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The opposite of the exotic: Provincial France and the family home from the perspective of French colonial novels

Lookup NU author(s): Dr Jennifer Yee

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Abstract

The French colonial novels studied here, which are fairly typical of the genre, deal mainly with the relationship between a white man and an exotic woman. This binary relationship is made more complex by the presence of a third character who seems insignificant but who plays a symbolic role of the utmost importance: the hero's white fiancee, still living in France in his native village. In fact, what is at stake in the colonial novel is often less colonialism than the colonizer's own identity, and in the texts studied here this threatened identity is symbolised by the conflict between the ill-fated attraction the hero feels for his exotic mistress and his attachment to his fiancee. This article shows that the latter is the incarnation of values associated with family, regional and national identity, and the white race.

Publication metadata

Author(s): Yee J

Publication type: Article

Publication status: Published

Journal: RLC: Revue de Litterature Comparee

Year: 2003

Volume: 77

Issue: 2

Pages: 155-168

ISSN (print): 0035-1466

ISSN (electronic):

Publisher: Editions Klincksieck

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