Creole Identity in the French Caribbean Novel

Adlai Murdoch offers a detailed rereading of five major contemporary French Caribbean writers - Glissant, Conde, Maximin, Dracius-Pinalie, and Chamoiseau. Emphasizing the role of narrative in fashioning the cultural and political doubleness of Caribbean Creole identity, Murdoch shows how these authors actively rewrite their own colonially driven history. Murdoch maintains that the culture of the French Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique is less homogeneous and more creatively fragmented than is commonly supposed. Promoting a new vision of this multifaceted region, he challenges preconceived notions of what it means to be both French and West Indian. The author's own West Indian origin provides him with intimate, firsthand knowledge of the nuances of day-to-day Caribbean life. While invaluable to students of Caribbean literature, this work will also appeal to those interested in the African diaspora, French and postcolonial studies, and literary theory.