Images and narration in Dany Laferrière’s work Cover Image

Images et narration dans l’œuvre de Dany Laferrière
Images and narration in Dany Laferrière’s work

Author(s): Paola Ghinelli
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Visual Arts, Studies of Literature, Comparative Study of Literature, French Literature, Theory of Literature
Published by: Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski Jana Pawła II, Instytut Filologii Romańskiej & Wydawnictwo Werset
Keywords: Laferrière; images; narration; time; present tense

Summary/Abstract: Narrative developments often stem from images in Dany Laferrière’s work. On the other hand, some of the narration in Laferrière’s fiction and nonfiction is synthesized in narrative snapshots that resemble descriptions. Temporal dimension plays a key role in this constant shift between image and imagination, because, as Didi-Huberman has shown, images carry an anachronistic element. This element also allows Laferrière and his narrators to use mainly simple present tense, even when the content of the narration is set in the past. Nevertheless, images are never explained or rationalized in Laferrière’s work, which keeps the mystery and ambiguity that characterize visual representations.

  • Issue Year: 2015
  • Issue No: 5
  • Page Range: 181-189
  • Page Count: 9
  • Language: French