European domination and transformation of colonized societies in Africa and the Caribbean has inspired a great deal of writing. Phyllis Taoua propounds a revisionist synthesis of the French colonial project, illustrating how writers from Africa, the Caribbean, and France developed avant-garde programs in dialog with one another. This provocative reassessment of canonical works by Aime Cesaire, Mongo Beti, Sony Labou, and others, deliberately challenges models of cultural freedom predicated on outmoded notions of cultural purity. A focus on avant-gardes and anti-colonialism highlights the antagonism inherent in colonial society, illustrating modes of cross-cultural innovation developed as forms of protest. What emerges is an interpretive model of dynamic interaction in which actors on both sides of the colonial divide participated and were transformed as a result.
Written in clear, jargon-free prose that both students and specialists will appreciate, this is the first book in the Studies in African Literature series to place African literature in firm dialog with France and the Caribbean, making it especially valuable to anyone interested in African, Caribbean, and other post-colonial literatures, as well as 20th-century French literature.