What does Francophone Literature look like?



In Francophone literature today, many writers (male and female) such as Alain Mabanckou (Congo), Ananda Devi (Mauritius), Lyonel Trouillot (Haiti), Patrick Chamoiseau (Martinique) among many others (Édouard Glissant, Fatou Diome or Yannick Lahens) present themselves as authors and critics. They talk about what literature looks (should look) like in the context of the postcolonial modern era. Writing is not only a way to fictionalize the world, but also the way to fictionalize the literature itself: to define its nature, to observe its functions, and to improve its limits. This course aims to examine these discourses in literature and the art of writing.



Required texts:

Patrick Chamoiseau, Que peut la littérature quand elle ne peut pas?, Paris, Éditions du Seuil/eLibelle (2025), EAN 973-2-02158892-7

Ananda Devi, Deux malles et une marmite. Quel est ce mystère d’écrire?, Paris, Éditions Project’îles, 2024, ISBN 978-2493036056

Alain Mabanckou, Le monde est mon langage, Paris, Grasset, 2016, EAN 978-2- 24680219-8 ; EAN Numérique 978-2-24680220-4