The Writer Under Trial: The Place of Space in Postcolonial Authorship

Authors

Sonali Ravi, Princeton UniversityFollow

Date of this Version

4-2020

Document Type

Presentation

Citation

Ravi, Sonali (2020). "The Writer Under Trial: The Place of Space in Postcolonial Authorship." 20th & 21st Century French and Francophone Studies International Colloquium, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, March 26-28, 2020. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/ffsc2020/

Comments

Copyright © 2020 Sonali Ravi.

Abstract

From the panel "Rethinking Space"

Any writer is riddled with profound anxiety, having to give form to their deepest thoughts and reflections. However, as cultural, geographical, racial and linguistic location and authenticity over-determine the reading and reception of postcolonial authors’ works, this talk explores what the place of space is in authorship and in defining authorial identity for postcolonial Francophone authors. By focusing on Ousmane Sembene’s Le docker noir (1956) and Dany Lafferière’s Je suis un écrivain japonais (2008), the goal of this talk is to examine the unique anxieties that postcolonial writers face, particularly in defining a sense of origins, nationality, identity and in claiming the auctoritas (authority) that is integral to the creative process.