Queering the Margins: Pedro Lemebel's Loco afan

Chile has gone from being a society in which gays, transvestites, and lesbians defied established models of sexuality and gender, and as a result were relegated to marginalisation and semi-clandestinity, to being a society into which these formerly excluded groups have been admitted, if only at the level of entertainment, and whose way of life has been captured and administered. This is the transition that Pedro Lemebel captures in his chronicles

Neither Here nor There: Linda Le and Kim Lefevre's Literary Homecoming

Much Vietnamese Francophone literature expresses the conflictual struggle of writers caught between two cultures: between the traditions and values of their native Vietnam, and the language and system left behind by the French colonial power. A distinguishing feature that recurs in many Vietnamese Francophone novels is the experience of exile and diaspora that came about as a direct result of the political upheaval experienced in Vietnam during the twentieth century, resulting in a humanitarian and economic crisis which led to the emigration of a significant portion of its population

Le 'vrai' moi: Nancy Huston's Concern for Authenticity

Nancy Huston, voluntarily exiled in France from her native Anglophone Canada, is constantly troubled by others’ perception of her displaced identity and her own presentation of her “real” identity. This article examines the way in which Huston situates herself within French culture and the French literary canon through the analysis of two of her nonfiction works, Lettres parisiennes: autopsie de l’exil (1986, in collaboration with Leïla Sebbar) and Nord perdu (1999). The analysis of the importance of childhood as key to Huston’s adult identity and the significance of the French language to her writing project and identity as a writer, is followed by the discussion of her right to claim belonging within the different aspects of her identity as French, Canadian, writer, and exile. The article concludes with a discussion of Huston’s notion of identity as constructed rather than inherent, the notion which lies at the root of her anxiety over the tension between imitation, and the authentic performance of identit

Anna Rocca and Kenneth Reeds, eds. Women Taking Risks in Contemporary Autobiographical Narratives. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2013. 232 pp.

Review of Anna Rocca and Kenneth Reeds, eds. Women Taking Risks in Contemporary Autobiographical Narratives. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2013. 232 pp

Laura Restrepo

Long revered by a loyal readership, Laura Restrepo has only begun to receive scholarly attention. She has now has achieved the rare feat of reaching vast audiences both local and international, and both academic and general. Of major national and international standing, Restrepo is celebrated for the oblique focus she brings to recent and contemporary Colombian history, as well as for engaging with the wider panorama of Spanish American political history. Translated into over twenty languages, and recognized by major international prizes and awards, Restrepo is not only a key figure of contemporary Colombian literature, but of Spanish American as well as world literature today

Writing Displacement, Demythologising Violence: Discourses of Violence in Contemporary Colombia and Laura Restrepo's La multitude errante

This article explores and analyses the representation of violence in contemporary Colombian culture. Violence has come to characterise Colombian society since the onset of the current armed conflict, with devastating consequences for its population. Within this context, this article examines tendencies in contemporary literary representations of violence, with a focus on La multitud errante (2001) by Laura Restrepo, one of Colombia’s foremost writers. It begins with an outline of the origins and evolution of violence in Colombia in the twentieth century, and draws links with the contemporary crisis. It then goes on to explore the ways in which violence in contemporary Colombian society has been narrativized in political, media and cultural discourses before focusing on Restrepo’s text to reveal a recent shift in cultural representations of violence. Framing the analysis in the recent findings of narratological and cultural studies of the discourse of violence, notably those of Sara Cobb, Yeny Serrano and Juana Suárez, this article argues that Restrepo offers new tools for understanding the origins and impact of Colombia’s now endemic violence by shifting the focus of representation from a contemporary trend towards the mythologization of violence and its actors

Ni una menos: Colombia’s Crisis of Gendered Violence during the Covid-19 Pandemic

In spite of the shared nature of the global suffering caused by the pandemic, the lockdown imposed to reduce the spread of Covid-19 has exposed and exacerbated the crisis of gendered violence in Colombia. While many countries around the globe have reported an increase in gendered violence during the pandemic, Colombia’s lockdown has taken place in a context of already high rates of violence towards women and girls. Such an environment has proven propitious for the propagation of incidents of gendered violence throughout all strata of society, with indigenous women and girls, and those living in precarious conditions, in particularly vulnerable to often life-threatening circumstances. This article charts the particular impact of the lockdown on gendered violence in Colombia and discusses the reactions of feminists, journalists, academics, writers and artists

Generation and Transmission: Transnational Ageing in Contemporary Women's Writing in French

This paper was presented at the Contemporary Women’s Writing in French seminar on ‘Women’s Ageing in Women’s Writing and Film’, organised by Kate Averis and Carrie Tarr, on Saturday 2 July 2016 at the Institute of Modern Languages Research (University of London). Research conducted in its preparation was carried out under the auspices of a Visiting Fellowship held at the IMLR and hosted by the Centre for the Study of Contemporary Women’s Writing (April – June 2016)