Quand Marie Darrieussecq parle de race : réception et posture de l’écrivain blanc

Abstract

This article reflects upon the remarkable reception of Marie Darrieussecq’s novel Il faut beaucoup aimer les hommes in the autumn of 2013. In the first instance, it questions the response of literary critics—surprisingly unanimous in spite of the novel’s treatment of interracial relations and colonial heritage—as well as the author’s posturing until she was awarded the prestigious Médicis prize. While French literary studies continue to be governed by ethnoracial criteria applied to minority authors (“francophone” writers, “beur” or “banlieue” literature, etc.), this article seeks to demonstrate that, during this period marked by extensively reported racist incidents, a certain image of the white writer emerged from the novel’s critical reception as well as Darrieussecq’s own public interventions.