Des microcosmes sociaux dans l’œuvre de Maylis de Kerangal

Abstract

Novels by Maylis de Kerangal tend to depict specific microcosms. Two novels will retain our attention here: Corniche Kennedy and Birth of a Bridge. Corniche Kennedy immediately introduces the concepts of surveillance, cosmic speed, and planetary rotation before focusing more specifically on a group of teenagers who all converge, by various means of transport, toward Corniche Kennedy in Marseille. In Birth of a Bridge, Diderot’s character sums up these same notions of cosmic speed and effervescence. Then the story turns to workers of various skills who also converge to the same place: here, that of a promising job site. Each of these two novels begins with a cosmic vision and then focuses on a specific environment capable of representing on a small scale the diversity and complexity of an entire society. More specifically, Corniche Kennedy denounces the political instrumentalization of antagonism toward Marseille’s youth as well as the outdated traditional panopticon surveillance system. As for Birth of a Bridge, the story seems to celebrate, in a Bakhtinian fashion, the workers’ high level of technicality while mocking the futility of the globalizing ambition that underlies the project.