Deconstructing home and exile

Abstract

"Little known at the time of its inception in the fifties, francophone literature of the Maghreb today represents a unique literary and cultural phenomenon. Maghrebian francophone fiction comprises a diverse body of writing both thematically and stylistically. Not having a novelistic tradition to draw from and having inherited a language that is not their own, Maghrebian francophone writers have often been in a position which resists classification and belonging. Their literary production described sometimes as a form of bastardy, some of them turn this illegitimacy into a subversive strategy to transcend monolithic thought and champion plurality and diversity. As Danielle Marx-Scouras observes, these writers have "succeeded in exploiting the alterity, bastardy, and treachery implied by writing in the adversary's language, recognizing that these apparently negative attributes are precisely what characterize the avant-garde specificity of Maghrebine Francophone literature" (4). Maghrebian authors who have opted for the ex-colonizer's language as their primary medium of expression continue to operate within the borderline of two conflicting cultures, languages, and identities. They are continuously in search for new pathways into a plural identity that lies beyond the demands of any national or regional allegiance. As Marx-Scouras further argues, "The very nature of Maghrebine Francophone writing dissociates literature from the concept of nationality. The Francophone writer is necessarily trans-national, transcending the artifice of national language, literature, and identity" (8).