Edouard Glissant's Rhetorical Marronnage or the Abolition of Generic Artistic Boundaries in his Fictional Work

Abstract

The present article seeks to analyse Edouard Glissant’s intellectual marronage, which is closely linked to his rebellious rhetoric, by which the Martinican writer tries to use a patent suit to tackle imperialist systems, which cultivate monolithic and unidirectional western rhetoric. For this reason, he transcends generic boundaries by abolishing the artistic and cultural barriers. In this perspective, he needs to experience his new dynamics of trans-rhetorical, which is based on the implementation of the intermixing between oratorical genres (judicial impetus, epidictic eloquence and deliberative aim) in his novels. Correlatively, the West Indian novelist, ethnographer and philosopher makes use of his trans-generic aesthetics, which is coextensive with the trans-rhetorical, in order to incorporate not only historiography, ethnography, poetry and theatre in his romantic fiction, but also music, painting, sculpture and arts of photography and filmmaking. This is how he places his new geopoetics under the label of intermixing between different human imaginations.