French Language & Literature

Freud and psychoanalysis taught us that rebellion is what guarantees our independence and our creative abilities. But in the contemporary "entertainment" culture, is rebellion still a viable option? Julia Kristeva illustrates the advances and impasses of rebel culture through the experiences of three twentieth-century writers: the existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre, the surrealist Louis Aragon, and the theorist Roland Barthes.

An analysis of social mobility in contemporary French literature that offers a new perspective on figures who move between social classes. Focusing on recent French novels and autobiographies, On Both Sides of the Tracks speaks powerfully to issues of emancipation and class. Cadieu offers a fresh critical look at tales of social mobility in the work of Annie Ernaux, Kaoutar Harchi, Michel Houellebecq, Édouard Louis, and Marie NDiaye, among others, shedding fascinating light on upward mobility today as a formal, literary problem.

Drawing (in) the Feminine celebrates and examines the richness of contemporary women's production in French and Francophone comics art and considers the history of representations made by both dominant and marginalized creators.

Fictions of Race in Contemporary French Literature is the first scholarly study to engage with the figure of the White writer and explore the White literary gaze in contemporary France. It focuses on seven case studies featuring texts by Marie Darrieussecq, Virginie Despentes, Annie Ernaux, Nicolas Fargues, Pierre Lemaitre, Édouard Louis, and Nicolas Mathieu.

This volume invites you to wander through the shadows of the City of Light and discover another, often invisible and silent Paris. Its chapters explore Parisian margins, including various populations, spaces and practices, as represented in French literature and cinema since 1800.