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https://doi.org/10.38003/ccsr.3.5-6.5
Le cas de « Terre-Noire » dans la saga des Nuits de Sylvie Germain : de l’hétérotopie à l’hétérochronie
Mara Blanche Magnavaca
; Université Toulouse Jean Jaurès
Abstract
Terre-Noire, the family hamlet of the Péniel clan in the saga Nuits by Sylvie Germain,
probably corresponds to a heterotopia crisis: a place reserved for family members only.
Foucault explained different heterotopias in 1967, and places such as Terre- Noire perfectly
exemplify his postulatse. Terre-Noire continues to be the scene of family dramas and is
the setting for a troubled and traumatized clan. It is the first of literary places marked by
Germain and it bears witness to family history, and above all to French history, during
the two Great Wars. The place changes, undergoes metamorphoses and sometimes even
suffers partial destruction, recreating on a small scale the destruction and violence
present in European cities during wartime. Conflicts reach Terre-Noire with their share
of suffering and mourning, and the Péniel family space embodies the place of war by
presenting all the features of a deadly space. The heterotopia represented by Terre-Noire
questions the notion of time, inseparable from considerations by 20th century geocritics.
Also, heterotopia establishes a peculiar heterochrony which must be understood through
questioning the force of the memory of the place, both in its fictitious aspect induced by
the literary form, and in the historical turn of the story.
Keywords
Sylvie Germain, heterotopia of crisis, heterochrony, Terre Noire, landscape
Hrčak ID:
328125
URI
Publication date:
31.12.2021.
Visits: 333 *