Writing postcolonial France : haunting, literature, and the Maghreb

This book examines the way in which France has failed to come to terms with the end of its empire, and is now haunted by the legacy of its colonial relationship with North Africa. It examines the form assumed by the ghosts of the past in fiction from a range of genres (travel writing, detective fiction, life writing, historical fiction, women's writing) produced within metropolitan France, and assesses whether moments of haunting may in fact open up possibilities for a renewed relational structure of cultural memory. By viewing metropolitan France through the prism of its relationship with its former colonies in North Africa, the book maps the complexities of contemporary France, demonstrating an emerging postcoloniality within France itself. -- From publisher's website This book is the first literary study to examine how France has failed to come to terms with the end of its empire, and is now haunted by the legacy of its colonial relationship with North Africa. It examines the form assumed by the ghosts of the past in fiction from a range of genres (travel writing, detective fiction, life writing, historical fiction, women's writing) produced within metropolitan France, and assesses the implications of haunting for French cultural memory. Introduction The return of the colonial in Le Clézio, Bona and Sebbar 17 October 1961: haunting in Kettane, Sebbar, Maspero and Daeninckx Writing from Algeria: haunted narratives in Cardinal and Cixous Abjection: the stranger within in Prévost and Bouraoui.