From Choice to Resistance: A History of French Twentieth-Century Literary Views

Author: Liu Mingjiu
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-08-01
Features: France is a nation that upholds individual freedom, and French literature adheres to the highest principle of pursuing the freedom of creative individuality. As a result, most new schools of thought and artistic styles in the world often originate from there. The field of French literature has always been a free and diverse landscape of various styles, especially in the 20th century, which was more conducive to individual development. Therefore, in 20th-century French literature, extraordinary and independent talents are abundant. For literary history, while there is always a need to categorize and summarize, many writers in 21st-century French literature are difficult to classify. The tenth part of this book focuses on some writers who defy fixed categories. They are hard to classify precisely because of the uniqueness and bold expression of their creative individuality. Ironically, this very boldness becomes their common trait, especially that they all boldly elevate their self-individuality, self-spirit, and self-state into literature as a distinctive feature. From Raddigue, Sartre, Colette, and Camus, to Jean Genet, Marguerite Duras, and Fran?oise Sagan, whose works do not feature an extremely prominent, capitalized "I"? This allows us to tentatively group them all under the term "self-expressive talents."