•  
  •  
 

Présence Francophone: Revue internationale de langue et de littérature

Abstract

This essay examines the relationship between writing, memory and prison, as it is deployed in Patrick Chamoiseau’s tenth novel Un dimanche au cachot (2007). In this text, the inscription of the writer within the space of a small prison located on a Martinican plantation, serves Chamoiseau’s larger project to survey the Caribbean territory in order to unveil memorial traces. As it exhumes the ruins of an old disciplinary prison cell, this archeological move triggers a series of crucial transformations: in Un dimanche au cachot, prison writing reclaims a new glissantian “Lieu”, while making room for a therapeutic way of dealing with contemporary issues. Ultimately, the novel features the emergence of yet another image of Chamoiseau: that of the educator, who now collaborates with the writer and ultimately plays a key role in deciphering the present.

Share

COinS
 
 

To view the content in your browser, please download Adobe Reader or, alternately,
you may Download the file to your hard drive.

NOTE: The latest versions of Adobe Reader do not support viewing PDF files within Firefox on Mac OS and if you are using a modern (Intel) Mac, there is no official plugin for viewing PDF files within the browser window.