenirs de sang, de larmes, hanterez-vous encore longtemps ma mémoire? ” (120). 6 As Roberta Rubenstein aptly remarks, “Not merely a physical structure or a geographical location but always an emotional space, home is among the most emotionally complex and resonant concepts in our psychic vocabularies” (1).

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“Ville d’arrivée” to “l’appropriation de la ville d’accueil” (12). In particular, she links the writers’ recognition of the impossibility of returning permanently to Haiti to a greater emphasis on the city of Montreal itself in their work: “L’apparition des romans de l’espace urbain coïncide avec cette phase de prise de conscience du non-retour” (10). This progression is evident in Ollivier’s corpus, which initially characterizes Montreal as a “ville ennemie,” but later evokes a “ville célébrée, lieu non seulement accepté mais revendiqué comme nouvel espace d’appartenance” (Pessini 342). In Ollivier’s early novella “Le vide huilé” (in Paysage de l’aveugle), which portrays the anguished experiences of a Haitian exile (Herman Pamphile) who has recently arrived in Montreal, the recurrent use of the verb “errer” in the description of the protagonist’s aimless wanderings,7 along with the labyrinthine structure of the text itself, forcefully conveys what Brière calls “the immigrant’s semiotic enigma” ("Writing Memory" 397), in this case, Herman's inability to decipher the unfamiliar city. The inclusion of official signage, regulations, and fragments of immigration forms and news clips, which appear in caps in the text, reinforces the impression of the estrangement and disorientation which results from his deracination. At the same time, the presence of Haitian “ethno-spaces” (Brière, “Writing Memory” 399) such as the ominously-named Hara-kiri bar, which ostensibly serves as a sort of refuge, evokes the tendency of many exiles to retreat into the past, and thus further highlights the notion of an impenetrable, hostile city. The pessimistic denouement, in which the protagonist is interned after committing a murder, again underscores the parallel between cultural dislocation and psychological disintegration. Published 14 years after “Le vide huilé,” Ollivier's novel Passages (1991) suggests that nostalgia for Haiti has circumscribed the lives of many emigrants. In the words of the narrator, “Les amis de Normand sont restés empoisonnés par l’obsession du retour au pays natal” (80). Although Normand and his friends have lived in Montreal for many years, they have been unable to discard any of the baggage they brought with them. While the narrator recognizes that some Haitians “florissaient à Montréal, délivrés de leur passé,” Normand “veillait sur ses blessures” (177), and his apartment is portrayed as an ethno-space where Haitians come together to talk about their homeland. Although Montreal is described as a “ville d’accueil” (70), a dynamic modern city that Normand has no difficulty deciphering, he is nevertheless not fully integrated into it. His daily



7 The idea of errance appears insistently throughout the story: “J'erre avec mes pas d'errant dans la ville” (92).

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“marche,” which goes through many of Montreal’s well known streets, takes him in a circle which reflects his identitarian “dérive”—“Il avait circonscrit une aire et refaisait toujours le même trajet” (70)—while at the same time recalling Herman’s errance in “Le vide huilé.” Despite his ability to read the city, then, Normand has not been able to reconcile his two worlds into a cohesive sense of identity, and the description of him as a “funambule” (72) underscores the way in which he still finds himself in limbo.8 Les urnes scellées, however, constitutes a turning point in Ollivier’s representation of the Haitian diasporic community and its relationship to Montreal. In this work, in which the protagonist Adrien Gorfoux returns to Haiti after twenty-five years, what was intended to be a joyous homecoming ends with him bidding his native land farewell. Characterized by Ollivier as “un roman sur le difficile retour. L’impossibilité du retour quand on a vécu longtemps en terre étrangère” (“Le mythe” D1–D2), the novel reflects the disillusionment the author himself experienced when he went back to his homeland in 1986. Adrien’s realization that he cannot re-adapt to life in Haiti, which is conveyed through images of orphanhood and estrangement, is reinforced at the end of the novel as he boards the plane to return to Montreal: “Il revient à la case de départ et rejoint ainsi le cortège de tous les errants, des sans-patrie, des déracinés en rupture avec leur passé” (293). His acknowledgment that he now belongs to a community of migrants thus creates a strong contrast with the obsession with returning to the homeland described in Passages. This evolution is underscored by Adrien’s decision to give up his current profession of archeologist in favor of that of cartographer, and thus to devote himself to the charting of territory, to a forward-looking quest for integration in Quebec rather than to the exhumation of the past. In this sense, Adrien’s letting go of his native land can be seen as part of the productive process of mourning that will potentially enable him to establish a different type of relationship with Quebec: “Adieu! as-tu dit alors, au pays de tes racines…Adieu! as-tu dit alors, adieu! ” (284–285). The notion of cartography elicited at the end of Les urnes scellées constitutes a central theme in La brûlerie, where it serves to establish a parallel between discursive and geographical space. The fact that a reference to mapping is foregrounded in the epigraph underscores the importance of this image in Ollivier’s conceptualization of writing: “Je voudrais que La Brûlerie soit un livre-univers, un livre-monde, et qu’au

 8

In his analysis of Passages, Munro, for example, notes that “Ollivier does not rework the experience of exile in terms of an enriching hybridity” (74).

34

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lieu d’être une lecture lyrique du flux, elle soit une écriture de la cartographie.”9 While La brûlerie purportedly recounts the complex life story of the narrator’s friend Virgile, it takes as its focal point a group of exiled Haitians who meet regularly in the cafés of the Côte-des-Neiges. Indeed, this multiethnic neighborhood functions as an example of a “contact zone” in Simon’s sense of the term, and the narrator’s remark that “La Côte-des-Neiges a pour extension le monde entier” (240) suggests both the existence of a multicultural mosaic within Montreal and its interconnectedness with the rest of the world. The representation of La Côte-des-Neiges in La brûlerie thus provides a good illustration of the link between urban writing and the presence in metropolitan centers today of “migrant communities that have strong local and global consciousness of their identities” (Balshaw and Kennedy 16). Through its “êtres de frontière” (182)10 and its emphasis on border crossings, the novel brings to the fore key themes of deracination, migrancy, and belonging in order to explore the question of how to create a livable space in Montreal: “comment vivre sur une terre en étant d’une autre espèce? Comment vivre ici sans passé d’enracinement, sans lignée de famille, ni sous-sol ni grenier bourrés de lettres jaunies et d’albums de photos?” (67). In this fashion, Ollivier underscores the protagonist's re-mapping of territory and of identity and examines the “recomposition identitaire”11 that results from migration. Although at first sight the novel appears to focus on a very local community, it constantly opens onto the rest of the world. Indeed, the structure of La brûlerie reflects the way in which multiethnic cities are composed of an “assemblage of diasporic fragments from all over the planet” and thus constitute “a kind of globality” (Médam, qtd. in Simon 168). In this sense, the text represents a good example of Ollivier's concept of a “livre-monde” (epigraph). With its multiple narrators and its polyphonic, fragmented structure, the text attests to the significance that Ollivier attributes to the notion of bricolage, which he relates to migration and to the formation of transcultural identities: “nous vivons dans une société fragmentée; il nous faut dans la plus grande urgence arriver à gérer les multiples articulations de ces fragments. . . . Aie des compétences de bricoleur. Cette attitude, aie-la partout, car elle est liée à toute l’histoire

 9

The essential nature of this concept for Ollivier is also evident in the following affirmation from an interview with Lise Gauvin: “Ecrire . . . ce n’est pas seulement signifier, c’est arpenter, cartographier des contrées inconnues” (146). 10 In addition, Ollivier describes himself as an “homme de frontières” and an “écrivain de frontières” (Repérages 67, 69). 11 Ollivier uses this expression in an interview with Suzanne Giguère (43-44).

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transnationale des migrants” (Repérages 38-39). In particular, the omnipresent intertextual allusions create the impression of a mosaic, while at the same time suggesting the porous nature of the borders of the modern city represented by the Côte-des-Neiges. As such, Ollivier’s extensive use of intertextuality mirrors on the discursive level “the intrusion of global forces into the local” (Sassen, qtd. in Simon 19). The metafictional dimension of La brûlerie underscores the importance of the intertextual references as the narrator, thinking of the novel he himself would like to write, highlights the key role to be played by networks of images in the spatial configuration of the text: “j’aurais voulu, pour tout dire, que ce livre prenne la forme de réseaux plutôt que celle d’un récit linéaire, le réseau étant un principe de connexion” (58).12 The great variety of the allusions, which range from Greek and Roman authors to contemporary theorists such as Derrida and Foucault, testifies to a rich literary heritage and links La brûlerie to a broad network of authors and works. Freud, Borges, Zola, Flaubert, Virgil, Perec, Queneau, and Robin are all referred to in the space of three pages, for example (55-57). Likewise, several characters bear classical names—Virgile, Homère Tremblay dit Dionysos d’Acapulco—as Ollivier draws on what Yolaine Parisot calls the “patrimoine mythique international” (216). The traces of Ollivier’s precursors, which are woven into the text in diverse ways, open up a dialogue between his text and theirs. In one of the references, for example, Haitian exiles are inscribed into a well known poem by Nerval: “Rêvant l’accoutrement de Nerval, nous étions les ténébreux, les princes de Côtedes-Neiges à la tour abolie” (37); in another, a slightly modified quotation from Régine Robin’s L’immense fatigue des pierres, which evokes the thematics of La brûlerie, is incorporated into the text without attribution: “je lui dis aussi qu’un vrai travail d’écriture sur Montréal devrait commencer par mettre en scène la parole nomade, la parole migrante, celle de l’entre-deux, celle de nulle part, celle d’ailleurs ou d’à côté, celle de pas tout à fait d’ici, pas tout à fait d’ailleurs” (55-56; Robin 41).13 In addition,



12 The narrator also refers to the novel he envisages writing as “le modèle réduit d’une grande bibliothèque” and notes that, because of the large number of literary allusions it would contain, “[s]on livre serait pratiquement illisible pour des lecteurs qui n’ont pas approché des grandes oeuvres qui joueront entre ses lignes” (58). 13 Parisot, who describes La brûlerie as a puzzle, identifies several other types of intertextuality. For example, the title La brûlerie recalls Laferrière’s L’odeur du café, and Henry Rousso’s description of the Vichy era as “le passé qui ne passe pas” appears in La brûlerie in a characterization of Virgile—"Virgile sans doute était victime d’un passé qui ne passait pas” (Ollivier 123 ; Parisot 217).

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the mosaic of allusions to canonical and lesser known works from many periods and cultures draws attention to the fact that the majority of the authors referred to are neither Haitian nor Québécois but represent a further type of globality, the literary world as a whole. As Parisot remarks, La brûlerie is characterized by “l’insertion du réseau haïtiano-haïtien dans celui, infini et aléatoire, de l’intertextualité sans frontières” (210).14 As with the intertextual references, Ollivier's use of the image of Babel, which evokes the proliferation of languages, underscores the idea that Côte-des-Neiges is composed of an assemblage of diasporic communities. Indeed, the narrator proposes a positive reading of the Biblical story: Je regarde la rue, j’écoute les conversations autour de moi, une fois de plus frappé par la diversité des accents et je me dis chaque jour, dans cette rue, dans ce café, est levée la punition de Babel, cette malédiction qui en réalité s’accompagne aussi d’une bénédiction, puisqu’elle n’est pas fermeture seulement, mais aussi ouverture sur un infini de possibles (230).

Here, the shift from “malédiction” to “bénédiction” and from “fermeture” to “ouverture” presents the diversity of languages as enriching rather than associating it with the disorder and confusion depicted in the Biblical version of the myth. This reversal is reinforced in an allusion to the stability that the narrator perceives as characteristic of the Côte-desNeiges: “Mais il est aussi des lieux qui agrègent dans leur stabilité . . . La Côte-des-Neiges semble être de ces derniers tant il y a une constance de ton derrière la multiplicité des présences, tant le phrasé d’une respiration continue sous la diversité des timbres de voix” (164). In this sense, the neighborhood serves as an emblematic manifestation of the increasingly multiethnic contemporary metropolis. The image of Babel as a metaphor for the modern city is reinforced by recurrent references to the iconic nineteenth-century figure of the flâneur. For literary critic Priscilla Ferguson, the relevance of the flâneur as a trope is not limited to the period of Charles Baudelaire and Walter Benjamin, the authors with whom the flâneur was initially associated, but represents “a general predicament” in that “every urban dweller must create a city that can be known and with which it is possible to cope” (Paris as

 14

It is interesting to note that many contemporary authors of the diaspora in both France and Quebec are using intertextuality as a narrative strategy in their works. See, for example, Bessora's 53 cm, Laferrière's Comment faire l'amour avec un nègre sans se fatiguer and Pays sans chapeau, and Alain Mabanckou's Black Bazar.

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Revolution 111). In La brûlerie, the flâneur, with his “defining mobility” (Ferguson, “The Flâneur” 32), is evoked on both the local and the global levels in relation to the Côte-des-Neiges and within the broader context of migration. The motif of flânerie is used to connect these two levels when the narrator addresses those migrants who might stroll along the Côte-desNeiges: “Migrant, si vous vous hasardez sur ce chemin d’un pas flâneur, d’un pas de flâneur traînant...” (15). Throughout the novel, the numerous intertextual allusions to archetypal wanderers, especially those from The Odyssey and The Aeneid, establish a parallel between migrance and flânerie and, by placing Ollivier's Haitian protagonists in an illustrious lineage, highlight their role as global citizens. Like the cartographer, whose role as defined in Les urnes scellées is to chart “les lieux de passages, les lieux intermédiaires” (292),15 the narrator of La brûlerie traces out the territory traversed by the denizens of the Côte-des-Neiges before they settle in Montreal. Virgile's trajectory, for example, takes him from Haiti to Quebec via Caracas, Brazzaville, Warsaw, and Santo Domingo, while Dave Folantrain, who is explicitly linked to Benjamin and plans to write a novel involving the topic of flânerie,16 has passed through Paris, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Cuba. Likewise, multiple allusions to nomadism and navigation underscore the interrelated themes of migration and transplantation and often suggest the painful effects of uprooting. In particular, the narrator and his friends are characterized as “un troupeau de Bédouins” (71), the inhabitants of the Côte-des-Neiges are described as “des bateaux démâtés, des naufragés ambulants” (15), and Virgile is compared to an unmoored boat which “vogue au gré des courants et des marées, des vents et des dérives, sur les flots innombrables des rencontres de hasard” (182). The fact that most of Ollivier’s protagonists are positioned between Haiti and Montreal suggests an additional connection to the figure of the flâneur who, as Ferguson remarks, is “caught between the insistent mobility of the present and the visible weight of the past” (Paris as Revolution 80). Throughout La brûlerie, the “weight of the past” manifests itself in the overwhelming sense of nostalgia that shapes the protagonists’ attempts to create a new life for themselves in Montreal. The narrator clearly conveys the implications of this need to return incessantly to the past: “Nous marchions toujours dans le passé. Ruminer ce passé donnait



15 The narrator refers to these in-between places at several points in the text: “J’ai vu ces peuples des espaces intermédiaires. Chassées de leur communauté, ces cohortes de flottants ont choisi de vagabonder, poussées par le vent ... ” (10). 16 As the narrator observes, “Il était hanté par l’idée de reprendre le projet de Walter Benjamin, là où ce dernier l’avait laissé ...” (48).

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du sens et du goût au présent vécu dans le sentiment d’avoir une histoire” (38). Indeed, all of the main characters are depicted as being haunted by painful memories, and they have come to understand that “les fantômes de [leur] passé sont prêts à rebondir à tout instant” (70). Extended descriptions of the symptoms of their nostalgia—“cette histoire que nous traînons avec nous” (83)—recur throughout the novel and are elicited in such expressions as “les copains du ressassement éternel” and “sempiternelles conversations nostalgiques” (76). In a more general sense, the definition of nostalgia given in the text—“la nostalgie, cette blessure sans cicatrices” (38)—brings out the idea that the protagonists’ severance from their homeland is the cause of an unhealed wound and constitutes a form of trauma. Virgile, for example, appears to be mired down in a hopeless, ultimately destructive recollection of his loss which prevents him from negotiating a place for himself between past and present, Haiti and Montreal: “Il n’a pas su trouver un modus vivendi entre l’héritage qu’on lui avait légué . . . et sa nouvelle condition de vie. Il n’a pas su trouver l’osmose, la symbiose heureuse entre ce qu’il avait été et ce qu’il était en train de devenir” (123). In Virgile's case, the metaphor of burial serves to suggest his inability to mourn the past and move on: “Pour Virgile, cet enterrement n’avait jamais eu lieu” (122-23). Like Virgile, Barzac is characterized as being immobilized in an intermediate space, represented here by the image of “purgatoire” (85), and, even after many years, he has not managed to overcome his grief: “il ne se consolait pas” (83). While the narrator acknowledges a fundamental change in his way of being in the world—“tu t’es résigné à faire le deuil du pays” (237)—the experiences of the majority of his fellow Haitians seem to bear out Edward Said’s well known contention that exile is “the unhealable rift forced between a human being and a native place, between the self and its true home” (57). Despite the painful effects of this rift, it is the positively-coded praxis of flânerie on the very local level which suggests that Ollivier’s emigrant protagonists have nonetheless succeeded in establishing a place for themselves in the Côte-des-Neiges quartier of Montreal. Their exploration of new territory during their daily strolls thus provides a cogent demonstration of Rob Shields’s argument that “flânerie is . . . part of a social process of inhabiting and appropriating urban space” (65). Furthermore, the novel is principally comprised of the observations of a narrator-flâneur, Jonas Lazard, whose peregrinations in the neighborhood are highlighted by his compelling reiteration of the words “j’ai marché” at the very beginning of the text (13-15). Likewise, the many allusions to other urban walkers further underscores the theme of flânerie; one of Lazard’s acquaintances, for example, is characterized as “ce piéton des

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bitumes et des pierres, arpenteur de déserts urbains, de pavés et de macadam” (11). The notion of flânerie is closely linked to references to the cafés of the Côte-des-Neiges which, unlike the image of purgatory evoked earlier in the text, serve as an “espace intermédiaire” (225) in a positive way and represent an essential part of the process of “inhabiting” the neighborhood in the sense posited by Shields. Both an observation post and a public space like the street, the café constitutes a contemporary version of the shopping arcades associated with the nineteenth-century flâneur, and a series of intertextual allusions accentuates the idea that the characters in La brûlerie take their place in a celebrated lineage: “ils ont découvert leur café, comme Verlaine, le Procope, Pessoa l’Arcada, Kafka, le Savoy” (236). The use of the possessive adjective in this passage, along with the earlier description of the café as a “port d’attache” (72), again accentuates the concept of appropriating urban space. Indeed, it is La Brûlerie, the last of a series of cafés the protagonists have been meeting in for over thirty years, which gives the novel its title. The related image of “la brûlure,” an expression that conveys the physical and psychological suffering born of displacement, provides a means of linking past and present in that it encapsulates both the Montreal café and the protagonists’ traumatic memories of Haiti—“la brûlure d’un enfer d’où nous nous sommes échappés” (70). Here, the protagonists’ position as consumers in the café creates an interesting contrast with Shield’s description of the flâneur of an earlier era, whose “visual consumption of the Stranger” through his encounter with commodities from the colonies “mimics the action of the explorer who not only maps but also describes, designates and claims territory” (74). In Ollivier’s reversal of this situation in La brûlerie, in which the Other is cast in the role of flâneur, the characters’ exploration of the Côte-des-Neiges evokes a different kind of mapping, that of the migrant carving out a place for himself in cosmopolitan Montreal. The sense of belonging evoked in La brûlerie, as Nicolas observes when speaking of earlier novels of the Haitian diaspora, is closely related to the characters’ acknowledgment that they are not going to return permanently to their homeland. Indeed, the expression “pas de retour” constitutes a kind of refrain at the end of the text (235), and Dionysos d'Acapulco explicitly associates this realization with a powerful depiction of belonging: “Il n’y aura pas de retour possible pour ces messieurs, pour toutes les raisons qu’on connaît et surtout parce qu’ils participent de la vie de cette ville. Ils ont réussi à fixer leurs empreintes dans ce quartier” (2356). Although the narrator himself admits to having experienced “un grand doute, une angoisse même, quant à toute possibilité d’épanouissement

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dans la condition de transplanté” (238), he, too, uses a series of striking images that illuminate his profound attachment to the area. The motif of rebirth, in particular, which is introduced in the very first words of the novel—“Je ressuscite depuis des décennies dans Côte-des-Neiges” (9)— foregrounds from the outset the intimate relationship between the neighborhood and Lazard’s identity, an idea underscored by the fact that he situates himself in relation to the neighborhood: “Moi, Jonas Lazard, sur la Côte-des-Neiges” (10). Indeed, the narrator later associates his ”sentiment de renaissance” with the multi-ethnic community of Côte-desNeiges, most specifically with the profusion of languages and accents he hears in La Brûlerie (164).17 Whereas the characters were portrayed as homeless when they first arrived in Montreal—“Paroissiens sans paroisse, indigènes sans pays, natifs sans nation, ni patrie, ni matrie” (160)—many other images elicit their impression of having found their place in Montreal. The characterization of the narrator’s friends as adrift at sea, for example, contrasts with his depiction of himself as the “capitaine d’un vaisseau de ligne doté des avantages d’un bateau de croisière” (16). Likewise, Lazard’s self-description, “tout couturé de cicatrices, faisant obstinément partie du paysage” (16), inscribes him into the physical topography of the neighborhood, while the city of Montreal is presented as an essential part of Dave Folantrain’s identity: “Montréal, cette ville qu’il croyait au début n’être qu’une terre de passage avant le grand retour, lui est entrée dans la peau, dans le cerveau” (47). Most importantly, perhaps, the protagonists have appropriated a place for themselves in the Côte-des-Neiges without severing their emotional ties to their native land. In this regard, Ollivier notes in an interview that “tout migrant pouvait être à la fois du lieu où il émigre et d’ailleurs” (Giguère 43), and thus seems to echo Stuart Hall's observation that many migrants "retain strong links with their places of origin" while having to “come to terms with the new cultures they inhabit, without simply assimilating to them” (310). The protagonists in La brûlerie illustrate this concept of a dual sense of belonging in that they form part of the history of both Haiti and Montreal. Although the narrator at times draws attention to the harsher realities of life in a large metropolis where some xenophobia still remains, the novel reads primarily as a celebration of the Côte-desNeiges. Indeed, the narrator’s repetition of the name Côte-des-Neiges in the opening pages of the novel produces an incantatory effect, and, in certain passages, Lazard attributes a mythic dimension to the area. At the



17 As Pessini aptly remarks, the narrator’s name, which evokes the Biblical stories of Jonas and Lazarus, also symbolizes rebirth (343).

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same time, his familiarity with the history of the quartier and his extended tribute to the previous residents of the Côte-des-Neiges, be they immigrants or Québécois de souche, underscores his desire to take his place in this lineage: “Qui se soucie encore du passé de Côte-des-Neiges? . . . Qui célèbre Côte-des-Neiges, terre arrosée de la sueur des hardis travailleurs, marchands, maçons, soldats, armuriers, boulangers?” (12). At the end of the novel, the idea that the characters identify strongly with the neighborhood is reinforced through a strategic reference to citizenship which evokes the recent shift in the conceptualization of the notion of home, namely that migrants often “belong at one and the same time to several 'homes' (and to no one particular 'home')” (Hall 310). As Ollivier's narrator remarks, “ils se déguisent tantôt en Haïtiens, tantôt en Québécois, mais à la vérité, ils ne sont de nulle part. Non, ils sont montréalais ou même exclusivement citoyens de Côte-des-Neiges. Si on pouvait avoir une citoyenneté de quartier!” (236). In this fashion, the characters’ progression from displacement to “citizenship,” which results in large part from their recourse to flânerie as a strategy for survival (237), constitutes an interesting illustration of François Maspero’s contention that “il n’y a pas de citoyenneté sans flânerie” (qtd. in Begag 184).18 In Repérages, the last essay he published before his death, Ollivier asks rhetorically whether Québécois national identity has been significantly influenced by the “mosaïque d’ethnicités” of which the province is composed (40). His depiction of multiethnic Montreal in La brûlerie, written during the same period as Repérages, provides in fictional form his answer to this question. Indeed, his portrait of Montreal seems to echo the views of several prominent socio-cultural anthropologists and political scientists who see multicultural cities, with their large numbers of immigrants, as places where important questions are being raised about the definition of citizenship today.19 In particular, Ollivier's protagonists are presented as citizens of the Côte-des-Neiges, as members of the Haitian diaspora, and as part of a broader global community of migrants. In this sense, the characters' trajectories in La brûlerie illustrate Marianne Hirsch and Nancy K. Miller's theorization of classic diasporic writing: The very definition of diaspora depends on attachments to a former home and, typically, on a fantasy of return. At the same time, diasporas' classic writings tend to defer that fantasy in favor of a practice of 'dwelling

 18

This argument is made in relation to the French banlieues. James Holston and Arjun Appadurai, for example, see cities as “especially salient sites for the constitution of different citizenships” (190).

19

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Chapter One (differently)' in a global network of interchange and circulation (3).

This emphasis on the global is articulated by Ollivier's narrator in his characterization of the novel he himself dreams of writing: "mon livre . . . retiendrait de la migrance le désir d’inclusion dans un ensemble global" (57). Ultimately, then, while flânerie on the local level in Ollivier's text leads to citizenship in the Côte-des-Neiges, the evocation of the characters' wanderings on the global level takes the question of identity beyond Montreal and Quebec and suggests the possibility of multiple forms of belonging in urban centers throughout the world.

Works Cited Agnant, Marie-Célie. La dot de Sara. Montreal: Editions du RemueMénage, 1995. Print. —. Un alligator nommé Rosa. Montreal: Editions du Remue-Ménage, 2007. Print. Balshaw, Maria, and Liam Kennedy, eds. Urban Space and Representation. London: Pluto Press, 2000. Print. Begag, Azouz. Quartiers sensibles. Paris: Seuil, 1994. Print. Bernier, Sylvie. Les héritiers d'Ulysse. Outremont, Quebec: Lanctôt Ed., 2002. Print. Bessora. 53 cm. Paris: Le Serpent à Plumes, 1999. Print. Brière, Eloise A. “Quebec and France: La Francophonie in a Comparative Postcolonial Frame.” Postcolonial Theory and Francophone Literary Studies. Ed. H. Adlai Murdoch and Anne Donadey. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005. 151-173. Print. —. “Writing Memory in Alien Places: Becoming a (Québécois?) Subject. Ecrire en pays assiégé Haïti Writing Under Siege.” Ed. Marie-Agnès Sourieau and Kathleen M. Balutansky. New York: Rodopi, 2004. 389403. Print. Etienne, Gérard. Un ambassadeur macoute à Montréal. Montreal: Nouvelle Optique, 1980. Print. —. Le nègre crucifié. Montreal: Editions francophones/Nouvelle Optique, 1974. Print. Ferguson, Priscilla Parkhurst. Paris as Revolution: Writing the NineteenthCentury City. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994. Print. —. “The Flâneur in and off the Streets of Paris.” The Flâneur. Ed. Keith Tester. London: Routledge, 1994. 22-42. Print. Gauvin, Lise. Ecrire, pour qui?: L’écrivain francophone et ses publics. Paris: Karthala, 2007. Print.

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Giguère, Suzanne. Passeurs culturels. Sainte Foy, Quebec: Les Presses de l’Université Laval, 2001. Print. Hall, Stuart. “The Question of Cultural Identity.” Modernity and Its Futures. Ed. Stuart Hall, David Held, and Tony McGrew. London: Polity Press, 1992. 273-325. Print. Hirsch, Marianne, and Nancy K. Miller, eds. Rites of Return: Diaspora Poetics and the Politics of Memory. New York: Columbia UP, 2011. Print. Holston, James, and Arjun Appadurai. “Cities and Citizenship.” Public Culture 8 (1996): 187-204. Print. Jonassaint Jean. Le pouvoir des mots, les maux du pouvoir: Des romanciers haïtiens de l’exil. Paris/Montreal: Editions de l’Arcantère/ Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 1986. Print. Laferrière, Dany. Chronique de la dérive douce. Montreal: VLB, 1994. Print. —. Comment faire l'amour avec un nègre sans se fatiguer. Montreal: Lanctôt, 1985. Print. —. J’écris comme je vis. Montreal: Lanctôt, 2000. Print. —. Le charme des après-midi sans fin. Montreal: Lanctôt, 1997. Print. —. Le cri des oiseaux fous. Montreal: Lanctôt, 2000. Print. —. Le goût des jeunes filles. Montreal: VLB, 1992. Print. —. L’odeur du café. Montreal: VLB, 1991. Print. —. Pays sans chapeau. Montreal: Lanctôt, 1996. Print. Mabanckou, Alain. Black Bazar. Paris: Seuil, 2009. Print. Munro, Martin. Exile and Post-1946 Haitian Literature. Liverpool: University of Liverpool Press, 2007. Print. Nicolas, Lucienne. Espaces urbains dans le roman de la diaspora haïtienne. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2002. Print. Ollivier, Emile. La brûlerie. Montreal: Boréal, 2004. Print. —. Mille eaux. Paris: Gallimard, 1999. Print. —. “Le mythe du possible retour.” Le Devoir, September 30–October 1, 1995: D1–D2. Print. —. Passages. Paris: Le Serpent à Plumes, 1994. Print. —. Repérages. Montreal: Leméac, 2001. Print. —. Les urnes scellées. Paris: Albin Michel, 1995. Print. —. “Le vide huilé.” Paysage de l’aveugle, nouvelles. Montreal: Pierre Tisseyre, 1977. Print. Parisot, Yolaine. “Mémoire occultée, mémoire littéraire: le roman haïtien en puzzle dans La brûlerie d’Emile Ollivier et dans Le briseur de rosée d’Edwige Danticat.” Le roman haïtien: intertextualité, parentés,

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affinités. Ed. Yves Chemla and Alessandro Costantini. Lecce: Alliance Française, 2007. 209-226. Print. Pessini, Alba. “Emile Ollivier: L’espace d’accueil apprivoisé.” Ecrits d’Haïti: Perspectives sur la littérature haïtienne contemporaine (19862006). Ed. Nadève Ménard. Paris: Karthala, 2011. 337-50. Print. Phelps, Anthony. Mémoires de colin-maillard. Montreal: Nouvelle Optique, 1976. Print. —. Moins l'infini. Paris: Editeurs Français Réunis, 1973. Print. Robin, Régine. L’immense fatigue des pierres. Montreal: XYZ, 1996. Rubenstein, Roberta. Home Matters: Longing and Belonging, Nostalgia and Mourning in Women’s Fiction. New York: Palgrave, 2001. Print. Rushdie, Salman. Imaginary Homelands. London, Granta, 1991. Print. Said, Edward. “Reflections on Exile.” Out There: Marginalization and Contemporary Cultures. Ed. Russell Ferguson, et al. New York: New Museum of Contemporary Art/Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press, 1990. 357–366. Print. Shields, Rob. “Fancy Footwork: Walter Benjamin's Notes on Flânerie.” The Flâneur. Ed. Keith Tester. London: Routledge, 1994. 61-80. Print. Simon, Sherry. Translating Montreal: Episodes in the Life of a Divided City. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2006. Print. Tachtiris, Corine. “Of Male Exiles and Female Nations: 'Sexual Errancy' in Haitian Immigrant Literature.” Callaloo 35.2 (2012): 442-458. Print. Walter, Roland. “The Americas between Nation-Identity and RelationIdentity: Literary Dialogues.” Interfaces 6 (2006): 234-248. Print.

CHAPTER TWO BABEL À MONTRÉAL : CES NOMADES QUI « TROPICALISENT » LA PLANÈTE ISABELLE CHOQUET ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF FRENCH, DENISON UNIVERSITY

« Comment peut-on vivre en n’étant pas tout à fait d’ici ni plus tout à fait de là-bas ? » (Ollivier, Repérages, 3). Cette question traverse toute l’œuvre d’Émile Ollivier suite à son exil d’Haïti sous le régime de François Duvalier, en 1964. S’installant à Montréal avec son épouse en 1968, il y vivra jusqu'à sa mort en 2002.1 Ollivier «[u]tilis[e] sa condition d’exilé comme observatoire privilégié de la scène mondiale » (Gauvin, 7) et explore dans toute son œuvre l’importance de l’identification à un lieu dans la définition identitaire. Dans Repérages, il illustre la centralité du lieu par l’étymologie du mot exil : puisque exilum signifie « hors d’ici », « hors de ce lieu » (Ollivier, Repérages, 33-4)2, la condition de l’exilé évoque une damnation, l’aliénation d’un espace de référence idéal défini par la communauté. Selon Ollivier, l’angoissante et difficile expérience du migrant vient de son « altérité, non seulement géographique, mais aussi psychique », de sa « crainte de devenir un Autre qu’il ne reconnaît plus et de se retrouver nulle part et hors du temps, comme dans la folie et dans la mort » (Ollivier, Repérages, 35). Plusieurs personnages des romans d’Ollivier incarnent cette condition tragique : Herman, dans Paysage de l'aveugle (1977), Norman dans Passages (1991) ou encore Virgile dans La Brûlerie (posthume 2004)3 ne supportent pas leur vie à Montréal. Aliénés 1

Voir le site île en île, « Émile Ollivier », Thomas C. Spear, http://www.lehman.cuny.edu/ile.en.ile/paroles/ollivier.html 2 Ollivier s’appuie ici sur un article de Verà Linhartova 3 Émile Ollivier, Paysage de l'aveugle (Montréal : Pierre Tisseyre, 1977), Passages (Montréal : l’Hexagone, 1991).

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de la ville, de leur présent et de leur vie, ils sont guettés par la folie et les pulsions suicidaires. Ces personnages cristallisent une conception négative de l’exil, rappelant la perspective que propose Edward W. Saïd dans « Reflections on Exile » : l’exil est « the unhealable rift forced between a human being and a native place, between the self and its true home : its essential sadness can never be surmounted. » (Said, 172) Pour Saïd, aucune réussite ne pourra faire oublier la perte de quelque chose laissé derrière soi pour toujours (Said, 172). La première publication littéraire d’Ollivier, Paysage de l’aveugle, montre cette aliénation complète de l’exilé, au point que Léon-François Hoffmann a pu décrire l’œuvre comme « une méditation, ou une lamentation, ou un hurlement contre l'impossibilité de la vie de l'Haïtien, que ce soit dans son pays ou dans la diaspora ».4 Cependant, Ollivier développe progressivement une vision plus complexe et nuancée de la déterritorialisation, reflétant en cela un tournant de la littérature haïtienne que J. Michael Dash a démontré. Suite à l’exil généralisé d’une génération d’intellectuels et à « la dégradation physique et symbolique de Haïti » dans l’imaginaire des écrivains, une « nouvelle identité mobile et une nouvelle géographie imaginaire » permettant d´établir un sentiment d’appartenance émergent. Elles mettent fin à une convention littéraire qui associait exil à « bannissement et aliénation » et voyait la nation comme « un paradis perdu. » (Dash, 152)5 La Brûlerie, publié à titre posthume en 2004, présente « par personnages interposés, différentes manières de vivre l’exil » (Gauvin, 7), reconnaissant dans le même temps que les départs de la terre d’origine peuvent être motivés par de multiples raisons et qu’ils sont parfois motifs à célébration, comme le rappelle Appiah dans « Cosmopolitan Patriots » (Appiah, 618). Le personnage Jonas Lazard offre une acception plus positive de sa vie hors du pays natal, puisque ce Haïtien qui vit à Montréal depuis des décennies a ainsi trouvé un équilibre de vie le protégeant de l’aliénation et du désespoir d’autres protagonistes exilés d’Ollivier. Dans Repérages, essai publié en 2001, après presque quarante ans de vie au Québec, Ollivier « fai[t] le point sur l’exil, le déracinement, l’errance et l’enracinement » (Ollivier, Repérages, 9). Il y évoque les richesses que l’exil lui a offertes : des « perspectives nouvelles nourries par les rencontres entre cultures, par les grands brassages de mœurs et par les interfécondations des connaissances. » (Ollivier, Repérages, 20). Grâce à la mise en contact avec

4

Cité sur le site île en île, « Émile Ollivier », Thomas C. Spear, http://www.lehman.cuny.edu/ile.en.ile/paroles/ollivier.html 5 Les traductions de l’anglais au français sont faites par l’auteur de cet article.

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« la splendide diversité », l’exil contribue « à la recherche de valeurs qui mènent à l’intercompréhension humaine » (Ollivier, Repérages, 20). La Brûlerie offre une réflexion sur les possibilités de vivre la mondialisation et les déplacements de population qui lui sont inhérents en évitant les écueils des « replis identitaires frileux » et en favorisant la rencontre et l’échange. Suite à « l’éclatement » de la « correspondance étroite entre l’État-nation, le Territoire et la Patrie, la Langue-culture et l’Identité » (Ollivier, Repérages 2, 54), Ollivier souligne l’urgence de « réagir et de recalibrer nos façons de faire et de penser » (Ollivier, Repérages, 114) et d’une « nécessaire refondation à trouver entre le faire ensemble (citoyenneté) et l’être ensemble (sentiment d’appartenance) » (Ollivier, Repérages 54). Illustrant les déclarations d’Ollivier sur la responsabilité de l’écrivain de mettre au jour les formes culturelles de ce moment charnière (Ollivier, Repérages 114), La Brûlerie utilise Montréal pour montrer la nécessité de repenser la vie dans les métropoles à l’heure de bouleversements identitaires majeurs. La métropole québécoise, « destination de prédilection » (Fouron, 3) des immigrants dans la province francophone, est un cadre propice aux questionnements d’Ollivier non seulement parce que presque 50% de sa population est composée d’immigrants de première ou de deuxième génération (Fouron, 55), mais aussi parce que cette immigration a changé le visage de Montréal ces dernières années. En effet, si depuis environ deux siècles des vagues migratoires se sont installées dans différents quartiers de la ville, l’origine des immigrants a changé au fil du temps : « Essentiellement européens jusqu’aux années 1970, les courants migratoires sont devenus de plus en plus diversifiés » et aujourd’hui Montréal accueille des citoyens provenant de tous les continents6. Non seulement cette immigration s’est intensifiée quantitativement ces dernières années, puisque « [s]ur le territoire de la ville de Montréal, les personnes ayant immigré entre 1991 et 2006 comptent pour plus de la moitié de la population immigrante » (Fouron, 47) mais elle a aussi changé le visage démographique de Montréal. Elle comprend en effet une part importante de « minorités visibles » : ainsi, 66% des immigrants arrivés à Montréal entre 2001 et 2006 font partie de ce groupe, « les asiatiques et les noirs [étant] les plus nombreux » (Fouron, 88). En outre, « plus de 60% des immigrants récents font usage d’une autre langue que le français ou l’anglais à la maison. » (Fouron, 66). Cette empreinte de l’immigration sur le profil démographique du Québec a donné naissance 6 Voir p 42, 44, et p 55 du rapport pour plus d’informations sur la diversité des origines des immigrants.

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aux débats sur l’identité québécoise qu’on connaît concernant le « NOUS identitaire (…) qui serait encore perçu (…) comme étant à dominante « pure laine » de vieille souche… européenne », mais qui ne peut désormais ignorer le « Québécois pure laine crépue nourri au lait de coco sur les plages conviviales de Jacmel » et autres membres de cette société cosmopolite. (Berrouët-Oriol) Le Montréal d’Ollivier « prend de nouvelles mesures d’un monde qui se rétrécit » (Ollivier, Brûlerie, 7). Loin de se limiter à une évocation spatiale, Ollivier utilise Montréal pour démontrer quel rôle les métropoles doivent jouer dans le monde actuel pour dépasser les fragmentations et la multiplication des « non-lieux »7 inhérentes aux agglomérations. La Brûlerie se focalise sur les marges de Montréal, pour exposer de nouvelles identités qui brouillent les dichotomies, bouleversent le rapport à l’espace et à l’Autre et pour réhabiliter la ville comme productrice de lien social.

« Une Écriture de la Cartographie » pour Repenser la Ville La Brûlerie montre l’impact et l’intensité des mouvements migratoires du monde contemporain, en insistant sur le chamboulement des définitions identitaires qui les accompagne : la « circulation désordonnée, tourbillonnesque même, […] ne laisse rien ni personne indemne. Elle brise les carcans et les limites établies » (Ollivier, Brûlerie, 52). Pour Ollivier, ces bouleversements nécessitent une renégociation de la place du lieu dans la définition identitaire, réflexion qu’il cristallise en opposant les métaphores de la cartographie et de l’enracinement. Il annonce dès l’épigraphe du roman : « Je voudrais que La Brûlerie soit un livre-univers, un livre-monde, et qu’au lieu d’être une lecture lyrique du flux, elle soit une écriture de la cartographie » (Ollivier, Brûlerie, 7). La cartographie d’Ollivier est une grille de lecture du monde pratiqué par ceux dont le parcours biographique et géographique a entravé le sentiment d’identification à un lieu. La représentation spatiale en trois dimensions et l’horizontalité associée à la carte font pendant à l’image de la racine caractérisée par une attache verticale. Deleuze et Guattari, qu’Ollivier cite plusieurs fois dans son essai Repérages, associent la carte au rhizome et soulignent ses possibilités illimitées de connexions et son ouverture. (Ollivier, Repérages, 22) Glissant a utilisé la métaphore pour évoquer comment, au moment du choc actuel des cultures qui caractérise le 7

Marc Augé, Non-Lieux, introduction à une anthropologie de la surmodernité (Paris : Le Seuil, 1992).

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« Chaos-monde » (Glissant, Traité du Tout Monde, 22) : « (…) être soi sans se fermer à l’autre, et comment s’ouvrir à l’autre sans se perdre soimême. » (Glissant, Introduction à une poétique du divers, 23). Les identités à racine unique doivent faire place aux « identités-relations, c'està-dire les identités-rhizomes » (Glissant, Introduction à une poétique du divers, 131), ce mouvement horizontal permettant à la « racine [d’] all[er] à la rencontre d’autres racines » (Glissant, Introduction à une poétique du divers, 23), et engendrant la créolisation des cultures. Pour Deleuze et Guatari ce mouvement entre des points qui n'ont pas de hiérarchie, la multiplicité des appartenances, la mise en réseau sont les solutions qui remplacent la volonté de s'enraciner de manière permanente dans un territoire. Ollivier utilise déjà la métaphore de la cartographie dans Les urnes scellées où un protagoniste haïtien exilé revient en Haïti pour faire des fouilles archéologiques, dans l’espoir de trouver un trésor d’origine africaine. Au lieu de creuser le sol de son pays d’origine, il choisit finalement de changer de métier au cours de son séjour : d'archéologue (…) il va devenir cartographe « qui repère les lieux de passages, les lieux intermédiaires » (Ollivier, Les urnes scellées, 292). Il retourne vivre à Montréal après avoir constaté qu’il ne trouvait pas le sentiment d’appartenance qu’il recherchait dans son pays natal. Ainsi, comme le souligne Joëlle Vitiello, « [l]e trésor aura changé » grâce à une prise de conscience : « D’exil nécessaire », son exil devient « choisi » et le personnage « franchit le fossé de l’archéologie à la cartographie. » (Vitiello, 54) Le parcours de ce protagoniste, son renoncement à un ancrage permanent et sa nouvelle quête du transitoire font écho aux déclarations d’Ollivier sur les limites de la métaphore de la racine pour définir une identité : « Je l’ai déjà dit à maintes reprises, à la notion de racine, je préfère celle de route, de chemin. Je crois que la notion de racine convient aux arbres et non aux êtres humains » (Ollivier, Repérages, 26). Dans une conférence donnée au Japon en 2001, Ollivier réitère son malaise vis-à-vis de cette notion, en soulignant ce qui le gêne dans le mot « lieu » : il « renvoie toujours à une notion d’espace, impliquant une inscription, un enracinement, une lourdeur. » (Ollivier, Repérages 2, 91) De par son parcours, Ollivier ne peut se reconnaître dans cette conception : « comment ne pas être embarrassé par tout ce que charrie le lieu, moi qui suis un adepte du vent levé, du temps perdu, de la route poussiéreuse, de la pluie battante et des soleils pérennes ? » (Ollivier, Repérages 2, 91). Dans La Brûlerie, Ollivier explore les possibilités laissées aux habitants qui ne sont pas enracinés dans leur lieu de vie: « comment vivre sur une terre en étant d’une autre espèce ? Comment vivre ici sans passé d’enracinement, sans lignée de famille, ni sous-sol ni grenier bourrés de lettres jaunies et

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d’albums de photos ? » (Ollivier, La Brûlerie 67). À travers une cartographie déroutante de Montréal, il montre le rôle central que les métropoles doivent désormais jouer. Reconnu pour l’engagement sociologique qui traverse toute son œuvre — aussi bien ses textes d’essayiste et de sociologue que son œuvre littéraire8—, Ollivier met en garde contre la déshumanisation des espaces urbains et affirme la nécessité de repenser la ville suite aux importants mouvements migratoires. Il exprime l’urgence de la situation et « le danger de vivre au confluent de plusieurs mondes » sans développer d’attache. Son personnage Virgile incarne ce péril de la « déliaison » après son exil d’Haïti et son installation à Montréal (Ollivier, La Brûlerie 167) : il ne parvient pas à développer de liens et d’ancrage dans son nouvel environnement. Son aliénation des humains et de l’espace urbain qui l’entourent le mène à la folie et au suicide. Comme pour souligner le rôle que devrait jouer la métropole dans le destin de ses habitants pour les protéger de ces trajectoires funestes, Ollivier insiste ailleurs sur l’urgence de « repenser les structures de voisinage » qu’il définit comme « les formes sociales actuellement existantes dans lesquelles les individus et les communautés développent des liens de sociabilité. » (Ollivier, « L’enracinement et le déplacement à l’épreuve de l’avenir », 92). Si les nouveaux arrivants porteurs d’autres cultures sont plus sujets à l’isolement et aux difficultés d’intégration dans un nouveau cadre dans un premier temps, ces questions sur la vie dans les métropoles ne concernent pas qu’eux. En effet, les considérations d’Ollivier participent aux questionnements contemporains sur l’évolution de la vie dans les villes et sur la crise d’une citoyenneté commune. L’anthropologue Marc Augé souligne l’impact du développement urbain sur les modes de sociabilité. Le traitement de l’espace est selon lui un moyen de penser l’identité et la relation, et de symboliser les constituants de l’identité partagée, particulière et singulière 8

Samuel Pierre, ed. Ces Québécois venus d’Haïti- Contribution de la communauté haïtienne à l’édification du Québec moderne (Montréal : Presses internationales Polytechnique, 2007), 367. Thomas C. Spear souligne la participation d’Ollivier au dialogue public à travers sa fiction « pour se joindre aux efforts collectifs de construire et d’améliorer une réalité concrète ». Certains sujets et thèmes unissent ses « textes de modes différents d’écriture » et « la genèse et la publication de l’écriture de fiction coïncident avec celles de l’écriture scientifique ». Thomas C. Spear, « Émile Ollivier : enracinerrant de Notre-Dame-de-Grâce », Études littéraires 34, n° 3 (2002),18-19. Ollivier a aussi beaucoup travaillé avec les populations immigrées de Montréal pour favoriser leur intégration et leur alphabétisation (http://www.lehman.cuny.edu/ile.en.ile/paroles/ollivier.html)

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(Augé, 67). Or, la surmodernité qu’il caractérise par la surabondance événementielle, spatiale et l’individuation des références (Augé, 55) modifie notre rapport au temps et à l’espace et notre conception de l’individualité. Augé souligne les modifications physiques importantes qui résultent de la surabondance spatiale : concentrations urbaines, transfert de population et multiplication des « non-lieux » qui entravent la formation d’identités singulières et de relations. Ces changements bouleversent les « grandes catégories à travers lesquelles les hommes pensent leur identité et leurs relations réciproques » (Augé, 55). Au moment où « jamais […] les repères de l’identification collective n’ont été aussi fluctuants [, l] a production individuelle de sens est […] plus que jamais nécessaire » (Augé, 51). Alors que ce contexte force à repenser les catégories de l’identité et de l’altérité (Augé, 52), les non-lieux fabriquent en même temps un « homme moyen » défini comme utilisateur (Augé, 126). Si les « lieux anthropologiques » sont identitaires, relationnels et historiques, et offrent ainsi une construction concrète et symbolique de l’espace, assignant une place à chacun (Augé, 68-9), les « non-lieux » ne créent aucune « société organique » (Augé 140). En effet, ce sont des endroits non-habités, dénués de contenu symbolique historique et identitaire, caractérisés par une « contractualité solitaire » (Augé, 119): constitués en vue de fins précises—le transport, le transit, le commerce, loisir (Augé, 118) —l'individu y demeure anonyme et solitaire, et doit y suivre des règles pour y évoluer librement. Les non-lieux sont multiples dans les villes : voies rapides, échangeurs, aéroports, hôtels, camps de transit, grandes surfaces (Augé, 100-101). Ils forment des parenthèses anonymes et sans jeu social, ne « cré [ant] ni identité singulière, ni relation, mais solitude et similitude » (Augé, 130). De manière révélatrice, Virgile le personnage que le narrateur de la Brûlerie cherche à comprendre après son décès, se suicide dans un des non-lieux désignés par Augé: une chambre d’hôtel. À travers l’histoire de Virgile, Ollivier insiste sur la nécessité de recréer du lien social, projet indissociable de la façon dont on pratique les villes. « Pour qu’un quartier ait une âme et soit digne de ce nom, les citoyens qui y demeurent doivent s’y sentir heureux, y vivre en osmose avec leur environnement. » (Ollivier, La Brûlerie, 192) Tout comme Ollivier et Augé, Richard Sennett souligne l’urgence de « concevoir de meilleures cités » afin de « retrouver le caractère collectif de l’espace » et de bénéficier de la richesse que la vie urbaine peut apporter grâce à sa diversité et la mise en contact avec des inconnus: il faut « faire interagir effectivement toutes les complexités qu[e la vie urbaine] recèle — afin que les gens deviennent plus cosmopolites — et faire des rues surpeuplées des lieux de prise de conscience de soi plutôt

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que des espaces de peur. » (Sennett, 24-5) Les codes de conduite qui régissent le monde du travail sous l’impulsion du capitalisme —ne pas s’engager, ne pas s’impliquer, penser à court terme— ont des effets similaires sur la ville et le lieu de travail : absence de fidélité et d’attachement à des lieux spécifiques, standardisation de l’environnement qui produit de l’indifférence. Les villes n’offrent plus « l’inconnu, l’inattendu, le stimulant » et « les acquis d’une histoire partagée ou d’une mémoire collective s’effacent devant la neutralité de ces espaces publics » (Sennett, 25). Sennett souligne en outre l’orientation de la société civile urbaine dans laquelle on assiste au retrait des adultes de la participation à la vie civique. L’espace urbain est désormais caractérisé par la « séparation hermétique », barrière à la rencontre d’autrui et aux pratiques civiques. La cité « a atomisé le domus, cette relation spatiale qui avait, avant l'ère industrielle, combiné famille, travail, espaces publics de cérémonies et autres espaces sociaux moins formels » (Sennett, 25) et il devient urgent de dépasser cette fragmentation en mêlant différentes activités dans un même espace. Dans la Brûlerie, Ollivier propose une cartographie de Montréal qui promeut le cosmopolitisme et l’abolition des divisions hermétiques à l’intérieur de la ville afin que « diverses sortes d’actions humaines, actions productives, reproductives, interprétatives, performatives, p[uissent] être initiées et menées avec sens » (Ollivier, « L’enracinement », 92). En mettant l’emphase sur la création de « lieux anthropologiques » qui résultent d'une « construction concrète et symbolique de l'espace » (Augé, 68), à partir de quoi se forment les identités personnelles, s'organisent les relations et se maintient une stabilité minimale, Ollivier revisite les cartographies identitaires mais aussi les frontières ontologiques du XXIème siècle.

Une Cartographie des « Lieux Intermédiaires » La Brûlerie semble mettre en œuvre le projet du personnage principal d’Ollivier dans Les urnes scellées : repérer les lieux de passages, les lieux intermédiaires pour répondre à cette question posée par l’écrivain dans une conférence en 2000 : « Comment saisir ce que deviennent les identités culturelles à l’âge du mouvement et de la diversité ? » (Ollivier, Repérages 2, 73). La cartographie qu’il propose est déroutante car caractérisée par le transitoire, le changement et l’abolition de toutes dichotomies. En outre, elle se focalise sur un quartier absent jusqu’ici de la scène littéraire, et donne la perspective des « minorités visibles » qui sont « paradoxalement […] des invisibles » (Ollivier, Brûlerie, 16), « ces personnages anonymes

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au cœur de l’anonymat, transparents et visibles au sein d’un monde invisible » (Ollivier, Brûlerie, 12). Pourtant, loin de décrire une enclave et un groupe marginal, Ollivier affirme évoquer « une espèce en voie de prolifération » (Ollivier, Repérages, 67). Il rejoint ainsi les propos de Deleuze et Guattari : après l'ère des sédentaires qui ont marginalisé les nomades, celle des migrants développant de nouvelles identités s'impose (Deleuze et Guattari 34).9 Reflétant le chamboulement des repères en notre époque de déterritorialisation culturelle et mouvements migratoires, Ollivier montre les identités et les relations qui se développent parmi des personnages ayant dû renoncer aux prétentions des communautés « ataviques ».10 Pour cela, il met en avant ce que Françoise Lionnet et Shu Mei Shi appellent les « micropractices of transnationality » (Lionnet et Mei Shi, 7): les formes multiples d’expressions culturelles des minorités et des membres de diaspora qui passent inaperçues la plupart du temps. Dans l’introduction de Minor transnationalism : les deux critiques déplorent le manque de visibilité donnée aux relations entre les « marges », mouvements horizontaux qu’ils opposent à des relations verticales entre discours dominant et minorités, déjà largement explorées. Ils s’intéressent aux pratiques culturelles et réseaux de communication développés par des agents à cheval sur les frontières nationales (Lionnet et Mei Shi, 5). Ces mouvements transversaux culturels engendrent de nouvelles formes d’identification complexes et multiples qui négocient avec les frontières nationales, ethniques et culturelles (Lionnet et Mei Shi 8). Puisque le « monde d’aujourd’hui n’a plus figure de mosaïque de cultures juxtaposées comme des entités séparées et contrastées » (Ollivier, Repérages 2, 77-8), Ollivier évoque lui-même l’émergence d’« un modèle d’êtres humains décloisonnés » sous l’impact de la mondialisation, « ce qui force à repenser le local, qui n’est plus un endroit géographiquement défini, une fois pour toutes » (Ollivier, Repérages 2, 74). Sa cartographie de Montréal explore ces nouveaux rapports au local. La représentation de Montréal qu’Ollivier offre est doublement originale : d’abord parce qu’elle ne s’appuie pas sur les quartiers représentant habituellement Montréal. Le narrateur revendique l’importance de « s’écarter d’une tradition d’écriture qui ne peint de Montréal que le boulevard Saint-Laurent, la rue Saint-Urbain ou le Plateau 9

Faisant écho à ces propos, un personnage de La Brûlerie affirme que l’histoire a vu la défaite des nomades et la victoire des sédentaires (168). 10 Glissant nomme ainsi les communautés basées sur une Genèse et une filiation sur laquelle une légitimité d’occupation d’une terre et une identification à un territoire peuvent se fonder. Edouard Glissant, Introduction à une poétique du divers (Paris : Gallimard, 1996), 60.

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Mont-Royal » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 56). C’est sur le quartier de Virgile et du narrateur, migrants venant d’Haïti, que tout le roman posthume d’Ollivier se focalise. Le narrateur souligne « l’originalité […] de […] rétrécir l’espace à la dimension d’une rue, planter le texte sur la Côte-des-Neiges » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 56). Cependant, Ollivier n’évoque pas un ghetto qui serait une parenthèse à l’intérieur de la ville, et c’est là la deuxième originalité de sa cartographie. Il ne présente pas une population victime de ségrégation spatiale dans un territoire en crise comme c’est parfois le cas dans ce que Barreiro appelle « l’écriture migrante » fondant « l’identité migrante » et « urbaine. » (Barreiro 41) En effet, si la récurrence toponymique souligne la focalisation sur un espace géographique restreint, la Côte-des-Neiges est pourtant présentée comme un lieu de passage connecté au reste du monde et en transformation permanente. Cette cartographie de Montréal évite donc la fragmentation de la ville moderne déplorée par Augé ou Sennett. La Côte-des-Neiges n’est pas une enclave puisque ses habitants y passent et en partent librement. L’ouverture de ce quartier est telle que diverses espèces migratoires et nomades le traversent constamment : le narrateur évoque ainsi entre autre : « maints vols d’outardes et leurs vagues ondulées […] » (9), « une foule de papillons multicolores [..], des quantités de Bédouins caracolant sur leur chamelle de transhumance, narines au vent » , des « pèlerins », des « cohortes de flottants [qui] ont choisi de vagabonder, poussées par le vent », des « errants » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 10), des « vagabonds », des « flâneurs » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 13), des « Bédouins nomades » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 17). L’évocation de la Côtedes-Neiges comme une « terre de passage » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 12) sans frontières hermétiques est renforcée par sa connexion au reste de Montréal et de la planète. Non seulement elle fait partie de ces « rues qui ne se terminent jamais, des rues longues, pareilles à des quêtes inabouties » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 15), mais « la Côte-des-Neiges a pour extension le monde entier, surtout depuis qu’il est troué de portes de toutes sortes ouvertes sur l’infini : le métro, l’autobus, le funérarium » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 240). En outre, la planète entière y est constamment présente puisque le quartier est qualifié de « microcosme » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 17), « vaste baraque foraine » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 240), « énorme melting-pot » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 164). Fasciné par ceux qu’il voit et qu’il entend, le narrateur compare le quartier à Babel et y réalise que « [l]e monde en fait n’est pas constitué de lieux séparés. Le monde est un lieu unique, d’un seul tenant » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 230). Ce décloisonnement s’exprime par l’évocation des diasporas chinoises et haïtiennes de par le monde et les nouvelles de la planète entière qui circulent parmi le groupe qui se réunit

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dans les cafés de la Côte-des-Neiges. Il se reflète aussi dans la structuremême du livre qui, même s’il se passe dans un seul quartier de Montréal, ne suit pas d’ordre chronologique et projette le lecteur dans différents lieux et diverses époques à travers les rêveries des personnages. Le roman réalise le fantasme de son narrateur d’écrire un livre « qui serait le modèle réduit d’une immense bibliothèque, elle-même reflet d’un instant du monde » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 57) et qui exprimerait « ce quelque chose qui renvoie à une conception organique du monde et qui dépasse les séparations, les distinctions et les coupures dont on et si friand » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 57), sous « la forme de réseaux plutôt que celle d’un récit linéaire, le réseau étant un principe de connexion » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 58). L’importante intertextualité du roman renforce cette structure fantasmée par le narrateur. A travers toutes ces métaphores, de la bibliothèque au réseau, Ollivier célèbre la richesse de la rencontre des perspectives, charriant imaginaires, lieux et époques, condition de la Relation rendue possible au sein de la métropole et créant quelque chose de nouveau. Ce quartier qui semble suivre le rythme des pulsations du monde est vivant, désigné par un lexique organique : la rue de la Côte-des-Neiges est une « artère », une « veine » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 17), il existe un « souffle » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 164) et un « esprit du lieu », un « rythme inhérent à cet espace » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 10). Vivante, la Côte-des-Neiges se « métamorphose » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 245). Le changement touche personnes, commerces, paysages urbains, au point que le narrateur dit ne plus reconnaître la Côte-des-Neiges alors qu’il y vit depuis quelques décennies (Ollivier, Brûlerie 239). Une harmonie cosmique se crée entre les flux d’arrivants et le quartier, comme les nombreuses références aux éléments – terre, eau, vent, feu- d’Ollivier le suggère. Alors que beaucoup des habitants de la Côte-des-Neiges ont dû renoncer à leur patrie d’origine, associée par l’auteur à la terre (Ollivier, Brûlerie 145), ils se laissent portés par les autres éléments, « traversés et portés par tous les souffles de la Terre, de l’Eau, du Feu et du Vide (…), poussés par le vent » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 10). Grâce aux caractéristiques de ce quartier –passage, connexion et transformation—, ses habitants inventent un nouveau modèle du rapport au lieu. Loin de vivre la Côte-des-Neiges comme un « non-lieu », ils peuvent y « construire un espace-temps clos qui, dans son déroulement, abolit la linéarité du temps, leur permet […] d’arpenter un univers stable, ordonné » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 236), et ainsi de lire l’espace et d’y trouver leur place. S’ils n’y ont pas de racines profondes, ils trouvent dans le quartier des ancrages temporaires. Dans cette « bulle d’équilibre et de tranquillité » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 24) qu’est un café, « l’agitation du monde

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s’[…] apaise » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 16), et les règles du temps sont différentes (Ollivier, Brûlerie 10, 16). Les cafés deviennent ainsi « des points cruciaux qui déterminent les coordonnées des destins » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 69). Grâce à cette cartographie, la Côte-des-Neiges fait partie de « ces lieux qui agrègent dans leur stabilité, des lieux qui situent sans enclore » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 164). Puisque les cafés permettent d’échapper à la solitude et à l’anonymat, ils jouent un rôle capital dans la vie des habitants : ils sont un « port d’attache, un asile » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 72). Les métaphores de l’ancrage temporaire se multiplient dans la Brûlerie pour évoquer une certaine « osmose » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 192) avec cet environnement, différant du modèle de la racine et correspondant à la vision de Glissant dans Traité du Tout-monde : « L’errance nous donne de nous amarrer à cette dérive, qui n’égare pas » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 63). Dans La Côte-des-Neiges, on peut « habite[r] une terrasse de café » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 236), « planter sa tente » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 228), vivre dans un « espace intermédiaire » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 225), se retrouver dans un « lieu miraculé de la vie, vaste et insondable », une « agora qui possède la vertu d’un champ magnétique » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 69). Les personnages ne parviennent pourtant pas tous à trouver refuge. Comparés à des « bateaux démâtés » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 15), ils doivent savoir inventer un nouveau rapport au lieu sous peine de devenir « vieux rafiot[s] hors d’usage » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 66), triste sort de Virgile qui se suicide. Ollivier évoque la « beauté équivoque » de ces « naufragés ambulants » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 15) qui passent dans le quartier. Cette équivoque est reflétée dans l’ambivalence du vocabulaire faisant référence aux éléments : parfois sources de vie, parfois sources de mort. Les arrivants sont des « naufragés », pouvant être « submergés, » au point de devenir comme Virgile « cette Venise des ruines et de la détresse » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 67) « flott[ant] au hasard » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 167), mais ce sont d’un autre côté des « cohortes de flottants » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 10) qui peuvent trouver des « ports d’attache » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 72), comme le narrateur qui « condui[t] sa barque » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 245). Les métaphores du feu expriment la même ambivalence: les personnages sont brûlés par le temps et par l’exil- l’expression : « Nap boulé », réponse à la question « comment allez-vous ? » est une expression créole signifiant « on tient le coup » mais dont la traduction littérale serait « on brûle » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 233). Elle fait écho au nom du café, la Brûlerie, où les personnages se retrouvent. S’ils se consument et s’immolent par la neige (Ollivier, Brûlerie 85), ils espèrent aussi renaître de leurs cendres comme des phénix (Ollivier, Brûlerie 233). Cette ambigüité marque l’inconnu de la transformation qui découle du passage

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dans ce quartier, inconnu reflété par le néologisme « déliaison » : il exprime une nouvelle expérience requérant un lexique inédit (Ollivier, Brûlerie 166), et rappelle le caractère imprévisible de la créolisation décrite par Glissant. Passer dans ce quartier est une expérience transformatrice et de nouvelles conceptions des identités, et du vivre ensemble se développent : « Migrant, si vous vous hasardez sur ce chemin d’un pas flâneur (…) vous franchirez une espèce de frontière morale et métaphysique. On ne vous considérera pas comme tout à fait Québécois : il paraît qu’il faut l’être de naissance. Du moins, l’on vous acceptera comme un être humain » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 16). Dans le cadre des cafés propice à l’échange, les relations avec autrui se détachent des critères traditionnels de l’identité. Les origines s’effacent comme critères d’identification premiers et rigides, rejoignant les propos de Stuart Hall sur l’identité culturelle : cette dernière est avant tout un positionnement vis-à-vis des discours sur le passé et la culture, et pas une essence reposant sur une loi de l’origine transcendantale et incontestable (Hall, 395). Des regroupements d’un type nouveau apparaissent, évoquant les « clusters » définis par Papastergiadis. Puisque les concepts de tribu, ethnicité, race et nation ne reflètent plus un sens de communauté avec des frontières stables et un lieu unique, Papastergiadis veut mettre en avant ces autres formes de rassemblements informels et invisibles. (Papastergiadis 200) Ils se distinguent des communautés traditionnelles puisqu’il n’existe pas de « master narrative » qui établirait une généalogie commune au groupe : la communauté ne préexiste pas à la rencontre et n’impose pas une liste de traits essentiels que les gens doivent partager pour être inclus. Elle est en fait créée en conséquence d’échanges entre personnes voulant partager, et ses contours sont toujours poreux (Papastergiadis 210). Il prend comme exemple les riches rencontres entre artistes et écrivains au gré d’événements internationaux et du hasard de leurs parcours. Ces rassemblements ne sont pas basés sur une recherche narcissique de l’identique en l’autre (Papastergiadis 210) et ils occasionnent de nouveaux échanges et possibilités grâce à l’hétérogénéité du groupe. Ils permettent aux gens d’échanger en respectant les différences, créant ainsi une énergie particulière. Cette mise au second plan de l’identique et de l’origine permet aux nouveaux arrivants de trouver une place dans la Côte-des-Neiges. Ollivier souligne l’abolition des dichotomies et des cloisonnements traditionnels, aussi bien dans la société montréalaise que dans les groupes se formant dans les cafés. En effet, loin d’être une société figée aux caractéristiques identitaires rigides, le Montréal de La Brûlerie est un « espace indécis » associé par les migrants au « vacuum », à la « vacuité », au « vide »

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(Ollivier, Brûlerie 41). Cette métropole est « un carrefour, une énigme, un mythe » caractérisée par l’hybride : « prise en étau entre le fleuve et une terre mangée par un million de lacs », « espace tissé » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 41), « œuvre de hasard », « hermaphrodite » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 42), sa société est hétéroclite et en transition présentant « les fastes de l’âge agraire, les derniers feux d’un Québec rude, proche de ses origines et des légendes qui l’ont bâti et des esprits qui l’ont hanté » tout en étant « totalement submergé[e] par la modernité » (11-12). C’est une société où « rien ne s[e] […] pass[e ]» (Ollivier, Brûlerie 24), un « hypothétique pays » (160), une « terre qui cherche […] à travers toute cette histoire qu’elle subit depuis des siècles, sa propre histoire, son histoire vraie » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 228). Dans cette société en transition, les dichotomies nous/vous se dissolvent, et les origines passent au second plan pour laisser la place au présent de l’échange. Le groupe qui se rassemble dans les cafés de la Côte-des-Neiges est défini avant tout par la relation puisque le narrateur le désigne comme « Ministère de la parole ». L’insistance sur le langage parlé exprime la fécondité de leurs rapports, puisqu’ils sont sortis de l’impasse du « drame planétaire de la Relation » : les « peuples néantisés » « en marge » (Glissant, Discours Antillais, 14-5) mis sous silence par l’« inscription fétichiste dans une universalité régie par les valeurs occidentales. » (Bernabé, Chamoiseau et Confiant, 22) Glissant comme les créolistes soulignent l’urgence de résister à « l’universel de la transparence, imposé par l’Occident » (Glissant, Discours 14) et l’importance de « [q]uitter le cri, forger la parole » (Glissant, Discours 28). Alors qu’Ollivier met en épigraphe de la Brûlerie une citation de Thomas Bernhard évoquant le cri comme « la seule chose éternelle, indestructible, la seule permanente… » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 9), il insiste sur la parole forgée au sein du groupe des cafés de la Côte-des-Neiges. Elle incarne une manifestation du Divers, « l’effort de l’esprit humain vers une relation transversale, sans transcendance universaliste » qui établit la Relation (Glissant, Discours 327). Réalisant que « l’autre n’est pas l’ennemi, que le différent ne m’érode pas, que si je change à son contact, cela ne veut pas dire que je me dilue dans lui» (Glissant, Introduction 57), le Ministère de la parole dépasse « la punition de Babel » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 230) grâce à « la poétique de la Relation », « réunissant (…) plusieurs identités ou entités maîtresses d’elles-mêmes et qui acceptent de changer en s’échangeant » (Glissant, Introduction 41). Au contraire, Virgile qui « n’a pas su crier » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 123) se coupe de tous et, ne pouvant supporter sa vie à Montréal, sombre dans la folie et se suicide.

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Bien que les cafés de la Côte-des-Neiges soient des lieux de rencontres de l’humanité tout entière, non seulement les différences ne font plus obstacle aux relations, mais ce dépassement des divisions permet une « ouverture sur un infini de possibles » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 230). Ce dépassement des frontières identitaires apparaît dans la description du « Ministère de la parole » qui se réunit depuis des décennies sur les terrasses des cafés : quelques Québécois, « quelques errants libanais, vietnamiens, haïtiens et autres Bédouins nomades. » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 17), De manière révélatrice, cette énumération peu précise ne privilégie pas l’origine territoriale et finit sur une catégorie très large détachée de tout pays (« autres Bédouins nomades »). Le narrateur multiplie les termes dissociés de toute référence territoriale : « nomades », « errants » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 17), « habitués de la Côte-des-Neiges » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 15), « Ministère de la Parole » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 20), au point que leurs « milliers de voix […] sembl[ent] sourdre des entrailles de la terre » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 10). Plus que leurs origines, ce qui importe, c’est leur point commun d’être « projetés dans un monde de chaos, […] voués à l’errance ». (Ollivier, Brûlerie 71) Même Dyonisos, dont la famille est ancrée depuis quatre cents ans au Québec, est avant tout un « être hybride, image parfaite du mutant […] vi[vant] au confluent de deux mondes » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 111-2). Les habitants de la Côte-des-Neiges inventent un nouveau rapport à l’autre dans ces « clusters » qui naissent dans les cafés. La rencontre y est possible grâce à l’éthique du rapport à autrui qui s’y développe et aux nouvelles identifications qui y naissent : ils forment « un troupeau de Bédouins qui ne connaissent pas d’autres lois que le respect, l’échange et la complicité des sentiments » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 71). Cette relation éthique se base sur un respect de ce qu’Édouard Glissant appelle le « droit à l’opacité » dans la relation à l’autre : il n’est plus nécessaire de comprendre l’autre, « de le réduire au modèle de ma propre transparence » pour « vivre et construire ensemble » (Glissant, Introduction 71). Depuis les terrasses de café, Jonas dit voir le monde autrement et insiste sur son attirance pour ce qui est différent chez autrui. Il évoque le « désir […] de saisir l’autre dans son altérité, dans son halo de présence chaque fois singulier. La pure présence de l’autre » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 226). Cette singularité reconnue et ces relations avec l’Autre modifient les cartographies ontologiques puisque les identités sont toujours mouvantes et que « cet énorme melting-pot […] communiqu[e] un sentiment de renaissance » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 164). Ainsi, Jonas Lazard — prédestiné de par la résonnance biblique de son nom aux morts et renaissances successives évoquées dans le roman (Ollivier, Brûlerie 9,16)— compare l’identité à un vêtement à recoudre sans arrêt « jusqu’à

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avoir l’illusion de trouver son style avec ses mythes fondateurs et son système de valeurs » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 231), illusion bien vite dissipée, ce qui nécessite un recommencement permanent du processus. Les habitants de la Côte-des-Neiges se libèrent de l’ « être », s’inscrivant dans une autre perspective décrite par Glissant : « L’étant ni l’errance n’ont de terme, le changement est leur permanence, ho ! – ils continuent » (Glissant, Traité 64). Comme les premiers mots du roman—« je ressuscite depuis des décennies dans Côte-des-Neiges » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 9) —l’indiquent, la vie dans ce quartier permet la réinvention de soi, de la cartographie du monde et des relations. Barreiro souligne l’obstacle que le bâti des villes peut représenter au sentiment « d’identification avec une ville d’accueil » des migrants : « le bâti […] représente la mémoire d’un passé auquel les communautés migrantes n’ont pas participé et […] leur est donc étranger ». Selon elle, la ville peut offrir d’autres espaces qui compensent ce sentiment d’exclusion : « des espaces d’ouverture, d’échange qui la rendent aimable, poreuse, créatrice de sociabilité et d’aménité » (Barreiro 47). Dans sa description de la Côte-des-Neiges, Ollivier va encore plus loin : non seulement la ville offre des espaces-carrefours, mais les habitants du quartier ont un pouvoir créateur et participatif à exercer : ils se réinventent eux-mêmes, et ils réinventent aussi la métropole et la cartographie des rapports humains dans une « nouvelle géographie identitaire » (Dash 152). Celle-ci naît d’un cosmopolitisme détaché de tout enracinement et de discours sur l’origine (Dash 153). En « mett[ant] en scène la parole nomade, la parole migrante, celle de l’entre-deux, celle de nulle part, celle d’ailleurs ou d’à côté, celle de pas tout à fait d’ici, pas tout à fait d’ailleurs » (Dash 55-6), Ollivier nourrit un « imaginaire urbain » (Samuel 348), modifie l’image de Montréal et insiste sur le rôle que chaque habitant peut jouer au jour le jour pour la « recherche du mieux vivre ensemble » (Repérages 2, 78). Ce message encourageant du pouvoir créateur des migrants contraste avec plusieurs évocations des dysfonctionnements des métropoles d’Ollivier. Ainsi, Sherry Simon propose une lecture de la nouvelle d’Ollivier « Une nuit, un taxi » comme « une vision babélienne et apocalyptique de la ville », un avertissement sur le « danger des excès du cosmopolitisme » quand aucun pont ni aucune citoyenneté commune ne se crée entre les communautés vivant au cœur d’une métropole.(Simon 381) Joubert Satyre souligne que le roman précédent d’Ollivier, Passages, met en scène une tropicalisation qu’il définit comme « une forme de reterritorialisation : le migrant transplante dans la terre d’accueil sous le mode fantasmé ou réaliste les éléments de sa culture, créant ainsi un espace d’hybridité. » (Joubert, 85) Comme le rappelle Appiah, quand les

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gens migrent, les pratiques culturelles voyagent aussi. Ainsi, « each local form of human life [is] the result of long-term and persistent processes of cultural hybridization. » De nouvelles formes culturelles sont ainsi créées localement : « The disappearance of old cultural forms is consistent with a rich variety of forms of human life, just because new cultural forms, which differ from each other, are being created all the time as well. » (Appiah 619) Cependant, dans Passages, la tropicalisation des migrants est limitée dans le temps, dans l’espace et dans son impact: Satyre évoque la scène du carnaval antillais dans un parc, manifestation d’un ailleurs à Montréal strictement encadré par la police et limité à un petit espace, pour quelques heures. Cette manifestation inquiète les autochtones et renforce la dichotomie Québécois/ migrants (Ollivier, Passages 86). Dans la Brûlerie, au contraire, la tropicalisation de la métropole dure et n’est pas ressentie comme une violence imposée à des autochtones, correspondant à l’idéal cosmopolitain qu’Appiah résume par : « take your roots with you », et qui veut que chacun soit libre de choisir les formes locales de vie humaine dans lesquelles il évolue (Appiah 622). Ollivier montre qu’entre Montréal et ses habitants existe une relation organique : « Cette ville a fini par constituer une composante obligée d[u] jeu [des membres du ministère de la parole] : […] ils sont montréalais ou même exclusivement citoyens de Côte-des-Neiges » (Ollivier, Brûlerie 236). Si les migrants sont modelés par leur passage dans les lieux intermédiaires, ils modèlent eux-mêmes le quartier et la ville : « […] ils participent de la vie de cette ville. Ils ont réussi à fixer leurs empreintes dans ce quartier. » Ainsi, la présence des migrants « bouscule et tropicalise » Montréal (Ollivier, Brûlerie 56). Cette tropicalisation s’étend en fait à toute la planète, selon la perspective à laquelle Ollivier parvient après des décennies de vie à Montréal : « Apprends à vivre dans les zones franches des marges, des bordures, car cette figure est en passe de devenir emblématique de la condition humaine et de la modernité » (Ollivier, Repérages 38-9).

Bibliographie Appiah, Kwame Anthony. « Cosmopolitan Patriots. » Critical Inquiry 23, No. 3 (Spring, 1997), pp. 617-639. Augé, Marc. Non-Lieux, introduction à une anthropologie de la surmodernité. Paris : Le Seuil, 1992. Barreiro, Carmen Mata. « Identité urbaine, identité migrante. » Recherches sociographiques 45, n° 1 (2004) : 39-58.

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Berrouët-Oriol, Robert. « Lettre ouverte à Pauline Marois. » Planète Ayiti, le 10 février 2008. http://planete.qc.ca/ayiti/nouvellesbreves/nouvellesbreves-1022008144973.html Chamoiseau, Patrick, Jean Bernabé et Raphaël Confiant. Eloge de la créolité. Paris: Gallimard, 1989. Dash, Michael J. Haiti and the United States- National Stereotypes and the Literary Imagination. 2d edition. NY: St. Martin's Press, 1997 (1988). Deleuze, Gilles et Félix Guattari. Capitalisme et Schizophrénie. Mille Plateaux. Paris: Les éditions de minuit, 1980. Fouron, Farah. « Portrait de la population immigrante à Montréal. » Portraits démographiques. Division des affaires économiques et institutionnelles, ville de Montréal, mars 2010. http://ville.montreal.qc.ca/portal/page?_pageid=6897,68149732&_dad =portal&_schema=PORTAL Gauvin, Lise. « Préface. » Repérages 2, Émile Ollivier. Montréal : Leméac 2011. Glissant, Edouard. Introduction à une poétique du divers. Paris : Gallimard, 1996. —. Le discours antillais. Paris : Gallimard, 1997 (1981). —. Traité du Tout Monde. Paris : Gallimard, 1997. Hall, Stuart. « Cultural Identity and Diaspora. » Colonialism and Culture, Nicholas B. Dirks, ed. Ann Arbour: University of Michigan Press, 199), 392-403. Lionnet, Françoise, Shu-mei Shih, ed. Minor Transnationalism. Durham: Duke University Press, 2005. Ollivier, Émile. La Brûlerie. Montréal: Boréal, 2004. —. « L’enracinement et le déplacement à l’épreuve de l’avenir. » Études littéraires 34, n° 3 (2002) : 87-92. —. Les Urnes scellées. Paris: Albin Michel, 1995. —. Passages. Montréal : l’Hexagone, 1991. —. Paysage de l’aveugle. Montréal : Pierre Tisseyre, 1977. —. Repérages. Montréal: Leméac, 2001. —. Repérages 2. Montréal: Leméac, 2011. Papastergiadis, Nikos. The Turbulence of Migration: Globalization, Deterritorialization, and Hybridity. Malden, MA Polity Press, 2000. Pierre, Samuel, ed. Ces Québécois venus d’Haïti- Contribution de la communauté haïtienne à l’édification du Québec moderne. Montréal : Presses internationales Polytechnique, 2007. Satyre, Joubert. « Non-lieux et déterritorialisation, tropicalisation et reterritorialisation dans Passages d’Émile Ollivier et Chronique de la

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dérive douce de Dany Laferrière. » Voix Plurielles 5, n° 2, 2008, 80-89. Sennett, Richard. « Explosion des solidarités, uniformité, solitude. La civilisation urbaine remodelée par la flexibilité. » Le Monde diplomatique, février 2001, 24-5. http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/ 2001/02/SENNETT/14782 Simon, Sherry. « The bridge of reversals: translation and cosmopolitanism in Montreal. » International Journal of Francophone Studies 9, n°3, 2006, 381-394. Spear, Thomas C. « Émile Ollivier : enracinerrant de Notre-Dame-deGrâce. » Études littéraires 34, n° 3 (2002) : 15-27. Vitiello, Joëlle « Au-delà de l’île : Haïti dans l’œuvre d’Emile Ollivier. » Études littéraires 34, n° 3 (2002) : 49-59.

CHAPTER THREE MON PAYS, CE N’EST PAS L’HIVER : MONTRÉAL DANS LA DOT DE SARA DE MARIE-CÉLIE AGNANT PASCALE DE SOUZA, LANGUAGE AND CULTURE INSTRUCTOR, FOREIGN SERVICE INSTITUTE

De nombreux écrivains haïtiens contribuent à la diversité de « l’écriture migrante et métisse du Québec » (Robert Berrouet-Oriol et Robert Fournier, 7). De Dany Laferrière examinant la position de l’immigré francophone découvrant Montréal, ses quartiers, bars et universités dans Comment faire l’amour avec un Nègre sans se fatiguer à Emile Ollivier proposant une vision du quartier de la Côte des Neiges dans La Brûlerie, plusieurs ont élaboré un nouvel espace urbain pour les écrivains en quête d’un lieu d’écriture leur permettant de négocier une double, voire triple identité. Parmi ces écrivains, dont certains ont été primés1, une seule femme émerge : Marie-Célie Agnant. Ses deux romans ont certes sollicité l’intérêt de quelques critiques et lui ont permis d’être finaliste pour le prix littéraire Desjardins et celui du Gouverneur Général ; elle demeure toutefois une voix encore trop méconnue de la littérature migrante du Québec. Des critiques ont comparé son œuvre à celle d’autres écrivaines de la migration telles que la Française d’origine guadeloupéenne Gisèle Pineau dans L’Exil selon Julia ou la Québécoise d’origine libanaise Abla Farhoud dans Le Bonheur à la Queue Glissante, examinant le rôle de la transmission matrifocale d’une mémoire culturelle et familiale. Seule Dawn Fulton 1

Dany Laferrière a obtenu, entre autres, le Prix Carbet de la Caraïbe en 1991 pour L'Odeur du café, le grand Prix du livre de Montréal et le prix Médicis en 2009 pour L'Énigme du retour, tandis qu’Emile Ollivier a reçu, entre autres, le prix Jacques Roumain pour Mère Solitude en 1985 et le Grand Prix Littéraire de Montréal in 1991 pour Passages.

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s’intéresse toutefois à la représentation de l’espace urbain chez Agnant. S’inspirant des modèles textuels métropolitains du philosophe français Michel de Certeau, son essai intitulé « The Disengaged Immigrant: Mapping the Francophone Caribbean Metropolis» examine le rôle des migrants qui doivent négocier une identité nouvelle dans un espace étranger mais qui reconfigurent aussi cet espace en y imprimant leur propre marque, au sens littéral et figuré du terme. Elle conclut que l’immigré, cet étranger culturel, joue un rôle fondamental « not only in generating the transnational city but also in endorsing a reading of it as such » (245). Cet article se base sur ces mêmes prémisses d’une double relation à l’espace urbain montréalais. Si la ville imprime d’une part sa marque sur les immigrants présentés par Agnant dans La dot de Sara, elle se voit aussi transformée par ces mêmes migrants par le biais de multiples tactiques dont les jeux de langue mêlant oraliture2 et écriture. Une nouvelle lecture de l’espace urbain émerge alors qui modifie celui-ci non seulement pour les migrants mais pour les résidents de souche. Tout en s’inspirant des conclusions de de Certeau, l’analyse proposée replace le roman dans le cadre d’une écriture postcoloniale héritée des multiples tactiques de résistance adoptées par les esclaves sur les plantations du Nouveau Monde. Ainsi, bien que le marron, esclave ayant fui la plantation, soit devenu un des héros de l’histoire de la résistance antillaise, parvenant même parfois à se voir reconnaître des droits sur la terre comme en Jamaïque, voire à chasser les planteurs du pouvoir comme en Haïti, la petite marronne a aussi largement contribué à l’histoire de l’opposition interne au système plantocratique. Que ce soit par le biais de sabotages, d’empoisonnement, de refus de travailler ou procréer, les esclaves de la plantation ont su trouver maintes tactiques oppositionnelles. A ces tactiques ayant pour but d’entraver le fonctionnement du système, correspondait toute une panoplie de moyens d’opposition culturels, tels que l’émergence de religions syncrétiques, les traditions du carnaval, ou encore les chants, contes et récits hérités de l’Afrique mère et/ou nés de la matrice créole. Parmi ces derniers, les récits mettant en scène des figures de tricksters telles qu’Anancy l’araignée se rebellant contre un pouvoir royal par le biais de multiples tricheries se prêtaient particulièrement bien au 2

Le concept d’oraliture a pour origine un texte de l’écrivain Ernst Mirville publié dans la revue haïtienne Le Nouvelliste en 1974 puis repris dans le cadre d’un entretien en 1984. Par le biais de ce terme, Mirville ne souligne pas seulement l’art codifié de la parole et du chant mais élargit son application à diverses productions et souligne le passage d'une oraliture reposant uniquement sur les possibilités du corps humain, à une oraliture faisant appel à diverses technologies. Pour de plus amples informations, voir l’article de Maximilien Laroche « Oraliture et Littérature » paru dans Sociopoética.

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contexte de la plantation. L’araignée adoptant de multiples apparences, vivant entre deux mondes et jouant de la langue pour mieux tisser sa toile est une figure de l’oraliture qui reflète non seulement les tactiques adoptées par les esclaves dans les plantations mais celles de leurs descendants devant résister à de multiples autres menaces pesant sur leur identité après l’abolition. Dans L’invention du quotidien, Michel de Certeau oppose aux stratégies institutionnelles de contrôle du peuple diverses tactiques individuelles allant de résistances externes à oppositions internes. Son analyse reflète la mainmise des plantocrates s’exerçant sur les lieux, êtres et objets de la plantation cette matrice du Nouveau Monde et les diverses méthodes de résistance et d’opposition au système mises en place par les esclaves. Après une brève analyse des parallèles entre les stratégies et tactiques de de Certeau et celles qui régissent le monde de la plantation, j’analyserai comment les lieux de vie, ravitaillement, travail forment un nœud centré sur l’échange entre commères en Haïti alors qu’ils se diffractent à Montréal, obligeant les migrantes à adopter de nouvelles tactiques pour les relier. Le rôle ambigu de l’église tant en Haïti qu’au Québec souligne paradoxalement la prise de pouvoir des femmes qui ne trouvent leur autonomisation que dans le tissage d’une toile féminine reliant de multiples fils et leur permettant, telles des Anancy, de préserver et transmettre leur identité haïtienne. Prêtre jésuite, Michel de Certeau s’intéressa sa vie durant à «l’homme ordinaire. Héros commun. Personnage disséminé. Marcheur innombrable» (de Certeau, 11). Ce marcheur innombrable est confronté aux diverses stratégies de structuration de l’espace, boulevards, avenues, rues mais aussi murs et autres obstacles qui bloquent sa progression. De Certeau définit de telle stratégies comme «le calcul des rapports de force qui devient possible à partir du moment où un sujet de vouloir et de pouvoir [une entreprise, une armée, une cité, une institution scientifique] est isolable d’un environnement ». (59) Or, cet espace réglementé est celui-là même qui offre au marcheur les interstices lui permettant de tracer son propre chemin. Faisant appel à de multiples tactiques, « ruses silencieuses et subtiles, pratiques réfractaires, mécanismes de résistance, mobilités manœuvrières » (Bedin et Fournier), le marcheur tisse un nouveau maillage reliant les divers lieux de son existence. A cette relation entre stratégies institutionnelles de structuration de l’espace et tactiques individuelles d’appropriation de l’espace correspond chez de Certeau un jeu entre écriture et oralité. Ainsi, si l’écriture impose ses codes, l’oralité permet à la communauté de s’approprier un autre espace : « la place d’où l’on parle est extérieure à l’entreprise scripturaire. L’élocution survient hors des lieux où se fabriquent les systèmes d’énoncés. » (ibid).

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Cette structuration de l’espace divisé entre l’entreprise scripturaire d’une part et le lieu dénonciation d’autre part est toutefois contredite par le rôle de l’oraliture dans de nombreuses sociétés, dont les cultures créoles nées sur les plantations. Dès les années 50, Aimé Césaire souligne l’importance du « Verbe marronner », titre d’un poème qu’il dédit à l’écrivain haïtien René Dépestre. A la petite marronne correspondrait ainsi un marronnage linguistique, ne s’inscrivant pas dans l’opposition français/créole mais dans les interstices de la langue française que Césaire manie pour mieux la remanier. La hiérarchie oppositionnelle qui sépare traditionnellement le discours et l’écriture, le premier étant perçu comme naturel ,direct et le second comme une représentation artificielle et oblique (Culler, 100) fait ici place à une autre perspective, le discours émergeant comme une forme d’écriture que Culler nomme « vocal writing » par opposition à « graphic writing » (Culler, 101). Ainsi, tant les récits, les contes et les chants transmis de bouche à oreille que les poèmes, pièces de théâtre ou romans émergent comme des stratégies discursives de dissimulation faisant partie d’un « overall pattern of revolt and selfdefinition that functions through the interstices of language and culture » (Murdoch, 205). Pour reprendre la dichotomie élaborée par de Certeau dans L’Invention du quotidien, les contes et chants des esclaves, voire la manipulation de la langue même par le détour, s’inscrivent ainsi dans le cadre non pas de stratégies de résistance externes mais de tactiques d’opposition internes. Car si les maîtres façonnent le paysage pour en tirer le meilleur profit et pour exercer un contrôle constant sur les esclaves, qu’ils surveillent du haut de leur maison sise sur une colline, ils interdisent de même l’accès à l’écrit. En reléguant les esclaves aux pratiques orales –chants, contes, récits de veillée, ils leur ouvrent par là même de multiples moyens d’expression communautaire. Les tactiques de résistance des esclaves, celles liées en particulier au petit marronnage, vont modifier l’espace par le sabotage, la destruction de cultures mais aussi transmettre tout un imaginaire subversif puisant entre autres dans les contes animaliers venus d’Afrique de l’Ouest, dont ceux d’Anancy l’araignée. Ainsi, aux maîtres que Simone SchwarzBart assimile à des araignées prédatrices, les Desaragnes de Pluie et Vent sur Télumée Miracle, vont répondre les femmes de la communauté qui tracent de nouvelles trajectoires, tissent des liens permettant à chacune de trouver sa voie/x. 3

3

Voir à ce sujet De Souza Pascale, « When Anancy meets the Desaragnes: an arachnean reading of The Bridge of Beyond, » MaComère, 2000 vol. 3, 57-68.

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De même, les migrantes dans La dot de Sara, en particulier les grandmères venues d’Haïti pour rejoindre leurs enfants et petits-enfants à Montréal, puisent dans leurs traditions communautaires l’inspiration requise pour renouer les liens avec les commères que la migration a distendus mais aussi pour tisser littéralement une nouvelle toile dans les rues de Montréal. Comme le souligne Fulton : To the extent that such immigrant speech acts draw new lines of interdictions on the urban topography, the superimposition of literal and figurative acts of reading also suggests an intermediary layer of translation: the city dweller who translates while walking (or in order to walk) offers not only the uniquely creative if ephemeral enunciations of de Certeau's walkers but also the palimpsestic mappings of multiply inflected signs and meanings, readings and translations. (247).

Ainsi, Mariana, Chimène et autres commères de La dot de Sara élaborent au gré de leurs marches et leurs rencontres, une nouvelle cartographie de Montréal, traduisant les signes urbains en nouvelles énonciations, qui, loin d’être éphémères, modifient l’espace urbain lui-même. La dot de Sara s’inscrit dans une longue tradition de romans féminins antillais focalisés sur la transmission matrifocale de stratégies de survie et de résistance identitaire. Cette transmission s’effectue souvent de grandmère en petite-fille comme dans Pluie et Vent sur Télumée Miracle de Simone Schwarz-Bart ou L’Exil selon Julia de Gisèle Pineau. Ce dernier roman, ainsi qu’Un plat de porc aux bananes vertes coécrit par André et Simone Schwarz-Bart, examine comment les personnes âgées doivent négocier leur propre place de migrante afin d’élaborer les stratégies de survie nécessaires dans leur nouvel espace/temps et de transmettre leur savoir-faire. Dans La dot de Sara, Agnant s’inscrit elle-même dans cette longue lignée d’écrivaines en faisant partager au lecteur le destin de Marianna tissant un lien entre sa propre grand-mère Aïda et Sara, sa petitefille née à Montréal. Aïda lui enseigne les outils requis à sa survie économique et personnelle et lui permettant de migrer avec succès du village d’Anse-aux-Mombins vers Port-au-Prince. En cousant littéralement les vêtements qu’elle vend et métaphoriquement des liens avec clientes et commères, Marianna acquiert les moyens de subvenir aux besoins de sa fille Giselle. La migration de cette dernière vers Montréal puis celle de Marianna invitée à venir aider élever sa petite-fille remettent toutefois en question la transmission d’un tel savoir. Confrontée à un espace urbain éclaté, Marianna doit apprendre à tisser de nouveaux liens. L’église joue un rôle ambigu dans cette autonomisation migrante en faisant de son sous-sol vétuste un lieu de rencontres où des Haïtiens soit tracent leur propre chemin

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soit rêvent d’un retour vers des terres d’abondance et des maisons aux galeries ouvertes sur la communauté. L’analyse proposée ici va se focaliser sur quatre espaces clefs : les lieux de vie, de ravitaillement, de travail et de culte. Confrontées à la nécessité de connecter ces quatre lieux, Marianna, Chimène et les autres tissent une nouvelle toile urbaine qui transforme non seulement leur propre espace urbain mais le tissu de la ville elle-même.

L’Autonomisation par la Migration La migration est souvent perçue comme une perte de pouvoir pour la personne âgée antillaise. Dans L’Exil selon Julia de Gisèle Pineau, Man Ya est isolée dans l’appartement de banlieue parisienne où résident son fils et sa famille, coupée de sa terre et langue natales et incapable de trouver son chemin vers l’église du Sacré-Cœur. Dans Un Plat de porc aux bananes vertes d’André et Simone Schwarz-Bart, Mariotte se sent de même perdue dans un Paris froid et enneigé. Pourtant, la migration peut aussi être source d’autonomisation, offrant la possibilité d’échapper à des relations hommefemme contraignantes et de transmettre des liens matrifocaux. La vie à Montréal inverse ainsi dans La dot de Sara les relations de pouvoir entre hommes et femmes antillais. Francine se rappelle de sa vie en Haïti sous l’emprise de son conjoint, « C’est vrai qu’il m’avait donné une boutique, mais qui contrôlait l’argent? Lui. Qui décidait de ce qu’il fallait y vendre? Encore lui. Osvald n’a jamais compris que j’étais une adulte, pas seulement sa femme, tout comme il avait sa femme, son cheval, ses terres! » (DS, 110).4 Le départ devient alors une fuite vers un monde meilleur : « le premier de mes enfants qui m’envoie un billet et m’offre de partir (...) je m’en vais et, s’il plaît à Dieu, je ne reviens jamais! » (DS, 110). Venette conclut de même «Ici nous avons les moyens d’être un peu plus indépendantes » (DS, 116). Giselle analyse très bien ce nouveau rapport de forces entre les genres : La vérité, c’est qu’il y a vraiment très peu d’hommes qui acceptent de rester. Ils disent qu’ils ne peuvent pas supporter les rigueurs de l’hiver. Mais ce n’est qu’un prétexte. La vraie raison, c’est qu’ils ne peuvent pas jouer au coq….Ici, c’est plus difficile pour eux de courir les femmes. (DS, 107)

A ses yeux, la migration est pour la femme antillaise « une bonne façon de se débarrasser d’un tyran » (DS, 107). Le défi demeure toutefois de recréer

4 Les citations extraites de La dot de Sara seront indiquées sous la forme (DS, numéro de page)

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les liens entre commères existant en Haïti et leur permettant de transmettre culture et pouvoir matrifocal. Agnant établit dès le départ l’existence de ce lien intergénérationnel. Ainsi, Sara rappelle en de nombreux points son arrière grand-mère Aïda : « Elle a tout d’elle, ses yeux de braise et de tendresse, ses cheveux en lianes qui me donnent tant de fil à retordre lorsque je dois les coiffer » (DS, 13). Tout comme Sara élevée à Montréal, Aïda doit faire face à de multiples défis dans sa vie de femme rurale en Haïti. Elle ne vit pas dans un lieu idyllique et fertile mais dans une « région aride où candélabres et bayahondes se disputaient les rares gouttes de pluie» (DS, 14). Le village de l’Anse-aux-Mombins est situé dans « une cuvette entre deux mornes, un affaissement de terrain » (DS, 14-15), termes qui évoquent les noms de lieux choisis dans un autre roman éponyme des Antilles : Pluie et Vent sur Télumée Miracle de la guadeloupéenne Simone Schwarz-Bart où les femmes de la dynastie des Lougandor habitent des lieux tels que Fonds Zombi, L’abandonnée. Tout comme les femmes de la dynastie Lougandor, Aïda est toutefois « une guerrière …une faiseuse de miracle» (DS, 15) qui « savait où elle allait » (DS, 13). C’est cette force de tracer son propre chemin que Marianna va transmettre à Sara car « La vie, tu sais, n’est rien qu’un long fil que l’on tire et qui s’en va et qui revient, sans cesse, toujours le même fil. » (DS, 16) Toutefois, pour ce faire, elle doit apprendre à négocier le nouvel espace/temps de la vie à Montréal et en particulier tisser des liens entre lieux de vie, de ravitaillement, et de travail autrefois unis en Haïti.

Lieu Commun Consciente de l’importance de ses racines au sens littéral du terme, Marianne trace une carte de l’Anse-aux-Mombins pour Sara : « lovée dans sa cuvette, avec tout autour les mornes bleus et les localités avoisinantes : Désarmes, la Plaine d’Azur. Au fond de la vallée, la petite maison de grandmère Aïda. » (DS, 68) La maison semble ainsi elle-même enracinée dans le paysage avoisinant, inscrite dans le pays. Cette maison va permettre à Aïda de réunir en un seul emplacement ses lieux de vie, de ravitaillement et de travail en ouvrant une boutique et proposant ses services de couturière. Ainsi, « on venait de tous les coins de l’Anse-aux-Mombins acheter chez Aïda deux doigts de morue, un peu de sel, une tête de hareng… Pendant ce temps, grand-mère cousait bout à bout des sacs de toile de Siam, de farine » (DS, 17). Les sacs évoquent non seulement les échanges commerciaux mais les échanges humains qui composent la mosaïque antillaise et tout comme la population qui se créolise, les sacs se

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transforment en « caracos, robes à volants, jupons et blouses ornés de ricrac multicolores » (DS, 17) qu’elle va vendre à de multiples marchandes venues de toute la région. Agnant n’établit pas de rapport direct entre la création de ces tissus multicolores et le maillage ethno démographique aux Antilles. Pourtant, l’image même de ces tissus migrants se transformant sous les doigts de la couturière pour vêtir les corps de femmes créoles avant de s’effilocher pour être voués à d’autres destins, évoque les phénomènes de créolisation infinis tels que les définissent Lionnet et Shih dans The Creolization of Theory : nés des économies de plantation du Nouveau Monde, ils continuent « to take new forms in the contemporary world, leading to unknown and unforeseeable results » (Lionnet et Shih, 30). C’est dans cette tradition que Marianna va puiser la force de recréer un tel réseau à Port-au-Prince. Ainsi, lorsqu’elle quitte l’Anse-aux-Mombins pour s’installer rue Pistache, elle ouvre un atelier de couture, sa machine à coudre « face à la fenêtre qui donnait sur la galerie avant » (DS, 31). Ses vêtements lui attirent beaucoup de commandes et lui permettent de s’intégrer non seulement dans l’espace urbain mais dans son calendrier : « de mars à juin, c’était le défilé des communiantes » (DS, 31). Ce monde de femmes s’inscrit dans un espace/temps communautaire où malgré la pauvreté, Marianna réussit à payer les frais scolaires de Giselle. Le seul lieu qui résiste à ces tactiques de résistance, à ces tentatives de transformation de l’espace urbain en une communauté, est l’église. Car, celle-ci demeure le lieu d’espoirs déçus, même si les femmes sont très croyantes et que la pratique religieuse s’inscrit, tout comme la maison d’Aïda, dans le paysage haïtien. Ainsi, les femmes se retrouvent à l’église, priant saint Yves, saint Antoine, et vont en pèlerinage où leurs voix se mêlent au rite et au bruit de l’eau: « une forêt de bras de femmes sous une cascade d’eau, puis les voix, les prières, sur tous les tons, un bourdonnement fait de lamentations confondues aux grondements de la cascade. » (DS, 53). Mais ce dialogue avec les éléments naturels, cette nouvelle voie reliant bâtiment religieux et cascade purificatrice, bute sur le refus des saints à répondre aux attentes des pèlerines. L’église reste le lieu de la déception, car « tous les saints du ciel réunis [sont] impuissants » (DS, 53) et lorsque l’amie de Marianna, MarieAnge, se tourne vers Sainte-Claire pour obtenir de l’aide, une autre commère lui rappelle la futilité de sa démarche : « Comment se peut-il que tu n’aies rien de mieux à faire que d’aller à cette heure-ci contempler sainte Claire avec ses joues et ses lèvres bien roses? » (DS, 54). Sainte-Claire la bien nommée ne semble ainsi pouvoir offrir aucune soutien, contrairement aux liens entre femmes. Dans ce dernier cas, c’est une autre femme et non Sainte-Claire qui aide Marie-Ange en lui donnant de quoi nourrir ses enfants. La communauté révèle ici la force spirituelle qu’elle puise d’une

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aide mutuelle et qui lui permet de s’autonomiser des forces en place pour devenir autarcique. La carte dessinée par Marianna lui fournit une tierce stratégie entre l’oraliture telle que la définit Mirville et l’écriture pour transmettre Haïti à sa petite-fille. Dans une interview, Agnant souligne le rôle de diverses manifestations d’une oraliture haïtienne : « sous-jacent à l'écriture il y a une voix, celle de la conteuse. On le sent de façon évidente dans La dot de Sara. » (Proulx, 2006, 53). Dans « Bearing Witness and transmitting memory in the works of Marie-Célie Agnant », Patrice Proulx interprète cette voix comme étant celle du griot assumée par de multiples protagonistes « as they become the central figures forming a restorative link between a legendary ancestral past tied to an Afro-Caribbean space and a more transitory present that is characterized by deracination and by geographical and psychological alienation » (Proulx, 2005, 36). Marianna assume certes le rôle d’une griotte qui transmet à sa petite-fille non seulement les récits de son héritage haïtien mais la langue même dans et par laquelle les conteurs ont su s’opposer au monde aliénant de la plantation. Ce faisant, elle lui inculque une certaine fierté ancrée dans les récits d’ancêtres africains et dans leurs itérations haïtiennes. Ce rôle du griot reste toutefois profondément ancré dans le lieu de l’énonciation et inclut la participation de l’auditoire. Or, à Montréal, Sara ne connaît pas l’espace afro-caribéen et ne peut donc participer au récit. Elle tire certes un certain ancrage identitaire des contes de Marianna, mais ne peut devenir griotte à son tour sur la seule base de cette transmission orale. Le rôle de la carte devient alors fondamental car elle permet de partager des lieux, lieux de mémoire mais aussi mémoire des lieux transmise sans recours à l’écriture mais par la seule tactique du dialogue entre dessin et la voix. Elle montre au sens premier du terme l’imbrication des lieux de résidence, de ravitaillement et de travail dans le paysage antillais, en opposition aux lieux diffractés de Montréal. Les réseaux féminins, représentés littéralement et métaphoriquement par la pratique de la couture, qui relient ces divers lieux, vont être confrontés à de multiples obstacles du fait de la migration vers le Québec. Si Giselle entretient ainsi le lien intergénérationnel en demandant à sa mère de venir, elle confronte également cette dernière à un monde diffracté où lieux de résidence, de ravitaillement et de travail concourent à son isolement. Paradoxalement, c’est l’église qui va lui fournir les moyens de recréer un réseau de commères.

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Lieux Éclatés Contrairement à Haïti, que ce soit l’Anse-aux-Mombins ou Port-au-Prince, Montréal paraît une ville éclatée, difractée où tout concourt à isoler le migrant dans des lieux de vie cloisonnés, des lieux de ravitaillement et de travail aliénés de leur environnement et devenus aliénants. Elle incarne les stratégies mêmes d’un sujet de vouloir et de pouvoir (ici, le gouvernement d’une cité) pour contraindre sa main d’œuvre à s’adapter aux dictats du milieu urbain avec ses divisions entre lieux de production (usines), lieux de ravitaillement (grands magasins, centres commerciaux) et lieux de vie (banlieues aisées, cités dortoirs, ghettos). Agnant évoque les conditions de vie de plusieurs Haïtiennes confrontées à une nouvelle forme de promiscuité. Chimène souligne le manque d’espace, une ancienne migrante quitte le logement de sa fille à cause des scènes avec son beau-fils, une troisième est mise à la porte par sa fille qui l’avait fait chercher. (DS, 129) Pour Marianna, la promiscuité de l’appartement où elle vit avec sa fille et petite-fille, sa couleur emblématique de même que l’impossibilité de sortir contribuent à son isolement : « je n’avais pas l’habitude de vivre ainsi, du matin au soir entre les quatre murs blancs d’une cage ». (DS, 27). Cet appartement « sans balcon, sans galerie » devient une prison où les 3 femmes vivent « barricadées, coupées du monde » (DS, 27). Marianna s’empresse d’ajouter qu’elle ne vit pas dans un désert, comme pour déjouer le sort qui l’a effectivement fait venir dans un désert affectif. Mais ce nouveau lieu de vie est bien en fait un désert anonyme qui se vide de ses habitants chaque matin. C’est un édifice de six étages « qui comptait, si je ne me trompe, plus d’une cinquantaine d’appartements » (DS, 27, je souligne) et recélant d’immenses couloirs « où s’alignaient, toutes pareilles, dix portes grises. Le matin, je les entendais se refermer. » (DS, 28). Édifice au nombre d’appartements inconnu, portes grises, uniformes, fermées: nous sommes bien loin de la boutique d’Aïda ouverte sur sa communauté et débordant de vêtements bariolés ou de la ruelle Pistache. Le temps consacré à Sara contribue à son isolement : « Sara lutte ferme pour faire le vide autour de moi. Comme une petite fée, elle s’applique à tout effacer de ma mémoire. Les contours de l’Anse-aux Mombins, les mornes bleus presque violets… tout cela lentement en moi s’estompe. » (DS, 38). La maison qu’elle avait gardée à Port-au-Prince et confiée à un ami se transforme en simple produit dans une nouvelle société de consommation, un produit que Giselle veut vendre pour acheter une maison montréalaise avec une galerie fermée. (DS, 62) Le climat à Montréal contribue à cet isolement. Marianna trouve un certain charme à la rotation des saisons et à la venue du printemps, de l’été

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et de l’automne. Chacune de ces saisons lui permet de découvrir divers aspects de Montréal et n’entrave en aucun cas ses allées et venues. Elles contribuent toutefois à l’élaboration d’un nouveau calendrier qui vient renforcer son impression de déplacement géographique et culturel. L’hivernage et le carême ne sont plus, les saisons ne sont plus marquées par des fêtes de saints, des pèlerinages, des communions ou autres dates historiques. L’hiver est le point d’orgue de ce phénomène d’aliénation car non seulement il apporte une nouvelle saison inconnue mais il entrave les déplacements de Marianne. La froidure, pour reprendre le terme utilisé au Québec, est telle qu’elle envahit même l’appartement: Chaque jour, au réveil, un souffle glacé envahit la maison et ma paralyse. Je sens des courants d’air partout. Un matin, tout était blanc… les arbres n’avaient même pas eu le temps de se débarrasser complètement de leurs feuilles. J’étais restée un long moment, subjuguée, à contempler ces lourds flocons qui tourbillonnaient, indifférents… (DS, 41) La neige, une immense lumière qui monte du sol. Pourtant mon corps se recroqueville. Il ne parvient pas à accepter ce changement radical de température. Cette lumière ne peut le réchauffer. Telle une marée, le froid m’enveloppe. (DS, 42) Sara n’avait pas le don de me faire oublier les fenêtres givrées; son babillage ne parvenait pas à couvrir la rage du vent sur le toit, ni cette froidure dont rien ne pouvait avoir raison. (DS, 52) le grand parc en face de la maison…se transforme, l’hiver venu, en un cimetière d’arbres, un asile de géants vaincus par le froid. (DS, 52)

Le cycle des saisons semble même s’être arrêté : rien ne peut mettre fin à ce froid, pas même la voix d’un enfant : « Lorsque les flocons commencent à tomber, on a l’impression qu’ils ne s’arrêteront qu’à la fin du monde » (DS, 42). Mon pays, c’est l’hiver, disait le poète québécois Gilles Vigneault mais pour Marianna, l’hiver n’est que le froid, ce froid qui tue les arbres, givre les fenêtres et transit les corps sans espoir de printemps. Si Chimène et Marianna déplorent toutes deux la venue de l’hiver, elles abordent cette saison sous des angles différents. Alors que Marianna se recroqueville et emploie « toute la force de [s]on être à détester le froid de l’hiver » (DS, 70), Chimène maugrée certes « contre le froid qui l’oblige à s’affubler ainsi pour sortir » (DS, 71) mais elle brave les rues enneigées. Marianna peut difficilement rejoindre d’autres lieux qui furent en Haïti lieux d’échanges et de commérages, lieux d’inscription dans la communauté. Pourtant, elle va peu à peu s’inspirer de l’exemple de Chimène et élaborer de nouvelles

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tactiques lui permettant de s’échapper de l’appartement enneigé, résistant ainsi à la structuration de l’espace/temps montréalais. A ses yeux, un magasin est un lieu à double fonctionnalité : échange de produits (connus) et de nouvelles. Elle rejette ainsi les grands magasins que l’on admire sans autre but que d’y flâner : « Quelle drôle d’idée d’aller traîner devant les vitrines, regarder ce qu’il y a sur les étagères! » (DS, 43), et trouve ces boutiques « abrutissantes » (DS, 43). Le marché offre plus d’opportunités non seulement d’interaction humaine mais aussi de découvertes sensorielles : « J’aime, par contre, me rendre à ce marché en plein air où tranquillement, le sens aux aguets, je parcours des allées, dévorant des yeux les montagnes de fruits et de légumes » (DS, 43), « ce sont les odeurs qui me parlent de la vie, du soleil, le marché de poissons qui m’offre l’odeur de la mer » (DS, 57-8). Malheureusement, ils lui rappellent aussi son statut d’étrangère car ces étals ne recèlent ni grenadine, ni corossol, ni « beau fruit d’arbre à pain bien à point » (DS, 57-8). Contrairement à Chimène qui découvre et apprécie l’accès à diverses cuisines du monde entier, Marianna regrette de ne pas retrouver les fruits et légumes de son pays. Le Montréal des années 1990 foisonne pourtant de migrants apportant leurs traditions culinaires et leurs fruits et légumes. Il semble que ces tactiques de résistance à la cuisine locale n’aient toutefois pas atteint les marchés que fréquente Marianna. Nombre de chercheurs ont souligné le rôle fondamental que joue la cuisine dans la construction identitaire. Dans un article intitulé « Edwige Danticat's Kitchen History », Valérie Loichot explore le rôle de la cuisine chez une autre écrivaine haïtienne diasporique. Elle y souligne le rôle de la nourriture dans la création d’un lien entre personnages et pays natal : Just as food maintains tight links among the members of the community, it establishes a vital relationship between the inhabitants and their immediate environment. The goods consumed come directly from the land. There is no mention of imported or processed products. In the absence of refrigeration, food is obtained daily, from the local market or the garden. Therefore, production, preparation, and consumption of food frame time and community in a tight and cyclical manner. (Loichot, 94-95)

Ce lien entre lieu de vie et produits fournis par la nature affectent jusqu’à la structure de l’espace/temps. Or, la diaspora perturbe ces liens en introduisant de multiples nouvelles cuisines, en coupant les migrants de leur accès aux produits venus de leur terre et en leur interdisant ainsi le retour à un calendrier cyclique. Dans Breath, Eyes, Memory, le roman d’Edwige Danticat analysé par Loichot, c’est par l’intermédiaire d’un repas reliant quatre générations de femmes que le personnage principal parvient à

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surmonter la boulimie induite par la diaspora. L’Exil selon Julia, autre roman antillais de la diaspora écrit par l’auteur guadeloupéenne Gisèle Pineau, souligne le rôle de la cuisine dans la préservation identitaire et la transmission de l’héritage culturel en situation de diaspora. Dans respectivement « Culinary diasporas: the language of food in Gisèle Pineau’s Un papillon dans la cité and L’exil selon Julia » et « Reconstruire dans l'exil: la nourriture créatrice chez Gisèle Pineau », Brinda Mehta et Valérie Loichot analysent ce rôle dans la transmission intergénérationnelle entre Man Ya, grand-mère exilée, et sa petite fille Gisèle n’ayant jamais vécu aux Antilles. Mehta interprète l’approche de Man Ya comme une forme de « culinary resistance to deterritorialization » (Mehta, 43). Si chez Pineau, Man Ya parvient à recréer la Guadeloupe dans la cuisine métropolitaine de son fils et à transmettre certains de ses parfums et goûts à sa petite fille, chez Agnant, Marianna ne parvient pas à trouver les ingrédients lui permettant une telle préservation identitaire et transmission intergénérationnelle. De même, alors qu’en Haïti, ses talents de couturière lui permettaient de faire de sa maison/atelier un centre d’échanges inscrit dans le tissu urbain, à Montréal, le travail exige de quitter son lieu de vie pour s’aliéner dans des usines produisant des vêtements uniformes et anonymes. « Tous les matins, je perçois la va-et-vient des racloirs sur les pare-brise, les pneus qui hurlent sur la glace, les automobiles qui démarrent bruyamment, tout le quartier qui part à la recherche du pain quotidien, dans les bureaux, dans les écoles, comme Giselle » (DS, 44). On assiste ici à une inversion des échanges, alors que la maison/atelier était au centre de la toile et que les clients y venaient passer et chercher leurs commandes, à Montréal, les habitants quittent leur lieu de résidence pour aller gagner leur vie. Nombre de migrants se dirigent vers Rabanel, « une rue où l’on retrouve des usines, des manufactures de toutes sortes, construites comme de grands cubes avec des fenêtres qui très souvent ne peuvent s’ouvrir » (DS, 160). Le contraste est flagrant avec la maison/boutique/atelier d’Aïda ou la machine à coudre face à la galerie de Marianna. Si, Marianna devait certes souvent travailler des heures durant pour finir ses commandes, ces dernières étaient du moins personnalisées et correspondant au calendrier annuel. A Montréal, les couturières « passent leur journée dans ces cubes, courbées sur les piles de vêtements qu’il leur faut coudre à toute vitesse, tant de douzaines à l’heure » (DS, 160). Elles ne vont jamais revoir ces vêtements qu’elles ne vendront pas elles mêmes à des clients connus.5 5

Il est intéressant de noter qu’en Haïti même, cette tradition de couture artisanale a souvent cédé la place à des ateliers de confection exploitant une main d’œuvre

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Ce travail répétitif en lieu clos excentre les travailleuses et contribue à leur isolement, à leur exclusion. D’activité exigeant savoir-faire et tissant des liens communautaires, la couture est devenue seule affaire de profit, l’argent gagné retournant à peine vers la communauté car une bonne partie est expédiée vers la famille restée dans le pays d’origine. Ni le lieu de résidence, ni ceux de ravitaillement et de travail ne contribuent ainsi à l’intégration de Marianna à Montréal. Paradoxalement, le lieu qui semblait être celui de l’exclusion en Haïti, l’église, devient à Montréal refuge et centre de rencontres. Il va devenir le centre d’une nouvelle toile transformant l’espace urbain et offrant à diverses migrantes l’accès à l’oraliture permettant de tisser une nouvelle communauté.

Lieu de Culte au Centre d’une Toile Urbaine Comme nous l’avons vu auparavant, l’église en Haïti joue un rôle ambigu. Elle est pleine « à toute heure du jour » (61) de femmes éplorées mais celles-ci prient en vain des saints étrangers. Il n’est guère étonnant que les branches noires des arbres dépouillés en hiver évoquent pour Marianna les bras levés des femmes requérant en vain une intervention divine en Haïti. Pourtant, Marianna va s’y rendre à Montréal. Elle se trouve toutefois en porte-à-faux par rapport au calendrier des messes car elle doit tout d’abord déposer Sara à l’école : « la messe est souvent terminée lorsque j’y arrive, mais je reste là, assise, toujours à la même place » (DS, 61). Ce rôle passif va se transformer peu à peu sous l’impulsion de Chimène. Après avoir rencontré son amie d’enfance par hasard, Marianna va modifier son propre emploi du temps pour y inclure des visites à l’église. Elle ne s’y rend pas pour la messe mais pour y retrouver d’autres Haïtiens tous les samedis midi au sous-sol de l’église. Saint-Antoine, Sainte-Claire ont fait place à « l’Église des Saints d’Ici et d’Ailleurs » (DS, 105), un espace qui échappe enfin à l’hiver : « un cocon où nous nous donnons rendez-vous, beau temps, mauvais temps » (DS, 106). C’est là que Marianna et d’autres migrants haïtiens : « créent un espace où déverser leur déception face à leurs enfants qui les ignorent, leur colère face à la situation désastreuse de l'île et leur incompréhension devant une société à leurs yeux étrangère » (Selao, 14). En partageant leur souffrance, les membres du club partagent toutefois aussi leurs tactiques de résistance à l’assimilation et replongent dans une culture où l’oralité est à la base de la communauté. Le défi toutefois est de pouvoir se rendre sur ce lieu par des rues inconnues, de devenir cette locale au profit de l’exportation. Le tremblement de terre de 2010 a paradoxalement fortement perturbé cette nouvelle industrie.

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‘femme ordinaire, cette héroïne commune, ce personnage disséminé, cette marcheuse innombrable’ pour féminiser la citation de de Certeau. Or, la plupart d’entre elles ne parle ni ne lit le français. Leur capacité à se déplacer dans la ville en se fiant à leur habilité à demander leur chemin ou à lire des instructions écrites est fortement limitée par leur créolophonie. L’écrit sous la forme de messages ou d’instructions imprimées, et l’écriture, sous la forme de prise de notes à partir d’explications orales, ne leur permettent en aucun cas de se diriger dans la ville. Bien au contraire, ils contribuent à leur isolement et leur incapacité à trouver une nouvelle voix/e. C’est encore une fois Chimène qui va trouver une solution. La première fois où Chimène se rend à l’Oratoire Saint-Joseph, elle va se servir de diverses tactiques mêlant écrit et oral pour trouver son chemin. Elle demande tout d’abord à un jeune compatriote de l’y déposer, puis le prie de noter les instructions sur un carton qu’elle va alors montrer à un chauffeur de bus pour pouvoir se rendre seule à sa destination. Une autre tactique consistera à griffer les arbres bordant les rues pour y tracer son chemin. Comme le note Fulton, ces stratégies « transform both the city space and its attendant metaphors of reading and writing » (246). Ni oraliture, ni écriture, cette dernière stratégie fait toutefois appel à la capacité d’inscrire un signe déchiffrable et durable. En griffant les arbres, Chimène inscrit sa trace en filigrane dans l’espace urbain, tout comme ses ancêtres esclaves chantaient ou contaient leur opposition en transformant la langue du maître. En élaborant une nouvelle langue apposée à la flore même de Montréal, elle déstabilise l’espace urbain et confronte les habitants de Montréal à un balisage étrange(r) de leur ville. Elle leur impose ainsi une nouvelle manière de lire leur ville, manière qui va demeurer hermétique à la majorité d’entre eux, rejetés hors de leur propre espace urbain en mutation. Cette seconde stratégie introduit un nouvel élément car si la première permettait à une Chimène analphabète de trouver une solution personnelle pour apprendre un itinéraire sans recours direct à la lecture, la seconde balise littéralement l’espace urbain. Elle y appose une marque, « an alternative set of visual signs, a visible and transformative trace » (Fulton, 249) qui va devenir de plus en plus visible au fur et à mesure que les arbres vont croître et permettre la transmission d’un savoir à d’autres migrants en quête de l’oratoire. Au début du roman, Marianna reste tournée vers le passé, allant « sans but » par des rues dont « je ne connaissais rien du passé, ces rues où je me sentais étrangère, habitée par une autre histoire, une histoire écrite et contée dans une langue dont on ne connaissait pas la musique ici » (81) sans se rendre compte toutefois que ces marches sans but dans la ville sont en elles mêmes des tactiques de résistance, des moyens de reformuler l’espace

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urbain en se faisant fi des itinéraires tracés, voire même des obstacles. Chimène, elle, comprend plus vite que son amie les tactiques dont elle dispose et transforme le paysage urbain pour y laisser une trace ouverte sur l’avenir. De même, alors que Marianne se méfie du métro, Chimène le perçoit comme un conduit ouvrant sur un nouveau monde : Mais le métro n’a jamais mangé personne, Mia. Enfin, pas à ma connaissance. Moi je le trouve fantastique. En un rien de temps, on peut parcourir toute la ville. Et tous ces édifices sous la terre, tu ne trouves pas cela extraordinaire, creuser ainsi le ventre de la terre pour y planter des maisons, des magasins, des restaurants!...viens avec moi, il y a une station où on trouve la nourriture de tous les pays. C’est comme voyager un peu partout. (DS, 134)

Si Marianne continue ainsi à se plaindre des marchés urbains ne lui offrant que des produits locaux, Chimème a trouvé comment avoir accès non seulement aux fruits et légumes de son enfance mais à ceux du monde entier. La ville devient pour elle un moyen de s’ouvrir au monde, de résister à l’assimilation non seulement en empruntant le chemin familier de la cuisine haïtienne mais en créant de nouvelles recettes. Contrairement à Julia chez Pineau qui ne voit dans la cuisine qu’un moyen de renouer avec son île natale et de transmettre cet héritage par l’odorat et le goût à ses petitsenfants, Chimène se place dorénavant dans la position d’une migrante ouverte à de nouveaux mondes, culinaires et autres. Les racines qui auraient pu figurer son héritage haïtien ont laissé la place à un monde rhizomatique. Il ne s’agit toutefois pas ici des rhizomes tels que les conçoit Édouard Glissant mais d’un système de galeries souterraines creusées par l’homme, le ventre de la terre donnant naissance à maisons, magasins et restaurants du monde entier. Pourtant, confrontées à la vieillesse, Chimène et Marianna retrouvent une même appréhension de cet espace urbain ; ni l’une ni l’autre ne veulent y être enterrées. Ainsi, Chimène affirme « je ne veux pas être enterrée dans les cimetières ici. Avec le froid, ça doit être terrible. Lorsque j’y pense, il me semble entendre craquer mes os comme la glace sur les trottoirs au mois de février » (DS, 135) tandis que Marianna renchérit « Je ne veux pas que mes os aient froid sous cette neige, l’hiver dure trop longtemps. J’aimerais bien dormir au chaud pour mon dernier sommeil » (DS, 137). Même Chimène qui avait trouvé les moyens de braver le froid des années durant à Montréal, craint d’y être confrontée après sa mort. C’est ainsi paradoxalement à l’approche de la mort, lorsque le corps va perdre sa chaleur, que les deux femmes se tournent vers le pays natal. Agnant choisit alors de conclure son roman sur une double ironie. Chimène meurt d’une

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insolation après une journée d’été passée à jardiner dans un pays réputé pour son froid et sa neige, alors que Marianna retourne à Port-au-Prince pour y découvrir un pays qu’elle ne (re)connaît plus. Cette nouvelle expérience souligne un autre aspect de l’expérience migrante, lorsque le migrant en vient à occuper un espace entre deux, mi pays d’origine mi pays d’immigration, ni pays d’origine ni pays d’immigration. Marianna a sans le savoir acquis une nouvelle vision de l’espace urbain haïtien, une vision montréalaise… mais pas tout à fait. Les rues et maisons de Port-au-Prince deviennent pour elles étrangères, et pourtant elle se déplace dans cette ville sans carte ni repères tels que des marques sur les arbres. Ce n’est pas la topographie qui lui est étrangère mais l’entretien des rues « jonchées de cadavres de chiens, les montagnes de détritus sur lesquelles les indigents qui fuient la misère des campagnes bâtissent leurs cases » (DS, 169). Elle devine « une guerre sourde entre les piétons, les chauffeurs et les chiens » (DS, 171) et elle apprend un nouveau calendrier car « on ne peut s’asseoir sur la galerie après sept heures » (DS, 75). Contrairement à sa case de la rue Pistache, haut lieu d’échanges communautaires, les maisons sont désormais « couvertes de lèpre, des maisons bancales qui ne savent plus comment se tenir » (DS, 169). De même, les corossols et fruits à pain, qui évoquent la cuisine locale pour un Antillais, ont fait place aux hibiscus et aux bougainvillées (DS, 169) des brochures touristiques. Dans ce nouveau monde, les liens entre lieu de résidence, de travail et de ravitaillement qu’elle a connus se sont défaits, les rues exigent de nouvelles tactiques de déplacement. Mais nul ne saurait toutefois la prendre pour une Québécoise pure laine ou autre car Haïti reste la destination de son retour fantasmé vers le pays natal. Si l’espace est devenu pour Marianna un milieu étrange mais pas tout à fait étranger, le temps s’est arrêté à l’heure du Québec. La dernière phrase du roman souligne que seule la présence de Sara pourrait réactiver la pendule : « Je l’espère et je l’attends » (DS, 177). Dans « The Disengaged Immigrant: Mapping the Francophone Caribbean Metropolis, » Dawn Fulton propose une analyse des stratégies discursives et narratives qui permettent à Chimène de tracer son chemin dans les rues de Montréal et dans le même temps, de transformer l’espace urbain en y laissant une marque indélébile. Le jeu entre traces écrites et orales permet effectivement à Chimène, Marianna et d’autres protagonistes de s’inspirer de leur héritage afro-caribéen pour non seulement trouver leur place à Montréal et ce faisant, en modifier la topographie, mais pour transmettre leur héritage et tactiques d’adaptation à leurs enfants et petitsenfants face aux stratégies aliénantes et assimilatrices de la ville. Le titre du roman suggère que la transmission de l’espace/temps haïtien de Marianna à Sara contribue en fait à l’élaboration d’un nouvel espace/temps

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haïtio-montréalais. Ce dernier englobe désormais non seulement la topographie et les quatre saisons de Montréal mais les rues et deux saisons de Port-au-Prince. Si le retour en Haïti confronte Marianna à sa nouvelle identité migrante, il oblige aussi Gisèle et Sara à faire une place plus grande au pays antillais. Ce nouvel espace/temps relie aussi toutes les générations depuis l’arrière grand-mère car la transmission englobe désormais la mère. Ainsi, Giselle reconnaît qu’elle a aussi bénéficié des enseignements de sa mère : « J'ai aussi appris à voir le monde autrement grâce à toi.... Tu n'as pas été que la gardienne de ma fille, tu as été la gardienne de mon équilibre » (DS, 161). Il lui faut toutefois le départ de Marianna pour admettre qu’elle voit désormais Montréal sous un autre jour. Ces tactiques d’adaptation à l’espace et de l’espace mêlent écrit et oral et si le créole semble absent du roman, il émerge toutefois sous diverses expressions. Sara demande ainsi à Marianna de lui « raconter là-bas au temps longtemps » (DS, 26). L’emploi de l’expression ‘au temps longtemps’ permet de réduire la distance spatiale (là-bas) et temporelle (longtemps) qui sépare Sara de son héritage. L’expression revient lorsque Marianna retrouve les membres du club haïtien et évoque : « le plaisir de parler, tout simplement, du temps longtemps » (DS, 105). La transition de l’oral vers l’écrit reste toutefois difficile pour ces migrantes analphabètes comme l’atteste le parcours de Chimène qui apprend peu à peu à écrire. Pour Sara toutefois, la transmission de l’héritage ne se poursuit pas par l’oralité mais pas la textualisation de son histoire. Le succès de la transmission ne se juge pas sur son éventuel retour vers Haïti mais sur sa promesse de passer de l’oral à l’écrit, créant ainsi de nouveaux réseaux de lecteurs : « J'écrirai ton histoire, le monde entier la lira cette histoire, alors elle ne finira jamais, elle sera éternelle, belle et éternelle » (DS, 26). L’espoir de partager avec ‘le monde entier’ reflète l’innocence de Sara âgée de six ans au moment de l’énonciation de cet extrait. A moindre échelle, Agnant parvient au travers de La Dot de Sara, à « faire un roman à partir d'un matériel sociologique…. [à] lier fiction et social » (Jurney, 385). Ce faisant, elle devient une marcheuse innombrable, racontant sa ville, et modifiant par le jeu de l’écriture la vision de ses lecteurs : Son pays, ce n’est pas seulement l’hiver.

Bibliographie Agnant, Marie-Célie. La dot de Sara. Montréal: Editions du RemueMénage, 1995. —. « Ecrire pour tuer le vide du silence. » Canadian Woman Studies 23.2 (Winter 2004): 86-91.

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Bedin, Véronique et Martine Fournier (dir.), « Michel de Certeau. » La Bibliothèque idéale des sciences humaines, Editions Sciences humaines, 2009. URL : www.cairn.info/la-bibliotheque-ideale-des-scienceshumaines-article-78.htm. Berrouët-Oriol, Robert et Robert Fournier, « L'émergence des écritures migrantes et métisses au Québec. » Québec Studies 14, 1992, p. 7-22. Culler, Jonathan. On Deconstruction: Theory and Criticism after Structuralism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1982. de Certeau, Michel. L’invention du quotidien, 1/ Arts de faire, 1ère partie, « Une culture très ordinaire. » rééd. Gallimard/ Folio Essais n° 146, 2002. Fulton, Dawn. « The Disengaged Immigrant: Mapping the Francophone Caribbean Metropolis. » French Forum 32.1-2 hiver/printemps 2007. 245-62. Jurney, Florence Ramond. « Entretien avec Marie-Célie Agnant. » The French Review 79. 2. 384-94. Laroche, Maximilien. « Oraliture et littérature. » Sociopoética, vol.1, #3. Consulté en ligne le 11 novembre 2012 à l’adresse suivante: http://eduep.uepb.edu.br/sociopoetica/publicacoes/v1n3pdf/09_maximili en_laroche.pdf Lionnet, Francoise et Shih, Shu-mei eds.. The Creolization of Theory. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011. Loichot, Valérie. « Reconstruire dans l'exil: la nourriture créatrice chez Gisèle Pineau. » Etudes Francophones 17, 2002. 25-44. —. « Edwidge Danticat's Kitchen History. » Meridians: Feminism, Race. Transnationalism 5, octobre 2004. 92-116. Mehta, Brinda. « Culinary diasporas: the language of food in Gisèle Pineau’s Un papillon dans la cité and L’exil selon Julia. » International Journal of Francophone Studies 2005, 8.1. 23-51. Murdoch, H. Adlai. Creole Identity in the French Caribbean novel. Miami, FL: University of Florida Press, 2001. Proulx, Patrice J. « Bearing witness and transmitting memory in the works of Marie-Célie Agnant. » Quebec Studies printemps / été 2005. 35-53. —. « Breaking the Silence: An Interview with Marie-Célie Agnant. » Québec Studies 41, printemps/été 2006. 45-61. Selao, Ching. « Les Mots / maux de l'exil/ex-île: Les romans de MarieCélie Agnant. » Canadian Literature 204 printemps 2010. 11-25.

CHAPTER FOUR LE PARC MONTRÉALAIS DANS ÉVANGELINE DEUSSE D’ANTONINE MAILLET PIERRE DAIRON ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF FRENCH, KENYON COLLEGE

La pièce de théâtre Évangéline Deusse publiée en 1975 par l'écrivaine acadienne Antonine Maillet1 est le lieu d'une rencontre à dimensions multiples. Il y a tout d'abord la diégèse qui nous rapporte l'histoire d'une vieille acadienne exilée à Montréal, se retrouvant par hasard dans un lieupersonnage - un parc anonyme montréalais où elle veut planter un petit sapin -, dans lequel elle rencontre trois autres ‘exilés’ archétypaux. Il s'agit ensuite d'un récit auto-fictif de l'exil que Maillet écrit alors qu'elle s'engage dans une nouvelle étape de sa vie, partageant désormais son temps entre son Acadie natale et la métropole québécoise. Il y a aussi la mise en scène de cette pièce qui se fera pour la première fois à Montréal, au Théâtre du Rideau Vert2 ; le parc se trouve alors enfermé dans un théâtre de cette métropole qui s'impose à première vue comme le pivot géographique du récit, de la publication et de la performance. A l'intérieur de cet espace urbain aux contours flous, le ‘parc’ – toujours défini mais anonyme - est le creuset de la transformation des personnages principaux. Une des questions essentielles qui se pose dans cette dynamique intégrant les personnages, l'auteur et la connexion Acadie-Montréal, est 1

Antonine Maillet, Évangéline Deusse (Montréal: Leméac, 1975). L'abréviation ED sera utilisée pour faire référence à ce texte. 2 La directrice du théâtre à cette époque, Mercedes Palomino (1913-2006), n'est autre que la compagne d'Antonine Maillet, celle-là même pour qui l'auteure choisira de s'exiler et avec qui elle ne révélera officiellement la relation qu'en 2009 dans le film de Ginette Pellerin, Les possibles sont infinis (L'Office du film du Canada, 2009).

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celle du rapport de l'identité au lieu. Maillet est prise dans ce questionnement et dans le renvoi constant à son histoire individuelle que ses détracteurs ne manquent pas de lui rappeler : comment rester/être ‘acadien/ne’ et se réclamer auteure acadienne tout en vivant hors de l'Acadie? Maillet se considère en effet toujours ‘acadienne’ et tire à l'époque sa légitimité et son autorité de cette posture, alors qu'à partir de cette même période, elle passe une grande partie de son temps à Montréal. Évangéline Deusse évoque ces tensions et contradictions ontologiques et y propose des solutions, de la même manière que le proposent Deleuze et Guattari au travers de leur conceptualisation du rhizome dans Rhizome (1976) et Mille plateaux (1980). Le sapin qu'Évangéline Deusse vient planter dans le parc permet d'initier cette expérience transformatrice qui passe par la rencontre avec les autres personnages. Le sapin n'est plus un arbre et devient le prétexte à un questionnement des origines, à une reconstruction de la mémoire, à une remise en question des attaches et des racines, tournés vers ce que les personnages peuvent accomplir. La fiction très concrète de Maillet fait en ce sens étonnamment écho aux réflexions abstraites que l'on retrouve dans Rhizome qui deviendra l'introduction de Mille Plateaux : [...] à la différence des arbres ou de leurs racines, le rhizome connecte un point quelconque avec un autre point quelconque, et chacun de ses traits ne renvoie pas nécessairement à des traits de même nature [...]. À l’opposé de l’arbre, le rhizome n’est pas objet de reproduction : ni reproduction externe comme l’arbre-image, ni reproduction interne comme la structure-arbre. Le rhizome est une anti généalogie. C’est une mémoire courte, ou une anti mémoire. [...] Ce qui est en question dans le rhizome, c’est un rapport avec la sexualité, mais aussi avec l’animal, avec le végétal, avec le monde, avec la politique, avec le livre, avec les choses de la nature et de l’artifice, tout différent du rapport arborescent : toutes sortes de ‘devenirs’.3

Dans Poétique de la relation, le théoricien martiniquais Edouard Glissant reprend l’analyse de Deleuze et Guattari pour distinguer l’‘identité-racine’ marquée par une volonté d’ancrage territoriale et associée à une culture atavique – c’est-à-dire fondée sur une filiation légitime caractérisée par une genèse et des mythes fondateurs de l’‘identité rhizome’ combinant diverses cultures nées de la colonisation : […] une racine démultipliée, étendue en réseaux dans la terre ou dans l’air […]. La notion de rhizome maintiendrait donc le fait de l’enracinement, mais récuse l’idée d’une racine totalitaire. La pensée du rhizome serait […] 3

Gilles Deleuze et Félix Guattari, Mille Plateaux (Paris: Minuit, 1980), pp.30-31.

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une poétique de la Relation, selon laquelle toute identité s’étend dans un rapport à l’Autre.4

Dans ses premiers écrits – publiés entre 1958 et 1973 -, Maillet s’appuie essentiellement sur l’identité racine pour contribuer à la réémergence d’une culture acadienne ancrée dans son terroir et son histoire. Au cours des années 1970, des tensions apparaîtront dans ses écrits entre cette attirance pour l’‘identité-racine’ et celle pour une ‘identité-rhizome’. Toute la problématique de la digenèse acadienne se trouve représentée dans cette tension entre la première genèse de 1604 née de la colonisation française devenue atavique, et la seconde résultant de la Déportation massive organisée par les Anglais en 1755 qui a créé les fondements de nouvelles cultures. Maillet est tiraillée entre ce passé et la nécessité de trouver un nouveau système référentiel et normatif sur lequel appuyer sa vision de l’Acadie et des Acadiens. La tension entre racine et rhizome, la nécessité d’une rupture épistémologique, une certaine ‘poétique de la relation’ qui se développera dans la seconde partie de l’œuvre de Maillet en opposition à une volonté de pureté qui marque le début de son œuvre offrent un ensemble de grilles de lecture particulièrement intéressantes et replace l’œuvre de Maillet – et la pièce Évangéline Deusse en particulier dans une dynamique postcoloniale. Cette pièce qui fait figure d’exception dans l'œuvre de Maillet présente et combine de manière surprenante identités racine et rhizome. Dans cette comédie sise dans un parc, Montréal est à la fois un prétexte pour illustrer la question de la territorialité de l'identité, et une manière de légitimer ‘l'exil’5 que s'impose Maillet. On y retrouve une femme acadienne ‘exilée’ dans la métropole québécoise où elle essaye de se faire une place dans un ‘ailleurs’ parfois peu accueillant. Si La Sagouine 6(1971) et Évangéline Deusse mettent toutes deux en scène un personnage féminin fort, pétri de la mémoire de son pays d'origine et de son histoire stigmatisante, mais refusant toute victimisation, le roman s’inscrit dans la quête d’une identité racine alors que la pièce reflète des questionnements idéologiques et identitaires qui agitent la vie de l'auteur et les sociétés québécoises et acadiennes des années 1970. En se réappropriant de façon explicite 4

Edouard Glissant, Poétique de la Relation. Poétique III (Paris : Gallimard, 1999) p.23. 5 Les guillemets indiquent qu'il s'agit aussi bien d'un concept extrait du texte, que d'une notion problématique et dont la définition dans la pièce est loin d'être homogène et stable dans le temps. 6 La Sagouine est l'héroïne d'une série de monologues publiés en 1971 relatant l'histoire de cette vieille Acadienne et le regard critique qu'elle porte sur sa société.

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l’Evangeline de Longfellow, héroïne éponyme du Grand Dérangement, Maillet s’y affranchit du déni mémoriel et offre une pièce dont les personnages d’origines et d’identités multiples ouvrent de vastes perspectives rhizomatiques au ‘peuple acadien’ à qui elle dédicace sa pièce. L'absence de l'Acadie des cartes – alors que l'Acadie et les Acadiens ‘existent’ - est une de ces apories à laquelle Maillet doit faire face. Dans le texte, le Breton trouve une solution à cette contradiction en allégorisant l'Acadie et en lui substituant celle qui semble pour lui incarner au mieux le territoire disparu : « Évangéline, mon Acadie préférée! » (ED, 57). Le vécu des personnages et leurs expériences remplacent alors les marqueurs territoriaux. Cette question a aussi soulevé l’intérêt des auteurs de Mille plateaux appelant à « faire la carte, et pas le calque », à dessiner « une carte qui est affaire de performance » et qui intègre la multiplicité et la non répétition à travers l’image du ‘rhizome’ (1980, 6-7). Dans la pièce de Maillet, les personnages archétypaux tracent par leur discours les cartes de leur exil, et le seul point précis qui apparaît dans le récit n'est que ce parc anonyme de Montréal, lui-même lieu de passage et d’ancrage. Évangéline entretient un rapport diachronique profond – voire, au début de la pièce, foncièrement schizophrénique – vis-à-vis de son identité puisqu'elle se trouve placée dans la même situation que son homonyme célèbre – héroïne fictive du poème de Longfellow intitulé du même prénom Evangeline (1847). Celle-ci avait dû s'exiler lors de la migration forcée imposée par les Anglais au peuple acadien. En effet, suite au traité d'Utrecht signé en 1713, la partie la plus peuplée de l'Acadie et ses 1 700 habitants sont cédés à la Grande-Bretagne. Devenus plus de 15 000 en 1755, les Acadiens, sujets britanniques, refusent de renoncer à leur foi catholique, leur langue française et de prêter allégeance au souverain britannique. Ils seront les victimes de la première migration forcée de l’histoire moderne, hommes et femmes/enfants séparés lors de l’embarquement et éparpillés au gré des aléas de la mer dans de nombreuses régions du pourtour atlantique, dont la Louisiane –où ils donneront naissance au groupe cadien/cajun. Le poème de Longfellow met en scène et ré historicise ce Grand Dérangement, élément fondateur de l’identité acadienne. Dans ce poème, Évangéline passera sa vie d’exil dans l’errance de la quête de son fiancé Gabriel, qu’elle ne retrouvera que sur son lit de mort, dans le lieu de naissance symbolique du nouvel empire américain et anglophone qu'est Philadelphie. Dans ce sens, le rapport au temps, à l'espace et à la mémoire de l'Évangéline de Maillet fait le lien avec les concepts d'identité-racine et d'identité-rhizome. Il ne s'agit plus seulement d'un ancrage ‘atavique’ dans un lieu (identité-racine) dont

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Évangéline doit se défaire mais d’un système aliénant initié par le récit victimisant du poète Longfellow où il lui faut puiser. Pour se libérer, elle devra accompagner son exil d'un repositionnement composite vis-à-vis de son histoire. La difficulté vient notamment du fait que le poème Evangeline de Longfellow soit devenu un récit symbolique et mythique complexe qui s'est peu à peu imposé comme l'histoire officielle de l'Acadie7. Le poème est tout d'abord la résultante d'une culture atavique. Ce type de culture, telle que la décrit Glissant, base sa légitimité sur une genèse et utilise les mêmes récits et systèmes de référence axiologiques8. D'autre part, Longfellow est un écrivain américain romantique dont l'objectif est de produire une poésie et une littérature d'inspiration et de conception authentiquement américaines -aux sens continental et états-unien du terme. Longfellow, qui n'a pas encore visité Grand-Pré quand il écrit son poème, s'inquiète peu de la vraisemblance de ses descriptions car ce qui lui importe, c'est bien de raconter une histoire états-unienne : C'est l'antique forêt!... Noyés dans la pénombre, Vieux et moussus, drapés dans leur feuillage sombre, Les pins au long murmure et les cyprès altiers, Qui bercent aujourd'hui, sur des fauves sentiers [...] Grand-Pré n'existe plus; nul n'en a souvenance; Mais il vit dans l'histoire, il vit dans la romance.9

7

Une statue d’Évangéline se trouve au pied de l’église de Grand Pré en Acadie, site du patrimoine de l’UNESCO marquant la déportation des Acadiens. Une autre est située à Saint Martinsville en Louisiane. Cette dernière est souvent présentée comme marquant l’emplacement de la tombe d’Évangéline telle que le rapporte un palimpseste longtemps prétendu comme racontant ‘la vraie histoire d'Évangéline’ par le juge cadien Felix de Voohries, dans Acadian Reminiscences: The True Story of Evangeline (Opalousas, Louisiane : The Jacobs News Depot Co. Publishers, 1907). Quand ces statues ont été installées – respectivement en 1920 à Grand-Pré et 1929 à Saint Martinville –, il s'agissait, dans chacun de ces lieux (celui de l'origine de l'Acadie historique de la première genèse de 1604 et un des lieux clefs de l'Acadie diasporique née des événements de 1755-1762), de s'approprier l'image du personnage mythique et fictionnel afin de l'ancrer dans un lieu et de garantir l'authenticité "acadienne" du groupe qui le revendiquait. Ce doublon atavique gardait encore en 1975, au moment où Maillet a écrit sa pièce, un fort pouvoir symbolique dont l'auteur voulait se défaire. 8 Edouard Glissant, Le Discours antillais (Paris: Seuil, 1981), 36. 9 Il s'agit ici de la traduction libre en français des premiers vers du poème par le poète québécois Pamphile Lemay, Évangéline. Un conte d’Acadie (Québec: P. G. Delisle, 1870 [1865]).

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Non seulement la description physique des lieux ne correspond pas aux paysages de la côte ouest de la Nouvelle-Ecosse de l'époque, mais le poème se termine à Philadelphie, ceci alors même que de nombreux Acadiens avaient regagné les terres d’où ils avaient été chassés et auxquelles ils accordent, depuis la fin du 19e siècle, une place centrale dans la définition de leur identité. Ces choix conscients que fait Longfellow lui font prendre en considération un large éventail de références et de motifs spécifiques à la période romantique américaine : une esthétique de la nature sauvage et des paysages américains grandioses et l'importance des thèmes moraux et des valeurs religieuses et familiales sont présentées comme étant constitutifs d'un peuple nouveau qui s'était installé dans le Nouveau monde. Ce deuxième ensemble de choix semblerait plutôt placer le récit de Longfellow dans ce que Glissant appelle les cultures composites. Ces cultures correspondraient à des groupes essayant de se façonner une genèse basée sur les restes de plusieurs cultures ataviques. En incorporant son propre imaginaire, le créateur d'Évangeline introduit une nouvelle dimension dans ce continuum et ce processus de créolisation où s'entremêlent des récits destinés à créer un nouvel ensemble sémantique. Évangeline devient un récit distinct qui a le pouvoir d'atteindre les publics des diverses cultures auxquelles il fait référence, tout en attirant un lectorat plus classique grâce à l'intégration de codes littéraires et iconographiques traditionnels10. C'est à cette ‘mythification’ que Maillet/Évangéline Deusse essayera d'échapper en proposant une nouvelle définition de l'identité acadienne non plus attachée à un lieu mais transportable. Maillet situe son action à Montréal et écrit son texte en ‘exil’. Elle y relate la première année que passe à Montréal Évangéline Deusse, une femme âgée originaire du Nouveau-Brunswick (seule province bilingue du Canada). Celle-ci occupe le centre de l'action et se révèle peu à peu dans les nouvelles relations qu'elle établit avec d'autres personnages rencontrés sur place, eux-mêmes migrants ou locaux. Le Québec et le Montréal des années 1970 sont une province et une métropole en transition : s'y combinent un questionnement identitaire qui défend une vision puriste et exclusive – notamment vis-à-vis des ‘anciens maîtres’ anglophones – et une volonté d'accueillir une immigration francophone. C'est dans ce 10

Paradoxalement, les lectures critiques du poème de Longfellow, du 19e au 21e siècle, s'appuieront sur divers systèmes normatifs successifs de pensée et de référence lui imposant des interprétations intimement liées au contexte et au lectorat. Voir Renate Eigenbrod, « Evangeline, Hiawatha and a Jewish Cemetery: Hi/stories of Interconnected and Multiple Displacements, » in World Literature Written in English, 40.1, (2002-03), pp.101-14.

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Québec qui se métisse qu'arrive Évangéline. Deux fois plus âgée que l'auteur quand elle arrive à Montréal, Évangéline vient tout comme elle des environs de Bouctouche, village acadien de la côte est du NouveauBrunswick. Elle quitte son village pour venir vivre chez un des ses sept fils résidant à Montréal, probablement pour des raisons économiques. Le parc sert de marqueur temporel dans la pièce divisée en quatre saisons, et de lieu de rencontres entre Évangéline et trois personnages archétypaux aux surnoms souvent métonymiques. Le ‘Breton’ est un octogénaire venu de France il y a cinquante ans, qui se sent toujours étranger et dont Évangéline s’éprend. Le ‘Rabbin’ est un juif errant qui hésite à aller en Israël tandis que le ‘Stop’ est un jeune exilé économique venu d'une zone rurale éloignée de Montréal. Les personnages sans nom de Maillet représentent des facettes bien différentes de l'exil, autant d'allégories de la marginalité socioculturelle, économique ou physique. Au gré de ces rencontres, Évangéline va peu à peu s’ouvrir à de multiples influences et les références à l’Acadie qui scandent le début du récit s'estompent peu à peu. Maillet évoque ainsi les récits franco-identitaires nord-américains considérés comme aliénants tels que Evangeline, A Tale of Acadie (1847) de l'Américain Longfellow ou Maria Chapdelaine (1913) du Français Louis Hémon. Aliénants car écrits par des étrangers, parfois dans une langue étrangère, et s'étant imposés comme des écrits incontournables – voire quasiment uniques – des canons littéraires québécois et acadiens, ces récits ont par ailleurs créé des images caricaturales, victimisantes et rétrogrades des Acadiens et Québécois transmises pendant des décennies jusqu'à la deuxième moitié du 20e siècle. Tandis que Maillet s'interroge sur le rapport au passé et à la mémoire, la révolution tranquille qui secoue le Québec des années 1970 ne vient jamais s'immiscer dans les discours de ses migrants. Si Montréal représente la toile de fond, certains lieux spécifiques, en particulier le parc urbain anonyme, forment des éléments essentiels de l'intrigue et affectent l'évolution des personnages. Le parc joue le rôle allégorique de substrat et d'incubateur identitaire, de lieu tangible de reterritorialisation des exilés – au sens littéral et métaphorique encore une fois, car l'objectif premier d'Évangéline est de planter un petit sapin acadien. Mais reflétant l’évolution de l’auteur, il passe de lieu incontournable de l'enracinement à un espace permettant la libération et l'extériorisation. Montréal joue pour Évangéline le même rôle que la cité industrielle états-unienne de la fin du 19e et du début du 20e siècle. Lieu d’exil déshumanisant, la ville ne parviendra toutefois à faire d’Évangéline un

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paysan tel qu’Euchariste Moisan de Trente arpents11 qui s'en ira mourir chez son fils déserteur parti s'installer aux Etats-Unis. Pour la seule et unique fois de son œuvre, Maillet présente le Québec comme lieu de perdition où le « petit parc public à Montréal » (ED, 11) tire son rôle salvateur de sa localisation hors-ville, hors-Québec en plein cœur de Montréal. Le lieu-personnage est lui aussi un lieu exilé – un îlot de nature contrôlé qui donne accès à la terre au milieu du béton. Dans cet espace que l'on pourrait qualifier de « paradigme transnational » (Clifford, 1994, p.304), toutes les transformations et les renaissances semblent possibles. Le non-lieu qu'est initialement le parc devient non pas le creuset d'une identité commune au petit groupe, mais un nouvel espace propice aux révélations des identités individuelles. Jusqu'à la fin du récit, le parc restera anonyme, mais les quatre ‘exilés’ dévoileront peu à peu leur nom et leur histoire, bien que les didascalies conservent leurs noms archétypaux. Au cours des quatre saisons qui les verront se rencontrer, chacun va partager son histoire et celle de son exil. Cet espace neutre et anonyme, lieu de passage par excellence, devient l'écosystème d'une petite communauté en gestation dont l'enracinement est symbolisé par le petit sapin acadien qu'Évangéline s'évertue à essayer de faire survivre. A première vue, la pièce se structure autour de cinq tableaux et de quatre personnages. Pour autant une cinquième entité impose toujours sa présence sur scène, bien qu'elle ne s'exprime jamais et n'entre pas activement en interaction avec les autres personnages humains. Le sapin est présent d'un bout à l'autre de la pièce et occupe souvent une place centrale, aussi bien au sens spatial que figuré du terme. Le sapin est une figure paradigmatique : il sert d'élément de référence identifiable, et son rôle sémantique se trouve recyclé tout au long du texte. Il sert de lien organique non humain – rhizomatique - entre les différentes parties du texte et occupe de multiples fonctions qui sont autant de figures stylistiques et rhétoriques. Il est aussi macrostructural, car il est non seulement présent dans le texte mais aussi sur scène, et cette présence traverse tout le récit. Plus qu'une simple présence, le sapin fait aussi office de catalyseur et de lien avec le substrat qu'incarne le parc. Au tout début de la pièce, c'est lui qui est à l'origine de la rencontre des personnages puisqu'Évangéline se 11 Ringuet (Philippe Panneton), Trente arpents, (Paris, Flammarion, 1938). Il s'agit là d'un des récits fictifs majeurs du canon littéraire québécois de l'entre-deux guerres. Un récit qualifié de "roman du terroir" dans lequel l'auteur défend les valeurs d'une identité-racine attachée à la terre et qui ne peut survivre et se perpétuer que dans les campagnes du Québec.

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rend dans le parc pour le planter. Il est aussi fondamental car il permet d'initier des contacts entre les personnages. Au moins une fois dans chaque tableau, ces derniers vont centrer leur attention sur cette altérité qu'ils essayent de protéger et qu'ils intègrent de maintes façons dans leurs conversations. Le sapin est finalement central au sens spatial car il fait office de point de repère physique, de poteau-mitan 'naturel', d'être vivant totémique autour duquel les personnages vont se rencontrer, vont discuter et vont même chanter et danser. Il structure le récit et constitue une sorte d'arbre généalogique de l'exil, dans lequel chaque personnage correspondrait à l'aboutissement de l'un des embranchements. En « défrichant la parenté de l'exil »12 (ED, 47), Évangéline et ses compagnons en arrivent à la conclusion ultime que la Relation13 et l'enracinement— même temporaires—conditionnent la survie de l'exilé. Comme trait d'union, le sapin renvoie à la fois au général et au particulier ; il permet de dépasser la complexité du jeu des interactions et des identités mouvantes des personnages humains. L'arbre a d'une part une vocation holistique contrebalancée par la fragmentation narrative et identitaire que suggère chacun des individus humains qui l'entourent. Il offre la possibilité de dépasser les spécificités individuelles et de revenir à une vision d'ensemble simplifiée car débarrassée de toute conscience et de tout imaginaire. Au sens végétal du terme, le sapin renvoie à un tout ; arbre qui en apparence représente tous les arbres de son espèce. Le sapin donne à l'identité et aux processus d'identification une constance, un but qui dépasse les processus conscients de l'imaginaire individuel humain : le sapin pousse, il ne choisit pas, il a une vocation 'naturelle' à survivre dans un lieu en s'y adaptant, grâce à ces racines et ses épines. Ses capacités d'adaptation et de survie dans un milieu et à un moment donné sont toutefois limitées et conditionnées par ses origines et ses caractéristiques intrinsèques—génétiques et acquises dans son milieu de naissance (le difficile biotope de la côte est du Nouveau-Brunswick). Tout en imposant 12

Maillet qualifie de « défricheur » ou « défricheuse de parenté » les généalogistes populaires qui s'intéressent à la reconstruction des structures de parenté. Cette appellation apparaît régulièrement dans ses écrits de l'époque et renvoie aux personnes qui reconstituent oralement les généalogies dans les familles et petites communautés. Ces discussions auxquelles prenaient part les adultes plus âgés permettaient de recréer à l'oral la trame du tissu familial et de la mettre à jour : nouveaux mariages, naissances, décès, changements d'activité, ragots, voyages et déplacements. Selon Maillet, cette activité très répandue dans les familles acadiennes s'était mise à décliner au cours du 20e siècle. 13 Au sens glissantien du terme ; c'est-à-dire la relation à l'Autre. Édouard Glissant, Poétique de la Relation, (Paris: Gallimard, 1990).

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l'importance de la mise en contexte et la logique du lieu, le sapin contribue à créer une identité narrative14 simplifiée, plus stable et élémentaire, que celle qui ne s'intéresserait qu'à des dynamiques d'identification individuelles en constants changements. D'autre part, ce sapin est unique car il a subi un déplacement forcé et lointain que les arbres ne subissent pas 'naturellement' ; il rejoint en ceci une caractéristique plus humaine que végétale, comme tous ses compagnons d'exil. Bien qu'il n'exprime pas de désir et n'ait pas de mémoire active, il a une histoire spécifique et impose son particularisme dans ce parc où il est le seul de son espèce. Ce sont des humains qui le menacent, mais sa survie est aussi conditionnée par sa relation avec les humains qui l'entourent et qui s'occupent de lui. Ce réductionnisme15, qui s'intéresse à l'histoire spécifique d'un individu de l'espèce au sein du milieu neutre que constitue le parc, renvoie une nouvelle fois à l'impératif qui garantit la survie symbiotique et la réussite de la transplantation : la relation à l'environnement et à l'autre. Au début de la seconde partie de la pièce, Évangéline découvre avec horreur son arbre déraciné. La surprise est totale et contredit directement ce qu'Évangéline est en train de dire à ses amis, à savoir que les arbres— les Acadiens—ont une espérance de vie plus longue que les puissances qui les contrôlent. Ce sentiment d'invincibilité est remis en question par le déracinement—la déportation—que personne n'attendait : EVANGELINE - Un sapin, par chus nous, est capable d'enterrer son maître, ses enfants, pis les enfants de ses enfants. Parlez-moi de ça!... Ben quoi qu'est que je vois? L'esclave du Bon Djeu! Qui c'est qui y a fait ça? Elle se dirige vers le sapin, déraciné. [...] LE BRETON – Les salauds! LE RABBIN – A votre avis, c'est du vandalisme ou c'est le zèle des gardiens de la paix? (ED, 82-83)

Ces gardiens de la paix montréalais éliminent ce qui est différent dans le parc qui, bien qu'offrant un espace de liberté, n'en reste pas moins sous leur autorité. Évangéline avait eu tort de penser que cet espace neutre, devenu un lieu bienveillant de la rencontre des étrangers en plein cœur du Centre, permettrait si facilement à l'exilée de se l'approprier. Pourtant, le sapin va survivre à son déracinement grâce à l’intervention du Stop qui le 14 Vincent de Gaulejac, « Identité », in J. Barus-Michel, E. Enriquez et A. Lévy (dir.), Vocabulaire de psychosociologie, références et positions (Paris : Érès, 2002), pp.174-180. 15 Au sens épistémologique et ontologique du terme, à savoir la réduction d'une situation complexe à quelques éléments fondamentaux et facilement discernables.

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rapporte. Le détail est particulièrement évocateur quand on replace cette solidarité du personnage « québécois » vis-à-vis de l'exilé minoritaire « acadien » dans le contexte plus large de la question indépendantiste. En effet, pour certains francophones minoritaires hors-Québec, l'indépendance du Québec signifierait une disparition à plus ou moins long terme de ces minorités16. Car c'est le poids démographique, économique et politique du Québec au sein de l'état fédéral canadien qui sert de garant à la promotion de politiques (bilinguisme, système scolaire) en faveur des minorités francophones hors-Québec. La survie du sapin acadien dépasse donc la simple volonté individuelle des Acadiens de survivre identitairement. Cette survie passe notamment par la prise de conscience et l'assistance du ‘grand frère’ québécois. Au fur et à mesure, le sapin va passer de la survie à l’intégration, reflétant le destin d’Évangéline et celui de l’Acadie dont la survie francophone est liée à celle du Québec. Au-delà du substrat qu'il offre au sapin, le parc sert aussi de tribune libre et publique où le subalterne a droit à la parole. Ainsi, Évangéline se rebelle contre les « pigeons anglicisés » (ED, 49) de Montréal qui viennent déféquer sur le sapin. Ces derniers reflètent la présence croissante de l'anglais et des Anglais perçus comme une menace assimilationniste17. Le passage a une double fonction : d'une part il évite de tomber dans la sensiblerie de victime et dégonfle le pathos qu'Évangéline vient de créer lors d'un long monologue dans lequel elle décrit la ‘deuxième déportation’ des Acadiens causée par les difficultés économiques. Dans le même temps, 16 Pour les défenseurs de cette pensée anti-indépendantiste, l'indépendance du Québec provoquerait l'assimilation linguistique de ces populations dont la langue ne serait plus protégée, ou alors les obligerait à migrer au Québec pour pouvoir continuer à vivre en français. 17 Référence est faite au joual, ce parler « créolisant » issu des quartiers populaires de Montréal qui mélange de l'anglais au français. Maillet passe sous silence la forte tendance à l'assimilation linguistique des populations acadiennes francophones, en particulier dans la région de Moncton et dans le reste des provinces Maritimes où l'anglais reste la langue majoritaire. Un autre « créole », mélange de français et d'anglais appelé le « chiac », est justement issu de quartiers ouvriers francophones—« acadiens »—de Moncton. Maillet passe cette menace de l'assimilation linguistique en « Acadie » sous silence et ses personnages s'expriment dans un français le plus souvent « purifié » de tout anglicisme, ou n'utilisant que de rares mots anglais. Maillet fait ainsi référence aux « cans » (ED, 21) ou aux « shops » (ED, 48) comme autant d'éléments extérieurs, produits de la culture anglophone et qui sont plus qu'une pollution de la langue, devenus des signes tangibles de l'imposition du pouvoir colonial anglais ou de l'impérialisme économique américain qui viendrait une nouvelle fois soumettre les « Acadiens » et autres francophones du Canada.

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c'est un appel à peine voilé à la résistance et au soulèvement qui se traduit dans la pièce par un élan du groupe qui aide Évangéline à chasser la « volaille étrangère » (ED, 49). L'animalisation des anglophones, réduits à des pigeons piailleurs et déféquant, est une première revanche. L'ironie permet aussi de critiquer la puérilité des discours haineux qui peuvent exister à l'encontre de la population anglophone : EVANGÉLINE – (Elle s'élance, furieuse, sur les pigeons.) Ben ça va faire! Vous allez larguer mon sapin à la fin mes espèces de pigeons anglicisés! Ça sera pas dit que j'arons marché dix ans dans les bois, et pioché deux siècles sus nos côtes, et fait le voyage tout seul là-bas du pays, pour nous faire chier sus les branches par des volailles étrangères! Non, ça sera pas dit! Les autres l'aident à chasser les pigeons. Cris d'enfants dans la rue. Le Stop s'arrête brusquement, puis s'élance, oubliant son « stop ». (ED, 49)

Les exilés se rejoignent dans une résistance cathartique et grotesque contre l'occupant anglophone qui souille les héritages acadiens et québécois. Le Stop, le seul québécois de souche, laisse tomber ce qui l'aliène et l'objectifie, son panneau "STOP" écrit en anglais qui est devenu le symbole de ce qu'il est devenu, un subalterne porteur de panneau exilé dans son propre 'pays', figé dans son identité objectifiée d’aide aux personnes pour traverser la rue. Lui-même s'implique et sort de son apparente léthargie habituelle pour se révolter (tranquillement) contre l'Anglais animalisé sous forme de pigeons18. Le sapin est plus qu'une ficelle théâtrale ; il est l'expression des facettes de la personnalité d'Évangéline et de ses compagnons. Le sapin incarne le détour glissantien par excellence : plutôt que de proposer une vision explicite du monde, il révèle de manière indirecte, voire elliptique, la subjectivité des personnages, faisant du texte lui-même un lieu d'errance19 dans lequel le parc semble constituer la seule possibilité de reterritorialisation. En racontant son histoire, Évangéline trace une nouvelle carte de l'Acadie. Au-delà de la simple interprétation du sapin comme étant le symbole de la 18

Dans Comment faire l’amour avec un Nègre sans se fatiguer (Montréal : VLB, 1985) et Chronique de la dérive douce (Paris: Grasset, 2012 ; 1994 Montréal: VLB), Dany Laferrière, écrivain haïtien émigré à Montréal en 1976, fait lui aussi l’expérience des parcs et pigeons montréalais. Le parc pour lui n’est toutefois que très rarement le lieu de rencontres, mais devient plutôt le lieu d’écriture et les pigeons une source gratuite de calories, la chasse lui permettant de suppléer à ses fonds limités. 19 Valérie Masson-Perrin, Le statut du personnage dans l'œuvre romanesque d'Édouard Glissant (Université de Cergy-Pontoise, novembre 2006) p. 291.

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transplantation et de l'enracinement d'Évangéline dans un nouveau lieu20, le petit arbre est un relai métaphorique polysémique. La métaphore filée est présente tout au long du récit et offre à Évangéline la possibilité d'exprimer pudiquement son ressenti sur son histoire personnelle, son expérience de l'exil et sur le monde qui l'entoure. L'importance de l'enracinement en tant que besoin vital et naturel semble toutefois limitée dans sa liberté d'expression par les gardiens de l'ordre et de la norme. L'exil est tout d'abord source d'angoisse et d'incompréhension des codes qui régissent le lieu de l'exil. Dès le début, sans qu'elle ne l'explique, Évangéline a peur de la police et des inconnus qui déambulent autour du parc : « Le verrat [cochon en termes injurieux, en référence au policier qui ne fait que passer], i' vient pour mon sapin. » (ED, 20). Elle parvient pourtant à planter le sapin qui semble prendre, ce qui fait le bonheur de ses nouveaux amis. A la fin du premier acte, tous les personnages reconnaissent le sapin comme une entité incontournable qui va vivre et qui s'apprête à ‘s'exprimer’ (via l'oiseau que rapporte le Stop) : EVANGELINE – Surtout que des déportés comme j'en sons, c'a point l'droit de vieillzir aussi vite que les gens du coumun, par rapport que ceuses-là, ils avons un pays à transplanter. Les trois dévisagent le sapin. LE BRETON – Il a pris racine! LE RABBIN – Il pousse! EVANGELINE – Il va vivre, le petit enfant de Dieu ! Pendant qu'ils s'approchent du sapin, le Stop revient emportant dans le creux de ses mains un oiseau. (ED, 70)

Cet oiseau – un "bec-scie" (ED, 70) - que le Stop rapporte, montre que l'agressivité dont il a fait preuve vis-à-vis des pigeons n'est pas destinée à tous les animaux mais bien aux oiseaux ‘anglicisés’. L'anthropomorphisation du sapin—ils le ‘dévisagent’, l'appellent ‘le petit enfant de Dieu’21—évoque 20

Ecrit seulement deux ans après la parution de la pièce, l’article de Jonathan Weiss aborde les principes de la déterritorialisation de l'Acadie comme stratégie de survie. Jonathan Weiss, « Acadia Transplanted: The Importance of Evangeline Deusse in the Work of Antonine Maillet », Colby Quarterly, 13.3 (September 1977), pp.173-185. 21 Les images religieuses et références à la Bible sont récurrentes dans le poème de Longfellow, et le nom même d'Évangéline fut méticuleusement choisi par le linguiste qu'était Longfellow. Le poème était plus qu'une simple narration de la Déportation des Acadiens de Grand-Pré ; l'Évangéline selon Longfellow était un nouvel Evangile métaphorique de la fondation des Etats-Unis d'Amérique. En se l'appropriant, Maillet réécrit cet Evangile évangélinien et le peuple de nouveaux

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à nouveau cette métonymie polysémique de l'autre végétal qui renvoie à Évangéline, aux Acadiens et par extension à l'Evangeline de Longfellow. La peur de la police reste toutefois présente et cristallise une peur de l'autorité, d'un pouvoir arbitraire qui voudrait effacer l’origine d’Évangéline pour l'assimiler. La police n'est pas ici protectrice de la liberté ni de la sécurité des individus. Elle est perçue comme la garante de l'homogénéité et la gardienne d'un ordre normatif local. Évangéline fait part, vis-à-vis de cet ordre normatif, d'une incompréhension accrue par sa présence dans un espace à priori neutre : « Je peux pas ouère quoi c'est qu'ils avont contre les sapins » (ED, 23). Ce qui compte pour elle, c'est la survie du sapin : « je le planterai et i' réchappera » (ED, 20). A la fin de la première partie l'arbre semble de nouveau enraciné. On peut aisément faire le parallèle entre ce moment de l'intrigue et le poème de Longfellow dont la première partie décrit les Acadiens partis de France et réinstallés avec succès à Grand-Pré. Dans la représentation de Maillet, pas de grandiloquence mais l'expression d'une double césure : celle de l'exil—s'exprimant dans la nécessité de transplanter le sapin déraciné—et celle du souvenir nostalgique d'un lieu qui n'est lui-même qu'une tentative de récupération moderne d'un territoire mythique disparu. Le petit sapin seul, menacé et déraciné, doit être replanté, dans un parc public, loin de son lieu de naissance, au milieu d'arbres dont aucun n'appartient à son espèce. Contrairement aux représentations traditionnelles des groupes ancrés dans leur milieu d'origine, l'individu moderne vivant dans un contexte minoritaire est ici présenté comme étant en lutte constante pour sa survie. Évangéline ne se représente pas Montréal comme faisant partie d'une entité nationale – le Canada – à laquelle elle s'identifie. Seul le parc, grâce au tissu de relation et de solidarité qu'il a permis de créer, semble capable de permettre la fin de l'exil et le début de l'enracinement. A la fin de la pièce, Évangéline se libère de cette longue tâche d'adaptation et peut enfin quitter le parc protecteur: ÉVANGÉLINE - Va les qu'ri. Montre-leur à traverser la ville sans se faire chier sus les ailes par les pigeons. Et asteur, mon petit sapin naissant, tu seras pus tout seul pour grandir à l'étrange22. Le cri du pays est arrivé.

personnages et de nouveaux symboles qui racontent une toute nouvelle histoire de l'Acadie diasporique héritée de la déportation. Le sapin-petit enfant de Dieu n'est pas né dans une crèche mais dans un parc, et les trois mages nomades prennent l'apparence d'exilés perdus dans un centre urbain moderne. 22 "A l'étranger".

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(Pause.)... Qui c'est qu'est l'enfant de choeur qu'a osé dire qu'une parsoune pouvait point recoumencer sa vie à quatre-vingts! Elle s'élance à son tour à la poursuite des goélands. RIDEAU (ED, 108)

Le parc constitue une rare alternative à l'urbanité ambiante. Il se fait, ontologiquement, espace liminal bien que situé au cœur de la ville. Cet espace de verdure sans nom et sans emplacement géographique précis est tout d'abord un non-lieu rassurant. C'est aussi dans cet espace de verdure minoritaire – sorte de parenthèse spatiale et temporelle dans le continuum géographique et dynamique de Montréal – que se font les rencontres. En situant exclusivement le lieu de l'action, des rencontres et des interactions dans un parc anonyme, Maillet fait perdre à Montréal une partie de son identité urbaine. Maillet transcende aussi les barrières temporelles car le parc permet un rapport direct à la terre que ne permet plus le béton des villes. Le sol est le marqueur ancestral, la preuve concrète qu'il existe encore une terre sous le béton et que cette terre était là avant l'arrivée des colons, avant l'essor d'une civilisation dont les maîtres successifs – Français, Anglais et Québécois – n'ont que faire des particularismes. La pièce de théâtre Évangéline Deusse est produite à la conjonction de ces trois pôles d'influence concentriques que sont l'Acadie, Montréal et le parc. Le parc apparaît tout d'abord comme la destination finale de l'héroïne qui vient y planter son sapin ; un sapin qui viendrait se perdre dans ce lieu anonyme, sorte de cabinet de curiosités pour espèces en voie de disparition. Pourtant c'est à partir du parc que va repartir la spirale excentrique des discours et interactions des personnages – la cartographie spatiale, sociale, temporelle et mémorielle - autour d'un objectif commun – sauver le sapin. Contrairement à Évangéline qui a pu créer son rhizome acadien à partir de l’arbre envoyé par son fils, le Français et le juif errant de la pièce ne peuvent se rattacher à cette terre montréalaise. Ils vont toutefois y puiser une autre force, celle de repartir vers la France – le Breton en reviendra déçu de ne pas avoir retrouvé le pays rêvé de sa jeunesse - ou de partir vers Israël, pays de l’identité atavique: LE BRETON – Aucun de ces pays n'est resté votre pays? Où avez-vous laissé votre cœur? LE RABBIN – Mon cœur? Heh!... J'ai laissé en Amérique du Sud ma fortune ; en France, mes amis ; en Suède, en Suisse, ma santé ; en Allemagne, j'ai laissé trois fils dans les camps ; et mon père et ma mère reposent en Roumanie. Quand nous avons débarqué au port de Montréal, ma femme et moi nous n'avions plus rien. Elle est morte ici, l'an dernier. LE BRETON – Alors vous seul aujourd'hui êtes citoyen du monde. LE RABBIN – C'est trop grand, le monde. (ED, 54)

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Dans le cas de ces deux personnages que sont le Breton et le Rabbin, Maillet affirme l'importance du lieu et de ses représentations comme repères essentiels dans la définition d'une identité individuelle et collective sereine. Les systèmes culturels ataviques— s'appuyant sur des récits fondateurs anciennement constitués—des deux hommes bénéficient de l’ancrage territorial que représentent la France et Israël. Si à première vue les personnages semblent pouvoir se différencier en deux groupes—le Rabbin et le Breton donnant deux exemples d'exilés venus d’autres pays, alors qu'Évangéline et le Stop sont deux exemples d'exilés venus d’autres régions—on constate rapidement que le système de catégorisation dépasse les logiques et les frontières géographiques ou nationales. Avec l'aide d'Évangéline, Maillet ne fait pas que « remettre l'Acadie sur la mappe »23, elle propose de redessiner les cartes de son monde. Les notions de ‘pays’, de ‘terre des aïeux’, ou encore de ‘citoyen du monde’ et en particulier l’expression « mettre l’Acadie sur la mappe » reviennent régulièrement dans les écrits et commentaires de Maillet. Elle y fait moins référence à une réalité géographique et cartographique qu'à une représentation mentale du monde dans laquelle l'Acadie serait de nouveau présente. L'anglicisme ‘mappe’ peut être remplacé par ‘discours’, ‘imaginaire’, ‘mémoire’ et Maillet utilise l'expression pour parler de ses travaux ou du poème de Longfellow. Elle l'a utilisée notamment dans les commentaires qu'elle a fait après le succès populaire de La Sagouine24 qui a véritablement lancé sa carrière d'écrivaine et a selon elle permis de faire parler de nouveau de l'Acadie, notamment au Québec et en France. Maillet représente les tensions que Glissant oppose dialectiquement entre système et errance : « La pensée de système est la pensée du territoire. La pensée de l’errance, c’est la pensée du non-système et de la terre »25. L'errance se substitue à l'exil et ouvre de nouvelles perspectives d'identification identitaires à Évangéline et au Stop. Les cris des goélands et la sortie précipitée des deux derniers personnages semblent être les signes d'un renvoi du Stop et d'Évangéline à un chaos libérateur. Ils s'inscrivent en cela dans les mêmes dynamiques qui animent tous les personnages, pris qu'ils sont entre déterminisme et chaos. Le Rabbin est de nulle part et a toujours été destiné à une terre promise vers laquelle il veut se rendre mais qu'il n'atteindra pas dans le 23 Marguerite Maillet, "De la Nouvelle-France à la Nouvelle-Acadie", Québec français, n° 60, 1985, p.30. 24 Antonine Maillet, La Sagouine (Montréal : Leméac, 1971). 25 Édouard Glissant, avec Alexandre Leupin, Les entretiens de Bâton Rouge (Paris : Éditions Gallimard, avril 2008) p.124.

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récit. Le Breton mourra en découvrant qu'il est d'un pays qui n'est plus. 26 Quel que soit le sort des personnages, ces quelques mois dans le parc leur ont permis d'établir des liens et d'alimenter leur imaginaire. Ils ont appris à lutter contre le déterminisme et le chaos de l'exil en combinant enracinement—le sapin a pris—et Relation—d'amitié ou d'amour. La plantation, l'entretien et la protection du petit sapin deviennent bientôt l'objectif commun des quatre personnages. Le parc constitue à priori un milieu favorable et il fournit le substrat nécessaire à la transplantation. Tous participent à cette tâche malgré des facteurs extérieurs hostiles ; les déracinements sauvages des policiers, le manque d'eau ou encore les déjections des pigeons. Au-delà de la cohésion qui s'effectue autour d'un effort commun, la rencontre avec l'Autre archétypal singularise et historicise progressivement chaque personnage. Évangéline Deusse révèle et se voit ainsi révéler, par ses compagnons, ses multiples facettes ; celle tout d'abord de son illustre ancêtre de fiction née de l'imagination de Longfellow et du drame du Grand dérangement – la sainte patronne mythique du poème Evangeline. A Tale of Acadie (1847). Apparaissent aussi un alter ego autofictif et la réplique d'autres héroïnes de Maillet – telle la Sagouine – qui n'avaient jusqu'à présent jamais quitté l'Acadie. A l'heure où le Québec se posait la question de son identité nationale et de son indépendance territoriale, Maillet mettait déjà en évidence la diversité migratoire et mémorielle de sa métropole. Contrairement aux autres personnages dont on ne suit que la dernière étape du processus de désaliénation, Maillet offre au public les six mois qui vont du début à la fin de « l'exil » d'Évangéline. Évangéline arrivée du Fond de la Baie27 plante son sapin et rencontre d'autres personnes qu'elle identifie comme des exilés et auxquelles elle s'identifie. Elle se découvre et prend la mesure des spécificités de ses origines géographiques et culturelles en se trouvant confrontée à celle des autres. Mais la prise de conscience de la possibilité de ‘refaire sa vie’ n'arrive qu'après le décès du 26

Pendant l'intermède qui sépare les deux actes de la pièce, il sera retourné en France mais n'aura retrouvé qu'une Bretagne modernisée, aux arbres coupés. Il reviendra finalement à Montréal pour retrouver Évangéline, devenue sa nouvelle attache sentimentale. Après son retour, les amis se retrouvent dans le parc, le Breton et Évangéline se déclarent leur flamme, mais ils ne semblent pas dans ce cas pouvoir échapper à la malédiction de Longfellow puisque comme l'aura fait Gabriel dans les bras d'Evangéline, le Breton mourra dans les bras d'Évangéline Deusse. Mais Évangéline Deusse, contrairement à Evangéline, a une descendance et ne reste pas une exilée. 27 Où se trouve Bouctouche, le village natal de Maillet, sur la côte est du NouveauBrunswick.

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Breton et le départ du Rabbin, la réussite de la transplantation du sapin et l'arrivée des goélands (qui ne sont pas ces oiseaux des parcs mais les oiseaux marins de son Acadie). Seule avec le Stop qui veut connaître la fin de l'histoire d'Evangeline et de Gabriel, elle termine cette histoire fictive. Le Stop raconte sa propre histoire littéraire, fictive et mythique – celle de Maria Chapdelaine – et les deux personnages finissent par affronter les récits aliénants de leurs origines et s'en libérer. Le cercle de l'exil est brisé, les deux derniers personnages peuvent enfin quitter le parc à la poursuite des oiseaux de mer, complétant le mouvement d'extériorisation initié par le Breton et le Rabbin—les deux exilés de l'extérieur qui ont décidé de tenter l'expérience du retour manqué et décevant vers la Bretagne et vers un Israël jusqu'alors trop fantasmé. Évangéline et le Stop, nés tous les deux sur cette terre du Nouveau Monde, ont réussi à recréer un lien organique avec leur terre. Le parc leur a servi d'incubateur, de « périmètre d'imagination et de fiction »28, et leur a permis de se réinventer. Seul le sapin transplanté reste l'humble signe de leur passage dans ce parc qui redevient un îlot anonyme dans une grande métropole. Si le sapin est l'unique représentant de son espèce dans le parc, rien ne permet pour autant d'affirmer que les autres arbres appartiennent tous aux mêmes espèces. Peut-être chacun des arbres n'est-il aussi qu'une exception dans un parc qui reste fondamentalement ouvert sur le monde? Peut-être ces arbres et leurs racines sont-ils les signes et testaments mémoriels (racines) de la libération (rhizome) d'autres exilés qui sont passés par Montréal depuis des siècles? Peut-être ne sont-ils que des témoins neutres et bienveillants qui attendent qu'une nouvelle Évangéline vienne tenter d'enraciner un de leurs congénères ? A travers les relations entre les personnages et les récits, Maillet exprime une conception de l'identité qui rompt avec celle exprimée dans ses précédents ouvrages, car elle n'implique pas de relation stable et essentialiste au monde. Ce qu'Évangéline et ses compagnons mettent en œuvre s'apparente plus à ce que Jean-François Bayart appelle des « opérations d’identification »29. Tous les protagonistes en ‘exil’ de la pièce expriment à un moment ou à un autre la nécessité de se positionner. En réponse au détachement de leur territoire des ‘origines’, ils fondent une 28 Marie-Agnès Sourieau, « Entretien avec Maryse Condé: de l'identité culturelle », in The French Review, Vol. 72, No. 6 (May, 1999), pp. 1091-1098. 29 Jean-François Bayart, pour qui « il n’est point d’identités, mais seulement des opérations d’identification. Les identités dont nous parlons pompeusement, comme si elles existaient indépendamment de leurs locuteurs, ne se font (et ne se défont) que par le truchement de tels actes identificatoires, en bref par leur énonciation » Jean-François Bayart, L’illusion identitaire (Paris, Fayard, 1996), p. 98.

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territorialité de l'humain dans un parc qui de non-lieu devient substrat, et semble fonder cette « poétique de la Relation »30. La réalité de l'identité individuelle est une constante négociation qui se fait au contact de l'Autre, un Autre qui porte un regard curieux et bienveillant, source de « renouvellement »31 (Condé), de métissage, et de « créolisation » (Glissant) des imaginaires.

Bibliographie Arnold, A.J. Ed. A History of literature in the Caribbean. Vol I : Hispanic and francophone regions. Amsterdam ; Philadelphia : J. Benjamins, 1994. Augé, Marc. Non-Lieux, introduction à une anthropologie de la surmodernité. Paris : Le Seuil, 1992. Bayart, Jean-François, L’illusion identitaire. Paris : Fayard, 1996. Bhabha, Homi. « DissemiNation: Time, Narrative, and the Margins of the Modern Nation. » Nation and Narration. Homi K. Bhabha, ed.. London : Routledge, 1990. pp. 291-322. Brière, Éloise A. « Antonine Maillet and the Construction of Acadian Identity. » Postcolonial Subjects. Francophone Women Writers. Mary Jean Green et al. (dir.). Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1996, pp. 321. Calba, Romain. « L’identité nationale : de territoires nationaux dotés d’identités à la construction symbolique du sentiment d’appartenance nationale. » RUSCA, Territoires et identités, n°2, 2009. http://www.msh-m.fr/editions/edition-en-ligne/rusca/rusca-territoirestemps-societes/l-atelier-des-doctorants/la-revue-en-ligne/numero-2territoires-et-identites/L-identite-nationale-de Clifford, James. « Diasporas. » Cultural Anthropology, Vol. 9, No. 3, Further Inflections : Toward Ethnographies of the Future, Aug., 1994, pp. 302-338. Deleuze, Gilles et Felix Guattari. Mille Plateaux: capitalisme et schizophrenie II. Paris: Editions de Minuit, 1980. 30

Une Relation, qui selon les mots de Glissant, « relie (relaie), relate ». Édouard Glissant, Poétique de la Relation (Paris, Gallimard, 1990) p.187. Pour un exemple d'utilisation des concepts de Glissant comme grille de lecture d'une auteure, voir l'article d'Ines Moatamri, Poétique de la Relation : Amina Saïd et Edouard Glissant, in Trans, no4 (Paris : Publications de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 4 février 2007). 31 Marie-Agnès Sourieau, «Entretien avec Maryse Condé: de l'identité culturelle.» (Mai 1999), p.1092.

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—. Rhizome. Paris : Éd. de Minuit, 1976. —. Capitalisme et Schizophrénie 1. L'Anti-Œdipe, Paris: Minuit, 1972. Gannon, Kathryn. « Mapping the Margins: Representations of Place and Space in Antonine Maillet's Pélagie-la charrette. » Space: New Dimensions in French Studies. Emma Gilby et Katja Haustein (dir.). Oxford: Peter Lang, 2005, pp.105-118. Gaulejac, Vincent de. « Identité. » Vocabulaire de psychosociologie, références et positions. J. Barus-Michel, E. Enriquez et A. Lévy (dir.), Paris : Érès, 2002. Pp. 174-80. Glissant, Édouard et Alexandre Leupin, Les entretiens de Baton Rouge. Paris : Éditions Gallimard, avril 2008. Glissant, Édouard. Poétique de la Relation. Paris : Gallimard, 1990. Johnston, Andrew John Bayly . «The Call of the Archetype and the Challenge of Acadian History. » French Colonial History, vol. 5. East Lansing, Michigan : Michigan State University Press, 2004, pp.63-92. Laferrière, Dany. Chronique de la dérive douce. Paris: Grasset, 2012 ; Montréal: VLB, 1994. —. Comment faire l’amour avec un Nègre sans se fatiguer. Montréal : VLB, 1985. Lemay, Pamphile Evangéline. Un conte d’Acadie (Québec: P. G. Delisle, 1870 [1865]). Maillet, Antonine. La Sagouine. Montréal : Bibliothèque Québécoise, 2000. —. Evangéline Deusse. Montréal : Leméac, 1975. Maillet, Marguerite . « De la Nouvelle-France à la Nouvelle-Acadie. » Québec français, n° 60, 1985, p.30. Moatamri, Ines. Poétique de la Relation : Amina Saïd et Edouard Glissant. In Trans, no4, Paris : Publications de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 4 février 2007. Masson-Perrin, Valérie. Le statut du personnage dans l'œuvre romanesque d'Édouard Glissant. Université de Cergy-Pontoise, novembre 2006. Osu S. N., Col G., Garric N., Toupin F., (dir.), Construction d'identité et processus d'identification. Bern, Berlin, Bruxelles, Frankfurt am Main, New York, Oxford, Wien, 2010. Pallister, Janis. « Antonine Maillet's Évangeline Deusse: Historical, Popular and Literary Elements. » In American Review of Canadian Studies, 18.2, 1988, pp.239-48. Papastergiadis, Nikos. The Turbulence of Migration: Globalization, Deterritorialization, and Hybridity. Malden, MA : Polity Press, 2000.

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Rinne, Marie-Noëlle. « L'Acadie d'Évangéline Deusse et l'Irlande de Maria: femmes et frontières chez Maillet et Joyce. » Dalhousie French Studies, 62, 2003, pp. 137-45. Sourieau, Marie-Agnès. « Entretien avec Maryse Condé: de l'identité culturelle. » The French Review, Vol. 72, No. 6 (May, 1999), pp. 10911098. Usmiani, Ronate. « Recycling an Archetype: the Anti-Evangeline. » Canadian Theater Review, 46, 1992, pp. 68-73. Voohries, Felix de. Acadian Reminiscences: The True Story of Evangeline. Opalousas, Louisiane: The Jacobs News Depot Co. Publishers, 1907. Weiss, Jonathan M. « Acadia Transplanted: The Importance of Évangeline Deusse in the Work of Antonine Maillet. » Colby Library Quarterly, Volume 13, Issue 3, 1977, pp. 173-85.

CHAPTER FIVE AMERICA SEEN THROUGH THE EYES OF THE NORTH, WITH THE SOUL OF THE SOUTH BRIAN MCLOUGHLIN GRADUATE STUDENT, NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY

Three short stories by Dany Laferrière (1953- ) are the basis for French Palme d’Or winner Laurent Cantet’s (1961- ) 2005 film Heading South1. Cantet’s sixth film is a presentation of Haiti in the late 1970s as seen, primarily, through the eyes of three North American women of a certain age seeking a vacation full of sun, solace, and sex. Directed by a member of the global North, and based on the writings of a Haitian immigrant living in Montreal, this Franco-Canadian production proposes an intriguing and complex presentation of the North-South relationship, that in turn reveals how characters from the North, including Montreal, view the Haitian immigrant’s home and its own immigrants of color. Dany Laferrière first explored race and gender relations in Montreal in his first novel Comment faire l’amour avec un Nègre sans se fatiguer [How to Make Love to a Negro Without Getting Tired] (1985). Laferrière began this “American autobiography,” as he calls it (Laferrière 2010: 136), by exploring his adoptive city of Montreal through the lens of a black man and his sexual relations with stereotypically WASPy women. Ever the provocateur, seven novels later, he presented his country of origin in La Chair du maître [The Master’s Flesh] (1997), a collection of short stories focused on desire, sex, and power in Haiti. Three short stories of this series, including the one entitled “Vers le sud” [“Heading South”] about three North American middle-aged women who visit Haiti in the late 1970s in search of sex/romance tourism, inspired Laurent Cantet’s film of



1 The screenplay for Heading South (original title: Vers le sud) was written by Laurent Cantet and Robin Campillo. All dialogue transcriptions are mine.

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the same name. The critical success of Cantet’s movie inspired Laferrière to rework his short stories in La Chair du maître into a novel entitled Vers le sud (2006). This complex interaction between writing and filming, North and South, offers innovative perspectives on Haiti and its rapport with the USA and Quebec. This study will explore such an interaction to identify how Cantet used Laferrière’s work and presented a dual vision of the North and the South, one based both on Haitian/Québécois literary sources and his own experience as a French film-maker. It will delineate the socio-political landscape of Haiti and of Montreal revealed through the conversations and testimonials of the three northern protagonists. Ultimately, this essay will lead us to challenge the vision of a “global North” versus a “global South” in favor of a more nuanced analysis of Québécois/Haitian relations.

The South as Seen Through the (Tourist’s) Lens Heading South opens with the subtitle: “Haiti, late Seventies.” Laurent Cantet begins his presentation of Haiti during a time known as “a reign of terror, [...] under Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier,” writes Judith Michelmann in “Re-Organizing Cultural Values: Vers le Sud by Laurent Cantet” (149). Michelmann reminds us that this was a time when: Opponents who spoke out against the Duvalier family were kidnapped at night or attacked in broad daylight; armed forces stoned or burned people alive and hung their corpses in trees. Removing a body and burying it meant risking one’s own life. (Michelmann, 149)

The dangers of the Duvalier regime are evident from the very first images. The opening scene of the film takes place at the airport, filled with police and soldiers, where we see Albert (Lys Ambroise), the manager of the Petit Anse resort, approached by an older woman asking him to take her daughter with him. The woman lost her husband and will no longer be able to support the family. She is also fearful that her daughter may be attacked for her beauty. The audience realizes the danger as we see the daughter through glass windows in a bright yellow dress, showing off her beauty, surrounded by policemen. Albert eventually declines the mother’s offer as Brenda (Karen Young), a tourist from Savannah, Georgia, appears. Françoise Lionnet argues in “Postcolonialism, language, and the visual: By way of Haiti,” that: The brief conversation between Albert and the mother provides an effective and succinct narrative staging of the political and social problems

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This first encounter with the country serves to frame the whole film: Albert ignores the Haitian woman’s plea and turns instead to catering to Brenda’s needs. While he can shield her from some of the violence, he cannot prevent her from being exposed to it on their way to the Petit Anse beach resort. The following scenes take place during the taxi ride, as Brenda looks out the window at the city of Port-au-Prince characterized by “destruction, shabbiness, dirt, a mob of people” (Michelmann 2011:150). These images are all carefully filmed from the point of view of Brenda. As a tourist, she is kept safe from the dangers and problems of the city. Having turned his back on the older woman at the airport, Albert must now ensure that Brenda is not bothered by the children begging for money who try to reach into the car. The closed window serves to keep them out, but cannot prevent the image from making its way to Brenda, and to the audience. While Albert is the first Haitian Brenda encounters, he is not the focus of her attention, but rather a facilitator and protector. As such, she barely glances at him during their arrival at the airport and subsequent taxi ride. The gaze changes when she meets Legba (Ménothy Cesar), a young Haitian man plying his trade, and his body, at Petit Anse. Aptly so, Legba is named after the vodou loa (god) or “the orisha, the seducer of women, the giver of eroticized life who governs the threshold to the spirit world and who as master of the crossroads can help you find the way if you are lost” (Tate 2011, 51). Legba first appears lying on the beach of the Petit Anse resort. He serves as a guide for Brenda and other tourists, as well for the audience, as the film follows his goings between the resort (the world occupied by tourists from the global North) and the Port-au-Prince of the 1970s (the world occupied by Haitians). We quickly learn throughout the film that Legba is indeed a seducer of women, more specifically a very successful gigolo. Legba is in such demand among female tourists that other young Haitians ask him during a soccer game: “why are they [women] all at your feet?” and even seek his advice on seducing women. But Legba is not only a guide for other young Haitians looking for ways to survive in Haiti by selling their bodies; he is also a guide for the Northern protagonists, and through them the audience, as he leads them to partially deconstruct their vision of Haitian as a poor, ruthless, corrupt society, and to discover its values and its rules as well.

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This particular scene featuring young Haitians playing soccer and hanging out shows a rather peaceful Haiti. This fleeting impression is brought to a halting stop when two TonTon Macoutes start to bully a young drink vendor. Eddy (Jackenson Pierre Olmo Diaz) tries to stand up the police chief, but Legba, who defuses the situation by telling the officer that there is “no problem,” stops him. Legba realizes who these men are and knows better than to pick a fight with them. Legba emerges in this scene and subsequent ones as a protector. While he may indeed be a model for several aspiring gigolos, he also enforces some tacit rules. When Brenda decides to dance with Eddy, Legba quickly removes him from the scene. At first, the dance seemed innocent to Brenda, but not to Legba nor to the audience. We are reminded of the risks threatening young Eddy through the previous scene featuring Brenda’s sexual abuse of 15 year old Legba. Brenda gave a testimonial describing her first encounter with him in these terms; she “literally threw herself on him” and experienced her first orgasm. Ellen (Charlotte Rampling), another tourist, provides an apt reading of the scene when she accuses her to be a “cradle snatcher.” Brenda agrees to such a reading and backs off from seducing Eddy. Ellen and Legba combine forces here to enforce the rules of the game. While there indeed may be a system of oppression in place at the resort, it comes with rules and safeguards. Legba is clearly aware of the rules that govern the oppressive system he finds himself in, so much so that he is able to manipulate some in his favor, as slaves were able to during the times of slavery. One of the rules that we learn early on is that Legba is not allowed to dine in the restaurant of the resort. Albert is seen shooing him off the premises after only talking with the waitresses. The tension between Albert and Legba reminds the viewer of the traditional tensions between the “house Negro,” who served as a domestic servant in the home of the master, and the “field Negro” who did manual labor out in the fields. The domestic servant belonged to the most favored class of slaves, as they were not exposed to the dangers of fieldwork, and had skills (such as nurses, cooks, etc.), as well as a better mastery of the master’s language which earned them a relatively easier life in the Great house (Harper 1985, 123). The terms “house Negro,” and “field Negro” are terms used by Malcolm X in his “Message to the Grass Roots,” where he explains the distinction between the two classes of slaves, while also arguing that because the “house Negro” has a better life than that of the “field Negro,” the “house Negro” is more willing to maintain the power structures of the plantation (X 1994, 10-11).

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These class and social distinctions are presented to the audience in the very first scene of the film where Albert is seen by the woman trying to ‘save’ her daughter as a Haitian of high(er) socio-economic standing. The choice of Albert as a name may also point to his parents trying to distance him from Haitian vodou practitioners, while increasing his relation with the North. Legba, on the other hand, is raised by a poor single mother whose expectations are lower than those of Albert’s because of their own socio-economic standing. Albert’s socio-economic standing is also supported by his access to a voice; he is able to express himself through a monologue, though such a monologue may be more aimed at the audience than other characters. Legba has no such testimonial, nor any real chance to voice his opinions other than through his actions. Albert’s ranking in the pyramid of power is however lower than the white tourists’ who speak their testimonials directly to the camera, whereas Albert must give his while working, indeed in reaction to having been ordered by Brenda to fetch a drink and a meal for Legba. Being able to dine with the tourist in the restaurant is a victory that Legba acknowledges when he gives a grin to Albert. Not only is Legba able to have a nice free meal but also he also reverses the power dynamic between him and Albert. Legba finds his way to “the Big Boy table” as Ellen describes, by getting Brenda to order Albert for food and drinks. He manipulates Brenda’s economic power over the resort manager to reach his goal while simultaneously exerting his own sexual power directly over the women. While the women are the ones who choose with whom they partner, Legba has the power to seduce the women into choosing him. Through Brenda’s testimonial on their first encounter, we learn that the sexual drive was so strong she could not resist him, despite her misgivings about his age. Even Ellen, the cynical tourist from Boston, admits that Legba could make her “come almost without touching” her, which was reason enough for her to do anything, like getting him a passport, to “keep him.” As Laferrière writes in “The Master’s Flesh,” the short story used for the movie and included in the novel Vers le sud, “desire is always what drives history” (Laferrière 2009, 211). Legba has the power to manipulate the neo-colonial system of oppression in the resort, but he has no interest in using his power to break the system. This would be a death sentence for him, or at least condemn him to a life of begging or small street jobs. He challenges the system in ways that maintain a balance between his own needs and interests and the rules of the resort/plantation, which relies on him and other gigolos to survive. While Albert and Legba may seem to be at odds, they in fact complement and need each other. Dany Laferrière makes this clear in the

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third story that inspired the film entitled “Les garcons magiques” and the subsequent novel. The story explains how the son of a Haitian judge uses his inheritance to open a hotel on a beach in Haiti, but struggles to make a profit (Laferrière 2009, 111-12). He quickly learns about “Les garcons magiques,” young gigolos like Legba whom Northern women flock down to visit every year (Laferrière 2009, 117). This leads him to develop a business plan around them: “That’s just what I need, he tells himself when he is back on the road. He won’t ban those magic boys from his hotel, he’ll put up with them, he’ll welcome them, and he’ll even invite them. They’re a real goldmine!” (Laferrière 2009, 117). Legba is fully aware of his ‘privileged’ life in the resort through his own experience growing up poor but also his current contact with Haitians living ‘off the plantation’, such as his mother or his ex girl-friend. As the latter reminds him: Look at the people around us. Like my sister: Maryse, the live-in maid, who has to sleep with her boss and his son! Your cousin MacKinnon fixes tires on the sidewalk, and gets insulted, all day!

This comment points to the existence of a predatory sexual system in Port-au-Prince as well; the latter however targets young women who must sleep with their employers or, like his ex girl-friend, become a sexual toy for a government official. In their case, however, there is no manipulating the system to choose whom to sleep with. Legba’s ex-girlfriend explains to him how the men in power can force their will, as Colonel Beauvais did with her, not through rape but with presents: No, that’s not how it happens. They give you jewels, smiles, gifts, roses... But you know that this man who’s giving you gifts and smiles, just for kicks, may gun down any fool who crosses his path! So the roses and gifts are like a machine-gun against you neck.

Legba’s work also opens up economic opportunities for those working in the tourism industry. Thanks to Legba’s ‘skills’, Albert too is able to gain another dollar. While Albert resents having to serve Legba, and the Northerners, because of his family history of fighting off Americans, “the invaders, occupiers, people who dare to tread on Haitian soil” as his father put it, he does so because he has no choice, the economic power of the North is too great as he explains: “This time, the invaders aren’t armed. But, they have more damaging weapons than canons: dollars!” The same economic power is exerted by Colonel Beauvais but backed by real weapons as Brenda’s and Legba’s visit to the market makes very clear. A

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peaceful scene like the one featuring youth playing soccer is once again interrupted when Frank, Colonel Beauvais’s driver, tries to run the couple down. Legba knows that he is the only target and indeed Frank chases him with his gun. Ultimately, Legba was able to manipulate the rules of the resort to his own benefit, but loses his life when he breaks the rules of the outside world. Meeting with his ex girl-friend, he infringes upon Colonel Beauvais’ prerogatives and pays with his life. Legba and his ex-girlfriend are found dead on the beach, a location that reminds the audience that no Haitian can escape the rules in place, even if he chooses to live in a resort. However, the dangers are less of a threat to the tourists. When Legba is chased down, Brenda is left alone in the city. No harm comes to her, and she even admits that the day overall was “fine” because she was able to spend the day with the man of her choosing, and bought him lots of presents. Even when the bodies are found on the beach, the inspector has little concern for tourists as he explains to Albert “tourists never die.” Laurent Cantet reinforces that perspective by showing how the tourists react to the deaths. They remain safe and if their lives at Petit Anse may have come to an end, they are free to leave and seek other opportunities.

A Vacation from Oppression The women who visit Haiti are free from the dangers that plague the country, but they too are oppressed in their homes. The beach resort serves the women as a haven from the dangers that Haitians, like Legba, must confront on a daily basis. Ellen shows the tourist’s perspective on the resort in contrast to the rest of Haiti in her testimonial where she says: I was always drawn to the South, but I neglected Port-au-Prince. To me, it was a hick town. Nowhere City. An animal compound. [...] I always stay in this hotel. It’s quiet, clean, the beach is beautiful. The moment I get here I feel at home.

For all the white northern women in the film, the resort in Haiti is a place where they can escape a North that sees them as undesirable whether it is because of their age, intellect, or size. They each explain their own reasons for coming to Haiti through personal testimonials. Brenda has come to reconnect with Legba, or more precisely to relive her sexual experiences with the same young man who gave her her first orgasm two years earlier. Ellen admits to the audience that she has come for the “love or sex,” that can be easily bought on the beach of the resort, though usually she limits her options to Legba. And a third woman, Sue, a “well-rounded” factory worker from Montreal, has come back to Haiti after failed experiences in

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Montreal. In the resort, she feels that her relationship with a local man will not be judged and will escape the confines of the white male dominated society of Montreal. These women have come to Haiti to pursue their (sexual) desires in Haiti during the hey-day of the world feminist liberation movement in the late 1970s. Their rapport with local culture is influenced by their own social class back in the North, as indicated by the exchange below: Sue: I love going to the market. It’s so cheap. For $3 you get a sculpture or a painting. I buy lots, my home’s full of them! Ellen: I go as little as possible. And when I do, I wish I’d stayed here.

Sue is quick to admit the ease of her purchasing the cultural artifacts of Haiti. Indeed naïve paintings in Haiti have become a staple of souvenirs for tourists. Since Dewitt Peters arrived in Haiti in 1943 and helped establish a year later the Centre d’art in Port-au-Prince, there has been a great interest in Haitian painting, with Hector Hyppolite (1894-1948) perhaps being one of, if not the best known Haitian painter (Barnett, 12425). Haitian painting features prominently in Laferrière’s work, especially in his novel Pays sans Chapeau (1996); rather than focusing on naïve art, he however underlines the individuality of painters presented in Port-auPrince’s art museum. On the other hand, the connection between naïve art and a northern vision/construction of Haitian painting is explored in the short story “A Naïve Painting.” The short story tells of a “New York Jewish Intellectual” who after seeing an exhibition of Haitian naïve art connects it to her own experience, declaring that she had found her “people” (Laferrière 2009, 74). While Haitian naïve art is now pitched to northern tourists and caters to their expectations, it nonetheless features many aspects of Haitian culture and identity. Its easy availability at the local market and Sue’s own admission that her “home is full of them” however turns them into cultural trophies. Unlike the original paintings by Hector Hyppolite on doors and walls (Barnett, 124), these paintings are smaller and easily packaged for ready export. Contrary to Sue, Ellen never leaves the resort nor does she buy local paintings. Her choice may reflect a different social class, and be an aside comment on the quality of such painting, but it also reflects her own preference for buying the (young and male) Haitian body directly. The latter is however far less easily transportable and requires her to return to Haiti for access. In the film, Ellen unabashedly explains why she is at the resort. Ellen explains to the audience in her testimonial that not only is there a lack of suitable suitors in her home Boston, but that she also abhors how the male sex in her North American culture treats its women by saying: “They [her

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students’ boyfriends] must be all alike. And surely enjoy having those girls at their mercy. Maybe a woman crying turns them on. I find it repulsive.” For Ellen, her vacations at the resort are spent primarily, as we see, enjoying the sun on the beach, and Legba. For the tourists, Haiti is indeed a site of “escapist tourism and danger.” (Tate, 51). Not only do they escape the banality of their lives at home, but also each of these women does escape a world where they are subordinate. Ellen escapes a world where her intellect is unappreciated, Brenda travels to Haiti to escape the traditional role of a housewife who does not experience orgasms, and Sue escapes a Montreal where her size can be an embarrassment for those who sleep with her. In the resort, they are all seen as beautiful women, at least that is what Legba tells them, and when he asks Ellen if she really wants to know what he thinks, she says: “No, dear. Leave me with my illusions.” Regardless of the realities that women face in the North or even in the South, in the resort they can become beautiful princesses, whose needs and desires are filled by Haitian waitresses, and by Haitian gigolos. They are however unaware that their economic power to buy whatever they desire, “turns everything into garbage”, as Albert pointedly remarks.

The “Black Guy From Harlem” in the “Great White North” The North is never shown in the film, likely because the audience is from the North, and so there is little need to provide visual cues, unlike for Haiti. We are given descriptions of the North and of Montreal specifically, again from the white northern woman’s point of view, as all of the women are white citizens of North American countries. Montreal is shown to be a place where women, like Sue can compete in fields historically occupied by men, such as factories. This is in opposition to the presentation of the United States, where, according to Brenda’s and Ellen’s descriptions, the woman’s place is either as a housewife, or if she chooses to be an intellectual like Ellen, a professional pursuit from which she can easily be dismissed. These tourists, all white women, are presented as representatives of what could be called the “global North.” This exaggerated representation is counterbalanced, by the exaggerated representation of the “global South” in the form of Haiti and Haitians, who, in the film, are all black and none of whom is middle-class. Ellen reminds Sue and the audience that in the North and Montreal in particular, there is “no shortage of black up there.” And many of them are from Haiti, like Dany Laferrière. Sue may have known some, and that may be why she is the only one of the woman

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that is heard speaking creole. “Either way, blacks [...] don’t interest” her, says Sue. This leads to a discussion of the difference between the black men of the North and the black men of the South. Brenda suggests that the difference may be that the latter are “closer to nature.” Ellen reveals, that the real reason is simply because of their body: “here you see them stripped down to the waist [...] They’re a dime a dozen, take your pick.” Like the paintings that Sue buys so cheaply, the gigolos like Legba, are objectified as “cheap commodities” (Tate, 54). The black man in the South or more precisely the “native” Haitian is preferable to these women of the North than any black man in the North. Ellen makes this blatantly clear when she snipes at Legba for wearing a European/Western buttoned down shirt that was given to him by Brenda by saying that he looks like “a black guy from Harlem.” Ellen says this in English to Brenda, making it look like a swipe against her for buying gifts for Ellen’s favorite gigolo (De Raedt, 130). Ellen stands by the statement when she translates the statement to Legba, who in response asks, “You don’t like black guys from Harlem.” Her response reveals what kind of “black guy” Ellen really likes. The black man that Ellen likes is the one who lies in her bed naked, objectified for the camera, both the camera of the filmmaker and the camera used by Ellen as she takes pictures. Judith Michelmann writes that this picture “can be seen in succession [...] to the south-sea pictures of Gauguin in the 19th century” (Michelmann, 152). This image reduces Legba even further to a mere body for Ellen to purchase, consume and export, like the small naïve paintings. Ellen also perceives Legba as non-politically involved or committed. When asked if the people in Haiti know about governmental waste, he answers: “I don’t know. Probably.” Ellen is surprised by his relative apathetic attitude and reacts by challenging it, “How can you stand it?” To which Legba quickly retorts: “Who says we do.” Legba exposes that he does stand against it (De Raedt, 130). Legba exposes himself as political being, who indeed is aware of everything going on around, from the socio-economic rules that he must abide by to the neo-colonial system that oppresses him and his mates on and off the resort. Once Legba reveals himself to be more informed than Ellen thought, she abruptly changes to conversation to banal subjects, like the reasons behind cocktail names. The type of black man that Ellen does not like is a politically aware, intelligent one, as Legba proves to be. Legba, as Thérèse De Raedt notes is in fact a nationalist, like Albert, as demonstrated by Legba’s constant refusal of an American passport (De Raedt, 129). This refusal, which leads to Legba’s own death, is seen as a form of resistance:

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Legba rejects the North, because he knows that while the passport may save him from oppression in Haiti, such freedom is really a mask for another form of oppression. What women like Ellen seem to want then is the stereotypical black man of the south or in the words of Dany Laferrière: “a cannibal, fresh out of the bush, [whose] father was the big medicine-man in his village. The whole mythology. [...] [A] real bushman, homo primitivus, the Negro according to National Geographic, Rousseau and Company.” (Laferrière 1987, 147) This is how many of the women see Legba, especially as he spends most of his time in swimming trunks or naked. Ellen most explicitly takes a picture of him naked like an exotic discovery. When Brenda first met Legba she watched him eat and was surprised as she “had never anyone eat so much in [her] life,” a scene very similar to one in Dany Laferrière’s first book when one woman watches a black man eat and declares: “Watching you eat fascinates me. You eat with such passion. I’ve never seen anyone do it like you do.” (Laferrière 1987, 24). For both of these white women from the north, the black man is reduced to a man indulging in his senses, as a consumer of both food and sex. Dany Laferrière explores this kind of stereotype in his novel How to make love to a Negro without Getting Tired. This kind of a stereotype is one that he explains in his novel, that black men in (1980s) Montreal must portray even if say “he’s not from the bush. He’s from Abidjan, one of Africa’s great cities. He lived in Denmark and Holland for quite a while before coming to Montreal. He’s an urban man, a virtual European,” (Laferrière 1987, 147). The black man in the North, particularly the immigrant, has no chance to find a partner if he does not condone and even play to the stereotype; he is then left aside much like these white women who seek their partners in the South. The black Northern western man is not what these Northern women want, except perhaps for Brenda, as she tries to dress Legba as a European/Northern/Western man. Brenda does appear to be different from the other Northerners. When she arrives in Haiti, the audience sees that she chooses to actively look out of the car to see the “authentic” Haiti, away from the resort. She also goes to the local market, like Sue. This is in contrast to Ellen, who looks fixedly ahead when she is driven to the airport and never goes to the market.

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When the women learn that Legba may be in danger, Brenda is the only one that goes off into the darkness of the city searching for him, while Ellen stays within the confines of the resort. Brenda finds herself sitting in a dance club eyeing the local men. Here there is some sense that both the white female tourist and the black Haitian male can be equals. Both are speaking through body language, and not with the language of the former colonizers/occupiers, as it is spoken in the resort. But she is the one looking and is content to be looked at by a black man. Brenda’s decision not to return to the North, unlike Sue, can be understood as a rejection similar to Legba’s. Brenda has gained the courage to leave the unrealistic imagined security of the resort “where tourists do not die,” and venture into the “authentic” Haiti. Brenda also decides to travel to the other islands of the Caribbean alone and decides not to return to the North, not just because she doesn’t “have a house anymore or a husband,” but also because she “want[s] nothing to do with men from the North.” Brenda has not only gained independence, she has realized what she wants: she rejects “the looks that say poor Brenda, crazy as ever,” and welcomes the look that Legba gave her, one of desire, albeit one paid for. Brenda’s and Legba’s decision to reject the “global North” is an affirmation that even though the South is a dangerous place, it is still a place worth living in. Like Laferrière’s character in “A Naïve Painting,” who leaves her New York life for one in Haiti, many are simply drawn to the “Pearl of the Antilles,” like Laurent Cantet who made a film after visiting it, and like Ellen, who despite having “neglected Port-au-Prince, [...] feel[s] at home.” Laurent Cantet’s presentation of Haiti was that of “a paradoxical object, fascinating, haunting, and repulsive, but also ‘spectacular’ and desirable” (Lionnet, 232). The tourists of the resort witnessed the dangers of Haiti under the Duvalier regime, but remained safe and able to purchase and experience whatever their hearts desired. While the tourists were shown to be safe from all dangers, local Haitians on the other hand had to deal with the oppression of a tyrannical regime, but also racism and abuse from the North. A North, where oppression still exists for many women, and where racism helps keep stereotypes alive. Through film and text, and through the eyes of the North with the soul of the South, the reality and complexity of our imperfect world is revealed.

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Bibliography Barnitz, Jaqueline. Twentieth-Century Art of Latin America. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2001. Print. Cantet, Laurent, dir. Heading South. Shadow Distribution Release, 2005. Film. De Raedt, Thérèse. “Vers le Sud:” de la violence, du pouvoir, du sexe et de l’argent. In J. Day (Ed.), Violence in French and Francphone Literature and Film (2008): 123-142. Print. Guitiérrez-Rodríguez, Encarnación. Migration, Domestic Work, Affect: A Decolonial Approach on Value and the Feminization of Labor. New York: Routledge, 2010. Print. Harper, C.W. “Black Aristorcrats: Domestic Servansts on the Antebellum Plantation.” Phylon 46.2 (Quarter 2 1985): 123-135. Print. Heading South, Shadow Distribution Press Kit. Shadow Distribution. n.d. Web. 14 Jan 2012. . Laferrière, Dany. Comment faire l’amour avec un Nègre sans se fatiguer. 1985. Montreal: Typo, 2002. Print. —. How to Make Love to a Negro Without Getting Tired. Trans. David Homel. 1987. Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 2010. Print. —. Heading South. Trans. Wayne Grady. 2009. Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 2009. Print. —. Vers le sud. Paris: Bernard Grasset, 2006. Print. —. J’écris comme je vis. Québec: Boréal, 2010. Print. Lionnet, Françoise. “Postcolonialism, language, and the visual: By way of Haiti.” Journal of Postcolonial Writing 44:3 (September 2008): 227238. Print. Livingston, Jessica. “The Global capital’s false choices in the films of Laurent Cantet.” Jump Cut: A Review of Contemporary Media 53 (Summer 2011). Web. 14 Jan 2012. Michelmann, Judith. “Re-Organizing Cultural Values: Vers le Sud by Laurent Cantet.” CINEJ Cinema Journal 1 (2011): 149-158. Print. Tate, Shirley. “Heading South: Love/Sex, Necropolitics, and Decolonial Romance.” Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism 15:235 (July 2011): 43-58. Print. X, Malcolm. Malcolm X Speaks: Selected Speeches and Statements. Ed. George Breitman. New York: Grove Press, 1994. Print.

CHAPTER SIX ÎLE DE FRANCE: THE CONSTRUCTION OF AN INSULAR CITY IN THE WORK OF ÉDOUARD GLISSANT CHRISTINA KULLBERG RESEARCHER IN FRENCH AND FRANCOPHONE LITERATURE, UPPSALA UNIVERSITY, SWEDEN

Urbanity is not the first word that comes into mind when reading the work of Martinican poet and thinker Édouard Glissant. One of the touchstones in his thinking is the idea that place is “incontournable.” This untranslatable term is elusive and polysemic but means, among other things, that we carry a place with us and cannot escape this place or even delineate its boundaries. In Glissant’s case, place is tied to the mornes around his native village of Bézaudin, located in the northern region of Martinique. So if Glissant famously advised Patrick Chamoiseau in the epigraph to Texaco to write from the urban perspective of Fort-de-France that formed Chamoiseau’s childhood, he lets his own writing be shaped by the rural setting of his childhood. Nevertheless, Glissant is one of the few Martinican writers who truly engage in a literary representation of Paris. Though both Aimé Césaire in Cahier d'un retour au pays natal and Patrick Chamoiseau in Chronique des sept misères created their first poetic visions of Fort-de-France in the French capital, the city is only indirectly present in their work. Glissant, on the other hand, relates the years he spent in Paris as a student in his first book of prose, Soleil de la conscience (1956). In a fragmented narrative recalling a prose poem, he depicts Paris through an unconventional lens, and this approach to the capital ties into key Glissantian concepts such as creolization, relation, and opacity. Paradoxically, as this essay will show, when Glissant encounters Paris, the very conviction that place shapes our being in the world will finally allow him to experience the urbanity of the French capital through the prism of his pays-natal.

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Urbanization and Creolization Glissant is clearly skeptical of urbanity. When he conceptualizes the notion of mondiality, for example, he does so by focusing on unexpected connections between landscapes and ecosystems rather than looking at cities as meeting points for cultures from different parts of the globe. The Tout-monde, his version of global interconnectedness, echoes the idea of the global as a village. Our world is, according to Glissant, experienced as small, like a village, not because new technologies bring us closer to one another but because global interchanges take place in reality and in the realm of the imagination, between individuals as well as between environments and landscapes, such as water and earth. Glissant always said he preferred Paris to New York because the French capital is like a conglomeration of villages. When in Paris, he lived in the heart of the city, on the left bank not far from the Place Furstenberg that surfaces in so many of his writings. In New York he lived in Long Island City, close to the water and looking out at Manhattan and its famous skyline. The country boy in him no doubt wanted to keep the city at a safe distance. Yet while New York may be overwhelmingly urban in the eyes of the Martinican, Glissant’s writings suggest that he would view its ethnic neighborhoods as an impediment to the emergence of a creolized city. New York is simply too compartmentalized; it is a mosaic which, according to Glissant, strongly decreases the possibilities for fruitful exchanges. At the other end of the spectrum, the traditional analogy of the melting pot also falls short since fused elements hinder the dynamics behind the process of creolization. The few times he does represent the city, Glissant seems to deliberately avoid looking at it through either of these lenses, even though they might reflect some aspects of a social reality. At the same time, the absence of engagement with the urban space in Glissant’s writings seems to go against his entire aesthetics and thinking, particularly with regards to his uses of the notion of creolization. As Françoise Lionnet and Shu-mei Shih show in The Creolization of Theory, the concept of creolization may on the one hand serve to describe complex linguistic and cultural mixing that occurred in some parts of the world at the beginning of colonization, notably in the Caribbean and in the Indian Ocean (Lionnet and Shih 2011, 2-3). On the other hand, it may also be used analytically to account for ongoing cultural contacts (Lionnet and Shih 2011, 11). While some critics stress local and historical dimensions and argue against the generalization of the notion of creolization, Lionnet and Shih claim that “all life stories of theoretical concepts do begin as

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regional concepts; they are all first historically and contextually specific before they become widely disseminated, applied, or assumed to be universal” (Lionnet and Shih 2011, 23). Lionnet and Shih further write that creolization can be conceived “as a dynamic, never-ending, and ongoing phenomenon that begins in the plantation economies of the New World (with their violent encounters that nonetheless gave rise to productive forms of contact, the mises en relation theorized by Glissant) that continues to take new forms in the contemporary world, leading to unknown and unforeseeable results” (Lionnet and Shih 2011, 30). Glissant, to whom Lionnet and Shih refer, shares a similar stance insofar as he takes his native Caribbean island as a point of departure for outlining a theory of creolization, but through stressing the unpredictable characteristics of creolization, he portrays it as a moving concept or a process that cannot be localized in one specific time-place. As Dominique Chancé points out, Glissant reserves the notion of créolité (creoleness) to the Caribbean while being quite critical towards the (in)famous manifesto Éloge de la créolité for being too essentialist and thereby working against creolization (Chancé 2011, 264). “[Creolization] is not merely an encounter,” Glissant explains, “a shock (in Ségalen’s sense), a métissage, but a new and original dimension allowing each person to be here and elsewhere, rooted and open lost in the mountains and free beneath the sea, in harmony and in errantry” (Glissant 1997, 34). Here, creolization appears as an attempt at conceptualizing a new form of identity in terms of plurality and transformation. This multilayered identity implies a spatial and temporal simultaneity and leads to a conceptualization of identity as being rhizomatic. Again, the metaphors and imagery used by Glissant are patently rural: mountains, seas, rhizomes and nomadism. However, for the “new dimension” of creolization to occur, initial shocks are necessary since they prevent creolization from becoming synonymous with fusion and hybridity. It is precisely these initial collisions that make creolization the opposite of a melting-pot. Since cultural shocks are traditionally more likely to occur in cities, the urban space may be more important to Glissant than he leads us to believe. In fact, even though the images and metaphors Glissant uses to express creolization may be mostly rural, his definition of the notion as being “a limitless métissage, its elements diffracted and its consequences unforeseeable” recalls many descriptions of the urban space (Glissant 1997, 34). Ulf Hannerz, one of the first anthropologists of the urban space, speaks of how the city results in unpredicted and often brief human relations (Hannerz 1983, 22). More recent theories of the urban space in the age of global migrations also add that the city is “a place where

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everything changes” (Saunders 2010, 1). In the perspective of today’s migrant urbanization, Doug Saunders’s book Arrival City approaches the city through a geographically articulated theory of desire: Migrants inhabit the surroundings of a global metropolis; from here they are pulled towards the cities’ downtowns, where the symbolic center of power is located (Saunders 2010, 2-3). In his book Creolizing the Metropole, H. Adlai Murdoch demonstrates how, despite their status as oppressed minority, communities of the Caribbean diaspora influence two former colonial capitals, London and Paris, in that they displace "traditional concepts of ethnicity and dispossession and their categorical corollaries grounded in a neither/nor binary and [replace] them with alternative positionalities of doubleness and difference" (Murdoch 2012, 12). Processes of cultural contacts put in place by urban immigrant communities destabilize Europe's “imagined communities”, Murdoch argues, and pave the way for identitarian constructions which include cultural crossings. Clearly, the very idea of encounters is persistent in theories of the urban space. This theoretical basis was formulated already between the World Wars in aesthetic theories outlining a particular form of urban poetics. Notably, Walter Benjamin interprets the encounter in terms of a shock occurring when disparate entities meet. He sees this shock as a sign of urban imprint in the poetry of Charles Baudelaire, from which the surrealists will develop their form of “urban” prose, notably Louis Aragon in Le Paysan de Paris and André Breton in Nadja (Benjamin 1968, 230231). Similarly, J. Michael Dash has underscored the surrealist influence on Glissant’s poetics of Relation in terms of aesthetics of shock (Dash 2003, 97-98). Dash claims that for Glissant and other writers of the postnegritude generation, “Surrealism would usher in the concept of radical plurality and the possibility of using unprecedented ways (traces, detours) of connecting or negotiating the irreducible strangeness of things” (Dash 2003, 100). Notions of plurality and itinerary metaphors for describing connections to the outside also echo the urban space from which the Surrealists drew their idea of objective chance. Benjamin’s essay “On some Motifs in Baudelaire” finds in shock at once a term for mediation with the outside world and also a term for the creative process. Referring to Freud, he argues that shock appears as the consequence of an overload of information (Benjamin 1968, 161). Consciousness works as a cushion to protect the unconscious from the avalanche of impressions. The shock is thus the outside world hitting against the shield of consciousness. In a space which allows for multiples impressions such as a modern metropolis, consciousness is under constant assault, and develops a protective response: “the more constantly

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consciousness has to be alert against the stimuli; the more efficiently it does so, the less do these impressions enter experience [Erfahrung], tending to remain in the sphere of a certain hour in one’s life [Erlebnis]” (Benjamin 1968, 163). In Benjamin’s reading, Baudelaire’s creative process appears like a duel between stimuli and consciousness, as the poet is drawn towards the stimulations offered by the great city, yet wants to avoid them and remain in the realm of experience. Thus, for Benjamin the notion of shock is part of a longer chain of mediations between the subject and the outside world and should not be considered as reflecting isolated moments. This spatially and temporally broader understanding of shock is close to Glissant’s conception of creolization as a dynamic process of cultural interconnections, tending towards new dimensions. Considering these connections between Glissant's theory of creolization and poetics of relation, and different theories of the urban, one is compelled to ask why he is clearly reluctant to embrace cities. Glissant's ambiguous relationship to urbanity shows striking similarities with his ambivalence towards globalization. In an interview included in Lionnet and Shih's The Creolization of Theory, Glissant turns to the notion of creolization when discussing contemporary globalization. While claiming that “today the entire world is becoming archipelagized and creolized” (Glissant 1997, 194), Glissant argues that the idea of globalization, as dominated by economic forces, actually operates against creolization. In globalization, as opposed to the Tout-monde, exchanges are subjected to the logic of liberal economy and in this structure these exchanges become predictable and controllable, according to Glissant. Globalization refuses unpredictability, which is a key factor in Glissantian creolization. As Chancé explains: “Subsequently for him, the concept of creolization encompasses and exceeds the concepts of métissage and acculturation, and it responds to the phenomenon of globalization, which should be combated as a forced 'mise en relation' or encounter, a mode of standardization and domination that produces a 'standardized dilution'” (Chancé 2011, 265). Globalization is not an organic but a forced process of mise en relation. Instead of leading to unpredictable multiplicity, it reduces differences under one powerful model. The threat of globalization is thus its tendencies to standardization. This brings us back to Saunders’ observations on contemporary migrant urbanization as linked to a theory of desire. In this perspective, cities are loci of power. They have the power of attracting elements from the periphery, drawing them in. This magnetic capacity creates a form of encounter that is not collisional. Instead, the dominant element tends to absorb the weaker. Such an encounter is not a result of a mutual movement

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towards one another. Moreover, since the element drawn towards the center desires to be part of that center, no violent clash is likely to happen. Surely, it might hit an obstacle and be denied passage, but in such cases there is actually no true encounter to speak of, just rejection. Having this power of absorption, the city would present a threat to creolization just as globalization does. This might explain Glissant’s reluctance to develop his concept of creolization specifically in relation to the city. What happens then when Glissant accounts for his personal encounter with the city of Paris in Soleil de la conscience? In the remainder of this essay we will see that while Glissant deals with the symbolic power of the urban, he simultaneously explores Paris as a possible site for creolization. On the one hand, Paris in the 1950s holds already what Glissant later will theorize as the threat of globalization, a “forced mise en relation” that promotes standardization instead of dynamic processes of cultural crossings which would characterize the chaos-monde or the Tout-monde. On the other, he seems to seek to come to terms with the city as a locus for possible encounters leading to creolization. Perhaps the metropole cannot suppress the creolizing forces after all. However, in order to approach the urban space, the narrator of Soleil de la conscience must conceptualize the city as an insular place. Throughout Glissant’s work, this insular model for urbanity will then operate as a means to connect the idea of creolization with that of the city as a counter-discourse to the ideals of the melting pot and multi-culturalism.

The City as Mirror Narration in Soleil de la conscience is far from being linear; it operates through thematic and poetic associations. The book is at once a travel account, an autobiography, a theoretical essay, and a poetics, relating Édouard Glissant’s encounter with Paris and Europe. Glissant is not just any voyager: he is both French (according to his passport, and his language of expression) and an outsider (he comes from the Caribbean). As Adlai Murdoch underlines, this is characteristic of the Antillean experience in France. He convincingly shows that after the French Antilles became France's Over-seas Departments in 1946, Martinicans and Guadeloupians are insiders by citizenship, but outsiders in terms of skin color, culture, and language as they also speak Creole (Murdoch 2012, 6778; 121). From this double-bind position, Glissant practices a form of “reversed exoticism,” as he lets his eyes wander around “the landscapes of French knowledge (connaissance)” (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 13).

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Soleil de la conscience can be seen as an exploration of the narrator’s coming to terms with Paris. However, the French capital is not a complete unknown: Glissant has been brought up with images of the French capital, read French nineteenth century realist writers, and studied French history in school. He knows Paris, and hardly seems surprised when he first encounters it: Paris, quand on y tombe (pour moi ce fut par le trou gris de la gare SaintLazare) étonne à peine: tellement les arts de la reproduction, les entêtements monolithiques de l’Enseignement ou l’imagination courant les livres vous ont habitué à y entrer. (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 15) [Paris, when you get there (for me, I came through the grey hole of the Saint-Lazare station) is hardly astonishing: the arts of reproduction, the monolithic stubbornness of education or imagination found in books have made you so used to entering this city.” All translations from Soleil de la conscience are mine unless otherwise stated.]

The Paris of monuments, cathedrals, and boulevards is a cliché or “tourist folklore.” But behind the narrator’s comment, one can sense a threat. The monuments that have been reproduced and disseminated throughout the world, including in the colonies, represent power. Their imagery has a real, palpable effect on people, and that is precisely why the narrator seeks to underscore their platitude. He creates a deliberate distance from certain aspects of the city that hold the symbolic power. In other words, the narrator is, in fact, protecting himself from the strong impact of symbols. The monuments are but momentary impressions that do not nor are allowed to leave an imprint. The inherent threat of the city is further present through the use of anthropomorphisms. The city “se referme très vite sur l’arrivant” [closes quickly upon the visitor] and “se refuse” [resists] (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 15). Further on, Glissant notes how Paris “n’aime pas ce sérieux qui paraît de l’affectation” [does not like this seriousness that comes from affectedness] and “joue à l’art et à la littérature” [pretends to play with art and literature] (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 17). Giving Paris human traits is also a way to control the abstract dimensions of its symbolic power. Thereby, the narrator can keep his distance and critically question the foreign yet familiar world of the metropolitan capital. The city becomes a body upon which the narrator projects French ways of knowing, seeing, and understanding with which he was, until now, only familiar through his colonial education. Paris incarnates an entire culture, its building reflecting values and mores. The narrator's sense of alienation towards this reality stems precisely from the fact that he knows Paris even though his

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Caribbean reality is radically different from the grey streets of the capital. He shares the same culture as metropolitan France, but coming from another place, he becomes aware of the differences, and that the French culture which has been depicted as universal and universally shared by all French citizens cannot be applied generally. The narrator immediately senses the impossibility of fusing with the city. This impossibility is not only due to a French culture unwilling to let him in. The fundamental reason is that he comes from another reality, making his reading of this space different from a Parisian’s own vision. Facing this French reality, the narrator questions the possibility of ever truly understanding or experiencing (éprouver) Racine or the cathedral in Chartres for instance (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 13). So the city is merely a pretext for questions of a more complex nature that are leitmotifs in Glissant’s entire oeuvre: Can one assume to fully know the other? And if not, how do we conceptualize our connections with the foreign? Instead of being seduced by the images of the city, Glissant tries to truly get to know it. He searches for the city's irreducible difference, or what Glissant in later texts would call its “opacity” (Glissant 1997, 190). Acknowledging the opacity of the other is, according to Glissant, a fundamental step towards establishing relations. Such a mise en relation between opacities does not depend upon understanding what is different but simply acknowledging it and trying to connect with it. Glissant is particularly struck by the isolation which permeates the city. There is no community life in Paris, each individual existing in the solitude of his/her room and apartment despite the density of the population (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 15). Likewise, Parisian individualism and Caribbean collective cultures are reflected in their respective expressions: “Nous sommes ici à l’opposé des littératures collectives, […], de l’acceptation du mot comme lieu commun de tous” (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 17) [Here we are at the opposite end of collective literatures […], of the word being accepted as a common ground accessible for everyone]. In Paris, experiences and expressions are not shared but individual. Each individual has to find his own voice in solitude. In this regard, the very gesture of writing an autobiography can be seen as one impact of Parisian life. The introvert’s search for the self comes out as a form of negotiation with what he identifies as Frenchness. Whereas the monuments and symbols of power are depicted at a distance, the sensation of solitude appears to be something to which the narrator can relate; there is a possibility for mise en relation between two facets of his identity (French and Martinican). The search for Paris is, in fact, a search for the self by means of difference and similarity: exposed to an environment to which he belongs

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but which he does not know, he draws from his experience of similarities and differences in order to objectively see himself, using that which strikes him as strange to understand his own subjectivity (Dash 2003, 101; Fonkoua 1995). The outside reality holds a mirror up to his self, but Paris is but a stop on the journey towards self-discovery, towards reaching the “sun of consciousness”, to borrow from one of his titles. Paris thus functions as a mirror: Sans même savoir que l’expérience était du miroir de ce vieux continent, sur son tain de glaces et de solitude, où mon image m’apparaît: telle que je la ressens, mais telle aussi que l’éprouvent ceux-là que je regarde à mon tour. (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 61) [Without even knowing that experience was from the mirror of this old continent, on its tain of ice and solitude, where my face appears to me: as I feel it, but also as those experience it, whom I finally observe in return.]

In the ice and solitude of the “old continent”, the narrator perceives himself. It is precisely those dimensions previously singled out as differences or opacities that turn Paris into a mirror. Only this mirror reflects a series of gazes: Glissant watching the European continent, where he sees himself the way he experiences his self-image but also how others (whom he, in turn, is watching) may see him. This series of gazes translates into a dialectics through which the subject takes shape in a multifaceted relationship with others and with the outside world. Glissant dislocates the self as an object and places it on the margin between the writing subject and the depicted self, French reality and Caribbean reality, past and present. This introspective gaze, not the external reality of the city, paradoxically offers him encounters that are usually associated with urbanity. He realizes that his heritage is constituted by cultural crossings that are much more intrusive than those of Paris: “Né d’un bouillon de cultures, dans ce laboratoire dont chaque table est une île, voire une synthèse de races, de moeurs, de savoirs […]” (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 20) [Born in a melting pot, in this laboratory where each table is an island, here is a synthesis of races, customs, knowledge…]. Glissant comes from a bouillon de cultures and therefore has difficulties in understanding homogenous and mature “Old” Europe. In fact, the capital city is not depicted in terms of clashes, conflicts, and mixes of groups and social classes. So if Paris is usually associated with urban diversity and encounters, Glissant's Paris is homogeneous, inhabited by classical aesthetics of harmony blended with modern and Romantic individualist ideals and blind to foreign presence and influence. It is his personal

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trajectory as a Martinican which allows him to theorize his experience in terms of creolization and transcultural encounters whereas French homogenous culture remains blind to the world's presence, its impact and influence. In these depictions of monuments and “high” culture which praise the individual, Glissant struggles against the force of his attraction to Paris as the colonial center rather than against the objects themselves. According to Benjamin’s theories on shock as mediation, the quest for consciousness is the expression of the process of coming to terms with an intrusive outside reality (Benjamin 1968, 165). Likewise, Glissant deploys strategies for diminishing the urban impact. Turning inwards would then be not only the sign of an identity quest but also a screen against the rays from the “city of light.” However, Glissant’s initial protective reaction turns into a reaching out towards the city, and the narrator gradually internalizes Paris on his own terms.

Deserted Streets Strikingly, Glissant, the great theoretician of cross-cultural encounters, creates a deserted Paris. In the few instances when he does write about human interaction, such as when he recalls conversations he had with friends in cafés, the individuals (including the narrator) are reduced to voices, devoid of any identity or sign of belongings (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 71). This is noteworthy since Soleil de la conscience was written during the heyday of decolonization and the time of Sartrean committed writing. Glissant does not want to get mixed up in politics and seems almost to distance himself from the issue of racism in Paris unless compelled to do so: “Il faut parler de racisme” (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 62) [One must speak of racism]. It is a subject he cannot avoid, but he does his best to generalize it using the indeterminate article “de” instead of “du.” Glissant does not localize racism to Paris, but displaces the question to the Caribbean and the Martinican bourgeoisie and their obsession with skin color. His analysis is close to those presented by Frantz Fanon in Peau noire, masques blancs that was published two years before Soleil de la conscience. Like Fanon, he looks for the mechanisms behind racism: Le problème racial est dépassé. (J’ai mal au coeur, de cette soupe au lait!) Je veux dire qu’il faut cesser d’en faire un absolu, pour élucider les raisons motrices du racisme, qu’on les trouve sociales, économiques ou politiques, et qui l’autorise à sévir encore. (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 63) [The racial problem is overcome. (I am sick of the milk soup!) I mean that we have to stop turning this problem into an absolute, in order to elucidate

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the driving reasons behind racism whether they are social, economical or political, which allow it to keep on raging.]

He urges the reader not to be blinded by an essentialist understanding of racism. Instead one should seek to understand how it operates. However, Glissant does not relate any personal experiences with racism. In fact, an impersonal tone runs through the narrative in Soleil de la conscience in spite of its autobiographical penchant. The closest Glissant lets his reader get to the narrator’s personal sphere is the evocation of the walls in his room (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 39). We never learn where this room is located or what he sees from his window. Contrary to a Fanonian analysis according to which subjectivation depends on the other’s recognition, Glissant’s narrator does not look for the other’s gaze. Instead he looks to connect with the foreign land. In fact, Glissant’s narrator seems to occupy the position towards which Fanon wants people to strive: acknowledging the discursive existence of race and then overcoming it. The Glissantian narrator even expresses a kind of condescendence towards Paris, this “milk soup,” for being uniformly white. But instead of dealing with its inequalities, seeing Paris as an oppressive ground, as did Fanon, Glissant uses the tensions to create a basis for self-development. He certainly plays out division and friction, but these occur within the self. In Soleil de la conscience the author seems to deliberately avoid both the personal and the social by choosing to focus on places that are accessible to all and have a particular aura, as the Place Furstemberg. This square, situated in the chic area in the sixth arrondissement on the left bank of the Seine, is described as one of the most melancholic places in the world: [La place Furstemberg] semble garder au secret de son bec de gaz une sorte de réponse que la ville éparpille alentour. Une réponse unique, alors qu’il est tant de questions. L’odeur des pierres, la patience des quais, l’agitation des gares, l’esprit au quatre feux, le velours noirs des sièges, toute la nuit l’encre du désespoir. Où est cette réponse, que la ville enfouit dans ses quartiers d’alentour? (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 66) [Place Furstemberg seems to keep in the secret of its gas light a kind of response that the city scatters around. A unique response while there are so many questions. The smell from the stones, the patience on the platforms, agitations in the trans stations, and the mind in four lights, the black velvet on the seats, the entire night the ink of despair. Where is this response that the city buries in the surrounding neighborhoods?]

The lantern that stands in the middle of Place Furstemberg holds in its yellow light the scattered reality of the city. The agitation of people in

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train stations, streets, and subways is only evoked indirectly and is processed through this magic lamp. This particular part of Paris is almost isolated, yet connected to the rest of the buzzing city. When Glissant returns to Place Furstenberg in the collection of poetry Les Grands Chaos, published in 1993, he still sees it as holding the city’s “secret answer” (Glissant 2000, 409). The ‘answer’ is more poetic than clarifying; it points towards the invisible bonds between the city and other places that allow each person to establish a personal connection with it. This time, almost forty years after Soleil de la conscience, human presence holds the city’s “secret.” The answer to the urban magic is no longer restricted to the lantern or even to the city of Paris. The capital is the receptor of the entire world. But again this mondiality is expressed from a singular perspective: the homeless gathered around the square and the adjacent market on Rue Buci. More than in the earlier writings, the city now appears as a shore on which the castaway of the world are stranded. These appear as differences within the homogenous Paris. They are not assimilated into the rest of the city, following the analogy of the melting pot, nor are they excluded to the outskirts of the center. Rather, they intrude in the urban space as reminders of the existence of a broader horizon. They bring chaos to the square. Glissant explains the theme in a sort of prelude to the poems: Pas loin de la Seine, sur l’aire mélancolique de la Place Furstemberg et du marché de Buci à Paris, les mages de détresse que sont les sans-abris, tombés de l’horizon. […] Ceux qu’Histoire a débattus et jetés là. Mais aussi la parole déroulée de leur errance. Ils détournent la raison suffisante de ces langages dont ils usent, et c’est par des contraires de l’ode ou de l’harmonie: des désordes. Ils comprennent d’instinct le chaos-monde. Même quand ils affectent, jusqu’à la parodie, les mots de l’Autre. Leurs dialogues sont d’allégories. Folles préciosités, science non sue, idiomes baroques de ces Grands chaos. Venus de partout, ils décentrent le connu. (Glissant 2000, 405) [Not far from the Seine, in the melancholy vicinity of the Place Furstemberg and the Buci market, are the magi of distress, the homeless, fallen from the horizon. […] History has debated them and dumped them here. But along with the unfurled language of their vagrancy. They deflect the sufficient reason of the languages they use, and this is accomplished by the opposites of ode or of harmony: disodes. They understand the chaosworld instinctively. Even when they affect, to the point of parody, the words of the Other. Their dialogues are all allegorical. Mad preciosities, unknown science, baroque idioms of these Great Chaoses. Come from everywhere, they decenter the known. […].] (Translated by Jeff Humphries (Glissant 2004, 231)).

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Glissant does not victimize the homeless. If anything he has a tendency to romanticize their marginalized stance, even though he warns against such penchants in the poem. The nameless, anonymous homeless carry all the world’s languages in their delirium. Glissant describes them as magi, holders of magic powers within the rational modern city: they are in contact with an otherness through the nomadic life that is imposed on them. Their existence within the heart of the city is crucial. They decentralize the hegemonic order through their intrusive presence, living on half-rotten fruit from the market, repeating the discourse of the center and thereby reminding the privileged that they might end up in the street as well. But more importantly, Glissant focuses on these marginalized peoples' forms of expression or word (parole). They use language precisely along the terms of creolization: they divert language in baroque ways, accumulating the languages that circulate in the city and turning everyday language into allegories. In other words, he does not treat the homeless as social problems, but sees them as poets, linking their expression to his own poetics of relation and to the chaos of unpredictability inherent to creolization. The absence of direct personal engagement with social issues such as racism and poverty does not mean that he ignores them. Glissant claims in an interview in the French magazine Télérama published in July 2010 that while racism was less aggressive in the 1950s, it operated and structured Paris. For example, people from the former colonies had difficulty finding apartments to rent. Glissant, Fanon and a number of other students from the former colonies were only able to find lodging in an ex-brothel on Rue Blondel. Rue Blondel, situated in the infamous neighborhood around Rue Saint Denis in the second arrondissement, was then a marginalized part of Paris. This street is never mentioned in Soleil de la conscience, whereas it does appear in later writings such as the 1993 novel Tout-monde (Glissant 1993, 322). Here, Paris is partly depicted as a divided city, reserving particular clusters for outsiders like the housing projects, the ghettos, and university housing and streets like Rue Blondel for students from the former colonies. Clearly, the beginning of his Parisian sojourn marked a break from his political commitment with the group Franc Jeu, which was notably active during the 1946 election campaign (see his novel La Lézarde for a fictional account of this period), and therefore also direct engagement with Antillean causes. However, despite the structural inequalities of Paris at the time (and today) Glissant grasps his own location both in relation to the cultural and symbolic center and to marginalized spaces, as a form of voluntary withdrawal. Glissant explains in the Télérama interview that upon arriving

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in Paris as an eighteen-year old he was “kind of asocial [sauvage].” (Leclère) “Je refusais instinctivement la fréquentation des gens. Une espèce de recul…” (Leclère) [I instinctively refused to see people. A kind of withdrawal…]. Living the “paradoxical exile” of being at once a citizen and a foreigner (Murdoch 122), Glissant actually adds a form of exile from the French as well as the Antillean community. As the recipient of a state stipend to pursue a degree in higher education, he belonged to what Madeleine Dobie calls Antillean “elite” migrants (Dobie 2004, 165). Perhaps the refusal to participate in black communal life in Paris was a reaction amongst the post-negritude generation of young Antillean intellectuals. Rather than reinforcing a sense of identity by adhering to an Antillean community in France, Glissant (and to some extent also Fanon) sought to meet the concrete world of the other, which also implied destabilizing and questioning their own identity. But the idea of a “savage” or “solitary” poet is also partly a literary stance. In reality, Glissant was a member of a large group of intellectuals, some of whom were dedicated to the issues of decolonization and race, through such initiatives as the publication of Présence africaine and the organization of the Congress for Black Writers in 1958 but also the publication of Les Lettres Nouvelles which dealt with more literary questions. The sense of exclusion that occurs in the pages of Soleil is a way to stage his poetic strategy. His voluntary withdrawal from society shapes the creative context of Soleil de la conscience but also underscores that Glissant’s ideas of crosscultural encounters are fundamentally ontological and phenomenological. Creolization is not merely a concept to be used to diagnose cultural encounters. It is a particular aptitude to be open towards the outside reality, an openness that will lead to a new dimension that is crucial in Glissant’s conception of creolization. In his opinion, creolization can only be grasped through the imaginary, the melancholy. Consequently, the absence of direct engagement with the social sphere can be seen as part of his poetic strategy of mobilizing the imaginary of the city.

Île de France While the narrator of Soleil de la conscience questions the seductive symbolic power of the city center, he also wants to avoid taking the position of an outsider who claims to know a foreign reality. To reach Paris, Glissant seems to look for another way in: he wants to experience Paris, and yet also preserve himself from such an experience. As stated in the book’s opening sentence: “L’hiver a ses séductions redoutables, dont il faut parfois se garder…” (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 13) [Winter is a dangerous

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seducer against which one must sometimes preserve oneself…]. Soleil de la conscience’s opening word is significant: “winter.” The theme of the cold and infertile season returns almost obsessively in the narrative because it marks the most palpable difference between the Caribbean island and the northern continental European capital. The Glissantian narrator thus immediately confronts difference, but it is a meteorological difference. This sets the tone for Glissant’s account of his experiences in Paris. He encounters the city through a filter of sensation: he feels the cold, touches the snow, watches the grey sky, and hears the silence of cold empty Parisian streets. Strikingly, this sensuous appreciation draws the attention away from a specifically Parisian or urban setting. The city becomes an atmosphere rather than an agglomeration of people, streets, and communications. The strategy employed by Glissant to approach Paris is thus not to give a panoramic view of the cityscape or to analyze it in its entirety. As Roland Barthes has shown in his analysis of the Eiffel Tower, panorama incites the “power of intellection” as it urges the viewer to link together points and map the city landscape (Barthes 1997, 9-10). The panoramic view posits the object as ready to be deciphered. Glissant rejects this type of omniscient and categorizing gaze and invents another approach, based on encounter rather than distance. Beyond the reproduced reality of the city with its symbolic force, he senses another way of connecting with Paris. Glissant aims for a sensory mediation of the urban space. In a first step, the narrator slowly gets a sense of the city’s rhythm: “C’est alors que se fait jour, par une sorte d’obscure sécretion, la conscience du rythme qui vient signifier le rythme. Car le retour périodique de l’hiver et de l’été est très propre à enseigner la Mesure” (15). [That’s when it becomes clear through a kind of obscure secretion, the consciousness of the rhythm that gives meaning to the rhythm. Because the periodical return of winter and summer is made to teach the notion of Measure.] Paris makes an impression on the narrator not by means of monuments, history, and political importance but through the cyclical changes of seasons. This encounter, produced in the city, is not intrinsically urban. Indeed, it is rather a rural way of measuring the world since temperature and weather generally play a larger role in country life. In the context of the narrator’s self-search, the cyclic harmonious rhythm of the changing of the seasons allows him to identify his own difference within this world. His temporal experience diverges radically with that of the metropole. The cyclic seasons lead to what Glissant calls “Measure,” his term for a particular way of organizing time and space according to

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harmony and balance. Measure, as he will develop in later texts, is different from his own chaotic conception of time and space. In Soleil de la conscience, Glissant performs the sensuous openness to the outside in his style. This is, for instance, striking when he describes a Parisian street slowly coming alive in the morning in order to poetically seize the “object of silence” against a “cloth of sound”: C’est par exemple le signal du matin, qui vient et s’en va sur la charrette du laitier. C’est l’autobus qui ne s’arrête pas à cette heure, et que je suis dans sa course: étoile filante dont le bruit décroît comme la lumière d’une comète en allée. L’homme porte son movement vers les vitrines attentives; une rue qui s’éveille a plus de réticences qu’un chat. (66) [It’s for example the signal of the morning that comes and goes on the milkman’s wagon. It’s the bus that does not stop at this hour and that I follow on his route: falling star whose sound decreases like the light from a comet passing. The man carries his movement towards the attentive windows; a street that wakes up has more hesitance than a cat.]

The windows are attentive and the street wakes up; the bus is compared to a shooting star. Paris in the morning is almost organic, and the one human presence seems hesitant. At this time of the day, the city belongs to itself, not to its inhabitants. To connect with this urban environment, the observing narrator must be sensitive to its signals. He does not claim to understand Paris but feels the city, and thereby he gradually gets closer to it. But to do so, he must also explore his own background. And in this oscillatory movement between Martinique and Paris, he will gradually come closer to Paris’ secret answer and its urbanity. Just as silence becomes audible through an absent noise (the bus that does not stop at this hour), the narrator learns that even the most incongruent realities are secretly linked. Glissant slowly and poetically forges the hinge linking Paris and his Caribbean island. The narrator is, for example, caught between two “oceans,” the concrete Atlantic and the metaphorical waves of splendor washing over him in Paris” (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 72). The city also has “foam” just like a wave (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 77). In the last section of the book, the narrator finally finds a common ground between these two disparate realities: Paris ainsi, au coeur de notre temps, reçoit, déracine, brouille, puis éclaircit et rassure. Je sais soudain son secret: et c’est ainsi que Paris est une île, qui capte de partout et diffracte aussitôt (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 82). [So Paris, in the heart of our time, receives, uproots, blurs, then clarifies and reassures. I suddenly learn its secret: and it is that Paris is an island

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which draws light from all around and diffracts it immediately.] (Translated by J. Michael Dash (Dash 2003, 102).

This final conclusion is that Paris operates as an island through which countless elements are captured and diffracted like light through a prism. The idea of attraction and diffraction is central to Glissant's notion of creolization as he will later develop it through the concept in Poétique de la Relation. Here the island space is everything but insular; it possesses a power that pulls in outside elements and as these elements accumulate within the space of the island, they will be transformed and projected onto the world. Forced into interaction, entities lose their roots and thereby become open to change. Like in this redefinition of insularity, the urban space has the capacity to release us from categories of identity and origin: in the city you are, above all, a citadin without a specific nationality, as the narrator observes (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 81-82). On this point urbanity and creolization can finally meet in terms of a new way of relating identity to place. In his interview in The Creolization of Theory, Glissant asserts that “My own place which is inexorable, incontournable, I relate it to all the places of the world, without exception, and it is by doing so that I leave behind single-root identity and begin to enter into the mode of rhizomatic identity, that is to say, identity-as-relation” (Lionnet and Shih 2011, 260). Similarly, the island/city allows for connecting with all locations in the world. As everything intermingles, mixes (brouille) and then leads to new, unpredictable constellations, the notion of identity will also be affected. In this multilayered setting, identity cannot be tied to a single identifiable origin. It becomes rhizomatic, connected to several places simultaneously, and more apt to follow unpredictable process of creolization. In his analysis of surrealist poetics in French Caribbean writing, Dash concludes that, “Glissant projects the cosmopolitan macrocosm of Paris into the luminously opaque monolith of Diamond Rock, thereby provocatively reducing the métropole to a kind of open insularity” (Dash 2003, 102). Dash’s reading links Paris to a specific island on the west coast of Martinique, which Glissant has used as an emblematic figure for his notion of opacity. This rapprochement suggests that the city and the island are irreducible in their differences. One cannot explain the other, yet Glissant ties them to one another by poetic means, as when he links Paris to the Caribbean by seeing individualism as a form of insularity (Glissant, 1997 (1956), 13). French individualism remains opaque to the eyes of the Martinican, but as our analysis has shown the narrator in Soleil engages the city. The insular solitary of Paris incites Glissant to search for himself

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and his expression in the very tension dividing and connecting his two realities. However, in so far as the island as well as the city become platforms for creolization, it is difficult not to see them as utopian creations. Using Dash’s words, Glissant's island/city creates an “imagined insularity” becoming “an exemplary state” (Dash 2003, 102). But reaching such an exemplary state would go against Glissant's entire theory of creolization as an ongoing, ever changing and erratic process. It is as if when a concept that relies heavily on the imaginary like Glissant's notion of creolization encounters a real space such as the city, the inherent danger is of a concept closing up upon itself. For creolization's utopian dimensions to have any power, the concept must remain on the level of the imaginary; it must remain a poetics. For Glissant, an “exemplary state of imagined insularity” would not imply harmony. It is obvious in later texts that he constantly counterbalances the utopic tendencies by linking creolization to violent realities. In his book on Faulkner and in La Cohée du Lamentin he represents the city as an extension of the plantation and thereby also a place for creolization (Glissant 2005, 99-103). Paradoxically, the utopian dimension is thereby linked to a fierce historical reality and is not a form of escapism from the struggles of urban reality. Rather, they exist side by side. In fact, Glissant conceives of all spaces of creolization, from the plantation to the city, as violent or at least potentially violent. And this is perhaps where he diverges most from the visions of melting pots and mosaics, as these are presented as solutions to cultural encounters: Glissant does not offer a single way out of conflicts. His vision of the city may be utopic in so far as the city, a space of meeting and conflict, incites the imagination. However, the creation of the exemplary state of open insularity that connects the city and the island destroys one of the fundamental features of all metropolises: the idea of the city as center. For Glissant’s island/city multiplies centers, electing no metropolis but making each place interact with other places, drawing them into an unpredictable process of creolization.

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Works Cited Barthes, Roland. The Eiffel Tower and Other Mythologies, transl. Richard Howard, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1997. Benjamin, Walter. Illuminations, transl. Harry Zohn, New York: Schocken Books, 1968 (1955). Chancé, Dominique. “Creolization: Definition and Critique.” The Creolization of Theory, Durham: Duke University Press, 2011. Dash, Michael J. “Caraïbe fantôme: The Play of Difference in the Francophone Caribbean.” Yale French Studies, 103 (Spring 2003): 93105. Dobie, Madeleine. “Invisible Exodus: The Cultural Effacement of Antillean Migration.” Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies, Vol., 13, No 2/3, Fall/Winter (2004): 149-183. Fonkoua, Roumauld. “Édouard Glissant. Naissance d’une anthropologie antillaise au siècle de l’assimilation.” Cahiers d’Études Africaines 35.140 (1995): 797-818. Glissant, Édouard. La Cohée du Lamentin, Paris, Gallimard, 2005. —. Poèmes complets, Paris: Gallimard, 2000. —. Poetics of Relation, transl. Betsy Wings, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1997. —. Soleil de la conscience, Paris: Gallimard, 1997 (1956). —. The Collected Poems of Édouard Glissant, transl. Jeff Humphries, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004. —. Tout-monde, Paris: Gallimard, 1993. —. Traité du Tout-monde, Paris: Gallimard, 1997. Hannerz, Ulf. Explorer la ville: éléments d’anthropologie urbaine, transl. Isaac Joseph, Paris: Minuit, 1983. Leclère, Thierry. “Édouard Glissant et son Tout-monde. Entretien.” Télérama, July 8, 2010 http://www.telerama.fr/idees/edouard-glissantet-son-tout-monde,58073.php, consulted 2012-06-20. Lionnet, Francoise and Shih, Shu-mei eds.. The Creolization of Theory, Durham: Duke University Press, 2011. Murdoch, H. Adlai. Creolizing the Metropole: Migrant Caribbean Identities in Literature and Film, Bloomington and Indianapolis, Indiana University Press, 2012. Saunders, Doug. Arrival Cities: How the Largest Migration in History is Reshaping our World, London: William Heinemann, 2010.

CHAPTER SEVEN PARISIAN ALTERNATIVE CARTOGRAPHIES: MEANDERING THE AMBIVALENT BANLIEUE IN WILFRIED N’SONDÉ’S FICTION VÉRONIQUE BRAGARD ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR IN COMPARATIVE LITERATURE, UNIVERSITÉ CATHOLIQUE DE LOUVAIN, BELGIUM

Mireille, ah Mireille, rancard place St Michel avec ta robe à fleurs, en dessous tes parfums, je m’y noyais. Tes lèvres goût tiède d’eau de pluie, du bon venin, une bise veloutée quand elles taquinent les miennes. C’est le vin des amants. Paris notre royaume conquis à la seule force d’être bien ensemble, la ville s’ouvrait à nous. (N’Sondé, Le Cœur des enfants léopards, 31). Elle veut vivre en couleur, et plus jamais dans cette crasse, entre la route nationale, les immeubles et le supermarché. Loin du gris et des cages à humains délabrées, crachats et odeurs de pisse dans l’escalier, tout est sale et à moitié cassé. (N’Sondé, Le Cœur des enfants léopards, 61)

Like many passages in Wilfried N’Sondé’s work, this extract illustrates how his fiction is anchored in a Parisian cartography. Characters roam the streets and attempt to appropriate the famed French metropolis, which is present in references to locations such as the Pont d'Austerlitz or the Seine and numerous metro stations. But the originality of N'Sondé's approach is that it plunges into the depths of the Parisian (non)melting-pot, a (non)melting-pot torn by the daily violence of its underprivileged banlieue, its psychological suffering and social marginalization to highlight the ambivalence of (un)belonging. Paris is only conquered and tamed thanks to the strength of carnal love among characters and their determination to bridge cultural gaps and avoid ghettoization. N'Sondé's

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three novels Le Cœur des enfants léopards (2007), Le Silence des esprits (2010) and Fleur de béton (2012)1 take place in famous Parisian metro stations, on some of its streets, squares and bridges but also on the margins of the French metropolis, the ghettos the reader can easily visualize through such images as “the six thousand cages” (FB 212) that constitute the setting of Fleur de béton2. All his characters are second-generation migrants from different ethnocultural backgrounds who are familiar with the city of Paris, though it remains indifferent to their citizenry. His three novels explore questions of origin and identity and how to handle life in the borderlands of a society which seems to relegate you away from its center. And yet, the author believes in the migrant’s agency: Je viens du ventre de ma mère. On n’a pas de racines, on n’est pas des plantes. Le comble, c’est que l’histoire de l’homo sapiens n’est qu’une histoire d’errance. Plutôt que d’origine, j’aime mieux parler d’héritage, parce qu’un héritage, on peut l’accepter ou le refuser. (Divet)

The confrontation with the city of Paris pits N’Sondé’s characters against both their respective pasts and the (colonial) past linking France and their native nation. It will be read along Manuela Ribeiro Sanches’ contention that we “need to rethink Europe’s present from a perspective that recognizes how the colonial past still determines the way in which the present is approached and the future envisaged, as is to be derived from the connections established between present migration policies and former colonial histories”. (Sanches, 10) For centuries, Paris has attracted outsiders, whether coming from the Provinces, (former) colonies or even other countries. As such, it has emerged as a diasporic site for generations of migrants. In, respectively, Paris Noir and La rive noire, Stovall and Fabre show how the French capital played a crucial role in the Black American experience; others like Kuietche Fonkou illustrate how central the French capital has been as a

 1

Wilfried N’Sondé, Le Cœur de enfants léopards (Paris: Acte Sud, 2007), Le Silence des esprits (Paris: Acte Sud 2010), Fleur de béton (Paris: Acte Sud, 2012). Further references will be included in the text with the following abbreviations CEL, SE, FB. 2 Besides diegetic similarities, one needs to note a number of relevant references in Fleur de béton to the 2005 riots. In terms of figures, 6000 echoes Le Chêne Pointu, where the deaths of two boys who had been running from police took place and led to the 2005 riots, which are referred to with “70% of the 6,000 residents live under the poverty line”. The direct allusion to the 2005 riots is also present in the name Moussa Traoré, police captain in Fleur de béton and Bouna Traoré, 15, who died electrocuted with Zyed Benna while hiding from the police in 2005.

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crucible for movements such as the Négritude and African and Asian independence struggles. Dominic Thomas’s Black France, a more recent study of the black presence in metropolitan France and the voices of its immigrant communities, acknowledges the centrality of Paris but also “decenters the symbolic territory to provincial sites, simultaneously refuting any notion of cultural homogeneity that may be suggested or implied by such a diasporic site” (9-10). In light of Christina’s Horvath’s observations in Le roman urbain contemporain en France (2007), I will consider N’Sondé’s work as illustrating the substantial differences between two worlds: Paris and its banlieues. The banlieue as Dominique Baillet observes is perçue et représentée par les médias, mais aussi par la majorité de la population française, comme une zone de non-droit, un espace d’exclusion sociale, un ‘non-lieu’, selon l’expression de Marc Augé. (Baillet, 29)

As N’Sondé himself observes, the term banlieue is often used to hide the reality of things, a reality he associates with la pauvreté, le brassage des populations venues des quatre coins du monde qui amène des changements qui font peur car on veut encore croire que les êtres humains, les identités et la culture sont des choses figées alors que depuis toujours les être humains bougent, se mélangent et créent des choses nouvelles. (Mboungou)

In this sense, the banlieue, despite its spatial connotations, is to be considered as a symbolic site that stands for the challenges associated with globalization and rapid unplanned urbanization but in the continuity of colonialism as Didier Lapeyronnie highlights in La Fracture coloniale: La fracture sociale est ainsi alimentée par une ‘fracture coloniale’ qui lui donne son sens et l’institue comme un ordre normatif, comme si l’immigration s’était inscrite dans la continuité du rapport colonial au-delà des indépendances. (Lapeyronnie, 214)

As Lapeyronnie underlines, the obtention of independence does not constitute a turning point with regards to migration to France. Rather, movements to the (former) colonizer seem to perpetuate a colonial order. Paris and its banlieue have been a major source of inspiration for French and francophone writers, especially since the 1980s with Mehdi Charef’s Le thé au harem d’Archi Ahmed (1983) in which “in a combination of cynicism and naivety, the kids face and discuss questions of unemployment, rage, ennui, drug, racism and self-definition” (Recchia,

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56) in a banlieue of hope and despair. Published in 1999, Rachid Djaïdani’s Boumkoeur is considered one of the first novels by an “écrivain de banlieue” (Reeck xiv). Written with the langage of décentrement Faïza Guene’s (nicknamed “la Sagan des cités”) Kiffe kiffe demain (2004), further delves into the disillusionment of banlieue life, urban stigmatization, frustration and bitterness. As Azouz Begag did for Lyon, these writers, among many others, have established a banlieue writing tradition that has unfortunately also imprisoned a number of them. As Begag himself expressed it “Je suis écrivain aussi, pas seulement Beur de banlieue ! Je veux exister par ce que je fais, pas seulement par ce que je suis.” But the label “écrivain de banlieue” persists and Fleur de béton3 features on the babelio list of banlieue works, confirming “a label that has nonetheless proved equally problematic” (Reeck, 127) and further ghettoized the beur community. The 2005 riots urged writers to seek to understand better what living on the margins meant. Houda Rouane’s Pieds-Blancs (2006) and Thomté Ryam Banlieue Noire (2006) feature among the numerous banlieue novels written after these violent events. In his analysis of several literary publications after 2005, Steve Puig observes that the banlieue, which has been perceived as ambivalent and dangerous by French writers since Hugo, Balzac or Cendrars, emerges in contemporary urban fiction as “a place that inspires mixed feelings among its inhabitants, from rejection to a certain sense of pride” (Puig, 180). N’Sondé’s novels, which were all published after the 2005 riots, can be read as part of these new literary experiments which Puig describes as une nouvelle mouvance littéraire qui transcende l’appartenance ethnique des auteurs (on parlait auparavant de littérature ‘beur’ par exemple) pour mettre l’accent sur leur appartenance géographique (à la banlieue parisienne). (Puig, 183)

N’Sondé highlights this urban geographical dimension particularly in his latest novel Fleur de béton, in which the story follows characters of Guadeloupean, Sicilian, or Arab origins as they meet in the basement of a suburban housing project. In N’Sondé’s fiction, Paris and its banlieue emerge as a tentacular psychological maze where protagonists get lost as they delve into the abyss of past brutality and diasporic errance associated with colonialism. They become a labyrinthian site, haunted by a violence that unveils



3 The reference to béton (concrete) directly alludes to “littérature de bitume”, another term used to refer to banlieue writing.

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wounds of shame, war and trauma. The banlieue is associated with a world where police forces compel (literary) confession, from which characters can only escape via an imaginary, ephemeral “melting-pot” of sensuality. More specifically, the city of Paris in N'Sondé's novels is associated, on the one hand, with an ambivalent feeling towards the banlieue and, on the other, with alternative pluricultural voices that challenge famous historic and touristic sites to unveil a mosaic of violent memories and conflicting diasporic heritages hidden beneath the city of light. These memories interweave references to Algeria and the Congo, moving beyond national and temporal borders. Born in Brazzaville in 1968, Wilfried N'Sondé grew up near Paris, where he moved with his family at the age of 5. A sociologist, musician and writer, he himself currently has an external diasporic perspective on Paris and its banlieue, having settled in Berlin in 1988. What is central and most original in his work is the musical, poetic and erotic tone of his writing that imparts sensuality and strength to the harsh migrant experience despite the suffering he unveils. This sensuality can be read as an attempt at spatial intimacy to counter the fragmented and traumatized identities of the protagonists struggling to find their way in an imprisoning urban public space, to melt into alternative ways of being. In his first novel Le Cœur de enfants léopards (2007), a young man is interrogated by the police and charged with murder. As he psychologically retreats from the policemen’s verbal abuse, he offers the reader a long confessional monologue about his past, his failed hopes and lost love Mireille, a Jewish pied-noir girl (pied noir referring most probably to the shoes of French citizens (vs barefoot Algerians) who lived in French Algeria before independence) who fled the violence associated with the banlieue and moved to Israel. The story expands by creating a space of tension between the controlled site of the prison where he is being detained and the uncontrollable site of his tormented mind. A visit by an ancestral figure reminds him of the values associated with his cultural heritage and of his friend Drissa. He takes refuge in illusions “ à l'aide des ses rêves et son imagination, il ne fuit pas seulement la réalité, mais commence aussi à se retirer de la société et de la normalité” (Stauff, 125) to eventually reach self-discovery. In her analysis of masculinity and spirituality in Le Cœur des enfants léopards, Laurence Gouaux contends that the narrator “is born to a new light by appealing to his African ancestral spirits”; she reads his narrative as “the genesis of both a new identity and a new spirituality born out of suffering, anger and résilience.” (Gouaux, 94) The narrator, who progressively bares his soul and confesses his crime, regurgitates via corporeal details, how his identity has been

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controlled in terms of space and identity. As a young boy, the baker’s wife would greet him regularly but once he reached adolescence, the same woman comes to perceive him and his friends in terms of immigration and illegality: “Nous portons sur la gueule la misère du monde pour laquelle elle ne veut pas payer” (28). Her comment highlights how she is unable to accept him as an equal as his use of the word ‘gueule’ with its original meaning (the mouth of an animal) testifies and echoes its subsequent use in ‘le délit de sale gueule’ (racial profiling). His friend Drissa’s mental instability caused by forced integration and cultural rejection “Noir dehors, blanc dedans” (47) most probably reflects the narrator’s own unstable mind. Drissa’s disaffliliation and questioning of identity turned him mad but also led him to use his “folie comme stratégie de révolte” (131). His madness is somewhat idealized by the narrator who slowly plunges into a similar psychic disintegration to struggle against his own contradictions and feelings of rejection. The narrator’s confession reveals how his father managed to achieve emancipation, thanks to education, and move to Europe, while he (the narrator) never found a decent job in the French capital: “Oui monsieur, je suis bon élève, tout se passait bien à la faculté. J’ai eu mon examen. Jamais je n’ai pu trouver un travail décent” (41). Paris emerges as the ambivalent metropolis par excellence: it is welcoming and excluding at the same time but perhaps not over the same periods of time. The city of Paris reflects the alternative voices N’Sondé wants to explore, the voices of second generation migrants. As the two characters – Drissa and the narrator - are going up the Eiffel tower (25), the ride up does not provide an opportunity to take flight and conquer the city. Rather Drissa tries to refrain from shouting his anger, yelling instead his questions as he trembles and cries. Paris is here given an alternative voice as it comes to embody the inability to find one’s place in the French metropolis: Je t’ai réceptionné à la gare, puis, dans l’ascenseur de la Tour Eiffel, tu t’es mis à trembler, à chialer, je suis avec toi, relève la tête, surtout faut pas crier, doucement tout le monde t’entend (25).

In this particular quote, the transition between the literal entry into Le Champ de Mars through the station and the (symbolic) climb up the Eiffel Tower is so abrupt as to appear impossible. The narrator’s admonition points to his friendly support but also to his fear of public perceptions. In Black France, Dominic Thomas analyzes how such Parisian commemorative sites are considered with irony in various francophone novels such as Fatou Diome’s Le Ventre de l’Atlantique. As Thomas

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contends, “The Eiffel Tower is of course inextricably linked to the Universal Exposition of 1889 and the celebration of technological progress, imperial expansion, and the centennial of the Republic.” (Thomas, 191-2) As The Eiffel tower is also a communication tower for radio and TV stations, it becomes a conduct for Drissa’s voice and the attempt to silence him contradict the tower’s real function. Ultimately, the tower however fails in this role as both men are discreetly taken away by policemen. The tower, and the Paris it symbolizes, reject Drissa’s anger and difference. In her article “Seven years after the riots, the suburbs of Paris still simmer with resentment”, Angélique Chrisafis insists that Police unions in France deny racist policing. She further notes that this happens “at Paris locations like the Gare du Nord, or in ‘white’ places such as around the Eiffel tower, where, they say, black people are stopped and asked what they are doing.” The reference to the Eiffel Tower as a “white place” confirms the novel’s association and excluding policing. This episode stands in stark contrast to the narrator’s fusional experience with Mireille a few pages later. He recalls how he and Mireille used to taste white wine on rue Saint-André-des-arts (located near la Sorbonne and Notre Dame, the street is now mostly a tourist mecca), roll over the lawn of the Champ-de-Mars (the open plaza where the Eiffel Tower is located), and studied on the rue de Rennes (37) (which leads from the Luxembourg to Montparnasse (two very different sites in terms of housing and symbolism). These highly emblematic ‘white’ sites are experienced in different ways by different people while they are also seen as empowering in the extract above thereby contrasting with the absence of monumental memorials in the banlieue, as we will later examine. N’Sondé explores the ambiguities of Drissa and the narrator’s experience through another figure which also prevents the reader from a reductive analysis of Paris as a place of rejection: Pascal Froment, the outgoing policeman who “se faisant compréhensif et rassurant” (26) urges Drissa and the narrator to move away to avoid any dispute. Pascal Froment is portrayed as a kind man who attempts to mediate between communities (106). By underlining his sensitivity as a loving husband and father, the novel also hints at the image of a nation that strives to welcome alterity. N’Sondé however perceives this potential as a failed one insofar as Froment becomes the victim of the narrator’s violence. N’Sondé portrays the policeman’s demise through a dual approach: on the one hand, he depicts a drunken man – whom we recognize as the narrator- who starts to urinate on the bonnet of his car (357) and thereby unleashes a string of

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events. On the other hand, he leaves the brutal murder of Pascal Froment4 to be explained and acknowledged by the narrator himself. His confession is explicit and important: he killed the policeman with vicious blows. The novel draws to a close as the narrator recalls his drunken errance and tells of his separation from Mireille. The Eiffel Tower of the City of Lights is no longer portrayed; it has given way to two other ironic sites: the Place Sainte-Opportune near the Louvres, which belies its name and location by not providing any opportunity for integration and the bar La Cervoise, which, as its name ironically suggests evokes French ties to a long history of Gallic pride in ‘Nos ancêtres les Gaulois’. They both come to embody his downfall and actual crime. As the narrator’s confession reaches its high point, he is excluded from the City of Lights and pushed into the darker recesses of his own consciousness, expressing his anger and frustrations through violence: “je l’ai frappé, poussé, mordu, lui ai envoyé de violents coups de pied à la tête” (129) “j’ai pissé sur l’agent mes frustrations [...] mes frustrations de pauvre, ma peur de demain, l’amour qui m’a quitté [...] le Congo dévasté” (130). When he imagines the suffering of the policeman and the emotional trauma his wife endures, he however does not connect with either through emotional bounds. Rather he sees his act more in terms of an attack against a figure representing order and legitimacy: “Moi, j’ai sauvagement assassiné un agent de la force publique, un exécutant de la violence légitime, père de famille sérieux et aimant” (131). The expression ‘père de famille sérieux et aimant’ suggests more an official discourse, such as one in a public eulogy by a supervisor, rather than a real attempt to acknowledge the humanity of his victim. His feelings of guilt seem to be more linked to the public role of his victim than to his personal life as a husband, father, and ultimately, a humane policeman who previously attempted to avoid confrontation. Commenting on Le Cœur des enfants léopards, the Djiboutian writer and critic Abdourahman A. Waberi considers “the veritable anguish of a man desperately chasing after his lost childhood” and observes that “[t]he spaces drawn in the novel (from the metro car to the cell at the police station, from the housing project to the boys’ bedroom) open onto other worlds so close and yet so far away” (107). As he further contends, the characters “seek out a space for themselves >…@ in a wasteland that is la banlieue” (108). All these spaces are small and closed in contrast with the boulevards of Paris and the Champ de Mars. This wasteland is

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Note that the name of the policeman Froment is a synonym for a core ingredient of bread and often taken as an example of ‘real’ French values while Pascal is associated with Easter in the Christian calendar – a celebration of rebirth.

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characterized by, as T.S. Eliot’s famous poem suggests, a lack of faith and stability, a fragmented and empty site. But more importantly, it is a space that is deprived of the very characteristics of the city. As Horvath observes, “Les banlieues sont dépourvues de jardins publics, d’animation, de rues commerçantes, de spectacles, d’équipements de santé, de vie nocturne, de mobilier urbain, d’équipements sportifs et de monuments” (44). This is what makes the banlieue a wasteland. It is the absence of sites of sociability that establishes a clear border of ghettoization, turning the banlieue into a place of idleness where people wander without any memorial building to identify with. Last but not least, the monotonous and imprisoning architecture of these cities of ‘6000 cages’ lead to the emergence of ‘les jeunes de banlieue’, a pejorative expression, which as N’Sondé notes, highlights social gaps in French society: “Je pense que ce qu’on appelle les jeunes de banlieue, ce sont des gens pauvres issus de l’immigration qui se retrouvent très tôt confrontés à des problèmes.” (Mboungou) The emergence of problems seems attributable to the confluence of their status as poor migrants and their relegation to the banlieue. N’Sondé not only identifies the geographical location of his migrants as a source of alienation but returns to colonial times and the Algerian war to unveil forms of trauma that still trouble the national discourse emblematized in the cartography of the city. The narrator’s ancestor points an accusatory finger at the system of injustice encouraged by colonialism in Africa as he recalls his father’s story: “hommes attachés à la queue leu leu dans la rue, pour ne pas avoir payé l’impôt” (86), “brutalité des miliciens” (86) “les soldats s’exprimaient à la chicote” (86), the forced separation between white and black cities (87). His accusations are not only aimed at the colonial past of his country but at its evolution since independence: “le mensonge socialiste” (104) and “la parodie démocratique” (104). N’Sondé’s first two novels denounce the way in which the proud leopards (his ancestors) quickly turned into “vautours sans foi” (104), birds that feed on carrion, and how “le peuple noir auquel nous avions cru est décédé” (105). The ancestor even declares that “le peuple noir n’exista jamais qu’au fond des cales sinistres des bateaux” (105), a direct allusion to the solidarity that was forced on board ships during the Middle Passage in the times of the Atlantic slave trade and can be seen as only a solidarity of suffering, persecution, and enslavement. While some of N’Sondé’s characters deplore the lack of solidarity among African displaced communities, the prologue to the novel points to a diasporic community of cross-cultural heritage. The author’s merging of numerous Black Atlantic references (Mamie Watta (24), marabout (23),

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kongo legends5) foregrounds a community of spiritual values. N’Sondé also highlights how spirituality and love can help people move away from the deadlock of the banlieue. In an interview, he insists on the fact that this spirituality has survived: “elle a survécu à l’esclavage, à la colonisation, au dénigrement quand on parle du vaudoo en Haïti” (Zemassa). The city of Paris, a path towards emancipation and self-discovery for the narrator’s father during colonial times, entraps many migrants who attempt to tame its cartography. For N’Sondé, the development of neo-liberal multicultural policies has resulted in more social, political and economic inequalities confirming Gary Mole’s analysis of Le Cœur des enfants léopards: le roman, dans ce qu’il véhicule comme réflexion sur l’identité et les origines, est loin de célébrer une quelconque hybridité identitaire, et le multiculturalisme dont N’Sondé aurait voulu faire l’éloge ne fait que dévoiler en fait la permanence d’une inégalité socio-économique structurelle. (Mole, forthcoming)

The key word here is ‘structurelle’ as inequality is presented as ingrained in public institutions rather than a result of personal choices. Mireille’s story unveils another colonial legacy as it highlights the complex and violent past of a Jewish Algerian ‘pied noir’ family forced to leave the country during the war of independence. The trigger which forces the family into exile was the traumatic death of Mireille’s little sister after her father’s café is bombed. Her story helps the narrator understand why Mireille ultimately leaves their neighbourhood to seek freedom in Israel, a place where paradoxically bombings still occur frequently. She perceives her suburbs as characterized by its “crasse” and crammed between “la route nationale, les immeubles et le supermarché” (61) and imagines another city where she can “vivre en couleurs” (61). The solidarities born out of diasporic encounters appear superficial as Mireille seeks to reconnect with the birth place of her religion rather than pursue her affair with the narrator and her parents befriend African migrants but draw the line at their daughter having a relationship with one of them (59). The city and its banlieue evoke and reflect cruel pasts and neo-colonial exploitation. However, as Waberi appropriately points out, Paris becomes “this interstitial territory thin as a salamander, a territory that is hostile but not without reassuring enclaves (meetings with friends in the projects, the warmth of brotherhood, the flashbacks to the carefree days of childhood

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Along the Atlantic shores of Africa, Mamy wata refers to a seductive and dangerous water spirit. A marabout is a leader and teacher in West Africa. 

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and so on)” (108). It is within this context of exclusion and disillusionment that the narrator also experiences love and pleasure. The city synonymous with frustration and anxiety can also allow carnal fusion with the other. This sensuality, which emerges as the ultimate and only possible escape, plays a central role in Le Silence des esprits and Fleur de béton. In a similar confessional vein, Le Silence des esprits takes partly place in a Parisian suburban train, a huis clos transitional space that parallels the identity in transit of the protagonist and his transient relationship with the woman he meets in the train. Clovis Nzila, a homeless African illegal immigrant, and Christelle6, a French nurse, are both cloistered in their respective pasts. They first meet while crossing the Pont d’Austerlitz (19) and then in the Gare de Lyon. Christelle has seen violence first hand and been deceived in love. Her current fate is hardly better as she is trapped in a routine job characterized by “l’ennui et la lassitude” at the PitiéSalpêtrière Hospital (29). Clovis is an undocumented worker who is seeking asylum without really trying to obtain it: Illégal, je n’avais ni ami ni compatriote. Je m’étais donc discrètement éclipsé aux aurores, un pied puis l’autre, une fois, deux fois, mille fois, le regard plus noir que jamais, absent, seul dans les rues de Paris, exclu du bonheur dans mes chaussettes sales et trouées. (26).

He anxiously wanders the streets of Paris, looking at the frozen garbage in the Seine with which he identifies. Contrary to the tourists who stroll around, he “rasais tous les murs de Paris” (24), eager to hide from the police and conceal his shame. He is eventually welcomed by Christelle who considers him "un plus démuni qu'elle" (19). The Parisian town Clovis perceives as most cold and cruel becomes for a few hours warm and welcoming. Christelle comes to embody an idealized city that affectionately greets and comforts Clovis like a mother(land) for a man who feels “comme un gros bébé qui cherche une maman” (33). Clovis first listens to Christelle’s confession before going on to relate his own story (and that of his twin sister Marcelline), focusing on his childhood years as the ugly twin baby raised by a grandmother, whose kindness disappeared upon widowhood. Her husband died after years of forced labour on rubber plantations. Again, N’Sondé creates interesting echoes by juxtaposing Clovis’ experience of violence in the city with his grandmother’s experience

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Clovis was the first king of the Franks. Closely connected with the birth of the French nation, he was also the first king to be baptized and hence brought Christianity officially to the kingdom; Christelle likewise echoes a Christian heritage.

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of trauma during the colonial period: “terrorisée par la chicotte de l’armée coloniale, sa jeunesse avait été tremblements de peur au quotidien” (69). The demand for and exploitation of rubber in the Congo Basin is clearly presented as responsible for this traumatic event.7 During the Second World War, Belgian and French colonizers drafted many Congolese into forced labour to meet the increased demand for rubber. Clovis’s grandfather returns from such forced labour a broken man: Il avait été enrôlé de force par des soldats d’à peine vingt ans pour aller trimer dans la jungle à extraire cette mélasse avec laquelle on faisait les pneus des jeeps et des camions sur lesquels les héros blancs, chewing-gum et cigare à la bouche, allaient terrasser les divisions nazies, des plus méchants qu’eux! (69)

N’Sondé does not portray Allied forces and the Congolese as fighting on the same side against the Nazi but rather places both the Allies and the Nazi on the evil side, albeit at different levels. By establishing a connection between the city of Paris and the European colonial past, N’Sondé rekindles criticism against the Belgian king Leopold II while emphasizing how European nations more generally exploited and plundered the whole region. If Paris is referred to in detail in the text, the African references remain vague, thus suggesting an overall indictment of European colonization in Africa. Combining these references, N’Sondé points out how the facade of exquisite touristic sites hides a brutal colonial past. But the author moves beyond the weight of colonialism to also address the postcolonial violence that has haunted the African continent since the wave of independence in the 1960s. Clovis was born an ugly and rejected twin. Only his twin sister Marcelline shows him steadfast affection but when they are caught together in an incestuous embrace one morning, Clovis is forced to flee. He loses sight of her for many years as a result of the civil war. N’Sondé establishes subtle echoes here between Clovis’s traumatic experience of banishment and his grandfather’s forced exile: both lose their grounding and self-identity. The novel then gives voice to Clovis’ own confession revealing how the latter, who appears as a victim for half of the novel, became a perpetrator himself. This shift between the role of victim and

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Although the brutal use of Congolese people for rubber production is often associated with the infamous Belgian King Leopold II, the French also ill treated the local population for the exploitation of natural goods in the Congo Basin. French and Belgian companies held concessions that exploited the area's rubber and ivory resources.

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that of perpetrator forms the ethical core of the novel. Faced with a terrifying reality, Clovis became the Rambo he alludes to but rather than defend his community, he persecuted it. A few pages describe how he plundered, assassinated, or burned buildings (153) but they suffice to convey the horror of his deeds. In this sense, the violence and ghettoization he experiences in Paris remind him of his own experience in the Congo but also of the different path he took when faced with hunger and fear. The city haunted by colonial violence triggers Clovis’ confession in the context of post-independence civil war but also emerges as a potential redeemer as Clovis asks it for forgiveness through his appeal to Christelle: “priant la mère de la Terre pour que Christelle me pardonne mes crimes inavouables” (134). Through his own belated confession, Clovis recalls his twin sister’s fate. Marcelline arrived in Paris as an illegal immigrant to escape the horrors of the civil war in which Clovis was himself a perpetrator. But Paris, evoked on page 107 as a beacon of hope, soon opens a path to destruction. She meets her own Rambo in the XXth arrondissement, away from the famed sites of central Paris (108). Sensuality leads, in her case, to her downfall since Stanislas (called Staline) exploits her and in the end abandons her to a life of exclusion: “cette terre nouvelle ne voulait ni d’elle ni de ses attentes pourtant si simples” (113). When she decides to go to the police to share her own horrific experience of war, she meets Laurent Levasseur, a law student who tries to help refugees pro bono. The latter quickly concentrates on “sa poitrine et sur la chute de ses reins” (125) rather than on any documentation to support her petition. His desire for her paradoxically opens a door as she yields to his lust to obtain her visa. Paris becomes associated with Staline and Laurent as users and abusers of migrant women. If N’Sondé’s writing is rhythmic and often sensual, the sensuality that often conveys a melding and true encounter with the other fails here and N’Sondé denounces how migrants are still prey to the former colonizer. The last event of the novel puts an end to the idealized representation of the city. When Clovis, whose confession has given him a renewed sense of innocence, decides to go and buy croissants, he is caught by the CRS (Compagnies Républicaines de Sécurité). His quest for croissants, a staple diet which has come to symbolize France, ultimately leads to his demise: L’espoir avait échoué… le désespoir m’imposa un kaléidoscope cynique dans lequel je reconnus les dépouilles de mes anciens camarades miliciens abandonnés au soleil implacable, aux charognards et à la pluie. Une multitude de cadavres flottant sur le fleuve ou pourrissant dans la jungle (168-169).

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The image of the croissants being trampled conveys the symbolic and literal violence of his encounter with the police. Again, the two landscapes, Paris and the Congo, amalgamate as his own arrest brings forth images of fellow dead soldiers, left to rot without even a grave. Both the Seine and the Congo evoke fear and anxiety as the former leads him to remember his own hidden past as a murderous child-soldier. N’Sondé blends past and present together in the very concrete and physical experience of the city. As Jean José Maboungou observes, the novel raises fundamental questions: can one escape one’s destiny? Can happiness be reclaimed? Is there any salvation? : ce monstre pervers et cruel, cet artiste du crime, cette figure de la déraison des temps post-coloniaux africains, peut-il réellement tourner le dos à son passé, se guérir de ses instincts de mort, jeter derrière lui son stock de crimes et d’abominations, se laver de la souillure qui entache son être, afin de redevenir un homme normal capable d’amour et de compassion? Quand le mal atteint des formes extrêmes, celui qui en est le vecteur, peut-il, jamais, redécouvrir le bonheur? (Maboungou)

Maboungou perceives irrationality in the novel as an indication of both victimization and a tool for resistance. While his use of the word ‘vecteur’ reflects the fate of the post-colonial individual who will not only be a victim of post-colonialism but spread the virus, the use of ‘normal’ implies that the post-colonial subject is sensed as abnormal. At the end of the novel, the reader is left to decide. Fleur de Béton raises similar questions insofar as it explores whether one can escape geography and destiny and overcome disillusion through love. As the title suggests, the novel is set in the concrete heart of the 6000 cages of the cité, specifically, in an underground disco located in Tour C, created by the recently deceased Antonio. Though he died of an overdose, Antonio haunts and connects all the characters of the novel. While the Tour is a “(l)ongue barre de béton, vide, insalubre, condamnée à la destruction” (FB 11), the improvised disco named the Black Move, gathers all the neighbourhood youth in search for a place to hide and dream (13). Located both outside the city and below its suburban housing, this cellar emerges as a space of emancipation. It provides opportunities for various migrants to escape their dead-end lives and share their respective culture: Jason from Guadeloupe is a gifted dancer, Rosa Maria from Sicily struggles with a family who has experienced both grief after Antonio’s death and economic demise as their father has lost his job, Mouloud is a solitary young man who was forced into military service by his father in North Africa. Rosa Maria’s father Salvatore, a violent and ambivalent

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Sicilian who came to France in search of a better life, feels emasculated by the recent loss of his job to outsourcing. His reclusive attitude prevents his daughters from mixing with those he condescendingly considers responsible for his misfortune: “On devrait tous les embarquer et les renvoyer chez eux dans la jungle, c’est eux avec leurs trafics pourris qu’ont emmené mon fils dans le malheur” (120). While he blames his unemployment on outside economic forces, he sees migrants from other countries as the only ones involved in drug trafficking. The novel starts with the sexual encounter between Rosa Maria who “essaie de panser sa plaie en aimant encore plus fort” (29) because of her brother’s violent death and Jason who, like most characters, dreams he can escape the cages of the banlieue. A cage evokes a mixed message as it can be both a prison to keep animals but also be a means of protection. It both excludes and includes- yet, the question is who from whom. The housing projects are portrayed as the flip side of the city of lights, a dark periphery characterized by poverty, unemployment and disillusionment: Dans l’hiver du chômage au cœur de la cité des 6000 en Ile-de-France, il y a les coups, la drogue, toujours un peu d’espoir, les crachats dans l’escalier, le confort moderne dans les appartements, les jeunes garçons oisifs sur les bancs publics à moitié cassés, ou entassés dans les halls d’immeubles à discuter, rire, gêner les riverains (34).

A contrast emerges here not between Paris and the banlieue but within la cité itself. On the one hand, there are comfortable apartments and neighbours’ expectations of peace. On the other hand, the public benches have been vandalized and the hallways become the only gathering spots for local youth who express their being in the world by disrupting local dwellers, rather than going to the city to riot. When police officers Moussa Traoré and Laurence da Silva, whose names point to foreign ancestry, come to announce the closing of the disco for security reasons, several young men express their disapproval. Lucien, a retired corporal who served in the French colonial army, shouts his own objections with racist misanthropic language from his open window. Violence escalates and Lucien is wounded by a beer bottle Jason throws at his window. Fleeing the hustle and stampede, both Jason and Rosa Maria take refuge in an aunt’s apartment where a sofa will provide Rosa Maria with an opportunity to offer her virginity to Jason. The encounter allows her to experience a sense of wholeness and travel back in spirit to her native Sicily and images of her deceased brother Antonio. Riots break out throughout the whole neighbourhood as Jason and Rosa Maria lie protected by this borrowed private space, made all the more private by the

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love-making and return to the past. Again, N’Sondé’s characters seem to naively believe sensuality, and even sex, will become solutions to their problems. To some extent, this carnal pleasure is equated with a form of poetry and fusion that counterbalances the despair which infuses most protagonists’ lives. And yet, the reader immediately understands that Jason, the handsome seducer, is using Rosa Maria. He fails to realize or acknowledge her lost virginity and admonishes her for having sullied the sofa with blood. In his view, their brief encounter was simply a fun time: “c’est bon tu fais chier là, on s’est marrés un coup toi et moi, t’avais envie, moi aussi alors on a fait ça tranquille, mais c’est tout!” (105-106). His vulgar and violent language contrasts sharply with Rosa Maria’s dreams of Sicilian harmony. Two other characters play an important role in the story. The first is Mouloud who dreams of escaping with Rosa Maria and her unborn child to Bora Bora. Bora Bora is referred to several times because of a giant poster advertising a beach vacation “Faites-vous plaisir, évadez-vous, découvrez Bora-Bora” (71). Bora-Bora, a small volcanic island with a magnificent lagoon is located in French Polynesia. It is often featured among the most beautiful and expensive tourist destinations, a haven away from busy urban lives, including from the regional metropolis of Papeete. This distant and clichéd place becomes the antinomy of the banlieue: “partir, loin du quartier, peut-être jusque là-bas où y a plus de cités, dépasser Paris” (159). Ironically, Mouloud imagines such an escape ‘beyond Paris’ but still within France. Mouloud’s experience reveals the complex ambivalence of belonging that tears apart a number of inhabitants of the banlieue. Born and raised in France, he was sent to his father’s native North African country for military service, and returns mute after months of violence and humiliation: “Là-bas, il a appris la douleur qu’il était français. Un traumatisme, mauvais traitements, brimades, coups et humiliations quotidiennes” (42). The phrase ‘he learned he was French’ ironically suggests he never had this feeling in France, constantly being stigmatized as other. Since then, he has been striking at others, using a body that has become “insensible à la douleur” (43). He remains taciturn and spends his days on a bench spitting his suffering in vain: “Il crache en permanence, sans doute pour évacuer des impuretés enfouies” (158). When the riots break out, he beats up a policeman. His private anger turns into public revenge while also materializing in excess the patriarchal authoritarian figure his parents imposed upon him (157). The other central character is Marguerite who most of the boys call Margarine, alluding to her blond hair and large breasts. Raised by an alcoholic single father after her mother’s departure, she quit school, and

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sells her body in the basement of building F. The basement is both a public and private space. It is often a hiding place, a private refuge for secret acts but such acts have become public transactions offered to one and all. However, in this world characterized by poverty and aimlessness, everyone is equal and Margarine does not discriminate against migrants. On the contrary, she feels closer to their marginalized status. Mouloud, who is hiding from the police, meets her in the basement and asks her for money to escape with Rosa Maria. Margarine refuses and even retaliates because she feels attacked by Mouloud’s accusation of having dragged Antonio into drugs. Tension rises and Mouloud cannot contain his anger and suffering, which become blurred in his violence: Elle lui crache dessus, l’insulte, le pousse, coups de pied, hurlements. Un voile noir de colère aveugle Mouloud et lui renvoie ses souvenirs de souffrances. Ses forces décuplent en quelques secondes, un sursaut. Il enserre la gorge de Margarine d’un geste rapide et brutal. (179)

In a previous dream, Mouloud had imagined their reconciliation on a beach after the drowning of the 6000 cages (207). The fact that Mouloud has turned his previous dream of violence against the banlieue to violence against Margarine points to a failed common struggle against an outside oppressor. Instead, the two characters, whose bodies bear the scars of psychological or physical trauma, turn against one another. While the disco and the basement are both subterranean spaces, the former is associated with potential métissage and life while the latter epitomizes isolation and death. Not only does Marguerite die there but Salvatore hangs himself upon discovering her corpse. The disco, which provided for a pleasurable escape from alienating living conditions, cannot provide a source of resilience. This third novel concludes on the image of suburban youth being surrounded by Capitaine Traoré and his fellow policemen. While the basement failed to provide salvation, a station, a quintessential space for endless wander, marks a potential new departure. At the Gare du Nord, Rosa Maria, who has terminated her pregnancy, resists the impulse to commit suicide, and finally boards a train away from the 6000 cages. She is torn between a wish to escape the cité, and a feeling that she belongs. What she wants is to “s’éloigner de la crasse et du bitume” (211), thereby confirming Didier Lapeyronnie’s observations that suburban youth cannot hope to change the system through rioting but “n’ont d’autre issue que le départ individuel” (Lapeyronnie, 215). If hybridity and dialogue fail at the diegetic level, they are reasserted at the stylistic level in all N’Sondé’s work in which he weaves together multiple cultural references and language registers. The city becomes here

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an intersection between the global and the local, a transnational space that constantly needs to be apprehended and that melds rich heritages but also replicates former hierarchies and racialized thinking. N’Sondé’s novels capture the circumvolutions of the city, its hidden streets, and its maze reminiscent of the consciousness of his narrators trying to escape. As Waberi observes “the narrative refuses to follow a linear path and multiplies flashbacks and side trips, repetitions and rehearsals.” (108) In many ways, N’Sondé’s novels can be read as confessions to the city as protagonists disclose their intimate wounds and crimes. His work moves beyond the ‘Beur' movement' and the Afro-Parisian Diaspora. As Gary D. Mole contends, it belongs both to a new urban fiction and to Congolese literature, to migritude and civil war narratives. Because N’Sondé’s work establishes a “Deuil des origines” (see Prix des cinq continents de la Francophonie 2007), moving away from national or even hyphenated labels, his work fills a gap in what one could apprehend as a postcolonial/transnational voice of the urban. By repossessing the centre in its concise geography of streets, bridges, monuments and central rail stations, N’Sondé’s creative work dismantles and reshapes national identity, exposing the sites of marginalization and amnesia within the metropolis. But the expression that would probably best convey N’Sondé’s position and writing style is that of a border writer. Following Emily D. Hicks’s analysis of ‘border writing’ and concept, one can emphasize how N’Sondé’s writing transgresses physical borders (national and Center/banlieue) as well as cultural, linguistic and generic borders. And as Bellemare-Page contends when reusing the label in the context of Quebec, borders can be seen as dividing but also as uniting. Migrant writers, she adds, display “une conscience aiguë du double rôle joué par les frontières, celui de diviser et de réunir, et se permettent de les franchir, voire même de les redéfinir.” (Bellemare-Page, 32) Many of N’Sondé’s protagonists attempt to move away from structural divisions to such a redefinition. N’Sondé’s novels expose how, to use Manuela Ribeiro Sanches’ introductory words to Europe in Black and White (2011), new forms of apartheid have emerged “replicating fissures and dividing lines inherited from colonial times.” (Sanches, 9) The apparent call for a return to nature and village life in the three novels reveals the search for community and spiritual harmony, away from (sub) urban settings. But these three novels also move beyond denouncing the invention of a homogenous nation that resonates in a number of European discourses, and point to the social fractures between the have and have-nots. The alternative geography and community N’Sondé exposes move away from the Arab or African

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migrant waves: more than anything and more than ever they are intimately linked to social processes and to what Zygmunt Bauman would polemically call the “human waste”(15) the modern capitalistic system is producing and relegating to the margins of the banlieues.

Works cited Baillet, Dominique. “‘La langue des banlieues’: entre appauvrissement culturel et exclusion sociale.” Hommes et migrations 1231, mai-juin 2001. 29-37. Bauman, Zygmunt. Wasted Lives: Modernity and its Outcasts. Cambridge: Politi, 2004. Bellemare-Page, Stéphanie. “Pratiques de l’écriture frontalière chez quelques écrivains migrants québécois.” Nouvelles Etudes Francophones 27.1, (Printemps 2012. ), pp. 19-33. Charef, Mehdi. Le thé au harem d’Archi Ahmed. Paris: Gallimard, 1988. Chrisafis, Angélique, “Seven years after the riots, the suburbs of Paris still simmer with resentment.” The Guardian (November 12, 2012). http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/03/estate-racial-hatredpoisoning-france?INTCMP=SRCH Djaïdani, Rachid. Boumkoeur. Paris: Seuil, 2005. Diome, Fatou. Le Ventre de l’Atlantique. Paris: Editions Anne Carrière, 2003. Divet, Marie-Anne. “Wilfried N’Sondé: l’écrivain sans racines.” Histoires ordinaires. Accessed on line on October 3rd 2012 at http://www.histoiresordinaires.fr/Wilfried-N-Sonde-l-ecrivain-sansracines_a777.html Fonkou, Aubin Kuietche “La représentation de la ville de Paris dans le roman négro-africain.” Paris 13, Master Thesis 2005. Gouaux, Laurence. “Masculinity, Spirituality and Roots: Wilfried N’Sonde’s Le Cœur des enfants léopards.” Edith Biegler Vandervoort (ed.) Masculinities in Twentieth and Twenty-first Century French and Francophone Literature. Newcastle, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2011. 93-108. Horvath, Christina. Le roman urbain contemporain en France. Paris, Presses Sorbonne Nouvelle: 2007. Hicks, Emily D. Border Writing: The Multidimensional Text. Minneapolis, Oxford: University of Minnesota, 1991. Lapeyronnie, Didier. “La banlieue comme théâtre colonial, ou la fracture coloniale dans les quartiers.” Pascal Blanchard & co. (eds) La Fracture Coloniale. Paris: Editions la découverte, 2005. 209-18.

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Maboungou, Jean José. “Roman: Wilfried N’Sondé publie Le Silence des esprits.” accessed on line on November 3rd 2012 at http://www.starducongo.com/Roman-Wilfried-N-Sonde-publie-LeSilence-des-esprits_a2995.html Mole, Gary D. “Voix des banlieues, voix africaines: Hybridité textuelle et polyphonie dans les romans de Wilfried N’Sondé.” Dalhousie French Studies vol. 99, forthcoming 2013. Mboungou, Vitraulle. “Wilfried N’Sondé livre Le Coeur des enfants léopards.” accessed on line on October 3rd 2012 at http://www.afrik.com/article11755.html N’Sondé, Wilfried. Le Cœur des enfants léopards. Paris: Acte Sud, 2007. —. Le Silence des esprits. Paris: Acte Sud 2010. —. Fleur de béton. Paris: Acte Sud, 2012. Puig, Steve. “’Enfermés dehors’: representation de la banlieue dans les romans de Rachid Djaïdani.” Formules 14: Formes urbaines de la création contemporaine. 2010. 179-190. Recchia, Francesca. “Immigration, politics and violence in urban France: between fiction and facts.” Information, Society and Justice. Volume 2.1, December 2008: 47-61. Reeck, Laura, Writerly Identities in Beur Fiction and Beyond. Plymouth: Lexington Books, 2011. Rouane, Houda. Pieds-Blancs. Paris: Philippe Rey, 2006. Ryam, Thomté. Banlieue Noire. Paris: Présence Africaine, 2006. Sanches, Manuela Ribeiro. “Europe in Black and White.” Saches, Clara, Duarte & Martins (eds), Europe in Black and White. Bristol: Intellect, 2011. 7-14. Stauff, Nina. “Les représentations fictionnelles de la folie dans Le Cœur des enfants léopards de Wilfried N’Sondé.” Jean-Marie Kouakou, Les représentations dans les fictions littéraires vol. II. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2010. 122-138. Thomas, Dominic. Black France: Colonialism, Immigration, and Transnationalism. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2007. Waberi, Abdourahman A. “Fragments of an African Discourse: Elements for a New Literary Ecosystem.” Yale French Studies 120, 2011. 100110. Zemassa, “Wilfried N’Sondé, Entretiens.” (May 2007), accessed on line on November 3rd 2012 at http://woli.eklablog.com/rencontre-aveca547717.

CHAPTER EIGHT A RELUCTANT MIGRANT IN PARIS: MALAMINE, UN AFRICAIN A PARIS BINITA MEHTA ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, MANHATTANVILLE COLLEGE

French language comic books, or bandes dessinées, have long been an important part of French and Francophone popular culture. Swiss, Belgian, and French comic book artists have “delighted many generations of children and continue to do so” (McKinney, The Colonial Heritage of French Comics 1). Yet, French-language comic books of the colonial era, with some exceptions, reinforced stereotypes of non-white people with whom the French came into contact. Mark McKinney critically analyzes comic books from the French colonial period, such as the “Zig et Puce” series by Alain Saint-Ogan, demonstrating how “colonialism and imperialism left an imprint on French comics, generally in the form of unsavory imagery and colonialist narratives” (McKinney, The Colonial Heritage 164). McKinney draws particular attention to the sixth volume of the Saint-Ogan series entitled, “Zig et Puce aux Indes,” that was serialized in 1931-32 and published as a book in 1932. This comic book’s exoticization of India, where the French had a few colonial possessions, or comptoirs, as a land of sacred cows, snakes, elephants and fakirs, was similar to some of the comics that stereotyped the Other in the popular Tintin series written by the Belgian comic book artist Hergé (Georges Remi), who was a fan of Saint-Ogan (McKinney, The Colonial Heritage 2-3). In recent years, several essays have critiqued racist stereotypes of the Congolese people in Hergé’s Tintin au Congo.1 In 2007, the British 1 These include Pascal Lefèvre’s “The Congo Drawn in Belgium” and Nancy Rose Hunt’s “Tintin and the Interruptions of Congolese Comics.” In her essay, “Human Rights and Comics” Sidonie Smith cites the authors Hsuan L. Hsu and Martha Lincoln who criticize Hergé’s representation of black Americans in Tintin in America as well as black Africans in Tintin in the Congo. This list is by no means

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Commission for Racial Equality branded Tintin au Congo, written in 1930-31, as racist. As a result it was moved from the children’s to the adult section in Borders bookstores in the United Kingdom and the United States (McKinney, History and Politics 4-5). Pascal Lefèvre acknowledges racist representations of the Congolese in Tintin au Congo, although he asserts that not all representations of the Congo by Belgian comic book artists were racist. Some comic books of the period such as “Blondin et Cirage” and “Tif et Tondu” had “other approaches toward blacks” (Lefèvre 184). While Belgian and French comic book writers represented the worlds of their colonies, including Africa, Francophone African comic book writers and artists in the post-independence period represented their own worlds in various forms - political cartoons, comic strips in newspapers and specialized journals, comic book magazines, and individual albums. Other comic books were published by non-governmental organizations to educate people about sanitary and health issues with the help of African writers and illustrators. As publishing opportunities in Africa slowly dried up, and as some African artists faced political pressure in their countries, the first decade of the 21st century saw the migration of several African comic book writers and illustrators to France and Belgium.2 Recent worldwide interest in African comics includes a first-ever exhibit in the United States entitled “Africa Comics” held at the Studio Museum of Harlem in 2006-2007.3 The first salon of African comic book authors was held from December 3-5, 2010 in the city hall of the 5th arrondissement in Paris to celebrate the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the independence of African nations (Cinquantenaire des Indépendances Africaines). It was organized by the L’Association pour le Promotion de la Bande Dessinée Internationale (APBDI) (Michel). Some important contemporary French language comic books written by African writers residing in France and/or Belgium include Franco-

exhaustive. Complete bibliographical details of the above cited works can be found in the Works Cited section. 2 This information was gathered from the catalogue that was published on the occasion of the first Salon of African comic book writers held in Paris in December 2010 entitled Cinquante années de bandes dessinées en Afrique francophone, written by Christophe Cassiau-Haurie and Christophe Meunier and published by L’Harmattan, 2010. Another article that gives an overview of Francophone African comics is Massimo Repetti’s “African ‘Ligne Claire’: The Comics of Francophone Africa.” 3 The Studio Museum of Harlem published the catalogue for the show in 2006 that includes short comics by African comic book writers and illustrators.

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Ivorian writer Marguerite Abouet and her French illustrator Clément Oubrerie’s Aya de Youpougon series that was awarded the 2006 Prix du premier album at the Festival International de la Bande dessinée at Angoulême, one of the most important comic book festivals held in France. Despite Abouet’s success, however, several prominent African comic book writers remain little-known outside the African continent (Cazenave and Célérier 140). Other comic books such as Edimo’s Malamine: Un Africain à Paris, the object of our study, have enjoyed critical but not material success in France because of the “social criticism it expressed” (Cazenave and Célérier 139-40). Malamine, un Africain à Paris, written by Franco-Cameroonian scenarist Christophe N’galle Edimo and illustrated by Cameroonian artist and illustrator Simon-Pierre Mbumbo was well-received by critics when it was published in 2009 and received a nomination at the comic book festival in Blois in November 2009 (Bouillet).4 Its author, Edimo, has written several individual comic books, and has contributed to collections, and collaborated with other comic book artists. He also founded an organization of African comic book artists in 2001 called L’Afrique dessinée (“Editer et diffuser”). Malamine follows the adventures of its African protagonist, Malamine, who lives in Paris, has a doctorate in Economics from the Sorbonne and is writing a book on the African economy. Edimo and Mbumbo continue a postcolonial gesture to rewrite from a different point of view, but have enjoyed critical, not popular success because the comic book deals with metropolitan identity and does not assume stereotyped identities. The non-linear narrative uses text and image to investigate the reasons for Malamine’s displacement, to provide a view of the African diasporic world he inhabits in Paris, to study his relationship with France and the French people, and to demonstrate his efforts to negotiate his metropolitan mosaic identity while living in two worlds. This essay examines how Malamine breaks through spatiotemporal barriers, moving between Paris and Africa to highlight interethnic rivalries in Africa through flashbacks in order to understand the reasons for Malamine’s migration to Paris from his country of his origin in Africa. It also studies the significance of Malamine’s critique of the French and their treatment of black African migrants in Paris in the narrative. Paris is the backdrop for Edimo’s narrative and the inspiration for Mbumbo’s black-and-white illustrations. The critics Jörn Ahrens and 4

The comic book festival in Blois called BD Boum is one of over 300 comic books festivals held in France every year, one of the most important being the festival in Angoûleme in southwestern France.

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Arno Meteling underscore the symbiosis between comic books and the city (4), claiming that there is “undoubtedly a link between the medium of comics and the big city as a modern living space” (5). We study the role that the metropolitan cityscape of Paris plays in Malamine’s daily life as well as the micro-locations he frequents within that space and examine how Mbumbo’s images help establish character, mood, and locale. Finally, we analyze how the protagonist reconciles his life in Paris and his relationship with disparate groups of African migrants living in Paris with his desire to return to his native country in Africa. Edimo’s Malamine, un Africain à Paris is part of a phenomenon of African writers living in Paris for the past three decades who are not interested in writing about Africa but have more personal concerns. Several critics have discussed and analyzed this phenomenon. In “Beurs noirs à Black Babel,” Bernard Magnier discusses this new generation of “écrivains africains de langue française …” (102). He states that they are neither interested in making grandiose statements about the state of the world of Africa, nor are they concerned with social causes. Their motivations are propelled by personal needs: Les drapeaux ont été rangés et, s’ils ne se désintéressent pas de l’avenir du monde en général et de celui de l’Afrique en particulier, leurs élans semblent davantage dictés par une stratégie individuelle et non par une adhésion à une quelconque cause commune. Leurs héros – mais le mot paraît bien impropre – sont des solitaires qui n’assument en aucune façon le destin d’un groupe ou d’une nation, encore bien moins d’un people ou d’une race. Leurs déchirures sont internes et leurs réactions relèvent d’une décision personnelle plus que d’un engagement collectif. (Magnier 102) [Flags have been put away, and if they are not interested in the future of the world in general and of Africa in particular, their desires seem to be dictated more by an individual strategy and not by an adherence to some common cause. Their heroes – the word appears rather inappropriate – are solitary people who do not assume in any way the destiny of a group or a nation, even less that of a people or a race. Their gashes are internal and their reactions are based on personal rather than collective engagement.]5

Magnier identifies the geographical space in which they write as another common denominator for this current generation of African writers (Magnier 103). Despite their diversity in terms of styles and subject matter, they unite in the metropolitan space of a multicultural and polyglot Paris, a modern day Babel:

5

All translations are my own.

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Chapter Eight Ils sont ‘black beurs’ ou ‘beurs noirs’ pour certains, ‘négropolitains’ ou ‘gallo-nègres’ pour d’autres… ils vivent et écrivent à Babylone-sur-Seine, dans un “black Babel” de Paris ou de banlieue. (Magnier 106). [They are ‘black beurs’ or ‘beurs noirs’ for some, ‘négropolitans’ or ‘gallo-nègres for others… they live and write in Babylone-sur-Seine, in a ‘black Babel’ of Paris or its suburbs.]

Abdourahman Waberi distinguishes this new African Parisian writing from that of earlier generations of African writers. Their generation, “Les enfants de la postcolonie” [children of the postcolony], most of whom were born after the independence of African nations, i.e. after 1960, selfidentify as writers first and black second (11). These writers are less interested in “le thème du retour au pays natal” (“the theme of a return to one’s native land”), a reference to the poem published in 1939 by the Martinican writer Aimé Césaire, which focused on the return of the migrant to his downtrodden native land, but rather on “le thème contraire” (“the contrary theme”), the immigrant African’s arrival in France (Waberi 12-13). Waberi suggests that this generation of exiled writers try to find a balance between their own culture and the culture of their adopted land to enrich their artistic lives (15). Lydie Moudileno suggests that these contemporary texts by African writers are part of a complex “parisianisme noir,” or postcolonialism, in which the tension between the particular and the universal is not resolved (Moudileno, “Littérature et postcolonie” 9, 12-13), while Odile Cazenave in Afrique sur Seine: A New Generation of African Writers in Paris examines thirty works by fifteen writers from sub-Saharan Africa, most born after 1960 (2), to show how these writers “contribute to a decentering of both the African novel and French literature” with the aim of developing “a distinct type of literature” (5). Casenave reiterates that writers of African origin living and working in Paris from the 1980s through the 1990s are no longer looking towards Africa as their predecessors did, but are turning their gaze “towards themselves and their own experience, their writing taking a more personal turn (1). Are these writers part of a “new generation, a new diaspora? Or … should they first and foremost be considered as individual voices?” (2), Cazenave asks. Edimo’s Malamine is part of that movement that decenters French literature. The critics have seen the complexity, the impossibility to categorize contemporary writers of African origin living and writing in Paris, suggesting that their writing needs to be judged on its own merits. They also assert that the writers are more interested in their own experiences and are less concerned with examining and writing about subjects outside of

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themselves. In Edimo’s Malamine, the tension between the universal and the particular is not resolved. The protagonist still relates to larger causes though his experience remains singular. Although Malamine is angry and unfulfilled with his life in Paris, his dissatisfaction with his lack of personal success motivates him to become a committed (engagé) writer who hopes to have a positive impact on the socio-economic and political well-being of Africa. He is convinced of Africa’s greatness and is critical of France for its past colonization of Africa and for its close postcolonial/neocolonial ties with contemporary dictatorial African regimes. He is equally critical of corrupt African governments and disdainful of extremist nationalistic ideas of a return to an idealized precolonial Africa.

Edimo’s Malamine, un Africain à Paris The name Malamine in the comic book’s title shows how the name is not a mere nom propre, a capitalized name such as that of a country or person, but the literal translation is ‘clean/proper noun’, because it embodies stigmatization and instability. Malamine cannot really represent anything because of the complexity of postcolonial identity. The mosaics of identity remain fragments. They almost come together, but they do not. Malamine, in French, literally means someone who “looks bad/gloomy.” The French meaning of his name mirrors his personality and psychological make-up. He is someone who is perpetually angry and frustrated at a number of things – French people, corrupt authoritarian African governments, his African compatriots in Paris, and his own fate. On the other hand, in his own country in Africa we learn that his full name, Malamine Karaboué, identifies him as a member of a tribe from the Eastern part of the country that was not favored by the current authoritarian regime (“Malamine” 19). Thus, although his name does suggest a specific region of the African country from which he originates, Edimo chose not to name the African country of Malamine’s birth in his comic book to minimize the divisiveness of African tribal affiliations and to project his vision of a harmonious pan-Africanism in the adopted home of the African migrant, Paris in this instance, where tribal and national differences become less important. Another motivation for Edimo was to suggest that Malamine could represent any African migrant in Paris. Despite having spent ten years in Paris, Malamine remains an outsider, a reflection of his postcolonial identity as a migrant in the diaspora. Mbumbo’s black and white realist images accentuate his alienation adding a dark, noir-ish quality to the drawings like in a detective novel

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(Bouillet).6 He makes a living as a stretcher-bearer (brancardier) in a Parisian hospital, a job for which he is clearly overqualified, and his lack of respect for his job shows when he is often late to work, much to the chagrin of his supervisor. His job is a “métier alimentaire,” as he puts it (“Malamine”16), that allows him to put food on the table so that he has time to write. In addition to his writing and his job he meets up with fellow Africans in the African neighborhood of Château Rouge. He also frequents a bar, “Le Smart Bar”, where he meets his “buppie,” or black urban professional, friends. This situation is similar to Alain Mabanckou’s novel, Black Bazar (2009), where the protagonist, nicknamed “Fessologue,” meets up with his African and Afro-Caribbean compatriots in an Afro-Cuban bar called “Jip’s”7 in Paris’s 1st arrondissement in the neighborhood of Les Halles. It reflects the particular experiences of the African in the diaspora as bars and restaurants become natural meeting places for different classes and groups of immigrants where they can share food, drink, and conversation without fear of harassment. Finally, Malamine meets yet another group of compatriots in a “cité,” or government subsidized housing in the Paris suburbs. The complexity of his outsider status is seen in his place of residence in Paris’s 7th arrondissement and is reflected in the opening frame of the book. Like the establishing shot in a film, it depicts the Eiffel Tower in the background. The recitative8 informs us that the scene is set in 1997. The image shows a bespectacled Malamine, suitcase in hand being welcomed by a few friends who accompany him to his apartment, a chambre de bonne or maid’s room at the top floor of an apartment building in the 7th arrondissement, one inhabited by wealthy, predominantly white Parisians. Living in a chambre de bonne in such neighborhood suggests that Malamine 6

Bouillet adds that the drawing materials that Mbumbo used - ball-point pen, acrylic paint, and white correction fluid accentuate the comic book’s dark quality. 7 The names of the bars, “Jip’s” in Mackanbou’s novel, and “Le Smart Bar” in Edimo’s comic book, could depict two opposing views of the black migrant in Paris. The word “Jip” is close to the slang word “gip” or “gyp” that is a shortened form of gypsy. The expression “to be gipped” means to be cheated or swindled. The use of English term “smart” in the “Le Smart Bar,” highlights the cosmopolitanism of the Malamine’s African migrant friends. While the first name promotes a pejorative view of black migrants, associating them with the stereotype of cheating gypsies, the second focuses on the black migrant elite in Paris, the “buppies,” or wealthy, black urban professionals who are at home in any large metropolitan city and can speak and understand English. 8 I will be using some of the terminology of comic books – frame/panel/une case/une vignette, un récitatif/recitative, text found in rectangular boxes on top or below the frame, speech bubble/balloon/une bulle.

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is one of its poorer residents and Mbumbo’s images of the sparsely furnished apartment prove it. A series of frames on the following page shows us Malamine ten years later asleep in the same apartment. The blackand-white images highlight the room’s functionality rather than its lived-in characteristics. There is a desk, a television, a bed, and a washbasin; a bucket under the sink catches a slow drip from the washbasin above.

The next few frames reveal an important aspect of Malamine’s character. He who has been stigmatized as an uncivilized and over-sexualized “other,” sees the French being Parisian lovers, also a stereotype. Later he is upset by the rude behavior of a Frenchman he encounters in the Parisian metro. As he leaves his chambre de bonne and walks down the Paris streets, Malamine is offended by a young white couple kissing in public. The recitative reflects Malamine’s thoughts: “…pourquoi donc imposer ses instincts sexuels aux autres? Et ils vont dire que c’est moi l’animal” (“…why then impose one’s sexual instincts on others? And they will say that I am the animal”; “Malamine” 5). Malamine’s internal monologue of being compared to an animal because of his ethnicity and skin color reflects the sixteenth-century

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French philosopher Michel de Montaigne’s meditations in his essay, “Des Cannibales,” in which the latter asks who was more barbaric - Europeans who tortured their own, or the so-called cannibals, the Native American tribes, who ate human flesh? Malamine’s use of the term animal may be less a reference to food and cannibalism, as in Montaigne’s essay, but more about the colonial vision of the black man who is endowed with superior sexual powers. Moments later, Malamine is rudely jostled by a man in the metro who does not apologize. Malamine comments angrily: “Incroyable! Pas étonnant que l’Afrique se porte mal, après avoir été colonisée par des gens de ce niveau!” (“Unbelievable! Not surprising that Africa is in bad shape after having been colonized by people of this caliber!”; “Malamine” 5). For Malamine, the impolite Frenchman of the metro was proof that Africa had been contaminated by its contact with the European colonizer and forever doomed to failure because of it.

Malamine and the African Immigrant Milieu in Paris Malamine frequents various micro-locations in Paris to meet with fellow African migrants from various backgrounds. The locales they inhabit in Paris reveal their socio-economic status. He meets the editor of his book, Scipion, in the area around the metro station Château Rouge. This predominantly working-class African neighborhood, located in the 18th arrondissement of Paris includes stores selling African foods and other

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products, as well as restaurants, night clubs, and bars frequented by the African immigrant population in Paris and its environs (Bardinet): Situé aux pieds de la butte Montmartre, à deux pas du Sacré-Cœur, Château Rouge voisine avec Barbès et le célèbre Tati. Le quartier appartient au 18ème populaire, vaste zone entre la porte de Clignancourt et la porte de la Chapelle, et les stations de métro La Chapelle et Barbès. Depuis la fin des années 80, c’est un des lieux de rendez-vous de la communauté africaine. L’ambiance est saisissante. L’Afrique au cœur de Paris. (Bardinet) [Situated at the foot of the Montmartre hill, a few steps from the SacréCoeur, Château Rouge is next to the shopping area of Barbès and the famous discount store Tati. The neighborhood is the working-class area of the 18th arrondissement, a large zone between the porte de Clignancourt and porte de la Chapelle, and the metro stops La Chapelle and Barbès. Since the late 1980s, it is has been one of meeting places for the African community. The ambiance is arresting. It is Africa in the heart of Paris.]

Scipion is the editor of a publishing house “Les Editions Ntounou.” When we first meet him immediately following Malamine’s experience in the metro, the latter explodes: “..je ne supporte plus ce pays, encore moins ses habitants” (…I cannot stand this country, even less its inhabitants”). When Scipion, an African nationalist responds, “Patience mon frère, le temps de notre revanche arrive” (“Patience my friend, the time for our revenge will come”), Malamine, puzzled by his comment asks, “Quelle revanche? De quoi tu parles?” (“What revenge, what are you talking about?”; “Malamine” 7). Scipion tries to deflect attention from his comment when he adds: “Heu…je veux dire, il faut savoir garder l’espoir.” (“Eh.. I mean, it is necessary to learn to have hope”; “Malamine” 7). Scipion’s use of the term revenge anticipates the looting and burning that occurs at the

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end of the comic book perpetrated by Scipion’s militant nationalist friends such as L’Osagefyo and his gang, although his comment that Malamine should hold onto hope suggests that some kind of change was in the air. Scipion quickly changes the subject and compliments Malamine on his research and references to Africa’s past glory in his manuscript. Malamine informs him that even though Scipion would like him to focus on that glorious past, his book was a critique of the theories of the Chicago School on the African economy and not really a treatise on the perceived strengths of the pre-colonial African economy. Malamine meets up with another group of African immigrants in the Paris suburbs. As leader of this group, Malamine is nicknamed “le Commandant de cercle,” a reference to the administrative structures of colonial Africa. The “Commandant de cercle,” or Circle Commander, was the European head of the smallest unit of the French administration in colonial Africa, and because of his close contact with local African chiefs was considered an “expert” or “specialist” on the indigenous population (Dimier). Bestowing Malamine with the title of a petty bureaucrat of the colonial administration, who was also an expert on the indigenous African population, reflects both Malamine’s powerlessness as an African migrant in Paris while highlighting his expertise within his African migrant circle that is composed of fellow migrants, many of whom are illegal and unemployed. They look up to the more educated, but lowly-employed Malamine for wisdom and guidance. They meet in a high-rise apartment building in a Parisian ‘cité’. This kind of subsidized housing built by the government in the 1970s on the outskirts of large metropolitan French cities for poor and lower-middle class citizens has further contributed to alienating economically and ethnically marginalized groups. The circle includes Maurice, who is unemployed, his girlfriend Diane, who is illegal and not employed, Salimata and her husband Magliore, and Traoré, an impressionable young man. They are all French-speaking African migrants and we do not learn about their countries of origin in Africa. They launch into political discussions about the fate of Africa over shared African meals. During one such encounter, Malamine expresses the need for unity among immigrant African intellectuals adding that they were in the midst of a global economic war, a war which Africa did not know how to wage. Malamine explains that the only way out for Africa was to return to traditional economic models and for immigrant African intellectuals and artists to return to Africa. When Magliore suggests that they needed money to live and that money was only available in France, Malamine retorts that they needed better explanations from the French and African heads of state, who are close collaborators, to explain why this was the

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case (“Malamine” 13). Malamine is critical of France’s post-colonial meddling in the affairs of its ex-colonies in Africa as French governments continue to prop up corrupt African regimes, enriching themselves and the ruling African elites while further impoverishing the general African population.

After meeting with his fellow migrants in the Parisian suburbs, Malamine meets another group of African compatriots, “buppies,” “Black Urban Professionals” in English, or “citadins noirs à revenus élévés” in French, at a bar called “Le Smart Bar” in the area around the Moulin Rouge nightclub also in Paris’s 18th arrondissement. These are young, successful African migrants, who are attached to the wealth they have amassed in France and have no desire to return to Africa. As they dance to African music, and drink and share African foods, Malamine reiterates his

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theories that Africa needed the help of its migrant intellectuals. His friends Baleba and Mokhtar are in complete disagreement: “Tu es pire que José Bové!”(“you are worse than José Bové”; “Malamine” 28), unfavorably comparing Malamine to the French farmer, activist, union leader and founder of the alter-globalization movement, currently a member of the European Parliament. Their description of Malamine as “worse than José Bové” highlights what they perceive as Malamine’s reactionary rejection of the benefits of globalization. Mokhtar claims that globalization could help strengthen Africa’s economy, but Malamine perceives his friends as traitors since they had abandoned Africa even though it so desperately needed its intellectual capital to return and help rebuild that continent. Malamine’s publisher Scipion introduces Malamine to another compatriot, a militant, nationalist African leader L’Osagefyo. The name L’Osagefyo, guide in Ashanti, was the title used by Nkwameh Nkrumah, the first president of independent Ghana who advocated pan-African unity. The reference to the Anglophone African country Ghana is important since it was the first African nation to gain independence. Moreover, President Nkrumah advocated African unity, something that Malamine himself advocates to his fellow migrants. His present-day namesake, however, wishes to continue Nkrumah’s struggle, but has a stridently militant approach. L’Osagefyo wants to take revenge for 400 years of slavery and colonization of Africa and hopes to restore Africa to its past glory. His followers call themselves Kamites, in accordance with the ideas of the Senegalese philosopher and anthropologist Cheikh Anta Diop who saw Africa’s roots in Egypt, thus tracing Africa’s origins to one of the oldest civilizations in the world. L’Osagefyo perceives Barack Obama’s Presidential campaign in the United States as the first step in bringing glory to black people worldwide.9 Obama’s father was Kenyan, so Obama was embraced by Africans as one of their own. Malamine is skeptical that Obama would win, but he is proven wrong with Obama’s election as President of the United States in 2008. For Traoré and L’Osagefyo winning is enough. It would prove that a black man is electable as head of state of one of the most powerful countries in the world.

9

Edimo was writing his comic book during Barack Obama’s campaign for the US Presidency in 2008.

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Although Malamine and L’Osagefyo share a common goal, to improve life in Africa, Malamine quickly learns that they have vastly different ways of achieving those goals. L’Osagefyo invites Malamine to a fancy African restaurant in Paris. L’Osagefyo rides in a chauffeur-driven limousine and dines at expensive Parisian restaurants hinting that he either obtained his money through corrupt means, or had rich donors who believed in the African nationalist cause. In the course of their conversation, Malamine suggests to L’Osagefyo that if Africa was to attain the respect of the developed world, all illiterate and illegal Africans should return to their homes in Africa as they were the “symbole…de la désespérance de l’Afrique qui tend la main” (“symbol of the despair of Africa that asks for handouts”; “Malamine” 77). He names Diane, who is illegal, as an example of such a person. By contrast, L’Osagefyo sees Diane as a resistance fighter and a good candidate for his Afrocentric vision of the world: “Rester ici sans papiers c’est être résistant! Il ne faut pas qu’elle parte! Mais qu’elle reste en laissant grandir sa colère” (“To stay here as an illegal immigrant is to resist! She must not leave! She must stay and let her anger grow”; “Malamine” 77). He could then harness the anger that resulted from her illegal status for the Kamite cause. Later he praises young Traoré, calling him a partisan for attacking a number of white women to further the cause of African glory, so playing into the image of the African savage with savagery based on sex, or at least gender. L’Osagefyo decides that Malamine would become his spokesperson, “ma plume” (“my pen”; “Malamine” 79). Malamine is disillusioned with L’Osagefyo when the latter sends a gang of black youth

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on a paramilitary operation aptly called “Opération oncle Tom” to scare black businesses in Paris who oppose his views and who had acquiesced with the enemy, i.e. the white, European, neocolonial infrastructure. This included an attack on the “Le Smart Bar.” The attack by L’Osagefyo’s African militants on a bar bearing an English name is meant to show how far removed these “buppie” migrants were from African culture. They were making a good living in France and had no intention of returning home. While L’Osagefyo wants to use guns to scare them, Malamine prefers to use his persuasive powers to urge them to return to Africa in order to contribute to its development. Traoré and Diane play influential roles in Malamine’s life and are responsible for his transformation at the end of the narrative. Malamine helps Diane, who is abandoned by Maurice and saddled with his debts, by allowing her to share his apartment until she files for asylum and finds a job and a place to live. Malamine offers her L’Osagefyo’s help to legalize her status, but she refuses, preferring to put her faith in the French justice system and not in “manipulative” African leaders. Malamine arrogantly interprets her reaction as one based on ignorance: “Aujourd’hui elle croit en la justice blanche, hier elle croyait à la sorcellerie noire… ces êtres sans instruction, il suffit de les changer de contexte et leurs préférences changent” (“today she believes in white justice, yesterday she believed in black magic…for these uneducated people, a change in context is sufficient for their preferences to change”; “Malamine” 80). Yet, she was a better judge of character than Malamine and immediately sees through L’Osagefyo’s duplicitous nature and violent methods. Malamine soon realizes that he had been blind to Diane’s strength: “Quel aveuglement, c’est Diane qui était le pilier de notre cercle et moi je ne voyais que Maurice…” (“What blindness, it is Diane who was the pillar of our circle and I only saw Maurice…”; “Malamine” 84). At the end of the graphic novel, she has a good chance of obtaining her papers thanks to her intervention in Traoré’s arrest. Yet, when the policeman mentions that he would ignore her illegal status since she was helping them, she states proudly: “Non, monsieur, je veux exister dans ce pays. Au moins une fois” (“No, Sir, I want to exist in this country. At least once”; “Malamine” 112). Diane wants to receive her legal status because of the legitimacy of her claim, and not because she had betrayed a fellow African. Ultimately, she wants to be acknowledged as an individual and not as a “clandestine”, the French term for illegal immigrant. Traoré, impressed by Malamine’s intellect and his desire to help Africa, claims him as his mentor: “…je serai la main guidée par ton cerveau!” (“I will be the hand that is guided by your brain”; “Malamine”

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23). He too is enthusiastic about Obama’s victory and what it could bring to black people the world over. Later, he brags about being the one responsible for aggression toward white women in Paris to help the African cause: “Tueur de femmes blondes! C’est ça que j’ai trouvé pour aider l’Afrique! Et c’est original!” (Killer of white women. That is what I found to help Africa. And it is original”; “Malamine” 86). As we mentioned earlier, L’Osagefyo considers Traoré’s acts heroic. Malamine, however, is horrified by Traoré’s actions, realizing that Traoré misguidedly assumes that his attacks on white women would be his way of helping Africa. Malamine knows that it would only have the opposite effect and would reinforce stereotypes of black Africans as brutes and savages. One of the women Traoré attacks is Germaine, Malamine’s friend and colleague, a nurse in the hospital where he worked and for whom he had romantic feelings (“Malamine” 88). When Malamine sees Germaine covered in bandages in the hospital, he realizes the horror of what had occurred and confronts Traoré. Traoré accuses Malamine of being an “intellectual incapable” (“incapable intellectual”) (91) and pummels him to the ground declaring himself the new “commandant de cercle.” Malamine is not sure if he or France was responsible for Traoré’s actions and rationalizes his own responsibility by acknowledging that despite his unhappiness with the status quo, he would never resort to violence. He denounces Traoré and L’Osagefyo’s group of thugs to the police in the comic book’s raucous climax. The power struggle here is one between brute force and intellect. Traoré sees Africa achieving greatness through force and attacks on white women like Germaine, whose name signifies her Aryan heritage and through her links France to that heritage. Malamine, on the other hand, denounces violence, believing that Africa could achieve greatness with the help of the intellect and hard work of Africans and one did not need to destroy the white global power structure to achieve that goal.

“Paris is After All an African City” Paris is a crucial backdrop for the comic book. The multicultural, cosmopolitan city is a crucible for the Francophone African diaspora. Paris is perceived in the comic book through four locales: the Eiffel Tower in a couple of frames, one during the day and one with the blinking lights at night, the area around the Château-Rouge metro station in the predominantly African immigrant neighborhood in the 18th arrondissement, “Le Smart Bar” located near the Moulin Rouge, also in the 18th arrondissement, and one in the Paris suburbs. The Eiffel tower represents

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the City of Lights, the iconic symbol of an international, metropolitan city. However, it is also the neighborhood in which Malamine lives in his chambre de bonne, on the top floor of a building in the wealthy, bourgeois 7th arrondissement of Paris. The Château-Rouge area and the “Le Smart Bar” are less pristine locales. The Château Rouge area is a working-class neighborhood for African migrants and “Le Smart Bar,” although a meeting space for young, professional African migrants is located in an area full of night clubs and sex shops. Finally, the “cité” in the suburbs of Paris lies on the periphery of the metropolitan space, thus further alienating its inhabitants.

The major part of the narrative focuses on two spaces frequented by the African migrant population in Paris and the Eiffel Tower serves as little more than a cultural icon. Very little of the comic book’s action takes place there although at one point, as Malamine is leaving the ChâteauRouge area with a lady friend he meets in a café, he sees the flashing lights of the Eiffel Tower in the distance, and comments, “Je ne savais pas qu’on aperçevait la Tour d’Eiffel d’ici” (I did not know that one could see the Eiffel Tower from here”; Malamine 60). Malamine’s statement underscores the chasm that divides the two neighborhoods. The first is a working-class black migrant neighborhood and the second, the area around the Eiffel Tower, is inhabited by mainly white, aristocratic Parisians. The presence of the ghettoized Château Rouge area for African migrants in Paris, indicates the “‘rage, frustration, and alienation’” of being an African immigrant in France. Edimo asserts in an interview:

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The African arrives in France knowing no one. A few friends from his home country, and his boss- but that’s a hierarchical and not a social relationship. Often, he can’t go home for political or economic reasons. He’s in a hurry to prove himself…Malamine isn’t an autobiographical character, but all the people and places in his life are real. I know the bar where the young integrated Africans gather, the publisher of African political tracts with his own bookstore, and the woman who went a year working under the table dodging the cops. (Gauvin)

Edimo’s cites “reality” as his influence for Malamine: “When I first started writing comics, editors suggested westerns, because westerns were selling well. I didn’t know a thing about westerns. But I know this.” He states that he subtitled his graphic novel, “An African in Paris to give publishers a hook” (Gauvin). Having Paris in the title would attract readers because Paris is a global city that is home to many diasporas. Despite his choice of Paris as a global city, Edimo is not particularly interested in the aesthetics of the cityscape and apart from the images of monuments, clubs, and metro stations, most of the illustrations in the comic book consist of interiors, streets scenes, and bars that could be found in any large, metropolitan city. The constructed anonymity of the city, therefore, reflects its migrant population, including the characters in the comic book. Edimo’s Paris is a cosmopolitan, post-colonial “living space” for migrants. Michael Cuntz discusses the problem the caricaturist Jacques Tardi deals with in representations of Paris in his comic books in the following terms: How does one make a specific city recognizable? By drawing famous buildings? The more certain well-known buildings are identifiable, however, the more they turn into mere shallow signs, providing a readily available visual currency. (104)

For Edimo these famous buildings and monuments, identifiers of Paris such as the Eiffel Tower and entrances to metro stations, are mere signs, “readily available visual currency” that indicate to the reader that the story he is about to tell is unfolding in Paris. Although Edimo’s choice to put the name Paris in the title of the book was a deliberate one, his refusal to inundate the comic book with too many iconic images of Paris provides an intriguing counterpoint to the comic book’s title. Yet, the choice of Paris was important for Edimo because Paris is the meeting point for African migrants from all over the continent:

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Since Paris is a neutral meeting space for African migrants regardless of country of origin, Edimo deliberately did not choose a specific country for his African protagonist. Edimo here is making the case for the panAfricanism of earlier African thinkers and leaders such as Nkrumah, suggesting that tribal, regional and national divisions only weaken the African continent. A united Africa would be a formidable opponent to the global superpowers in Europe and North America.

Dreams and Nightmares of Africa in Paris While Malamine dreams of building a better Africa, the comic book is interspersed with nightmares depicting his experiences in Africa and the reasons that propelled his move to France. The use of the flashback as a narrative device for these nightmares is effective since it breaks the linear trajectory of the narrative, adding depth to it and providing insight into Malamine’s personality, showing that his memories permeate his Parisian experience. These flashbacks are usually triggered by an event. The first one occurs as Malamine leaves Scipion’s office in the Château Rouge area and buys some cola nuts on the street. This staple African food triggers a memory of Malamine’s return to Africa ten years earlier. He is warmly greeted by his parents who are proud of his achievement of having received a doctorate at the Sorbonne. His family and friends reflect on how his new degree will “casser toutes les barrières…oui même celle du tribalisme!” (“break all the barriers…yes even tribal ones”; “Malamine” 9). Thus tribalism and ethnic divisions and tensions in Africa that pit one tribe against the other can only be eradicated through better education. In another flashback, his colleague Germaine suggests that although his hospital job was merely a means of making a living for him, it was an important one because he was saving lives. Later, Malamine reflects on that comment as he is falling asleep musing that a brilliant economist could save more lives than a stretcher-bearer. In his nightmare, depicted in vivid images, Malamine armed with his Sorbonne doctorate is being rejected from a job in the Ministry of Finance in his country because his

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name reveals his affiliation to his tribe from the Eastern provinces of his country that was unpopular with the ruling regime. He is rudely asked to leave: “Dehors, pauvre stupide! Vous n’aurez jamais de poste ici! Jamais!” (“Get out, you poor, stupid man! You will never get a job here! Never!” “Malamine” 19). The next few frames show Malamine fleeing the government office, and in the final frame we see him waking up in his apartment in Paris screaming the words “get out.” The term “get out’ resonates even after he awakens, indicating that Malamine is unwanted in France as he is in Africa and has nowhere to call home. Another flashback shows Malamine meeting up with some friends in a bar in his country, after being rejected by the government and the universities controlled by the same government. He decides to look for work in the private and “informal” sectors of the economy, but is dissuaded by his friends who urge him to return to Europe, to marry a white woman, and to remain there. For them, like for Frantz Fanon, a black man’s relationship with a white woman was a way to obtain white dignity and civilization (51). Consequently, Traoré’s violent attacks on white women, are a deliberate rejection of white civilization. While Malamine points out to his friends that things can change in Africa, his friends emphasize the reality of the corruption in that continent. If he made a name for himself, he would be considered a threat by the ruling powers and could end up in prison or the morgue (“Malamine” 31-32). Edimo suggests that Malamine’s move to France is not of his own choosing but one that is forced upon him by his own countrymen and by the African government who discriminate against him because of his tribal affiliation. We observe more inter-ethnic rivalry in a final flashback as Malamine leaves his family to return to France. He is harassed by an airport official who suggests that people from his tribe “partent tous comme des rats” (“all leave like rats”). Malamine responds sarcastically: “Lorsqu’on est là vous nous méprisez, lorsqu’on part, vous n’êtes pas contents…” (“When we are here, you hate us. When we leave, you are not happy…”). Angered by Malamine’s insolence the official forces him to pay a bribe, calling it “la taxe de l’air” (“air tax”; “Malamine” 48-49). In the last two frames we see Malamine in the airplane, tears running down his cheeks, devastated by the humiliation he has just experienced and saddened by the corruption he has just witnessed. These two episodes reveal that institutional corruption can be found in both worlds, in France and in Africa. While the authorities in Africa persecute Malamine because of his tribal affiliation, the police in France are willing to ignore Diane’s illegal status, thus breaking the law,

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and will even help her get her legal status for providing testimony that would help them arrest one of her own.

Malamine: Hero or Anti-Hero? Through the narrative, we witness a slow transformation in Malamine’s character. At the beginning of the novel, Malamine hardly elicits our sympathy. He is malcontent, angry and bitter at the world that does not recognize his brilliance, a reluctant migrant in a city whose inhabitants he perceives as vulgar and decadent. At the same time he cannot return to Africa, because of the discrimination he will face there. He condemns France for its neo-colonial domination of Francophone Africa and is a misogynist who relegates women to an inferior position, seeing them as only there to satisfy his physical needs. Malamine’s arrogance and sexist attitudes toward women, both African and French, come across at various moments in the comic book. Early in the narrative, he is attracted to a young African girl fashionably dressed in Western clothes: “Longtemps que je n’ai vu une nubienne10 aussi belle, aussi raffinée, aussi fraîche…” (It has been a while since I have seen a black woman as beautiful, as refined, as fresh…”; “Malamine” 23). He strikes up a conversation with her in a bus and when he discovers she is a student at the Sorbonne offers to use his connections to help her as a fellow African (“Malamine” 24). She sarcastically rejects his offers of help and as she gets off the bus she embraces and kisses a white man: “Encore une sœur sensible à l’argent des blancs…” (“Another sister seduced by white wealth…”; “Malamine” 24). Malamine here appears to be explicitly criticizing the young woman’s attraction to money that is mainly in the hands of white people while implicitly condemning bi-racial relationships. It is important to note that Malamine does not perceive his attraction to Germaine, a white woman, as a betrayal of his ethnic origins. Is Malamine’s condemnation of the corrupt white world a genuine one, or merely a reaction to young woman’s rejection? His thoughts are reflected in the recitative in the next frame: “Si cette fille était de mon niveau, je l’aurais emmenée au Smart et ensuite j’aurais fait l’amour avec elle” (“If this girl was of my level, I would have taken her to “Le Smart Bar” and then made love to her”; “Malamine” 24). The young woman is therefore 10

This term, Edimo informs us in a note, is the Afrocentrist one used to designate black people.

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only good enough to drink with and to make love to, a sexual object to be manipulated at will. Malamine’s objectification of women continues in chapter 3 entitled “Germaine et la Frustration.” Germaine, a nurse and colleague at the hospital where he works engages him in conversation and appears genuinely interested in learning the reasons for his bitterness. Malamine explains: “La colonisation de l’Afrique continue sous d’autres formes et pour nous autres qui sommes coincés ici, il n’y que souffrances et mépris” (“The colonization of Africa continues in other forms and for us who are stuck here, there is only suffering and contempt”; “Malamine” 37). When Germaine asks Malamine what prevented him from returning to Africa, he blames France for supporting the corrupt dictatorship in his country that discriminated against people from his ethnic group. Germaine offers her support if he ever needed a bank loan. Once again, the relationship with a white person in the postcolonial context is one based on monetary transactions.

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Malamine perceives Germaine’s offer to help as a form of colonial paternalism that needed to be rejected. As he falls asleep he has a dream. In that dream, we see of image of him wearing a loincloth and holding a machete in his hand. Germaine arrives at his door dressed in her nurse’s uniform. Malamine tells her to undress and she does so striking two poses, asking which one he preferred. In the first, she poses as the figure of Liberty with her breasts exposed, holding the French tricolor in her right hand as in the Delacroix painting, “Liberty Leading the People.” In the next frame, she appears as the naked Venus, her hands covering her private parts, as in the Botticelli’s “The Birth of Venus.” Malamine states that he preferred the second pose stating, “Reste comme ça! Tu dois payer pour mes humiliations!” (“Stay like that! You must pay for my humiliations”; Malamine 42). He proceeds to slaughter her with his machete. Although he kills her in his dream, the macho Malamine prefers the more docile figure of Germaine as Venus, the Roman Goddess in the Italian Renaissance artist Botticelli’s painting, to the more militant personification of freedom, the French Marianne, urging the French middle and working classes in the early 19th century to fight the ruling aristocracy. In reality, Malamine is attracted to Germaine and comes to the conclusion that she would be an ideal woman for him, but soon dismisses that thought because that would mean that “la France a gagné” (“France had won”; “Malamine” 53). So that France does not win, Germaine had to be killed off in his dream. Although critical of African regimes and angry at them for discriminating against him, Malamine blames France’s neocolonialist attitudes towards its ex-colonies in Africa, globalization, and white people in general for Africa’s problems. Malamine’s misogynistic attitudes are tempered at the comic book’s ending when he is forced to admire Diane’s strength, determination, and judgment. Malamine would not have denounced Traoré and L’Osagefyo

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to the French authorities if she had not urged him to do so. The recitative in the final frame reads: “De toute façon, ma décision est prise. Enfin! Si Diane est expulsée, je partirai avec elle, oui.. pour la vie.” (“In any case, my decision is taken. At last! If Diane is expelled, I will leave with her, yes… for life”; “Malamine” 115). Although we do not reach complete closure, Malamine has made a commitment to someone and appears to have learned a lesson in humility at the comic book’s dénouement. In Edimo’s Malamine, un Africain à Paris, Malamine feels the burden of responsibility for bringing positive change to Africa. He does this through his writing and through his interactions with fellow migrants in the metropolitan mosaic of Paris. Paris is the cosmopolitan space that allows for such interactions. Yet, Paris has been a “failed crucible” for Malamine, because unlike his “buppie” friends who are happy to court financial success in France, he is an impoverished writer, who despite his advanced degrees has not become wealthy and wants to return to his country of birth. He does not hesitate to blame African governments for their corrupt ways and their unwillingness to help resolve Africa’s problems, yet he is equally critical of France’s continued meddling in Africa and suggests that that continent needs to take the lead in resolving its own problems. He is not afraid to raise sensitive issues such as antiwhite racism when he critiques sexual promiscuity he sees on the streets of Paris, or to denounce reactionary views of extremists like L’Osagefyo, whose vision of change in Africa can only be achieved through violence (Arneau). The comic book is a Bildungsroman in that Malamine receives an education in humility through his interactions with various migrants in Paris, especially his two women friends, Diane and Germaine, who play prominent roles in his transformation in the comic book’s conclusion. Although he attaches himself to Diane and does not have the fortitude to make his own decision as to whether to stay in Paris or to return to Africa, his conflicted feelings are the result of the anticipation of rejection he knows he will receive on his return because of his tribal origins. The open ending of the comic book suggests the conundrum of the migrant of the diaspora. Malamine states that he will return only if Diane is expelled from France. Given the fact that Diane would likely be granted asylum, is his claim realistic? If he does return, what will he return to? Will he be able to change the political and social situation in his country that will allow members of his tribe to be successful? If he does not return, what is his place in his adopted home? How will he deal with the racism and discrimination he encounters there? Will he truly be integrated into the society of his adopted home? Can he ever be critical of the institutions and policies in his adopted home without fear of retribution?

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Does the migrant end up with no real “home” or is he/she doomed (or blessed?) to straddle two worlds? Does the migrant create a world to fit the needs of his/her hybrid identity? Or does the migrant reconcile his/her multiple identities in the adopted home to the point where origins no longer matter?

Works Cited Ahrens, Jörn, and Arno Meteling, eds. Comics and City: Urban Space in Print, Picture and Sequence. Continuum: New York & London, 2010. Print. Arneau. “Edimo: Un Africain à Paris.” sceneario.com. 3 June 2010. Web. 3 Aug. 2012. . Bardinet, Stéphane. “France: Château Rouge, Paris 18ème, un samedi en Afrique.” participez.com. 27 May 2004. Web. July 2 2012. . Bouillet, Clarisse. “La Grande Illusion.” Jeune Afrique. 1 Dec. 2009. Web. 2 Aug 2012. . Cassiau-Haurie Christophe, and Christophe Meunier. Cinquante années de bandes dessinées en Afrique francophone. Mayenne: L’Harmattan, 2010. Print. Cazenave, Odile. Afrique sur Seine: A New Generation of African Writers in Paris. Lanham, MD; Oxford, UK: Lexington Books, 2005. Print. Casenave, Odile, and Patricia Célérier. Contemporary Francophone African Writers and the Burden of Commitment. Charlottesville and London: University of Virginia Press, 2011. Print. Chaney, Michael A., ed. Graphic Subjects: Critical Essays on Autobiography and Graphic Novels. Madison, Wisconsin and London, England: University of Wisconsin Press, 2011. Print. Cuntz, Michael. “Paris au pluriel: Depictions of the French Capital in Jacques Tardi’s Comic Book Writing.” Ahrens and Meteling 101-116. Dimier, Véronique. “Le Commandant de Cercle: un ‘expert’ en administration colonial, un ‘spécialiste’ de l’indigène?” Revue d'Histoire des Sciences Humaines 1.10 (2004): 39-57. Web. 14 Sept, 2012. . Edimo, Christophe N’galle and Simon-Pierre Mbumbo. Malamine, un Africain à Paris. Paris: Les Enfants rouges, 2009.

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—. Interview. “Entre les lignes.” Dailymotion. 24 April 2012. Video. 2 Aug. 2012.