Countermodernism and Francophone Literary Culture: The Game of Slipknot

This text examines the literary culture produced by French speakers and writers born outside of France. Focusing on the commonalities revealed in their shared language and colonial history, Walker examines the work of six writers who, while artistically and geographically scattered, share complex sensibilities regarding their own relationship to France and the French language and, as he demonstrates, produce a counterdiscourse to their colonizers’ modern literary traditions. Martinique, French Guyana, Senegal, Morocco and Haiti serve as the stage for the struggle these writers have faced with French language and culture. The writers examined are Aime Cesaire, Leon Gontron Damas, Mariama B, Tahar Ben Jelloun, Ken Bugul and Gerard Etienne.